For this special report, we mixed two of the fast-growth areas of advertising creativity together, Sports and Health. Or rather, it turned out that we had to juxtapose them. What we thought in planning would go well together, that were two connected areas, turned out to be disconnected and altogether rather different and as a result, more intriguing in that way than expected.
We have done an odd thing here and we’re not sure it really works. You can be the judge. Let’s backup and explain the (wrong) thinking. On the face of it, doing sport is strongly connected with physical and mental health and strays increasingly into the whole “wellness” area.
Meanwhile, health may be strongly associated with big pharmaceutical companies selling medicine but it is also – and increasingly – a more extensive and holistic field, and yes “wellness” is the word that once again crops up. Indeed, big pharma wants a big piece of that space too. Put another way, both sports and health markets are increasingly concerned with messaging and actions that heed the “prevention is better than cure” logic. They are not simply about kicking a ball or popping a pill – they are about creating and supporting better, longer, more satisfying lives.
But while they clearly shade into each other at certain points, for the most part, these are two areas of creativity that are strongly differentiated specialisms in who does it and how it is done. In some ways, as those specialisms grow, fences between the two fields are also developing.
And so over the coming pages, we have a range of commentators who tend to come from one or other of these areas and do not generally ever work across both. And the work we have researched from our archive is then grouped as either one or other, sport or health. And, for the most part, they don’t have a lot in common. Or do they? Again, you be the judge. Read the analyses and gain, we hope, a little enlightenment and inspiration. Perhaps you can then join the dots, raise some investors, and create the first truly holistic specialist health and sports agency. No, let’s think bigger: make it a global network. It’s there to be done.
Top image: Wunderman, Dubai, L[A] 2/2020
Adam Hessel
Head of Creative and Experience The Bloc, New York
Creating educational content that is comprehensive, accurate, and engaging is definitely challenging, particularly for branded and healthcare professional materials, who require scientific language and robust content.
In a highly regulated industry such as pharma, you are not talking to consumers; you are addressing patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals. Every piece of content must be created through the lens of care, rather than purely for entertainment or sales purposes. Additionally, discussing health conditions that are often serious and life-threatening is hardly entertaining. However, these challenges also give us great opportunities. We need to double down on creativity to reconcile these needs, making the task, in my opinion, even more rewarding.
Emotional storytelling forges a deep, empathetic connection, allowing for more memorable and impactful communication. But pushing for too much emotion might make the message seem insincere, so it’s important for the creative team to be honest about how much sentiment they can actually try to convey. Emotional narratives must also be crafted carefully to be inclusive and respectful of diverse audiences, experiences and perceptions regarding health issues.
AI has the ability to create a hyper-targeted approach and can also assist in the creative process. It’s remarkable how it can customize messages to meet the specific needs and preferences of various audience segments to amplify reach.
And it doesn’t stop there — AI-driven tools can predict trends and refine targeting strategies, helping to engage people on a more personal level. Overall, it significantly improves the outreach and effectiveness of health-related communication efforts.
From a creative perspective, the direction of sports and health advertising is really fascinating right now. First off, there is a strong shift towards inclusivity and diversity when it comes to what our bodies can achieve. We’re seeing athletes and individuals of all ages, body types, and abilities showcased. It’s fantastic because this approach broadens the audience and inspires a wider demographic by reflecting a more inclusive community.
There’s the emphasis on mental health alongside physical health. We’re seeing more and more campaigns highlighting the importance of mindfulness, emotional wellbeing, and the psychological benefits of sports and physical activity. This holistic view of health really resonates with audiences, especially now, when mental health awareness is at its peak.
Janet Barker-Evans
Executive Vice President, Chief Creative Officer AbelsonTaylor Group, Chicago
Emotional storytelling is about recognizing the unmet needs of an audience and giving them a vision or glimpse of how a product or service can help meet those needs. By inviting the audience in and helping them imagine their life improved, we have an opportunity to inspire the audience to achieve their goals. The challenge is to avoid overpromising that improvement, minimizing the risks of a product, or downplaying the very real and unique health issues that some people face.
Andrea Siqueira
Executive Vice President, Executive Creative Director Energy BBDO, Chicago
The fight for attention is the same as in every industry but we can truly bring some sort of relief with health and wellness work, even if it’s just by making people laugh and relax a bit. We can create things that truly matter to others. Storytelling is more than just applying knowledge; it's how you leverage imagination. It helps to open the door, so you can inform, educate, and convince. There’s no previous data on how someone will react to your creative idea, whether it’s a poem or an ad. So, my advice would be: play with it.
