Today I went to the 34th Annual Meeting of the Healthcare Planning and Marketing Society of New Jersey. I was particularly happy to be there because Saint Peter’s University Hospital, one of our longtime clients was receiving an award for the best outdoor advertising campaign. The outdoor execution that won was part of a larger campaign including TV, Video and print created by my partner Niles Wolfson, and his longtime creative crony, Chez Pari. The TV component of the campaign featured a 30 second spot with real babies popping out of an animated cabbage patch while making cute baby noises. The background voice said: “Now there’s new hope in the field of fertility. The national Gianna Center for women’s health and fertility…a member of Saint Peter’s Healthcare System”. You can see it here: https://player.vimeo.com/video/174867290 I am telling you all of this to illustrate a point. The point is that good advertising has to be different. It has to make you step back and take notice. In this environment, the advertising of many healthcare systems looks alike. What’s the point of that? I am grateful that our clients give us the latitude to creatively stretch and differentiate them. It’s not always the safe choice, and sometimes it’s easier to go the safe route and stay under the radar. However, if you want your organization to grow, you are eventually going to have to put yourself out there. Safety works for only so long, and eventually it will come back and bite you. No matter what business you are in, survey the environment. Look at what your competitors are doing. What is their message platform? How do they portray themselves? Do they have a point of differentiation? What do their communications look and feel like? Do this review on a quarterly basis. Make a spreadsheet that chronicles what you find. Then…find that little nugget…that differentiator that you can claim that also solves a problem for your audience. Put the message out there in a way that is visually different from your competition. It sounds elementary right? Have you done it lately?