Skin cancer is one of the most common types of cancer. And in Delaware, malignant melanoma was on the rise—incidence rates had increased 78 percent according to the Delaware Cancer Incidence and Mortality Report. Delawareans needed to know what skin cancer looks like, how to conduct self-exams to detect it and when/how often to get checked by a healthcare provider. And the Division of Public Health had their sights set on Ads Variation to help.

One way to combat skin cancer is to educate people on how to detect it. We wanted to get people to look for unusual skin spots. So we put them out there—literally. Moles became the essence of this campaign. We crafted headlines to make people question the marks on their skin. And O’s in the copy were replaced with images of moles—both regular and irregular. Tactics included billboards, radio and in-store signage, as well as digital ads including Facebook ads, display banners, a rich-media game and a landing page. The campaign also included grassroots outreach in partnership with organizations like the Delaware State Parks, through which in-person education was provided on how to detect skin cancer.

Ads Variation definitely made a mark with this campaign. The digital media portion resulted in over 8.4 million impressions and 9,000 website visits to ProtectYourSkinDE.com over a three-month time frame. Social media engagements were high, reaching more than 405,000 Delawareans. Through our grassroots outreach efforts, we were able to provide in-person education to over 5,000 people on how to detect skin cancer.