Background

12% of Australians suffer some sort of hearing loss, this number is expected to double over the coming decades.

As hearing deteriorates, it takes sufferers seven years on average to seek help. This delay leads to social isolation, loss of relationships, reduced quality of life, and an increased likelihood of depression and cognitive decline.

Cochlear, the global leader in implantable hearing solutions, wants Australians to understand, identify and act on their hearing loss, before it’s too late.

Strategy

‘I was missing things one-to-one, I would have a half hour conversation with someone and wouldn’t understand a word. I hoped they wouldn’t ask me anything.’ 

Those are the words of Jennie Brand-Miller, aged 65. Jennie was a long-time hearing loss sufferer who eventually sought help from Cochlear and has since had her hearing restored. 

There are thousands of Australians like Jennie. They live a life of compromise and denial, hiding their hearing loss from others and delaying seeking help.  

We had to find a way to help people engage with their hearing ability and seek support earlier, as it had become the ‘invisible disability’. 

Our strategy was to make it visible.  

We will always remember the day when audiologist Emma Ramsay said, ‘no two people hear the world the same, your hearing is as unique as your fingerprint.’ 

This would become our springboard.  

Execution

Cochlear Hearprint is purpose-built software that bypasses the internet’s ‘one size fits all’ audio, calibrating all online content to your unique hearing ability.

Hearprint launched alongside two documentaries on a dedicated campaign site. The films shared the stories of inspirational Australians whose lives were changed by their Cochlear implant.

To watch them, users first set their Hearprint against four frequencies – identified by Cochlear’s audiologists as the most important for human hearing. 

During the setup, four scenes were selected from the documentaries that best sampled the four key frequency bands. Audiologist data helped define parameters within each frequency band based on normal hearing, as well as mild, moderate and severe hearing loss. This allowed us to isolate user’s unique hearing proficiency at each frequency level and inform whether their hearing was deemed ‘normal’ or ‘abnormal’.

The data calibration enabled real-time audio from the documentaries to be augmented, allowing people to alter the decibel level of individual frequencies within a piece of media from the film while it was playing.

A dynamic Hearprint visualisation was generated for each user, this acted as the interface, and the visualisation of their hearing. For most, this was the first time they had ‘seen their hearing ability’.  User's with an 'abnormal' Hearprint, were encouraged to get in contact with Cochlear for a free consultation.

Hearprint was promoted with a highly targeted paid media campaign that leveraged 1^st party customer data profiles, combining them with 3^rd party behavioural and interest data to improve efficiencies. 

Once installed Hearprint can be updated over time, giving Cochlear a direct view of how people’s hearing changes and identifying the ideal time to start a conversation about their hearing loss.

Hearprint has turned every video, TV show and audio track on the internet, into an opportunity to remind Australians of their unique hearing ability.

Results

Our campaign had two objectives:

Objective #1: Commercial - attract 1,634 highly qualified leads into Cochlear’s sales funnel over 12 months.

Objective #2: Purpose - help transform the way people understand and treat hearing loss.

Three months in to the 12-month campaign, results are as follows:

1. ·        1,020 high-value leads are already talking to Cochlear experts about the most relevant treatment path. This is 62% of our commercial lead target reached, in just three months of a 12-month campaign.

1. ·        5,307 have set their Hearprint, providing Cochlear with a view of their hearing ability.

1. ·        59% (3,146) of the Hearprints set to date have been identified as 'abnormal', indicating Cochlear could help.

Hearprint has also attracted enormous media interest, securing morning TV, metro newspaper, national radio, online news, and international coverage. We estimate the activity has reached over 30 million people already.