INFLUENCING
YOUNG ADULTS
WITHOUT
PREACHING.
Ten years of partnership. Nationwide impact. The campaign that proved public health messaging can be both influential and relatable.
THE CHALLENGE
Young adults have heard every warning there is. They can spot an institution talking down to them from the other side of a room, and sexual health is exactly the subject where being talked down to makes people stop listening.
The HSE needed them to listen anyway. The job was to say serious things about risk without preaching, to an audience that switches off the second you start.
THE APPROACH
Go where they already are, and sound like a person.
That meant campuses rather than campaigns. Partnerships with third levels across the country, roadshows that made the subject ordinary instead of awkward, and content written in the language of the audience rather than the language of a health body.
Humour does most of the work. Not jokes about the subject, but a tone that treats people as adults who can handle it. Nobody takes advice from someone who seems to think less of them.
THE WORK
Campus Activations & Roadshows
Nationwide educational roadshows brought sexual health conversations directly to third-level students. Interactive experiences, honest discussions, and resources that felt helpful rather than judgmental. Each activation was designed to break down barriers and open up conversations that students might not have elsewhere.
The approach worked because it met young adults where they were, both physically and emotionally. No lecturing. No scare tactics. Just real talk about real health decisions, delivered in a way that respected their intelligence and autonomy.
Content That Connects
Strategic content across owned and social channels spoke directly to young adults in their language. Social media campaigns balanced humour with important health messages. Educational content was shareable, relatable, and actually useful.
The content strategy evolved over a decade, adapting to changing platforms, shifting cultural conversations, and new health priorities. What remained constant was the commitment to authenticity and the refusal to talk down to the audience.
THE RESULTS
We have been doing it for ten years.
That is the result worth reporting. A public body does not keep an agency for a decade out of habit, and the work has widened over that time from sexual health into drug awareness, addiction services, cancer control and healthy eating.
We are not going to claim health outcomes. Nobody can honestly attribute a change in someone’s behaviour to a campus roadshow, and public health has enough of that already. What we can say is that young adults engaged with it, which is the hard part, and that the HSE asked us back every year.
How to work with us
Tell us what you’re trying to change
Thirty minutes with us, in our place or on a call. We work out what the problem really is, and whether an Audit is the right next step.
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