Public health is a difficult product to market. Why is this? One reason is there can be negative demand, no demand, or unwholesome demand for the behavior change required to improve the public’s health.

Negative demand means the target audience dislikes the product entirely or doesn’t want it. Healthy food choices are an example of a product in negative demand because people don’t want to give up the good flavors of high-fat foods or the convenience of fast food. An example of a product in no demand is something people simply are not interested in such as job training for the homeless. Tobacco, alcohol and drugs are examples of products with an unwholesome demand. These products must be de-marketed.

What can we do to address the low demand for our products?  We can begin by borrowing some strategies from commercial marketing. There are several commercial marketing concepts that must be understood to produce behavior and social change.

• Exchange.  For the product to be successfully disseminated amongst the population there must be a mutually beneficial exchange between two parties. I once heard an example of a lemonade stand. You give a dollar and you receive a glass of lemonade. Seems simple – you wanted lemonade, you got it. But what you really wanted was to quench your thirst and the lemonade served as a way to do so. We can frame the benefits of trading bad behaviors for good ones so the exchange is more beneficial for both parties.
• Self-Interest. People are naturally self-interested. Therefore, the exchange must result in the person viewing the behavior change as better for them than the alternative of doing nothing. Although most adults value fairness and justice, it is unnatural for us to willingly sacrifice something from ourselves to benefit others.
• Competition. Commercial marketers never lose sight of the fact that there are competitor companies and products (there would be no need for their jobs if there weren’t). In public health, we forget that every proposed behavior change has competition in the form of the current behavior and other influences. We cannot ignore the competing influences.
• Audience Segmentation. Commercial marketers know that you must understand your target audience through formative research before developing a marketing strategy. Marketers understand the needs of their audience and pitch to them. This consumer driven approach is often lacking in public health since we must create need and find a way to market a product with low demand.
• The Four Ps. Marketers know exactly what they stand for – price, product, place and promotion. In public health we need to spend more time thinking about what our target population must give up (price) to change their behavior not the health benefits they get. We also must understand how we can maximize the benefits and create higher demand for the product. We must understand our audience to determine which media strategy is most appropriate to promote the health behavior change.

As public health practitioners, we can embrace these strategies, but we cannot do it without the help of marketing, public relations and communications professionals. Just another reminder of why we must work together to improve the public’s health.

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