Marketing HIV Prevention for Heterosexually Identified Latino Men Who Have Sex with Men and Women: The Hombres Sanos Campaign

Abstract

This article describes the development process of Hombres Sanos, a social marketing campaign to promote HIV testing and condom use for heterosexually identified Latino men who have sex with men and women. The steps included qualitative formative research and a social marketing analytic framework to understand our target audience better, identify incentives and barriers to risk reduction, guide product development, define an optimal promotional campaign, and inform the selection of campaign platforms. A better grasp of the authors' target beneficiaries' needs and values led to an innovative dual strategy for audience segmentation and targeting. The campaign had consumer-centered, culturally sensitive, and theory-driven communication materials. The authors found communication materials and events to be appealing and effective. The campaign was well received among the wider community, and evaluation showed promising results among Latino men in general and among heterosexually identified Latino men who have sex with men and women in particular. The authors provide a step-by-step overview of the project's formative research, including research methods and findings, and how these were translated into a social marketing campaign. In addition, the authors discuss the challenges encountered in this process and the potential of social marketing to reduce HIV risk among Latinos.

Acknowledgments

This research (approved by the San Diego State University Institutional Review Board) was supported by a grant (#AL04-SDSUF-804 and #AL04-VCC-805) awarded to Dr. Martínez-Donate and Mr. Sañudo from the California HIV/AIDS Research Program, University of California.

The authors thank the many individuals who participated in the focus groups and in-depth interviews, those who participated in community testing of the campaign materials, and their talented graphic designers, Ashley Kerns and Luis Shriner.