On National Teacher Day, meet the 2024-25 Kenan Fellows
Ch011
1.
2. Chapter 11
“It’s All Coming Together”—
Communications Strategy for the
Medicare Part D National Education
and Enrollment Campaign
3. Learning Objectives
• Differentiate between earned media and paid
media.
• Describe the benefit of local earned media vs.
national coverage for an education and
enrollment campaign.
• Appreciate the need for simultaneous
development of program elements to maximize
a short time frame.
4. Learning Objectives
• Describe a national campaign with local execution
and provide examples of how a campaign can be led
by headquarters, but implemented by regional staff.
• Understand the importance of building strong
organizational partnerships to provide additional
communication channels to reach a target audience.
• Describe the multiple channels and materials of a
successful national education and enrollment
campaign.
5. A Program Without Precedent
• The Medicare Part D national education and
enrollment campaign.
– Signed into law 2003
– Designed to provide prescription drug coverage to
Medicare recipients
– Relies on the private sector competition
6. Timeline and Challenge
• Implemented in less than two years
• Directed at a very wide audience
• Required consumer engagement
7. Build the People Infrastructure
• The campaign would be nationally defined but
locally executed
• Headquarters provided the strategy, campaign
targets, key messages, tools, collateral materials
and training
• The 10 CMS regional offices developed local
field operations tactics and partnerships to meet
the needs and challenges of the communities
they served
8. We Can’t Do This Alone
• It was apparent that additional communication
channels would be necessary to enroll 95% of
Medicare beneficiaries in a Part D plan
• Other federal agencies that directly touched the lives
of senior citizens worked together distributing
materials and having events on sites to educate and
enroll Medicare beneficiaries in the new program
• Partnerships were developed at the state and local
levels, the backbone of which are State Health
Insurance Programs (SHIPS) across the country
9. Strategy, Tools, Resources
• Medicare Web site
• Medicare and You handbook
• 1-800-Medicare
• Training of counseling partners
• Print and media campaign
• Earned media
10. Summary
• The effort to provide prescription drug coverage to 37
million Medicare beneficiaries was vast in scope and
involved approaches that were entirely new to
Medicare
• The effort, as viewed by the beneficiaries, was an
astonishing success: 75% of respondents were
pleased with Part D, the highest poll number the
organization had ever received for any kind of
insurance program.
