This document provides an overview and context for a social marketing campaign aimed at reducing synthetic drug use among post-secondary students. It outlines the history and current issues with drugs like MDMA and ecstasy. Personas and journey maps are used to illustrate how students may be introduced to and potentially become regular users of synthetic drugs. The document discusses objectives, audiences, stakeholders, and strategic considerations for the campaign. Marketing tactics proposed include using hospitalization data to scare students, targeting students on campus and at events where drugs may be used, and promoting alternatives to drug use through various media platforms and one-on-one conversations.

1. Party Safe, Party Smart
By: Hannah M. Martin
100932766
COMM3301A: Social Marketing
August 14th, 2015
Joseph Boughner
Party Safe, Party Smart

2. By: Hannah M. Martin
Overview and Context:
The issue that I am concerned with and will be developing a cause for is the abuse of
synthetic drugs (Ex. MDMA, Ecstasy) within post-secondary communities. This issue holds
significant importance in today’s society because of the health and safety risks associated with
synthetic drug use. Peer pressure is playing a significant role in the consumption of these drugs
across post-secondary communities. The implications of inaction will surely result in the
continued increase in the consumption of these particular drugs, as well as the potential for
increased levels of negative long-term mental health effects on its users (depression, anxiety,
memory loss, ability to focus, ability to make critical and smart decisions, etc.).
Heather Callier (2011) outlines the history of MDMA (also known as “Ecstasy” or “Molly”).
She informs us that it was first created in 1912 by a scientist named Anton Kollisch as a means
to decrease appetite and pain for German soldiers during World War I. It wasn’t until the 1980’s
that MDMA was appearing in the public and was used as a “fun drug” at dance clubs. By the
time the 1990’s hit, MDMA became one of the most popular drugs in the United States (Callier,
2011). In 2002 the first campaign was directed to educate the public on the effects that this
harmful chemical drug had on youth. The use of television and print advertisements is what
drove this campaign. The exposure to these advertisements increased awareness of the harm
of synthetic drugs by 12% in one year. Nevertheless, in today’s society synthetic drugs are still
commonly used by youth, which clearly signals that something more needs to be done about
this.

3. Right now, teens and young adults attending college and university are feeling pressure to
consume synthetic drugs like MDMA and Ecstasy to fit into a specific crowd, and some may be
finding it as an alternative to alcohol consumption. The consumption of this drug is often seen at
music festivals, but has also been traced to nightclubs, bars, and other nontraditional scenes. In
order to help prevent the peer pressures of synthetic drug use by college and university
students, we must inform youth and parents about the dangers of such drugs. Barriers that
might intervene with this approach may come in the form of popular media and media depictions
of chemical drugs and recreational drug use. Many messages in popular media may clash with
messages and marketing techniques directed at changing the behaviours of our youth in a
positive and efficient way.
Environmental Scan:
Looking at the other campaigns and organizations that are looking at a similar topic to
me would be Health Canada and PDFC (Partnership of a Drug-Free Canada) which look at
eliminating drug-use within all of Canada. They are planning on doing this by educating parents
and youth on the harmful effects of all illicit drugs and how to start the conversation with the one
you love. In other countries this issue is still ongoing. In the United States, Minnesota
Department of Human Services (2015) has created a website called "Know the Dangers.com"
which was created to inform the public about the harmful effects of synthetic drugs and how to
start the conversation about this issue. They also have their website updated with recent stories
of abusers to keep their audiences alert and in the know of what is going on. The Australian
government has also been battling this same issue, which is why they have a National Drug
Campaign (2015), which gives their audiences (parents and youth), information on code names
for specific drugs, pictures on what they look like, information on what the drug is made out of,
signs of a user, what to do in an emergency and basically all negatives aspect about all drugs.

