By Amy Looker – editor National Liquor News
An evidence-based online campaign launched by DrinkWise Australia earlier this year has hit home with its target market of 18 to 24 year olds, according to chief executive officer, John Scott.
Scott told delegates at the Australian Liquor Stores Association (ALSA) conference in Cairns that DrinkWise's recent 'How To Drink Properly' campaign has been successful in reaching its key demographic and generating conversation about responsible alcohol consumption, which he attributes to its evidence-based approach.
"Our 'How To Drink Properly' campaign is very much evidence-based, and it's important for us to have that evidence in terms of how we're seen in the marketplace, as an organisation that's about social change.
"When DrinkWise was formed in 2005 it was all about harnessing the power of evidence-based social marketing to help bring about a better culture so that drinking to excess and too young was seen as undesirable," Scott told delegates.
"Drinking is a treasured passtime for a great number of Australians, and it's really fascinating when we do try to undertake these campaigns that DrinkWise has always been trying to understand how Australians drink and why we drink the way that we do.
"In terms of changing that – aspects that we consider undesirable – how do we go about doing that? We argue that today we take a targeted approach.
"What DrinkWise has been doing has been in the absence of anyone else out there doing the kind of work that we've been doing."