Combating the Stigma of Addiction Through True Stories of Recovery
Alcohol, opioid, and heroin addictions are often looked upon as being a moral failing that only impacts poor, uneducated people, but that is quite far from the truth. Addiction can affect men, women, wealthy, homeless, young, old, and everyone in between — and as long as there is shame associated with it, people will continue to suffer needlessly and die in silence.
Recovery Centers of America asked us to create a storytelling campaign, highlighting inspirational individuals who have been affected by addiction.
The Living Recovery campaign took the emphasis off of the facilities, and instead focused on the problem (substance use disorder) and the solution (recovery). We chose media channels that were organic to the message: blogs, social channels, and email campaigns that allowed the community to connect to, and naturally amplify, the message.
Living Recovery blogs generated over 8 times more page views than any other campaign. The average user spent over 5 minutes on a Living Recovery blog page (which is the estimated time it takes to read the post in its entirety).
999 interactions led to 786 web page views. Email communications gained a 24.6% open rate and 2.5% click-through rate. And, most importantly, 23 people filled out the lead form to start down the path toward recovery.