4. Organizational Objectives:
 Ultimate Goal: the overall objective is to decrease the amount of harm and
hospitalization that is caused from synthetic drug use.
o High-Level Goal: To decrease the amount of synthetic drug use in college and
university communities.
 Supporting Objectives:
 Give youth better alternatives to synthetic drugs
 Create a resource that is easily accessible for youth and parents
o High-Level Goal: Better market the long-term health effects to show the
unappealing side of synthetic drugs.
 Supporting Objectives:
 Educate our youth on not only short term but also, long-term
mental and physical health effects.
 Record the amount hospitalizations caused by synthetic drugs
Marketing Objectives:
My initial marketing objective that I have chosen is to record the amount of hospitalizations
caused by synthetic drugs. To make this supporting objective more “SMART” I must first narrow
my focus. I will be doing this is by looking at youths falling between the ages of 18-24 years,
even more specifically looking at how many of these hospitalization are post-secondary
students. These hospitalizations will be measured according to a timeframe of four months,
three times a year. The first timeframe will begin from September to December, followed by one
from January to April, and finally May to August. This will allow me to track when students are
more actively consuming drugs , and I can explore factors to determine why this may be. Being
able to record the peak of drug consumption will enable me to better market this cause at

5. particular times of the year. This will allow me to help change the behaviours of my audience’s
decision to not consume synthetic drugs. In regards to social marketing, this is relevant because
I am aiming to change the behaviour for the greater good of individuals. My specific objective
from the narrowed focus and changed behaviours is to see synthetic drug consumption
decrease 10-15% within post-secondary youths ranging from 18-24 years in age, within the first
year of this marketing campaign. This is a realistic goal that I think can be successfully achieved
because instead of only educating our audiences, we will be using a fear tactic to change the
behaviour of our audiences.
Strategic considerations:
There are things that I need to consider that might be slight barriers to my campaign. The first
thing that I must consider that my major idea of using hospitalizations within a specific area as a scare
tactic to my audience, might be easier said than done. Getting hospitals to willingly release this
information will be difficult as privacy becomes an issue. However, if I have Health Canada as a potential
stakeholder for my cause this might overcome this barrier. My second barrier that I could find within my
campaign would be getting institutions like Carleton University, University of Ottawa and Algonquin
College to support my cause, and allow me to have an information table or desk on campus. Having a
campaign targeting student on campus can be seen as a threat to an institution because it can influence
one's decision to attend their school or not. However, if the institution cares about their student's well
being, they should be accepting to wanting to support my campaign. The last consideration that I must
look at is what was mentioned previously about our mainstream media and the heavy influence they
have on my target audience and their peers. The mainstream media's messages are powerful and tend
persuade my audience into thinking that consuming illicit drugs is acceptable, therefore I must make
sure that my campaign's messages are strong and it really impacts their perspective. This is why I think
having one-on-one conversation with students will break the silence and make it more comfortable to

6. make conversation about the topic. Tactics will me mentioned in later on, which will give more ways to
overcome this barrier.
Audience:
The main audience that I will be targeting will be students attending post-secondary
institutions falling between the ages of 18-24 years old. More specifically, this will be marketed
towards people who are currently doing drugs or feel pressure from their peers to experiment
with drugs. My secondary audiences are parents, family members and friends of the user or
potential user. The reason I want to target them as well is because they have the power to sway
one's habits over and break the ice on making conversation about synthetic drugs. If I were to
take my audiences and break them down into two separate personas my primary audience
would have a variety of characteristics. The demographics of my primary audience is strictly
looking at has already been mentioned (18-24 years old, attending post-secondary). Giving their
age this means they are just entering adulthood and have not yet gained a large amount of life
experience. They are also either high-school educated, or are in the middle of their post-
secondary education. The careers that these people hold, are generally part time jobs which
means they have a low personal income. This audience all have general goals towards a career
after school, which means they also have a goal to graduate. However, they make the decisions
to become involved in synthetic drugs because they also look forward to having fun during post-
secondary and meeting new people. However, these things can clash because if you have a
goal to graduate, but you also want to have fun with doing drugs you can blur the line between
what holds more importance. It is normal to see a student focus on the wrong priorities at school,
and get involved with the wrong scene. Once a person is heavily involved with doing drugs, and
they do not have a bad experience with it, its makes it hard to get one to change their behaviour.
One might resist my campaigns efforts to create change because of the heavy influence from
their peers to get involved with doing these synthetic drugs, and they don't see the harmful

