Client: American Academy of Periodontology (Chicago)

PR Agency: Weber Shandwick (Chicago and Minneapolis offices)

April 2014-July 2014

Budget: $500,000

THE CAMPAIGN

1914: Founded by Dr. Gillette Hayden and Dr. Grace Roger Spalding
Today: 8,000 members
Periodontal disease affects 1 in 2 over 30
Periodontist: American Academy of
Periodontology members who specialize in
diagnosing and treating periodontal disease
and have registered to be included in this service.

AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PERIODONTOLOGY

Problem: lack of awareness about gum disease, its impact on the

body, and who is the correct person to treat it
Get people to understand the disease, symptoms, and overall health
implications
Increase awareness of who periodontists are

OBJECTIVES

Clever, interactive, and humorous approach

Chris Harrison from The Bachelor

STRATEGIES

Media tour in NYC

Chris Harrison from The Bachelor
#LoveYourGums
Micro-site
Infographic and graphics with puns

Online quiz
Periodontist locater

TACTICS

Perio.org traffic 65% increase

2,625 earned stories
AAP approved a budget to continue the campaign with Weber Shandwick
through 2015

RESULTS

Unique way to talk about health issue

Message strategy
Impressive results

WHY PRWEEK COVERED IT

Weber Shandwick
Chicago

WHY I CHOSE IT

Chris Harrison was chosen as a spokesperson for this campaign because of his role
in shows like The Bachelor, with a viewer demographic of mostly females.
Based on this and the feminine colors of the campaign, would you say it was
bias towards females and do you think this affected the way men saw the
campaign?
As mentioned, the campaign is scheduled to continue through 2015. One of their
main goals is to focus on periodontists expertise. What are some objectives
they can use when furthering this campaign to reach their goal?

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

Lewis, T. (2014, Oct. 3). Sense of Humor Increases Awareness of Periodontal Disease. PRWeek.
Retrieved from: http://www.prweek.com/article/1315314/sense-humor-increasesawareness-periodontal-disease
Online Dig Editions (April-June 2014). Love the Gums Youre With Campaign. Online Dig
Editions. Retrieved from:
http://onlinedigeditions.com/article/%22Love+The+Gums+You're+With%22+Campaign/17
21253/0/article.html
Perio.org (2008). American Academy of Periodontology: Timeline. American Academy of
Periodontology. Retrieved from:
http://www.perio.org/sites/default/files/files/PDFs/About%20us/AAP_timeline.pdf
Perio.org (2014). Our Vision and Mission. American Academy of Periodontology. Retrieved
from http://www.perio.org/about/vision.htm
Perio.org/sites (2014). Love the Gums Youre With. American Academy of Periodontology.
Retrieved from: http://www.perio.org/sites/loveyourgums/index.php
PR News Media (2014, April 22). Gum Disease Prevalence Surpasses Diabetes with Nearly 65
Million Affected. PR News Media. Retrieved from:
http://www.pwrnewmedia.com/2014/aap/love_the_gums_youre_with/
Sudhaman, A. (2014, July 7). Edelman, Weber Shandwick, Then Daylight. Holmes Report.
Retrieved from: http://worldreport.holmesreport.com/top-10
Weber Shandwick (2014). Who We Are. Weber Shandwick. Retrieved from:
http://www.webershandwick.com/

REFERENCES

Love The Gums Youre With

Lauren Vahldick

Love the Gums Youre With

How can you make people interested and informed about gum disease? Thats the
question the American Academy of Periodontology (AAP) in Chicago asked Weber Shandwick
when trying to find a way to educate consumers on oral health in a fun and engaging way. Their
public awareness problem was addressed by the Chicago and Minneapolis offices of Weber
Shandwick through the Love the Gums Youre With campaign. This campaign extended from
April 2014 until July 2014 and had a budget of $500,000.
AAP was founded in 1914 by Dr. Gillette Hayden and Dr. Grace Roger Spalding. These
two women originally named this organization American Academy of Oral Prophylaxis and
Periodontology and began with only 18 charter members. Five years later, the name was changed
to what the organization is still called today, the American Academy of Periodontology.
AAP focuses on its dental specialty of gum disease and sharing the importance of
periodontists with the American public. According to their website, APPs vision is,
periodontists will be recognized as an indispensable part of healthcare for optimal health and
quality of life (Perio.org, 2014). This is important to the AAP because when people think oral
health, they primarily think of dentists. Most people dont go to a periodontist, nor do they know
what one is. This is an awareness problem, especially when one in two adults over the age of 30
who are suffering from periodontal disease, commonly known as gum disease.
To get people talking, AAP partnered with the second largest PR firm in the world,
Weber Shandwick, in their first campaign together. AAP has had three previous campaigns, the
first in 1981, which was a national public awareness campaign that attracted over 1,900 people.
In 1997, AAP had a media launch that resulted in more than 58 million audience impressions and
331 mentions in publications, TV, radio, and online. In 1998, AAP launched another patient

