Before the opioid crisis fully took hold, Mallinckrodt was aiming to launch a pair of abuse-deterrent acute pain products, XARTEMIS XR and TAURGO XR.
We were tasked to create a prelaunch campaign that brought awareness to the growing problem while informing prescribers of the risks of their habitual prescribing patterns (as well as elevating the unmet need(s) in the acute pain space).
In response, we came up with an ambigram (a word, art form, or other symbolic representation whose elements retain meaning when viewed or interpreted from a different direction, perspective, or orientation). Ours reads “relief” when viewed right side up, but from another perspective we see “abuse” is directly tied to the benefit (no matter how much we want to ignore the problem). The client said it gave them “chills”. We ended up titling the campaign, Turn the Conversation.
Using journal ads, animated banner ads, email campaigns, and direct mailers, we drove viewers to a landing page with statistics and KOL videos about the issue. We even created a conference booth with a spinning ambigram to grab attendees’ attention, hoping to get them “hooked” on the idea of an abuse-deterrent option.