7. effects of them. Looking at the type of personas that I have described, these journey maps will
give a step by step process of how one might decide to experiment with synthetic drugs. This
will also allow me to figure out where my audiences could be best targeted throughout their
journey into experimenting with synthetic drugs like MDMA.
Journey Map #1: Johnny Entering Drug World
 #1: Johnny is going into high school
o Johnny makes new friends in gym/health class
o I could market to youth in high school, who are starting to gain more
insight on drugs. This could be done by face to face conversation, giving
my information pamphlets to their teachers to handout. I could also make
sure to speak over morning announcements or hang posters in the
hallways of high schools.
 Johnny is invited to a party with an older crowd.
 Johnny talks to parents about party
 Parents explain to him about drinking responsibly
 Targeting parents so they have correct information on how to
handle conversation and how to approach their children
about the topic. This could be done by sending information
kits in the mail or sending it home with students.
o When Johnny Attends party he is offered to smoke
Marijuana
 Johnny accepts this offer and becomes friends with
this group of smokers
 Johnny is informed about drug abuse in
health class

8. o Johnny builds up curiosity on these,
drugs but doesn't experiment with
anything else but Marijuana
 Johnny has completed high
school and is now graduating
 Johnny is now attending college and is living in residence
 Make sure to hang posters all over residence and set up information booths near
residences when students are moving in. This way I can not only target my
primary audience, I can also inform parents and peers
o Johnny finds friends who drink and smoked at his "Frosh Week" and
becomes friends with them.
o Give information out inside frosh kits when students arrive to they can gain
information about the dangers of synthetic drugs, and can be informed on
how to say no, go against peer pressure and to start the conversation
about drug use.
 The first rave of the school year is coming up, and Johnny wants to
attend
 Make sure to try and advertise campaign by getting in contact with
company hosting rave... Write on their Facebook page, and have
attendees of the rave on Facebook be followed with advertisements
on their Facebook feeds.
 Johnny attends with new friends. The conversations of doing
synthetic drugs (MDMA) goes on before rave
 Advertise on tickets with my campaign promoting to not do
synthetic drugs, this way Johnny has something to change

9. his mind about NOT doing them... Or makes him uneasy
about doing them.
o Johnny attends rave drunk, but witnesses people taking
synthetic drugs (MDMA) at show.
 Johnny goes to school and talks to friends
about what he saw
 Promote cause around school, having one on
one conversation to students to try and
persuade them to not try or experiment with
synthetic drugs.
 Friends mentioned that they want to try it at
next rave
o Johnny wonders what MDMA is like
while listening to music which
supports synthetic drug use.
 Johnny talks to people
who have done it and say it
was AMAZING.
 Be sure to promote the
negatives on synthetic
drug use, to make
audiences uneasy about
experimenting.
 Johnny tries MDMA at the next rave he attends
o Johnny becomes an avid user of MDMA, as well as his friends
 Johnny overdoses at rave, and dies in hospital.

10. Journey Map #2: Sally's Bad Experience
 Sally is in her 5th year of university
o Sally's friends have all graduated
 Sally makes new friends in one of her classes
 Promote cause before lectures so that large class and listen to what
we have to say about drugs. This way I am able to target a large
audience all at once. This also will allow for my cause to spread to
others, because it start conversation within friend groups.
 Sally's new friends love to drink and party on weekends
 Sally was invited to go to lunch with her new friends
 Sally's New friends invited her to come to a
party on the weekend
 Sally say's she will pass
o Sally's new friends pressure her into going
 Sally is successfully convinced and decides to attend
 Set up booths on campus where traffic is walking by and inform
students how to say no to peer pressure before it's too late. This
way I am able to have one-on-one conversation and get actual
opinions from students.
 Sally attends party and isn't too drunk, but is having fun
o Sally's new friends think she is so much fun
 Sally's friends are all smoking outside
 One of Sally's friends whispers and asks if
Sally wants to pop a pill.
o Sally says no.

