Ken McCray, a pastor in Danville, Illinois, and his wife were not vaccinated against COVID-19 when they traveled to a nephew’s wedding, he explains in a public service announcement.
“That resulted in my wife passing,” McCray said. “That resulted in me being in the hospital for three weeks. If we had received the vaccination prior to contracting COVID, I am fully confident things would have come out differently.”
The pastor has since gotten the vaccine and agreed to participate in the On the Fence campaign.
The state of Illinois hopes stories from McCray and 17 other residents who were once hesitant to get the vaccine will resonate with people still not vaccinated more than a year after the shots became available.
“Some of the earlier work that the state of Illinois and other government entities across the country did was really focus on getting that initial group vaccinated,” said Joe Raser, director of brand strategy at Schafer Condon Carter, a Chicago-based agency that worked on the campaign. “As we got later into the pandemic, one of the things we learned from research is that the most motivating messengers were, yes, [from] doctors and public health officials, but also people who had personal experience with COVID.”
On the Fence is the fourth COVID-19 vaccination campaign that Illinois hired Schafer Condon Carter and TimeZoneOne, an agency with a Chicago office, to create. The federal government provided funding for the latest campaign, according to the agencies.
Sixty-six percent of Illinois residents are fully vaccinated, and that number has slowly increased in recent months.
Among the 15% of adults in the United States who have not gotten at least one dose of the vaccine, about half said they had not been vaccinated because they were concerned about possible side effects, according to a December Household Pulse Survey from the Census Bureau. The other most common reasons among respondents, who could pick more than one, were that they didn’t trust the vaccines and didn’t trust the government.
“This campaign is about bringing the facts to life and following the data and science,” said Daniel Thomas, CEO of TimeZoneOne. “This campaign is really targeted around communities that are struggling with disinformation.”
For the campaign, the agencies and a production company, Tessa Films, interviewed people in their homes and workplaces around the state.
“We really wanted to bring people’s personal stories and have a sense of realness with the campaign. No studios. No actors. No marketing or PR spin,” said Thomas, who also worked on Illinois’ Greatest Gift vaccination campaign during the holiday season.
The On the Fence PSA featuring the pastor was released last month, and the campaign producers plan to release testimonials each month through June. The campaign will run in English and Spanish and on cable, broadcast and connected TV; streaming audio and radio; billboards and bus shelters; digital display and video; and print and social media.
Another video features Shannon, a nurse who shared that she has not returned to work 14 months after becoming sick with COVID.
“I think there’s a lot of skepticism about COVID being real, and I can tell you that it’s very real,” she said. “If you’re on the fence, get vaccinated.”
