EVERNORTH
CAMPAIGNS THAT DEFINE A NEW HEALTH SERVICES OFFERING FOR THE BUSINESSES AND STAKEHOLDERS WHO NEED IT
As the old adage goes, “If you’re explaining, you’re losing”, and Cigna had so much to explain. For the insurance giant, its merger with Express Scripts represented a decisive step in a new direction, one that compelled it to transform a disparate set of products, services, and businesses into a differentiated health services offering under a single brand. Cigna tapped R/GA as its digital innovation partner — a huge win for the agency’s fledging Health practice.
Soon, this new business had a name: Evernorth. And now, all it needed was a go-to-market strategy and campaign.
AGENCY: R/GA
ROLE: Creative Director, Copy
AS ALWAYS, THERE WAS A CHALLENGE
Beyond the usual hurdles of launching a new brand, Evernorth also needed to differentiate itself to a number of different audiences at once. Potential customers ranged from HR benefits leaders for commercial buyers to health care brokers and consultants to regional health plans. While these audiences occupy the same ecosystem, each has differing needs and priorities.
Was there some foundational brand element that could anchor our efforts build awareness and differentiate Evernorth to all these audience at once? Something that could explain how Evernorth wasn't here to replace existing health plans but to co-exist on top of them and enable them to offer more? When the client asked us to start by developing ideas for its Care+ suite of services, the answer became clear.
PLUS MEANS MORE
The “+” sign has been an integral part of Evernorth’s visual identity from the beginning, and it provided a solid starting point. After all, one key attribute that distinguished Evernorth’s offering was its modular structure that could be tailored to an individual organization’s unique needs. “Plus” fit well here — not as a way of replacing your benefits, but augmenting them. Making them more efficient and effective. Thus, the idea that Plus Means More.
Leaning into the “Plus” concept and the illustrative style that was developed in the brand work enabled us to develop messaging tailored to our individual audiences across channels.
Plus Means More in Print
This execution frames Evernorth’s Care+ offering in terms that would resonate with an HR benefits leader. But we also targeted health plan providers. See that version here.
As usual, social platforms provided a prime opportunity to reach our individual target audiences. And, because this was a B2B campaign, LinkedIn figured prominently in our plans. The samples below are specifically targeted towards health plan providers.
BUT THEN, A PLOT TWIST…
You can argue that the COVID-19 was the biggest plot twist of our generation, but in terms of our campaign for Evernorth, the bigger plot twist actually came later on, when some of the long-tail effects of the pandemic began to reveal themselves. Research revealed the anxieties and adaptations that organizations were facing in a post-pandemic world, so we started developing a new creative direction. In other words, we wanted to understand our customers by delving into…
THE QUestions keeping you up at night
We created a series of ads surfacing the questions that were most pressing and top-of-mind for our potential customers. Starting with this full page print ad that ran in the Wall Street Journal:
We also created a new brand video to introduce Evernorth, using the “Questions” framework while pulling forward some of the earlier illustrative elements to interact with a more people-forward, photography-driven visual direction
On social channels and paid banners we evolved the approach in a similar way:
And, as before, we carried this targeted approach over to LinkedIn as well.
We also created another campaign OLV that was focused on individual service offerings instead of brand.
And all of these drove prospective customers to a re-configured homepage hero that put the campaign theme front and center.
“It’s tremendous the way you’ve worked the calculus of this difficult category to have a big brand idea that works and then pulls down to the product level.”
but did the results keep us up at night?
Not unless it was with giddy excitement. The numbers told us that our work was doing its job, raising awareness and moving the needle. And, Evernorth continues to be a thriving and integral part of the Cigna’s health portfolio.
126.7M Impressions
307K Clicks
10.2% Video Pre-Roll CTR (8.5x the partner benchmark)
3x Improvement in Display Asset CTR
400% Increase in Traffic MoM
7.56% Estimated Ad Recall Lift Rate on Facebook (Above 5% is considered strong in the Health Vertical)