The role of branding in public health campaigns

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of branding in public health campaigns. Design/methodology/approach The paper reviews public health campaigns, and their goals and objectives vis‐à‐vis the current health market conditions. The imperatives for branding public health campaigns are enumerated. The paper then discusses salient features of branding that can be applied to health campaigns before drawing on an exemplar to illustrate how branding can be effectively harnessed in the realm of public health campaign theorizing and praxis. Findings Given the clutter of campaigns and their messages in a saturated health consumer market, uptake and sustained use of health campaigns needs alternative pathways to keep consumers interested and gainfully engaged with the products being offered. Branding, as a communicative strategy, can meet this need. Originality/value As the fundamental goal of a public health campaign is to induce and sustain health behavior among the public, efforts must be kept up to theorize about improved modes of delivering campaign products to consumers. This paper takes the initial steps in that direction.