Hypoactive sexual desire disorder (HSDD), a medical condition characterized by frustrating ongoing low sexual desire, is the most common form of female sexual dysfunction. Women who have HSDD have an imbalance of neurotransmitter activity in the brain, resulting in low sexual desire.

HSDD has been recognized as a medical condition since the 1980’s, but few women have heard of it. Vyleesi is the first treatment for HSDD that can be used as needed, acting in the brain to improve sexual desire and decrease associated distress 45 minutes after the injection.

For the millions of premenopausal women in the US afflicted by HSDD, Vyleesi is the solution for a problem they didn’t know had a name. To launch Vyleesi, we needed a campaign that defined the market, and a brand and product that created enough consumer demand to immediately drive sales upon FDA approval in June 2019.

“Ghosting” was added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary in 2016 and is defined as “the phenomenon of leaving a relationship of some kind by abruptly ending all contact with the other person.” With the proliferation of mobile, the phenomenon quickly became a part of the cultural zeitgeist, inspiring everything from Halloween costumes to reality TV shows.

The term resonated with so many because it’s a frustrating and all-too-common experience. When you get ghosted, you get angry. You want answers. You want to get back what you lost. Women with HSDD felt the same way.

The “Ghosted by Desire” campaign embraced this symmetry. Not only did “Ghosted by Desire” translate the complex clinical definition of HSDD into just three words, it made the condition intuitive, memorable and a part of a cultural moment. It was a rallying cry for women to refuse to suffer in silence and take back what’s rightfully theirs.

To deliver these ambitious goals, we couldn’t launch like a typical pharmaceutical brand. We had to make a complicated condition intuitive; we had to make the brand sticky; we had to make audiences feel engaged and create shareable moments.

Given HSDD affects ~10% of premenopausal women in the US, our brand and campaign needed to tap into shared cultural experience and emotion. During our launch, millions of women defiantly demanded what they deserved as a part of the Time’s Up movement, cultivating a collective feeling of reclamation. We tapped into that emotion for the millions of women with HSDD who suffered in silence because they’d been told women don’t need to enjoy sex; that losing sexual desire is a natural part of aging and that it’s no big deal. We issued women a simple call-to-action: take. it. back.

Vyleesi was bound to make waves, so we launched the brand hours after Vyleesi’s PDUFA. We spanned digital advertising and social media with luxurious and sleek product visuals that announced Vyleesi was now approved for treatment of HSDD, taking inspiration from how consumer brands tease products, like the latest iPhone. We capitalized on this excitement by driving email sign-ups and allowed women to receive an advanced prescription through our telemedicine partner, PlushCare. Like pre-ordering a consumer product, Vyleesi seamlessly arrived at women’s doors in our Now Available phase.

For this phase, we launched the “Ghosted by Desire” film, which captured attention across online advertising, sponsored content and social media with bold imagery and kinetic text. We drove women to Vyleesi.com where they could evaluate their symptoms through a chat-style tool and get a prescription through telemedicine. Women prescribed Vyleesi could also watch a confidence-building dance-style injection training video.

“Ghosted by Desire” broke industry convention. Women on social media talked about how they had never seen a campaign like this before, and doctors couldn’t wait to share the news. Our campaign made our brand and a complicated condition memorable, generating 500K Vyleesi and HSDD-related searches online.

Additionally, the campaign created intrigue, attracting over 1 million visits to Vyleesi.com. Women were motivated to learn more, with 28K signing up for our email program.