A very interesting campaign from Abbott has launched that promotes its wearable technology to monitor symptoms of heart disease and blood glucose levels. These are not disease education ads in the traditional sense. Nor are they the common corporate ads promoting their laboratory research. This campaign is more of a plug for technologies that Abbott developed to change how diseases are monitored.
The theme of the television campaign is that you don’t wait for life, you live it. The idea is that new technologies to monitor disease allow people to go on with the moments of life. The glucose monitoring execution shows children playing with their siblings and mom. After about 20 seconds, we see one child wearing a glucose monitor device on her arm. Then the announcer identifies the Abbott glucose monitor which he says is always on so you don’t wait for life, you live it.
In the second ad from this campaign, we see a man coming home to a dog apparently newly adopted, and then we see him later in scenes with his new dog. In this case, Abbott is promoting a small implantable heart monitoring device. Like with the glucose monitor ad, the announcer says the heart monitor technology allows you to live life.
The purpose of these ads is not to sell the technology to patients but to promote Abbott as a corporate leader in diagnostic technology. We have all heard about Abbott being active in developing the 15 minute Covid test. These spots seem to be designed to show Abbott is a leader across many disease states in diagnostic technology.
The campaign is an interesting take on corporate ads. We see consumers shown benefiting from the technology by making it easier to live life to its fullest. Abbott’s goal appears to be raising its consumer and investor profile as an innovative diagnostic company.
Abbott is also running print ads with the headline “Life. To the Fullest.” These are running in business publications like Forbes, Bloomberg, and Fortune, which discuss the rapid Covid test as well as the glucose monitor in a separate ad seen in The Economist.
Covid has raised the profile of Abbott through its widely publicized rapid test and the company also wanted to promote its other innovations to investors and influencers. The campaign is well done as it is visually interesting in both television and print. At a time where diagnostics is taking an important role for most Americans, the Abbott campaign is well-timed and highly relevant.
Bob Ehrlich
Chairman
DTC Perspectives, Inc.
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