Leveraging Partnerships Ultizing Digital Strategies

Background:

Launched in 2009, the Act Against AIDS (AAA) initiative is a multi-faceted national health communication effort to focus attention on HIV and AIDS in the United States. It supports the Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention (DHAP) Strategic Plan and national strategies. AAA promotes awareness, education, and targeted behavior change under one framework and brand.

Program background:

In 2015, DHAP launched Partnering and Communicating Together (PACT) to Act Against AIDS, a five-year cooperative agreement between the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and fifteen national organizations representing populations hardest hit by HIV, including African Americans, Hispanics/Latinos and LGBTQ people.

Through a collaborative approach, PACT members assist in achieving the goals of DHAP to reduce new HIV infections, improve health outcomes for individuals with HIV, and reduce HIV related disparities. By leveraging collective strength and influence, PACT members amplify the effectiveness and reach of Act Against AIDS campaign materials and messaging, while also promoting other CDC HIV prevention resources.

In supporting PACT members, CDC uses a comprehensive social and digital media strategy to increase the reach of key messages and encourage online conversations about HIV. PACT members are encouraged to engage in novel and current social and digital media strategies such as customized HIV testing locator widgets, coded URLs to CDC’s campaign webpages, coded banner advertisements, and relevant HIV infographics. By further customizing these tools, PACT members develop products that allow HIV prevention and awareness messages to more effectively reach their audiences and encourage greater engagement and information seeking among target populations.

Evaluation Methods and Results:

The coding in the URLs, banners, and widgets distributed by PACT members allow us to track engagement with their audiences. In the first three years of PACT, members directed people to the campaign website 9,146 times through coded URLs, 2,334 times through coded campaign banners, and 55,003 times through negotiated advertisements on digital applications and websites. In addition, in the few months that PACT members have had access to coded widgets, there have been 139 searches for HIV testing locations. PACT members report that the messages they shared on social media have garnered 30,680 shares on Facebook and 10,419 retweets on Twitter.

Conclusions:

The utilization of social media and digital media strategies can help increase engagement, effectively reach priority audiences, and build a stronger digital presence. These strategies make it easier and more accessible for organizations and communities to mobilize and to promote HIV prevention and awareness.

Implications for research and/or practice:

Timely, relevant, and meaningful content delivered through relevant strategies is critical to increasing audience engagement on social media and digital media platforms. Incorporating customized messaging enhances message relevance, particularly when the messages originate from trusted channels, such as CDC or national organizations targeting priority audiences.