General Mills Sponsors NBC's Healthy Week

NBCUniversal today announced that General Mills is returning as second year sponsor of its annual "Healthy Week" with a new, custom Integrated Strategic Marketing (ISM) campaign running across multiple platforms. "Healthy Week" is the anchor event of Healthy at NBCU, a company-wide initiative designed to connect consumers, marketers and employees with NBCUniversal's breadth of health and wellness content.

This year's Healthy at NBCU campaign for General Mills focuses on the Yoplait brand, featuring a mix of vignettes and commercials running across Oxygen, Style, USA, and Bravo; plus interstitials on E! and segments on The Weather Channel.

"We are excited to welcome General Mills back as ‘Healthy Week' sponsor," said John Kelly, NBCUniversal's SVP of Ad Sales for News Networks and "Healthy at NBCU." "Their proven success demonstrates the power of advertising in a contextually relevant environment, and we hope to help them move the needle once again, inspiring consumers to live an active and healthy lifestyle."

This campaign builds on General Mills' successful 2010 campaign, which according to case study research, resulted significant increases in brand perception and ad recall. Specifically, Nielsen IAG data showed that traditional Cheerios ads that ran adjacent to the custom vignettes sponsored by Cheerios - featuring NBCU talent providing health tips - resulted in a 40% increase in message recall and 58% increase in ad likeability (in comparison to traditional Cheerios ads that ran outside of Healthy Week).

"We are pleased to be partnering with NBCU again on this very important health initiative. General Mills is committed to nourishing lives. Our goal is to provide nutritious foods that - when combined with exercise and activity - can help people live longer, healthier lives. NBCU has created a great platform across their vast portfolio of media assets that will showcase the health credentials of our brands", said Rick Hosfield, VP, Content Planning & Distribution for General Mills.

This marks General Mills' third ISM deal, the first of which involved a campaign for Cheerios in 2009 that ran across the Women at NBCU properties.

A separate, but related study unveiled today by NBCUniversal examined the campaigns of several different advertisers, and further underscores the positive halo brands receive by aligning with health-related content. Namely, these advertisers were more likely to experience the "healthy halo" when they sponsored healthy tips adjacent to their commercial, than when their same commercial aired without the tips. On average, sponsors of healthy tips were also perceived as "part of the solution for consumers who want to lead a healthier life" and a brand that "understands the importance of educating consumers on how to lead a healthier life" by 8 in 10 viewers. In general, over half of consumers who saw the sponsored health tips indicated they were more likely to buy and/or recommend these brands because of their association with the healthy content.

About Healthy at NBCU:Launched in 2010, Healthy at NBCU is NBCUniversal's company-wide initiative designed to connect consumers, marketers and employees with a breadth of health and wellness content. NBCUniversal leverages its news and entertainment properties to raise awareness around today's most pressing health-related issues. Healthy tips, along with information on nutritional literacy, obesity and fitness are available throughout the year at http://www.healthyatnbcu.com./

Sources: Healthy@ NBCUniversal's "Health Halo Effects" online study conducted by Media Analyzer from March 16th to March 24th, 2011 among 738 respondents A18-54 (50% male, 50% female).

Nielsen IAG; A18-49; 9/21/09-7/20/10; Primetime, Non-Sports; Norms exclude airings in Healthy Week

 

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