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The Heart Foundation and News Corp ‘Walk Away From a Killer’ in the next chapter of their partnership

The Heart Foundation and News Corp Australia have released the follow up to the award-winning Serial Killer campaign which landed in February to much critical acclaim and success.

Walk Away From a Killer is again created by News Corp Australia in partnership with Host/Havas and urges Australians to get up and walk their way to better health. The campaign will be targeted hyper-locally at regional populations where the risk of heart disease is particularly high.

Heart disease kills one Australian every 30 minutes, although the initial Serial Killer campaign has since seen the deaths related to heart disease drop from 51 per day to 48. The new five-week integrated print, digital and broadcast media and marketing campaign follows on where Serial Killer left off, encouraging Australians to take pre-emptive steps to help battle heart disease.

The Heart Foundation and News Corp Australia have rolled out the next stage in their partnership – Walk Away From a Killer

In the first campaign, the print creative teased the reveal of ‘Australia’s Worst Serial Killer’, which was heart disease. The new campaign sees a headline of ‘I walked away from a killer’, promising the whole story inside the title. The campaign kicked off this morning with wraps across News Corp Australia’s key metro mastheads – The Daily Telegraph and Herald Sun. It was matched with full-page advertisements in regional mastheads including the NT News and The Gympie Times.

There will be another wrap in The Courier-Mail on Thursday and a wrap on Body + Soul on Sunday, and sponsored columns in the title over the following weeks.

The campaign is supported by an editorial series across key metro and regional mastheads, highlighting how walking has enhanced individual lives in different ways.

The Heart Foundation’s chief marketing officer Chris Taylor said walking was a proven way to cut the risk of heart disease, including associated factors such as high blood pressure and being overweight.

“Startlingly, only about 50% of Aussie adults meet the minimum daily recommended physical activity,” said Taylor.

The campaign seeks to build awareness of Australia’s largest free walking program, Heart Foundation Walking, which has more than 1100 walking groups across Australia.

“Our new walking campaign will feature strong, engaging content aimed at building awareness of walking and galvanising Australians to take a stand for their health,” Taylor said.

“Heart Foundation Walking is a truly great initiative and as part of this campaign we will be sharing stories of people whose lives have been transformed by walking.”

A double page spread in The Heart Foundation’s campaign

The initial Serial Killer campaign proved to be incredibly successful, resulting in the life-saving Heart Health Checks being added to the Medicare scheme and more than 880,000 uses of The Heart Foundation’s Heart Age Calculator.

The Heart Foundation has taken a bold approach to its marketing in recent times. The Heartless Words campaign launched in May, with Host/Havas, told families their loved ones were ‘lying’ when they said they loved them. The campaign played on the idea that if people really loved their families, they would care for their heart health.

The campaign received backlash almost instantly and was swiftly pulled, but Taylor maintains that tough campaigns are needed to encourage consumers to think differently about topics they may have become apathetic to, particularly when their health is involved.

“We needed a big idea, and we were very willing to take a risk to bring that to life. In fact, we wanted to shock Australia into action,” Taylor said on stage at Mumbrella 360 in June.

Taylor did say The Heart Foundation never sought to hurt anyone with its campaign, and that he was very sorry for anyone who was upset by the work, but that the intention had been to ‘cut through’ and make the most of work for an organisation that has limited resources.

News Corp Australia’s chief operating officer, publishing, Damian Eales said the ability to target hyper-local advertising showed the key role local news played in local communities.

“Our partnership with the Heart Foundation will include targeting populations where a significant portion of the population is at risk from a disease that’s often preventable, demonstrating how important local media is at the community level.”

Half-page advertisements in News Corp Australia’s metropolitan and regional mastheads on November 4 and 18 will coincide with geotargeting on Instagram and Facebook, digital direct response and search engine marketing campaigns.

People will be encouraged to join a Heart Foundation Walking group and download the Heart Foundation’s walking app. The pace will accelerate from November 1 to December 10 with the “Put Your Foot Down” step challenge, in which app users will go in the draw to win prizes for every 100,000 steps walked.

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