11.  Sally's friends decides to
take a pill
 Sally see's the effects of the drug on her friend, and her friend looks like she is having an
AWESOME time, but Sally is worried for her well being
o The next Monday, Sally's friend says she is going to "pop" again on the next
weekend
 Sally doesn't know how to confront her friend about the negative
effects of drugs
 Make sure to inform on website about how to start the conversation.
This can be done by advertising over social media, or using a
hashtag to draw more attention to our website.
 Sally is invited by her friend to attend rave over via Facebook
o Sally feels like she isn't fun so she decides to confirm
she's going
o Have my Facebook ads follow a user when they
confirm they are attending a specific event that
involves synthetic drugs. This will allow
 Sally is on the bus to school and wonders what
it's like to experiment to MDMA
 Make bus ads targeting students to no
experiment with drugs. This way when students
are commuting to school they will see these
ads.
 Sally builds up curiosity
o Sally ask's her friend about her
experience

12.  Is tempted to try synthetic
drug
 Looks online to read other's experiences with taking MDMA
o Reads lots online about positive experiences
 Goes on YouTube to watch videos of the "rave" or "Festival" scene,
to see if it her thing
 Have emotional or shock factor ads that play before watching videos.
If these videos have an emotional aspect to them or a shock-factor,
it will be more susceptible and more likely to impact one's decision.
This is seen a lot, for example: Cigarette packages, Drinking and
Driving commercials, etc.
 Listens to music on soundcloud to get herself amped for the
rave
 See if advertising on soundcloud would be possible. This way
anyone who using this app to listening to electronic music
will have to read or see this ad before their music starts. This
could also be done on other music websites, or apps.
o Decides that she will try synthetic drug
 Goes to rave with friends and decides to pop
 Comes home after rave, head is in so much
pain she must go to hospital.
o Hospitalized for three days.
Stakeholders:

13. In order to market this in a clear and successful way I must have a variety of potential
stakeholders that will be willing to fund me and support my cause. Health Canada (2015) could
be a major stakeholder because of their expertise with educating and targeting youth to not
abuse illicit drugs. Their focus is on “preventing, treating and combating illicit drugs and
prescription drug abuse” (Health Canada, 2015). Partnership for a Drug-Free Canada (PDFC)
might be a potential stakeholder because of their devotion to educating parents about their
children abusing drugs. PDFC (2015) sees that the abuse of illicit drugs has become a large
concern within youth today and they think that parents have the most power to stop this drug
abuse. They target parents by using media to educate in an easy and effective way (Partnership
for a Drug-Free Canada, 2015). My approach is different from both of these organizations
because instead of strictly just educating parents and youth on how to prevent the abuse of illicit
and prescription drugs, I am taking an approach where I gather information on the actual tolls of
hospitalizations and marketing fear towards youth. This will hopefully work with more success
because our youth can physically see how synthetic drug use is affecting their peers around
their community. I have not found a specific organization that looks at strictly synthetic drug
abuse towards youth; therefore the potential opponents would be the wide range of
organizations that look at targeting parents and youth on illicit drug and alcohol abuse.
Possible Tactics:
Opportunities for this cause would be that because the age group that I am targeting
falls under a post-secondary cluster, therefore I can take advantage of the assets readily
available to me on their campuses. A second opportunity would be to engage my audience by
using school websites to advertise my cause. Marketing this cause successfully could be done
handing out pamphlets and displaying a variety of posters around campuses. I could also get
involved with classes by engaging large groups of youth and speaking out about why this is an
issue and find out who is affected by it. Setting up information booths around campuses, in

