Many WriterGirl clients are taking full advantage of Heart Month as an opportunity to deliver crucial information about heart disease. Our writers and editors have been busy helping our healthcare clients with their Heart Month marketing ideas — blog posts, webpages and articles about prevention, services and advances in cardiac care.
The American Heart Association declares February as Heart Month each year — logical timing with Valentine’s Day reminding us of hearts and loved ones. Thanks to this huge public awareness campaign, most of us know that heart disease is the number one cause of death for both men AND women. The good news: up to 80% of heart disease and strokes are preventable.
It’s not too late to make sure your hospital leverages the heightened awareness to promote healthy lifestyle changes, screenings and effective treatment. Here are some Heart Month marketing ideas that will help you jump in.
Wear Red Day
National Wear Red Day is always on the first Friday in February. On this day, people wear red to raise awareness for heart disease in women, which causes one in three deaths each year. Encourage your employees to wear red on this day with shirts, hats, shoes; you name it! You can also pick a different day and participate in your own unique way within your organization.
Let the heart experts speak
Cardiologists and many primary care providers know how to communicate heart health to patients. Offer your most passionate expert on preventing heart disease and stroke to local media. Their credible information can show how important heart health is, especially when using plain language. Be sure to tie in upcoming classes, events, webinars and services you offer on weight loss, smoking cessation and diabetes management.
Use social media to spread your message
Social media is one of the best ways to get your message out there. Adding hashtags also helps people find your posts that are related to heart health. Some hashtags used for Heart Month are:
- #WearRedDay
- #OurHearts
- #HeartMonth
- #HeartDisease.
Carry out a Twitter campaign to inspire followers to know and do more to prevent heart disease. Ask your Facebook fans to tell you one thing they are doing for their heart health to get a conversation going. Or better yet, set a time for a cardiologist to answer questions live on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram.
Promote heart content
Posting heart-related content for a whole month (or even throughout the year) can certainly drive your message home. Include content that focuses on heart-healthy facts, tips, recipes, workouts and stress relief.
If you’re looking for a place to start, the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute created a free outreach toolkit you can use for your heart health awareness communications. It includes:
- Fact sheets
- Social media resources
- National Wear Red Day® resources
- State-based infocards
- The Heart Truth® resources
- Drop-in articles
- PowerPoint slides and flyers
- A selfie campaign
Promoting various types of content, like blogs or newsletters, also provides different ways for people to digest information. And remember — WriterGirl is here to help write your content if you need it.
Create a heart health challenge for your community
Come up with daily or weekly challenges to encourage your community members to adopt a more heart-healthy lifestyle. Promote walking, fitness, a healthy diet and getting regular check-ups. Then, share these challenges on your website and social media channels. You may even want to include prizes! And don’t forget to ask your employees to participate, too.
Acknowledge your current cardiac patients
While prevention campaigns are important, we can’t forget about raising current heart patients’ spirits during this month. Surprise your heart patients with a Valentine card, reminding them how much your hospital cares and encouraging them in their journey to heart health.
There’s never a bad time to talk about improving heart health, so keep up the good work all year.
Editor’s note: This blog post was updated on February 4, 2021. It was originally published in February 2016.
