Yoko Uryuhara1)2), Takeo Nakayama3)2), Norihiro Kanamaru4), Haruka Fujihira5)2), Aya Okada6)2), Masaaki Matoba7)
1)Doshisha University, Faculty of Commerce
2)The Social Marketing Research Centre, Doshisha University
3)Department of Health Informatics, School of Public Health, Kyoto University
4) Astellas Pharma Inc. Advocacy Department
5)School of marketing and International Business, Victoria University of Wellington
6)Graduate School of Information Sciences, Tohoku University
7)School of Nursing and Rehabilitation Science, Showa Medical University
This paper summarizes and examines the discussions held during the symposium titled “The Potential of Social Marketing: What Types of Social Value Can We Co-Create?,” which was based on case reports of social marketing practices in the healthcare domain. The symposium examined the importance of creating social value and the process of co-creation from various perspectives. Each presentation illustrated that dialogue and collaboration with target audiences not only promote behavioral change but also foster shifts in practitioners’ values and awareness. These findings suggest that social marketing has the potential to evolve into an ethical and reflexive practice. Furthermore, concepts such as “social value” and “social good” were revealed as not predetermined but rather dynamically redefined and shared through participatory engagement in the field. The paper summarizes the discussion’s conclusion that social marketing provides a responsive and relational framework that addresses increasingly complex social challenges.
Norihiro Kanamaru
Astellas Pharma Inc. Advocacy Department
Japan faces rising national healthcare expenditures and growing concerns over the sustainability of essential medical services caused by cost-containment policies. Addressing this issue requires not only policy-level efforts but also citizen engagement based on the recognition that healthcare is a finite resource akin to the global environment. In this study, we implemented a community-based event using social marketing to promote “medical eco-activities”?daily actions that contribute to the sustainable use of medical resources. The target audience was mothers in the child-rearing generation who were identified as highly concerned about their children’s health. Based on interview insights, we designed an experiential booth that incorporated three key elements: enjoyment, usefulness, and social connection. The experience enhanced participants’ awareness of healthcare challenges in Japan, and approximately 90% expressed an intention to engage in medical eco-activities. These findings suggest that recognizing the importance of medical issues effectively drives behavioral intention. By leveraging social marketing, we identified benefits that exceeded the target audience’s perceived barriers and incorporated these benefits into the initiative while enabling co-creation with partners with diverse capabilities. Consequently, highly effective social implementation was observed, with many participants expressing behavioral intention.
Haruka Fujihira
School of marketing and International Business, Victoria University of Wellington
Unlike traditional competitive approaches that are commonly observed in health marketing, co-design offers a participatory method that prioritizes stakeholder engagement from the outset. Top-down approaches that neglect the perspectives of those who are directly affected often fail to achieve a lasting impact. This paper explores the concept of co-design within social marketing by presenting case studies that demonstrate the concept’s effectiveness in fostering meaningful change. The paper concludes by exploring co-design as a potential strategy for addressing emerging social and health challenges in Japan and emphasizing its adaptability and the importance of community-driven solutions.
Aya Okada
Graduate School of Information Sciences, Tohoku University
Social marketing aims to change people’s behavior toward social good through strategically planned and implemented interventions. Whereas research on social marketing has mainly focused on examining the effectiveness of interventions and approaches regarding behavioral change, this study focuses on those who engage in social marketing. What values do social marketers gain from the experience? This preliminary analysis took an inductive approach and used the Grounded Theory Approach to elucidate what those who engaged in social marketing saw as values gained. The study observed that social marketers saw values in: witnessing responses from the target audience, engaging in an interesting process of social marketing, gaining new values and perspectives, gaining perspectives that could be utilized in the future, acquiring a sense of contributing to society, and feeling empowered. The article closes with the insight that social marketers may gain a reflexive perspective to question the definition of social good after experiencing the entire process of social marketing.
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