Years of sun exposure causes actinic keratosis, or AK—precancerous skin lesions.

Although millions of people have AK, few have heard of it.

AK is treatable with just 2 or 3 doses of Picato®, an effective topical gel. But patients haven’t heard about Picato®, either.

We needed to help patients connect with the urgency to treat AK with Picato®.

In addition, regulatory restricted use of the word “precancerous” to define AK in promotion of Picato® created a greater challenge to medicalize the condition.

The solution was the Picato® Visible Patch campaign, which transports patients back in the sun with a compelling revelation — their years in the sun may have put them at risk for AK.

We spoke directly to consumers through a multichannel approach: a consumer website, banner ads, a journal ad, patient brochures for the waiting room, and a 60-second cable TV commercial. Each campaign element promotes the urgency of the disease and compels consumers to get an AK assessment from their physician and to ask for Picato® by name.

A transmedia approach was orchestrated to give our audience maximum exposure to AK and Picato®. With the highest ad retention of any medium and the ability to reach a broad audience, cable TV was selected as the first medium to launch the campaign, followed by digital and print tactics.

The cable TV spot aired January 1, 2014, in target cities including Columbia, SC; Champaign, Springfield, and Decatur, IL; Columbus, OH; and Tulsa, OK. The commercial will continue to air for the duration of the first quarter of 2014.

Digital elements such as banner ads targeted consumers in Lubbock, TX ,and Evansville, IN, in addition to the cities listed above. The consumer site for Picato® is accessible nationally.

Print journal ads will run nationally until April 2014, and sales representative-delivered patient brochures for the waiting room are also available nationally.

Within one week of the commercial airing in target cities, sales representatives for Picato® found greater brand recognition among physicians, and patients were asking their doctors for Picato®.

In the first month (January 2014) that the commercial and digital campaign launched, total visits to Picato.com increased by over 550% compared to the average monthly visits in the 4th quarter of 2013.

Specifically, in the markets where the commercial and digital campaigns launched, traffic to Picato.com climbed from an average of 92 visits per month to 3,977 — a 4,300% increase.