The last thing Australia needs right now, as the Delta variant whips through Sydney, is a bandaid solution. But that’s exactly what we got. Bandaids. On anonymous arms.
Shelve for a minute the appalling mismanagement of the vaccine rollout and the fact that even if people were magically motivated to get the jab, so many of them actually can’t.
The rollout is one thing, the vaccine hesitancy another. The stats show that even if the government builds it, many won’t come. That’s why some sort of convincing ad campaign is needed.
We got “arm yourself”.
“Arm yourself” is the catchcry of the new ad, in step with the federal government’s tendency to militarise everything. To wargame it.
Where we needed emotion, empathy, inspiration, humour and humanity, we got faceless mundanity.
There’s clear science around how good health communication works.
A recent World Economic Forum pointed out the obvious fact that poor communication in a pandemic costs lives. It also highlighted the role of empathy. This PLOS ONE study emphasises the need for emotional, first-person narratives. This British Medical Journal article talks about the need for understand hesitancy, addressing it, and responding to individual concerns.
To break through, vaccine promotion needs to outweigh the bullshit being circulated online. It needs more heft to shunt out the hyperfocus on the rare ill effects. It needs to motivate those who are complacent. It needs to, emotionally and physically, move people.
The Kiwis nail this stuff. Remember their police recruitment ad? Their vaccination material echoes that. It’s funny, it’s real, it has the ring of authenticity. The French version is hand-on-heart, moving stuff.
The UK one features Michael Caine and Elton John, ferchrissakes.
It’s rich and full of life — and relatable. Unlike Australia’s attempt, which reeks of unimaginative marketing types carrying out a tick-a-box exercise. Different-coloured arms — that’ll do it, chaps. It’s blancmange when we need bombe Alaska.
Ad guru Russel Howcroft wrote that we need a powerful message. Something to rally the troops. He also said a scare campaign could be part of that — and we do have that, now.
There’s a “graphic” — and Sydney-specific — ad that will hopefully harness what has already been shown to work: that an outbreak brings home the reality of the need for protection. Images of a woman gasping for breath (a woman who does not really look as though she’s in an eligible vaccination category, but still) could provide the motivation for some.
Meanwhile, why did the government gurus settle for a faceless Brady Bunch grid?
It’s as though they couldn’t think of an inspirational Australian who can get people to their feet, roaring. A sportsperson, perhaps — the essence of vitality and ambition. Someone who has been vaccinated, and talked about it publicly. Someone who embodied the value of a “fair go” by ensuring they didn’t skip the queue to get the jab.
A woman would be good, considering women are more likely to be hesitant. Maybe a First Nations woman who is deeply admired across the age spectrum. Yeah. Imagine if we could find someone like that to put a face to the campaign.
And why do we need a crisply uniformed general to push this shambolic rollout? Is it to push the “war” theme harder? Very like Scotty from Sales, because to him image is everything.
Also is this military bloke being paid on top of is military salary to push the rollout? If so why?
Didn’t taxpayers shell out a small fortune for a couple of favoured consultant firms to push out this rollout? How much did we pay them and what happened to their efforts?
Do you really expect grifting parasites like McKinseys to actually do anything?
First we need vaccines and access for all that want/need
This campaign is only shifting blame from Gov to people (most of whom would like to be vaxxed asap)
There’s clear science around how good health communication works.
Morri$in does not do science, he claps, and tongue twists and only does ‘transactional’ deals. Communication and ad campaigns? He’s failed in every job he had previously, sacked actually.
Yeah – only sacked, when he should have been jailed!
The LNP government place absolutely zero importance on nurturing creativity and the arts, so I can’t say I’m surprised at the meh marketing.
On top of that, the Morrison method involves not looking that far afield from who he knows, and who are approved Morrison think-alikes….Do we all remember the conservative christian flavoured milk-shake video?
Morrison’s way of handing out jobs reminds me of that human centipede movie, except instead of unsuspecting backpackers, it’s a sealed conga line of his mates and people he wants to be his mates, joined a to m, ingesting large sums of money, and passing it on to the next mate. And of course, if it all goes according to plan, it probably winds up in the Liberal coffers after going thru enough colons.
There will come a time when we get sick of having our lack of creative goodness shoved in our face everytime we see the good stuff other nations produce, many with smaller populations. We’ll get sick of being shown up as unimaginative, unoriginal, poorly skilled and artistically barren, and we’ll get sick of watching the most talented we sprout, head off to countries that actually value what they do. And when we do decide to rebuild from the vandalism of the LNP years, it will take decades and a generation….but it absolutely ain’t going to happen at all under the stewardship of this lot.
So arm up for more milkshakes.
The ad was originally filmed at the end of last year ! 7 months ago! I guess Scum had to wait til after the end of the financial year to find some money to pay for its airing.
I doubt it there was plenty of car park money left over!
Why not – they’ve only built 2, apparently, so most of it should be in “the Kitty” – probably the same kitty promised for fire victims, etc, etc……