Communications Solutions - Marketing for Outdoor Health

Branding Air Quality Indices

Key Benefits of Branding

Supports Singularity
No other service does exactly what this service does.

Creates Synergy Increasing awareness of service across communities and provinces.

Creates Stability Although a product or service may change over time, the promise remains the same.

Brand Requirements

Mandatory to all brands:

Must be short

Must be bold and easy to remember

Must capture essence of product / service value propositions

Must be relevant to target audience / immediately recognizable

Must evoke an emotional response – unlock an association

Must work across all mediums – print, electronic, web – and in all scales (pen to billboard)

Must anticipate and visualizes the future of the product / service (longevity)

For example, an online search related to Canada’s Air Quality Health Index would typically involve searching "air quality" and "Health" and would result in more than 25 million responses. Add Canada to this search criteria and this number drops to 6.5 million responses. Compare this to a search on "AirAware" and the results drop down to 794. Add "Health" to the search criteria and result drop to 300 results and if the search is further qualified with "Canada" -- the results get down as low as approx. 150! This means that the concept of AirAware related to health in Canada is not that common -- in a global internet context.

Importance of the Positioning Statement / Tagline

The positioning statement tells, in one sentence, the benefits the brand provides. It is a descriptor that lets consumers know where to “place” the brand in their mind – what business the brand is in – what service it provides.

An Air Quality Health Index positioning statement must be short, easy to remember, and must also meet the Brand Positioning Criteria outlined below.

Branding Criteria

The following Air Quality Health Index Branding Criteria was provided to the Canadian Management Committee in February 2006 for review and approval.

Mandatory to Air Quality Indices:
• Support association between air quality and health
• Be effective in both official languages ( French / English )
• Support singularity / one stop shopping
• Equally effective among target audiences in urban and rural settings
• Consumer focused / must resonate with all target audiences across geography, age, gender, socio-economic status, education levels
• Is a trusted source for information / service
• Supports individual call to action

The AQHI Branding Research and Recommendation Process
Communication Solutions Air Quality Health Index (Canada) branding process involved a combination of creative and branding research with the base and qualitative research.

Base Research
A review of Canada’s Weather Networks “Air Quality - A Provincial Prospective” provided some baseline knowledge for the development of a nationally relevant brand. Public health branding strategies used by other Canadian government agencies and non-profit organizations were reviewed in order to learn from best practices and avoid messaging conflict. This stage of the process also included review of previously conducted focus test results (Environics) along with consultation with stakeholders exposed to the AQHI through the AirPlay pilot. Preliminary multi-lingual translation inquiries aided the filtering of potential branding options.

Qualitative Research
This stage of the branding process included an idea-generating focus group comprised of representatives of a variety of stakeholder groups representing asthmatics, seniors, family practice physicians, media and outdoor recreation enthusiasts. The goal of this idea-generating focus group was to identify word associations and mental imagery among representatives of the target audiences in order to develop brand concepts.

Concept Development
From the base and qualitative research, a number of branding concepts were further explored and presented to Health Canada and the Government of Canada’s Air Quality Health Index Secretariat along with results of consumer screening of a short-list of branding options.

Consumer Screening of Brand Concepts
Concurrent with the concept development stage, Communication Solutions Inc. choose a total of three branding concepts to test using an online focus test to measure consumer preference and gather qualitative feedback.

Preferred Brand Option: Air Aware

Concept: Reinforce personal responsibility and action in an easy to remember phrase. This concept allows for emphasis on either “air” or “awareness”.

Benefits / Limitations: Obvious is a good thing. Focus on increased personal awareness overcomes sensitivities regarding Air Quality Health Index promoting / discouraging activity and places responsibility on individuals for informed decision making. Personal responsibility for healthy activity aligns with many provincial health initiatives. Associations with existing initiatives provide entry points for supportive promotion and education campaigns.

The AirAware brand capitalizes on the public’s attention built through other awareness campaigns. In Canada these initiatives include Bear Aware (BC Government), Web Aware (Microsoft Canada/Media Awareness Network), and Well Aware (Ontario Branch of Public Health Inspectors) among many others. The common thread throughout these programs is that each sponsoring organization provides information that individuals can use to make lifestyle decisions. AirAware provides that same service.

While there is considerable online presence of the concept of being "air aware" -- for the most part, references to being air aware do not diverge greatly from the objectives of Canada’s air quality and health indices.

An "assessment of the on-line presence" of this proposed brand concept supports consideration of AirAware. This is very good news for the concept of AirAware.

AirAware successfully transfers to multiple media. The brand is easy to remember and because it is exempt from potential miss-spelling, it is easy for the audience to remember, and then seek out, as an information source.

The AirAware brand provides options for expansion beyond an information dispersal service. Extension into education programs designed around a slogan of “Are you AirAware?’ or “Be AirAware” create easy access points and support the branding identity.

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