Speak with a midwife encourages woman to book an appointment with a midwife as soon as they find out their pregnant and was co-produced with local woman representative of our diverse communities. The campaign launched across West Yorkshire and Harrogate on 18 September 2023. 
The West Yorkshire and Harrogate Local Maternity and Neonatal System (WY&H LMNS) is promoting maternity (also known as antenatal) care beginning at the earliest stage of pregnancy so women can be given the information and support they need to have a healthy pregnancy. Read more here.
Background
Speak with a midwife is driven by local data and insight to inform and ensure the campaign is meaningful, representative, and impactful across West Yorkshire and Harrogate. This will be delivered without blame or judgement. We will be respectful of local beliefs, understanding, and cultures as we endeavour to find out the potential incentives or motivations that would encourage more booking by 10 weeks of pregnancy. The campaign messages will be informed by pregnant people and will be positive, inclusive, and accessible to online and offline audiences.
Aim of the campaign
● Develop a local promotional campaign to encourage more pregnant people to be seen by a midwife within 10 weeks of pregnancy.
● This will promote antenatal care beginning at the earliest opportunity and sharing information to support pregnant people to have a healthy pregnancy.
Campaign creatives included digital screens, posters, infographics and real life photography.
Survey findings: Participant feedback
- There was overall positive feedback for the general look and feel of the campaign. Messaging: The ‘when’ message is strong - people understood the importance of booking to see a midwife in early pregnancy, and by how many weeks. The survey findings indicate the ‘how’ message may need developing further - the results indicated lower numbers of people who understood the booking process, and we had many comments on the survey linked to this. This may be because of the variations in process between different areas and practices. Our findings could indicate this is an important area of messaging to consider to address a potential barrier to women booking that early appointment.
- The primary platform that the ads have been successful on is Facebook. On Facebook, these ads have mainly been appearing on the feed placement such as the video feed. This shows the importance of using video content and the potential impact of video content.
- The ads were successful in reaching a high proportion of our target audience and encouraging them to engage, therefore driving traffic to the landing page.
Limitations
- The budget is optimal for this audience size as shown through the frequency result. An increase in budget would’ve likely resulted in an increase in frequency, which would cause creative fatigue.
- The budget was front-loaded to allow for insight gathering and user testing, but this was a limitation when it came to roll out of the campaign on a regional scale.