Repositioning Navy to Maximize PSA Exposure

Our work for the U.S. Navy Recruiting Command is illustrative of our full range of services, above and beyond PSA distribution and evaluation. One of our first clients, our work for Navy began in 1983 with an extensive audit of their entire PSA program to determine what was working well and where improvements were needed. We found many aspects of their PSA distribution that were weak and program evaluation was almost non-existent, which led to a complete restructuring of the entire PSA program to include:

• An external, rather than internal distribution system, which resulted in a deliverability rate of 98+% of Navy’s PSAs in TV, radio and print.

• A system to correlate our distribution plans with Navy’s contract procedures, which enabled Navy to order the appropriate PSA quantity and formats for all releases.

• Developing more intrusive and attractive graphic concepts for all collateral materials to help Navy cut through the competitive PSA clutter and increase the chances that Navy PSAs would get noticed and played.

• Introducing new cost effective distribution concepts such as live radio announcer postcards which were an inexpensive, but effective way to increase radio PSA frequency.

• Using “shared-reel distribution concepts to reach local cable stations which lowered the cost of sending TV PSAs to cable outlets by two-thirds.

• Developing a way to efficiently market, mail and evaluate Navy outdoor billboards.

• Writing custom software to break all Navy distribution and evaluation reports down by Navy Recruiting Districts and Areas for better PSA accountability.

• Developing a comprehensive evaluation system for all media components including the Nielsen SIGMA monitoring system to provide full coverage in all U.S. markets.

• Developing a list of 10 different PSA Parameters that we tracked from one year to the next showing how well Navy’s PSA campaign had performed on a year-to-year basis along with recommendations for future improvement.

Repositioning

One of the more controversial recommendations we made in the ten years of working with the Navy Recruiting Command was to re-position its PSA program, focusing less on a strong recruiting message and emphasizing its community service work.

Since the primary objective of their recruiting advertising is lead generation, on the surface our recommendation may appear to be foolhardy, but there was a strong rationale for our position.

As long-time members of the National Broadcast Association for Community Affairs, TV public service directors told us that they wanted PSAs about important community issues. These important gatekeepers were fairly specific about the kinds of messages they felt were most likely to make it on the air. Generally military recruiting messages were not a high priority to many broadcasters for a couple of reasons. First, most of the military services were buying airtime and use either the same or a similar creative approach in their paid spots as well as their PSAs. When given the option of using the paid spots or the PSAs, guess which one most of them would use? Secondly, in light of all the other more “pure” PSA messages, many broadcasters felt more comfortable supporting issues that centered on their community or vital issues of the day. Clearly, we needed to find a way that we could get Navy’s message out to gatekeepers in a format that both represented Navy’s recruiting interests, as well as those of the local gatekeeper.

In doing research on programs that might lend themselves to a strong PSA approach, we learned about the Navy’s Community Service Program (CSP). The CSP consists of Navy volunteers working in the areas of physical fitness, environmental cleanup, tutoring and mentoring at local schools, meal preparation for disadvantaged individuals, and anti-drug programs performed at the community level.

Knowing this was the answer to our problem, we convinced Navy to focus its future PSA efforts on the CSP. There was some internal controversy over this change in strategy, due to the fact that the CSP messages did not impart a strong recruiting message. However, our belief was that Navy’s paid advertising already fulfilled that marketing objective and the PSAs should have a message that was relevant to local communities because that’s what gatekeepers wanted. Navy advertising staff agreed to test our theory and their agency adapted a themeline of "Serving America Twice".

Not long after the campaign was launched, our repositioning strategy began to pay dividends. This graph uses evaluation data from the A.C. Nielsen SIGMA tracking system. The bar on the left shows the value of the first CSP PSA campaign. The bar on the right shows a ten-year average of values where stronger recruiting messages were shown. The CSP campaign generated 68 percent more TV PSA support than the recruiting messages and this data was further reinforced by increased exposure in other media as well.

Another intangible benefit from this repositioning effort is that Navy personnel – both those on duty at sea as well as recruiters – had a much more compelling story to tell about the importance of volunteering for the Navy. Enlistees had a chance to serve America twice in two completely different capacities and the media now had a reason to look at the Navy in a whole new light.

Our ten-year effort on behalf of Navy Recruiting helped them to build a solid base of PSA users numbering over 8,000 outlets and we helped to generate over $90 million worth of PSA airtime.