Institute of Women & Ethnic Studies

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IWES Wins Best Conceptual/Discussion Submission at the 2022 World Social Marketing Conference

After eight hours of travel from sunny and humid New Orleans to an overcast sky in Brighton, England, Iman Shervington, our Director of Media and Communications, and Petera Reine Diaban, our Sr. Social Marketing Manager, arrived at the 2022 World Social Marketing Conference (WSMC) this September. The conference was held on the southeast coast of England in Brighton, an area described as an artsy, quirky seaside resort. This description seems to be true judging from the array of murals, art installations, and the up-side down house. While the area itself was intriguing, the breadth of conversation held during the conference did not pale by comparison.

Iman and Petera attended the conference to share an innovative concept to strengthen the process of understanding the intended audience of a social marketing campaign. The duo infused the principles of Carl Jung, the Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who founded analytical psychology, into the formative evaluation process of audience segmentation. The premise of the presentation was that this aspect of formative research—understanding audiences—is crucial to the effectiveness of one’s campaign and should be approached with care and thoughtfulness. Ann Don Bosco, co-founder and COO of Canopie, shared at the 2019 WSMC convening, “During qualitative research, such as focus groups, one may find that participants share a more rational aspect of their lives, or they can’t remember all the details, which leans into recall bias.” Further, she states that “the real challenge is understanding the slightly less conscious barriers to changing one’s behavior.”

Without understanding the past experiences of the intended audience in a deep and instinctive way, we miss the opportunity to capture our audience’s attention and we potentially squander an opportunity to create change.

THE ORPHAN, THE REBEL, OR THE CAREGIVER…?

Exploring how the creation of archetypes through narrative analysis can impact the efficacy and success of social marketing campaigns

Carl Jung is well known for his theories around archetypes, which are illustrative descriptions of characteristics, motivations, and other details that formulate unique prototypes that help us understand different aspects of our “self,” different categories of people, and what inner motives drive our actions. According to Jung, these archetypes exist in our collective unconscious, and all humans inherit these basic ideas when we are born. This theory accounts for the similarities of many myths, fables, and stories different cultures grow up learning and believing to understand the world around them, and it explains why there are some basic survival-based, primordial facts we are born knowing (e.g., “if I cry, I will get fed”) even before we develop language and other vital skills. In this presentation we argued that archetypes can lend to value-enhancing marketing that can tap into one’s innermost capacity and desires. Humans are not always completely rational beings, therefore marketing campaigns built around archetypes can reach intended audiences more personally, deeply, and instinctually, as they may overcome barriers by speaking to the unconscious thoughts and desires one feels. Ultimately, the viewer will see themselves reflected in the creatives, and these creatives will successfully address the unconscious barriers to change.

To illustrate this theory, Iman and Petera leveraged this global stage to discuss the themes that emerged in New Nickels, the documentary short film we premiered at the New Orleans Film Festival in 2021 that explores the healing journeys of five Black women living with HIV as they emerge from the shadows and find community, self-acceptance, and love. After transcribing the interviews of the five main characters and extensive narrative analysis, we created core narratives and noticed that all of the women expressed varying degrees of early childhood trauma and excessive Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). This led the team to explore Jung’s idea that when a child experiences early trauma, they may dissociate and split their identities into different systems of consciousness to overcome the trauma, leading to potential unconscious behaviors and desires that could end up becoming a part of our “shadow” selves, which are parts of ourselves that we often repress, reject, or don’t even realize we have. If someone is acting from this shadow space, then a) they may engage in behaviors that put them more at risk for negative health outcomes, and b) rational messaging may not reach them. But, if we take the unconscious into account, we can craft messaging that overcomes these barriers. In the case of New Nickels, the Hero archetype was used to exemplify each woman’s journey to “slay their dragons” and find a sense of self, sense of power, and sense of belonging. By showing the women in this mythical, self-actualized light, overcoming diversity and taking back the reins in their lives, they are able to inspire other women in similar circumstances and catalyze them to start their healing journeys because the imagery taps into our universal understanding of the Hero that exists in our collective unconscious.

At the end of the conference at the closing plenary, we were extremely honored when the president of the International Social Marketing Association, Professor Jeff French, presented the award to Petera and Iman for Best Conceptual/Theoretical/Discussion submission! Needless to say, IWES was honored with the recognition and pleased to further the advancement in social marketing theory by presenting such an innovative concept.


To learn more about our presentation at the 2022 World Social Marketing Conference, or if you’d like to discuss the application of Jungian archetypes to social marekting, please contact Petera Reine Diaban, Sr. Social Marketing Manager.