The responsibility lies with all of us. I think the future will be what people want it to be, not what companies build, or gurus predict.
There’s an opportunity to bring more humor and levity into the world and handle even more serious issues with a lighter heart. There will be AI tools but ideas are still the most important assets we can have – if we can keep them alive. The hardest, most sophisticated part is making your peers, clients, audience, share the same vision.
Alec Vianu
Owner/Creative Director Vianu Inc, New York
Sports advertising seems to be one of the rare brand fields that focuses strictly on creating an attitude, a life manifesto (Just Do It), versus being product-centric.
Globalization has a flattening effect on any idea, as it needs to be understood and be an acceptable cultural fit to vastly different audiences. The solution in these cases is to be fully product-centric, which sometimes is not enough.
The opinion seems to be that audiences are losing trust in AI-generated advertising. Photos are not trusted, locations are not real, extreme sports may not be real either.
Sports has been a wonderful area to raise awareness of the general benefits of the sport as a catalyst as well as providing social commentary. Hiring top marketers from the CPG sector will modernize healthcare marketing. They will come with expectations for agencies to innovate and engage differently with healthcare professionals and patients. A new class of agencies will take advantage of AI in creation. Legacy and traditional agencies will rapidly deploy AI tools to harness the collective intelligence resident in the agency’s thought leadership and work history.
AI will disrupt how healthcare agencies create and brands will want agencies to ‘simplify the process’. They will be expecting faster turnaround time and in some cases may sacrifice the bespoke and $$$ for ‘kind of new’ and $.
Töbe Pickford
Creative General Health Army, Sydney
If a health message aims to prompt action, such as encouraging individuals to see a doctor or consult a healthcare professional, it is vital that these professionals are prepared for an influx of questions or concerned patients. This is akin to ensuring the head knows what the mouth is going to say – something that’s not always the case with a few of us. By ensuring healthcare professionals are ready, we maintain a smooth and effective communication flow.
Adding emotional storytelling to health-related brands is essential. Emotion plays a significant role in areas such as pain management, weight loss, cancer treatments, etc. Even a fungal toenail treatment needs to evoke emotion. While this approach is similar to mainstream marketing, the health sector has additional constraints on what can be communicated and a balance of negative vs positive needs to be considered.
Health-related campaigns do not always have to be overly serious either. During my time at Ogilvy, I led a campaign for the laxative brand Coloxyl where we introduced a character named Stefan the Stool Expert. This character helped to inform and empathize with people, demonstrating that even sensitive health topics can be approached with creativity and relatability.
AI and AI-driven technologies are enhancing efficiencies in health campaigns. Tasks ranging from reviewing clinical papers to writing iterations for Google ads or banner ads are increasingly becoming automated.
However, effective targeting still requires a deep understanding of your audience. Technology should not be a crutch; it is essential to get off your bum and engage directly with people. Brands in the health sector can transcend traditional advertising by making a tangible difference to people's lives. For instance, the development of innovative technologies to assist people with disabilities and health issues or creating experiences that foster empathy and understanding of various conditions, is becoming increasingly common.
However, not all brands take this approach. I would like to see high-use treatments and everyday health brands move beyond their standard strategies. By focusing on making a real difference and growing their purpose, these brands can unlock their full creative potential and have a more profound impact.
Nicholas Capanear
Executive Creative Director Eversana Intouch, New York
Agencies want to engage first, then slip in the education part undetected. Brands often want to educate first and then erroneously forget the engagement part. As a consequence of government restrictions, there is also an understandable limit to the hyperbole that can be used – often an important part of engagement. We have a duty to communicate with responsibility but it often comes down to, ‘How can we dramatize a brand's benefit without being too dramatic’?
Many health brands come with plenty of emotion baked in already and it can be argued there isn’t much more important to us in life than our health. Marketers have to work hard to inject emotion into so many brands that are cold by nature, like the services of a bank or office equipment. When health brands fail to capture true emotional storytelling, it’s a bigger fumble.
I can only imagine that AI will multiply our ability to find the people who need to hear our message most (like it’s doing with most everything). An interesting application I’ve seen is creating AI research personas, who accurately reflect our audience’s responses. This allows us to quickly test or optimize the message much more efficiently. In this example, AI didn’t think of the idea but it helps us determine if it’s the right idea.
