STI Testing Campaign
Work
Spec
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How do you get people to engage with something they'd rather pretend doesn't exist?
The Problem
STI testing feels awkward and clinical.
So rather than explaining why people should test, I focused on making them comfortable enough to actually consider it.
Research
I looked through audience discussions online and one insight kept popping up:
People weren't avoiding testing because they didn't understand it. They were avoiding the feeling that came with it.
The Strategy
If people instinctively avoid clinical messaging…don't make it feel clinical.
The campaign borrows familiar pieces of everyday British life to make the subject feel less intimidating.
The objective wasn't to make STI testing funny. It was to make the first five seconds less uncomfortable.
Visual Direction
The campaign deliberately avoids polished healthcare photography.
Instead, it uses a lo-fi 2000s digital-camera aesthetic that feels candid and slightly imperfect.
Like a photo your mate uploaded to Facebook in 2008 except this one reminds you to get tested.
From Awareness to Action
Once the audience had engaged, the campaign shifted tone.
Later assets focused on reducing friction by highlighting NHS partnerships, fast turnaround times and the simplicity of at-home testing.
The journey moved from:
"This made me smile."
to
"Actually... I could just order one."
What I Learned
Good health campaigns aren't always about explaining harder. Sometimes they're about making people feel safer.
This project reinforced something I come back to often:
People rarely avoid doing the right thing because they lack information. More often, they're avoiding the emotion attached to it.
The job here was to remove that emotion by making the next step feel surprisingly normal.
