Strategic Communication and Advocacy
Turning evidence into action, at scale and with speed
Communication and advocacy are critical public health competencies, too often underinvested in as crucial drivers of population health. We partner with governments, civil society and communities to detect the forces shaping public health, use rigor and evidence to direct campaigns that generate momentum for high-leverage change, and deploy campaigns that shift behavior and build public support for accelerated policy adoption.
Strategic Communication as Public Health Infrastructure
Data reveals what’s happening. Policy determines what should change. Strategic communication and advocacy are what it takes to generate the public support and political will that turn a policy idea into a lived reality for millions of people at a time. One of the things that differentiates Vital’s strategic communication work is a deep understanding of public health communication and health promotion units, and how civil society and ministries of health work together. We don’t just execute campaigns—we build strategic communication into government public health infrastructure itself. Take our long-standing tobacco control work in ten major countries: when we began, few had ever run a national media campaign. We partnered with each government to identify the resources and build the capacity to sustain one—annual budgets, health promotion levies, even new legislation. In 2025, those same ten countries spent more than $50 million worth of air time to tobacco control efforts.
How it Works
Detect
We use media monitoring and industry tracking to identify the most important trends, as close to real time as possible.
Direct
We use behavioral intelligence, audience research and message testing to sharpen strategy for effective campaigns.
Deploy
Reaching the right people, with the right message, at the right time—from broadcast media to creator-led campaigns.
Detect
We monitor the information environment—social media, industry tactics, public sentiment—to identify what’s driving harmful behaviors and where the openings for change exist.
Our work includes both Canary!–a digital monitoring service that led to new national protections for children in Indonesia–and STOP–which exposed tobacco industry influence tactics that led to hearings at the European Parliament .
Canary!
Canary! is an AI- and expert-powered system we have developed to scan social media for hidden threats, such as the promotion of harmful commodities or mis- and disinformation.
STOP
STOP, our global industry-monitoring network, exposes tobacco industry interference through research, strategic communication and partnerships—giving governments and institutions the intelligence to build industry-resistant policy.
Direct
We gather behavioral intelligence to develop, test and sharpen a strategy—before a campaign launches and after it lands.
Much of this critical work happens inside our Behavioral Insights Lab. From overdose prevention to road safety, experts at the Lab generate insights and evaluations that have shaped campaigns in 30+ countries, with 100+ publications built alongside experts in low- and middle-income countries as co-authors and partners.
Behavioral Insights Lab
Life-saving solutions fail when the behavioral insights to make them work are missing. Our Behavioral Insights Lab applies social and behavioral science to generate timely analysis and decision-ready insights that strengthen policy advocacy and communication. Before a campaign or rollout of a policy, it reveals why people behave as they do, what will move them, and whether the investment will deliver impact—so partners can assess how to maximize return before committing resources. After deployment, it evaluates what the campaign changed, and those findings sharpen the next round of the strategy.
Deploy
With our partners, experts at our Vital Strategies Media Studio have deployed 750+ campaigns in 140+ countries, across more than a dozen pressing public health issues.
In India, Vital-supported quit-tobacco campaigns achieved a quit at less than $3 each—proof that behavior change at population scale doesn’t require population-scale budgets. In Brazil, the “Right to Know” campaign generated 741 million+ views on the way to securing front-of-package warning labels—turning a regulatory fight into a fight the public could see and support.
Vital Strategies Media Studio
Vital Strategies Media Studio designs emotionally resonant, culturally grounded campaigns that spark change—blending creator-led content with trusted traditional media to reach audiences across budget sizes and platforms. We emphasize working in coalition with local leaders and communities with lived experience to create strategic communications campaigns that break through noise and generate momentum for public health.
News & Resources
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Data Systems and Public Health Intelligence
We support governments and civil society partners to strengthen surveillance systems, build local data capacity and apply AI and digital tools to data collection. This evidence anchors policy and program decisions in the lived reality of populations.
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Policy Solutions
We support governments to identify priorities, design cost-effective policies and sustain them through the policy processes it takes to pass and defend them. This work has secured food warning labels, health taxes and smoke-free laws covering millions of people.
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Strategic Communication and Advocacy
We support governments and civil society to treat strategic communication as a core public health competency. This builds the public trust and political will that turn evidence into action, and action into policy that lasts.
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