Because health is so native to the human experience, the sector can reach across many other categories. Health can be health and also retail at the same time. Health can also be entertainment or gaming or music. The benefit is that we keep things fresh creatively … and for me, that means constantly having new stimulation, new ways to think and look at things.
Katrina Encanto
Freelance Executive Creative Director, Amsterdam
Brands have a unique opportunity to unlock the hearts of sports fans, and being a fan is all about irrational emotion. Sports have the power to inspire, bring people together, and as Mandela said, ‘speak to youth in a language they understand.’ As fans, we subject ourselves willingly to pain, suspense, and heartbreak, spending an illogical amount of time, effort, and money towards the teams and athletes we admire.
There are many opportunities to reflect the unique ways different cultures enjoy sports across the world. There are stories to be told that reflect how the Japanese’s love for football grew through manga comics, or how even the most remote places in the Philippines have a basketball court. With all the technology at our fingertips, we have richer data that gives us insights we’ve never had previously, enabling us to tell powerful stories.
The globalization of sport has also made it more democratic. Where football continues to grow in popularity, other sports have also gained major traction. For brands, that allows us to move away from cliches and tell fresher, more relatable stories.
There are challenges with trying to work with one universal idea whilst reflecting all cultural nuances. What works in one place may not necessarily work for another in terms of insight, tech or ad regulations. It helps to have a diverse creative team and work closely with different markets, so ideas are feasible and culturally insightful.
The new technologies of today have completely changed both the way we get data, and how we use it to interact with fans. Through AI and new social listening tools, we can now know exactly where our fans spend the most amount of time and money, who they admire, and where and how they interact with our brands. This lets us tell richer stories, create new tools, update in real time, stage meaningful experiences driven by data and reach people at scale through social media.
The thing to remember is that everyone has access to these tools, and without creativity, the results often feel dry, bland and uninteresting. While tech may continue to develop, let’s not forget craft, nuance, and storytelling – all the magic that the human touch can bring. There are currently a lot of opportunities for creativity within sports marketing because of challenges such as the lack of equity for professional or grassroots women athletes, despite the rise in popularity for women’s sports,
Beyond the professional pay gap, many countries still lack safe spaces, have undeveloped training programs, or cultural stigmas that exclude girls from the world of sport. By tackling these issues, brands have the chance to bridge any gaps and bring meaningful experiences to a targeted audience.
The fan experience is also different for younger generations. As creatives, we cannot resort to the tools and tricks of the past, as a study by Fanalytics suggests, only 23% of Gen Z are passionate sports fans. We have to find new ways of bringing meaning to their lives, meeting them where they are rather than using the same old approaches that don’t appeal to them.
It’s always a delicate balance for a healthcare brand to be a trusted source of information for the mass public, as well as a reassuring voice for every patient. There are specific formats that work better for direct messaging, and others that support lengthier personal testimonials. Tonally, there can also be a slight range with the way we communicate, so that we’re able to fulfil the clarity certain moments require, while also providing compassion at more relevant touchpoints.
Stories help us make sense of the world, and the world of health is full of things that don’t make sense. The best healthcare brands acknowledge this and act as a source of clarity and hope. By reassuring patients with insightful stories, brands have the power of making them feel they have the information and support to overcome their situation.
The challenge with healthcare is that most patient data is private unless consent is given. This presents an opportunity for anyone mining for insights to connect through a real conversation. We’re not only able to comprehend the complexities of a disease better, we can also gain a better understanding of how patients feel and the kind of emotional support they could use.
The use of AI within healthcare is very sensitive, and healthcare leaders need to ensure they respect patient rights by keeping their data private. It has the power to decode and make sense of everything available – giving us up-to-date information on where sickness is spreading, where air quality is better, and which groups of people require more attention.
But, with AI still in development, there need to be tighter controls around the biases and broad assumptions that are still present with machines. After all, the last thing patients want and need is a lack of humanity.
With tech developing at such a rapid speed, and the quality of data available to us improving, the possibilities for sports and health advertising seem to unfold as we are unlocking each brief. Ideas previously considered crazy are all of a sudden possible. We have never had this many tools available to us, and I think we owe it to ourselves as creatives to try them out.
Anthony Atkinson
Freelance Creative Director, Toronto
When what’s relevant in sports and what’s relevant in culture come together, powerful storytelling emerges. The best in sports advertising drives momentum in both. Sports insights tend to be well-trodden but it’s how these insights are applied to what’s relevant today that drives loyalty.
