Question

Background of community services program: The Youth Parenting Program (YPP) is a new program for young mothers and fathers to provide them with skills to look after their new baby, for example:   Care of the baby   Health of the baby   Feeding   Breast feeding vs bottle feeding   Financial planning and assistance   Returning to school or entering/returning to the workplace Participants of the program may be self-referred or may be referred by health and community services practitioners. The target audience are parents aged under 25 who do not have support of family to help them in the early days of their baby’s life and are at risk. The aim of the program is to increase the level of knowledge of young parents in parenting and to reduce the incidence of neglect and violence towards children. The program runs for six sessions held on Tuesdays and Thursdays 2-4pm. Clients receive a phone and face to face interview prior to the program, and also receive follow-up support following the program. Suitable arrangements will be made for clients who need assistance with language or literacy. Digital media protocols for the organisation include:   All digital media strategies must be approved by the Media and Advertising Section before implementation   The following digital media platforms may be used for this organisation: -         Website -         LinkedIn -         Facebook -         Twitter -         You Tube -         Applications for mobile device   All digital media must be in line with the goals and objectives of the organisation and the program for which it is written.

As the YPP is a new program, a strategy is needed to provide information and promote the program to potential clients of the service. Challenges have been identified as:

•   Gaining the interest of the target interest
•   Using a media that the audience will access
•   Significant diversity in culture and ethnicity of target audience.

Using the template provided, develop a digital media strategy for promoting the program to young parents or potential young parents at risk.

questions

DIGITAL MEDIA STRATEGY FOR PROMOTION OF THE YOUTH PARENTING PROGRAM (YPP) TO TARGET CLIENTS

Statement of purpose: This digital media strategy has been prepared for the Youth Parenting Program to promote effective digital media communication to promote the program to young parents or expectant parents at risk in the community. It will do this by: (List at least two things)

Answer 1

For parenting programs to achieve a public health impact, it is necessary to increase the public awareness of the existence of these programs and to promote parental participation.

First strategy-

Marketing low intensity versions- of parenting programs can be particularly beneficial. It will not only increase the general awareness of the availability of parenting programs, but also reduce the stigma associated with using psychological interventions.

As participating parents become more familiar with how parenting programs work, they will feel more comfortable asking for further help or using other similar services if necessary.In addition, a greater number of parents can be served at a lower cost, as low intensity programs are often delivered in the form of large groups. Therefore, it becomes more feasible to direct prevention- and treatment-related activities toward all individuals rather than only toward those most disadvantaged and to produce more long-lasting positive effects consequently. Finally, creating more demand for the programs can in turn facilitate the adoption of the programs by a higher number of health providers.

Second strategy-

Promotion of positive child development -when the aim is to increase the number of parents who participate in universal parenting programs, highlighting the benefits of participation by focusing on how the program may promote positive child development is likely to be more effective.

Although fear-based, negative, messages are popular in health communication (e.g., health warning messages on cigarette packages), recent meta-analyses have suggested that alternative approaches should be considered, as negative messages per se are not likely to produce desirable behaviour change . Our findings indicate that in case of parenting programs, different approaches may be most effective for different purposes. When the aim is to attain public attention and increase the general awareness of the availability of parenting programs, emphasizing how program participation may help decreasing the potential negative child outcomes is somehow more effective