14. festivals, and outside of raves to educate and inform the user and their peers about why what
they are consuming is bad, and why they should care about this issue. I believe that targeting
the audience at the primary area of abuse might also create a type of scare-tactic for my
audience. They might see the booth and read about the information and choose to not do these
synthetic drugs. Almost everyone you meet that is between the ages of 18-24 years old, and is
attending post-secondary is on some sort of social media website (primarily Facebook). With
this in mind I think that making a Facebook ad would be helpful, because I can set it so that if
someone is attending an event like a rave, music festival, dance club, bar, etc. on Facebook,
then my ad will follow them and their friends. So the constant reminder to not consume synthetic
drugs is there, and if they need more information they can click the add and it will take them to
my informative website on synthetic drugs. This website will give statistics and information on all
negative aspects of synthetic drugs, and will give suggestions to make conversation about the
topic easier. I could also make YouTube Pre-roll ads to give audiences emotional videos with a
"shock-factor" to encourage them to not experiment with synthetic drugs. This would be a great
tactic because I would be able to create my ads, so if someone were to click the video it would
draw them to my informative website, I would also be able to measure how many people are
watching my ads, and how many people are clicking my ad to be referred to my website. The
last tactic that I have thought of would be to make some sort of care package which gives the
receiver information about consuming synthetic drugs and hospitalizations within the area, real
stories from local and regretful users of this drug, information on what to do in case of an
emergency and some sort of pin or sticker which they can wear and promote the cause with on
their bag or belongings. This care package can be handed out during festival seasons, at raves,
and can be given to new students entering university or college during their "frosh." To measure
if my actions are successful I will have an anonymous survey for people who have attended a
rave, or music festival to fill out. The survey will ask something along the lines of this:

15.  Please check off any of the following options:
o Drank alcohol at this festival
o Smoked Marijuana
o Consumed MDMA, Ecstasy, other synthetic drugs
o All of the above
o Went sober
o Only consumed alcohol
o Only consumed alcohol and smoked marijuana
o Consumed drug not listed
I know that this survey might be filled out dishonest. However if the people filling out the survey
know that it is completely anonymous and is strictly for research purposes they will be more
swayed to answer with honesty.
Evaluations:
 Marketing Objective:
 To see synthetic drug consumption decrease 10-15% within post-secondary youths
ranging from 18-24 years in age, within the first year of this marketing campaign
o Channel Objective:
o Using Facebook ads as a tool to follow attendees of rave and festivals, to try and get
users to click on website to seek more information on cause.
 KPI's
 Click throughs on the ads
 Target
 5% increase each 1/3 (January-April, May-August, Sept- Dec)
 Time on website who are coming from these advertisements

16.  Target
 Increase in website views by 2% each month of my campaign
o Channel Objective:
o Use end of event survey to measure if my campaign is working
 KPI's
 Seeing how many people are attending event with the plan of consuming
Synthetic drugs.
 Target
 7% decrease within the first four months of campaign
 How many people are going and not attending festival on drugs.
 Target
 10% increase overall within first four months of campaign
o Channel Objective:
o YouTube Pre-roll Ads link audiences to informative website to give more information on
given cause.
 KPI's
 Time on website who are coming from these ads
 Target
 3% increase on time spent on website
 See how many times a user has clicked through different pages on the website
 Target
 10% on people clicking through pages on website and time on each
page.

17. Bibliography
H. Callier, H. (2011). Risky Behavior, Ecstasy, and Education. The Shirley Hufstedler School of
Education, 1-65.
Health Canada. (2015). Substance abuse. Retrieved July 16, 2015, from HYPERLINK
"http://healthycanadians.gc.ca/healthy-living-vie-saine/substance-abuse-toxicomanie/index-
eng.php" http://healthycanadians.gc.ca/healthy-living-vie-saine/substance-abuse-
toxicomanie/index-eng.php
National Drug Campaign. (2015). Retrieved August 6, 2015, from http://www.drugs.health.gov.au/
Partnership for a Drug Free Canada. (2015). About Us. Retrieved July 16, 2015, from
HYPERLINK "http://www.canadadrugfree.org/about-us/" http://www.canadadrugfree.org/about-
us/
Synthetic Drugs // Start the conversation. (2015). Retrieved August 6, 2015, from
http://knowthedangers.com