We see some of the best sports campaigns during global events like the World Cup or Olympics. These huge global moments give birth to some incredible human experience stories through the lens of sports. That said, brands also need to speak directly to diverse cultures through regional advertising, like how women’s professional sports has made huge strides in some parts of the world, compared to others.
Emotional advertising will always be the key driver for awareness in my opinion, but tech innovations like AI or the metaverse open opportunities for brands to drive a deeper connection with consumers through immersive experiences, adaptability, and responsiveness. That said, when brands express their values through technology, the result can be just as emotional and impactful as traditional advertising.
As advertisers, we look to big brands to drive us forward. Whenever a new big sports campaign comes out, we always seem to hear the same thing: ‘Looks like a Nike ad’. Maybe sports brands need to stop living in Nike’s shadow and find their own voice.
So is sports marketing rising or falling? I would never say it’s falling, but there are lulls. I’d love to see more sports brands take a page from an athlete’s playbook and take bigger risks. Why does it always have to be Red Bull? Do you have to be in extreme sports to take a big leap? With the rise of many new athletic brands, I’m hopeful this will happen sometime soon. Consumers and professionals want to know how the sector is changing and doing things differently with the rise of complex new technology and medical breakthroughs. It is incredibly exciting for society, but incredibly challenging for advertisers. However, no matter who your audience is, emotion reigns supreme.
As treatments become more complex, there will always be the temptation to explain how exciting the technology is. But the last thing a consumer wants is a medical lesson. The key is to focus on a human story first, and the technology, service or product is in service of that. We will learn from brands outside of the health sector to inspire our storytelling.
Like sports brands, healthcare brands need to live their values through technologies like AI and not the other way around. Healthcare is becoming incredibly tailored to the patient, as machine learning and AI has the power to learn detailed information about your genomic makeup and your geographic data. Inside all this AI data lies a powerful story that can take the shape of a big emotional brand film or a hyper-targeted and bespoke one-to-one conversation.
Amy Fortunato
Vice President, Group Creative Director Klick Health, New York
Unlike sports advertising – where brands can tap into the deep emotional connections fans have with their favorite teams – health advertising can be perceived as disruptions and needs to work harder to create brand loyalty. That’s where the power of great storytelling comes in, allowing us to build emotional connections with audiences and create work that doesn’t feel like an interruption.
Some of the most impactful campaigns have come from the intersection of sports and health, leveraging the emotional pull of sports to enhance health stories and inclusivity. Look at Michelob Ultra’s Dreamcaster, which harnessed the power of AI to enable a blind person to commentate an NBA game live on TV for the first time ever. This merging of sports and health advertising illustrates how powerful storytelling – supported by technology – can create content that’s consumed like entertainment, not just advertising.
Your heart would have responded
And how was it for you? Having read through the our experts' wisdom, is a business plan developing nicely based on a daydream about how sports and health marketing can co-exist brilliantly, usefully, and lucratively? Can we see our way to a future in which we may perhaps one day expect to see, say, a Nike X Ozempic cross-brand collaboration?
Well, perhaps not that one. A bridge too far. At least for the foreseeable. But our expert commentators have given plenty of stimuli for possible future scenarios that radically develop both sports and health marketing and that, we would argue, could see them overlapping a lot more. Given the nature of modern networks, and the spirit of constant reinvention with start-ups, it’s only a matter of time, surely, before we bring these philosophically connected worlds much closer together in social and business strategies. Perhaps creative output can be the catalyst that helps drive that. The envisaging of things that do not seem possible at first, then become everyday through a series of steps that take in the incredible, the award-winning, and the mildly provocative, until we are dealing with the everyday reality.
With great advertising, it is the emotional truth that moves us and also moves us together. Sports and health, two sides of the same quest for physical and mental well-being, and an eternal quest towards an aspiration for a supremacy of personal and communal well-being. In some ways it begins and ends with what you can express in a great campaign that brings it to life and makes the heart beat faster.
If we can’t see it, perhaps some more creative AI will. Let’s end with a replay of a few words from Alec Vianu’s commentary. It turns the light towards the creature in the corner, the elephant with a big brain that may make more of these connections for us:
“A new class of agencies will take advantage of AI in creation. Legacy and traditional agencies will rapidly deploy AI tools to harness the collective intelligence resident in the agency’s thought leadership and work history.”
Yes, we won’t actually have to think about all these possibilities. We can nudge the machine to do it for us, while we work out.
