Silver
2023 Best Health Initiative
iHeart National Recovery Month - iHeartMedia & The Voices Project
More than 23 million Americans live in long-term recovery in the United States. To help educate, reduce stigma and provide resources, iHeartMedia partnered with The Voices Project for the 2022 Mobilize Recovery National Bus Tour for National Addiction & Mental Health Recovery Month (September). The bus tour was additionally supported by tech partners Meta, Google and Twitter, as well as local businesses, nonprofit organizations, elected officials, and government agencies to promote and educate about addiction recovery and center the voices of those impacted most by the addiction and overdose crisis in essential locations along the route.
OBJECTIVE
Since 2020, iHeart has partnered with The Voices Project to support and promote Mobilize Recovery. This delivers social good on an important issue—the health and well-being of the general population—but also has the potential to bring media spending dollars from medical and federal agencies with the same goal. By participating, iHeart Media sought to reach its quarter billion monthly listener with critical information regarding health and opioids awareness and the power of living in recovery, provide overdose resources ,and involve people in recovery activism. The program engaged musical artists to use their platforms to educate and empower listeners to better understand and help those in recovery. The Voices Project aims to alter public attitudes toward addiction recovery, supporting efforts to break intergenerational cycles of addiction and related problems.
METHOD
Using its platforms—broadcast radio stations, Black Information Network, iHeartRadio app, iHeartRadio social media channels, and its artist relationships, iHeart created a multi-faceted campaign to bring stories of addiction and recovery forward and to use them to inspire communities with messages of hope, resilience, and action during National Recovery Month. The Recovery Bus Tour received support from iHeartMedia but also from Meta, Gilead Sciences and many others. iHeart’s Black Information Network also coordinated with The White House to cover and promote a special bus tour stop to discuss the issue with Second Gentleman Douglas Emhoff and ONDCP Director Rahul Gupta and have them sign the Mobilize Recovery bus.
iHeartMedia used its platforms to promote the bus tour. Mobilize Recovery crossed the country, promoted by iHeartMedia across radio, digital and social channels, and recapping with video activity on iHeart’s Recovery Month website sharing tour stops, updates and a positive halo and activations.
iHeartMedia used the power of its relation to celebrities and its platforms to produce Recover Out Loud, a concert event that was streamed exclusively on the iHeart Meta page and YouTube channel. The event was hosted by American actor and stand-up comedian Gary Owen and featured headline performances by Macklemore, KT Tunstall, Evvie McKinney, Daphne Willis, The Residency and others. Attendees at iHeart’s Recover Out Loud in Las Vegas included frontline workers in the addiction and mental health field, impacted family members and people in recovery from addiction.
RESULTS
Not only did iHeart reach millions of people in communities across the country during National Recovery Month, the program positioned the company as a leader in the space of addiction and recovery.
- The Mobilize Recovery 2022 bus traveled 10,403 miles—passing through 25 states and the District of Columbia.
- Mobilize Recovery hosted over 35 organizing events throughout September 2022.
- At the end of the tour, the bus was covered with thousands of messages and names that represent an extraordinary amount of hope.
- The program distributed over 11,000 fentanyl test strips and 10,000 overdose response kits with naloxone.
- In just under one month, the campaign message reached over 1 million Americans through Facebook and iHeart.