Love The Gums Youre With

Lauren Vahldick

education campaign after news surrounding research linking periodontal disease to heart attack
and stroke hit media nationwide (Perio, 2008). These campaigns were all before modern
technology allowed organizations to reach a larger audience with their message. Elements of the
2014 campaign, like a celebrity spokesperson and setting the tone as fun and engaging, were
different than anything the AAP had done before and paid off in the end.
The problem the AAP found was that the general public lacks awareness about gum
disease, its impact on the body, and who is the correct person to treat it. According to Dr. Stuart
Froum, AAP president, Periodontal disease has become a major public health issue, yet one of
the least discussed (Online Digest Editions). Pertaining to class, Weber created two objectives
to address this problem. The first objective was to get the people to understand the disease and
the other was to increase awareness of periodontists (Lewis, 2014). People suffering from
periodontal disease are more likely to see a periodontist if that word is even in their vocabulary.
To reach these objectives, Weber decided to take a boring issue and use a clever,
interactive approach. The whole campaign became about love by personifying mouths to be a
significant other. They created a variety of puns, including the name of the campaign, Love the
Gums Youre With to make consumers see the topic of oral health in a new light. They did this
to engage consumers and make gum disease a more relatable topic. The target market for this
campaign was anyone over the age of 30 who had a mouth. By relating gums to a significant
other, consumers could connect that, just like in their own relationships, they have to care for and
work on their oral health. Another strategy was to make Chris Harrison, from ABCs The
Bachelor, the celebrity spokesperson. This was a perfect fit, since Harrison is seen as a matchmaker and is a person of authority for establishing healthy relationships. Harrisons main roles
were to drive media coverage and putting a face to the campaign (Lewis, 2014).

Love The Gums Youre With

Lauren Vahldick

A lot of tactics were used to accomplish these strategies and reach the overall objectives.
Their key tactic of this campaign was the media tour in New York City that launched on April 22
and 23, 2014. Chris Harrison was the host of this tour where he participated in 34 satellite
interviews with television and radio stations, spreading the word about oral health and directing
people to Perio.org to find a periodontist near them. This media coverage was featured on
Huffington Post, CNN, People.com, and The View, just to name a few (Online Dig Editions,
2014). Throughout the tour Harrison tweeted on his personal account and AAP tweeted on their
account, all using the hashtag #LoveYourGums. Another tactics was to create a micro-site for the
campaign, featuring an interactive oral health quiz, infographics, and a doctor locator tool. The
website includes a section for AAP members, including a digital downloadable toolkit to use in
their periodontal practices (Lewis, 2014).
As a result of all of these tactics, traffic to Perio.org during the months of the campaign
increased 65 percent compared to traffic to the website between December 2013 and March
2014. AAP gained 189 new followers on Twitter, while Chris Harrisons social media efforts
reached an audience of 372,000 Twitter followers and 19,741 Facebook likes. Due to the media
kick off, AAP gained 2,625 earned stories on shows and in publications such as The View, CNN,
People.com, and Huffington Post. Even though the campaign ended in July, it extended to the
AAPs annual September conference where AAP members were able to learn more about the
campaign in a Love the Gums Youre With interactive lounge. The AAP has decided to
expand this campaign into 2015 with their goal to focus on periodontists expertise and social
strategy programs messaging (Lewis, 2014). This campaign was a huge success for AAP and it
will be exciting to see how they implement a similar campaign in 2015.

Love The Gums Youre With

Lauren Vahldick

References
Lewis, T. (2014, Oct. 3). Sense of Humor Increases Awareness of Periodontal Disease. PRWeek.
Retrieved from: http://www.prweek.com/article/1315314/sense-humor-increasesawareness-periodontal-disease
Online Dig Editions (April-June 2014). Love the Gums Youre With Campaign. Online Dig
Editions. Retrieved from:
http://onlinedigeditions.com/article/%22Love+The+Gums+You're+With%22+Campaign/
1721253/0/article.html
Perio.org (2008). American Academy of Periodontology: Timeline. American Academy of
Periodontology. Retrieved from:
http://www.perio.org/sites/default/files/files/PDFs/About%20us/AAP_timeline.pdf
Perio.org (2014). Our Vision and Mission. American Academy of Periodontology. Retrieved
from http://www.perio.org/about/vision.htm
Perio.org/sites (2014). Love the Gums Youre With. American Academy of Periodontology.
Retrieved from: http://www.perio.org/sites/loveyourgums/index.php
PR News Media (2014, April 22). Gum Disease Prevalence Surpasses Diabetes with Nearly 65
Million Affected. PR News Media. Retrieved from:
http://www.pwrnewmedia.com/2014/aap/love_the_gums_youre_with/

Sudhaman, A. (2014, July 7). Edelman, Weber Shandwick, Then Daylight. Holmes Report.
Retrieved from: http://worldreport.holmesreport.com/top-10
Weber Shandwick (2014). Who We Are. Weber Shandwick. Retrieved from:
http://www.webershandwick.com/