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By Ishbel Macleod, PR and social media consultant

January 14, 2013 | 3 min read

Time to Change, the mental health anti-stigma programme run by the charities Mind and Rethink Mental Illness, has today announced the launch of a campaign that will combine TV advertising with print, digital and social media.

Running exclusively on Channel 4 for two weeks before being rolled out to other channels, the ‘It’s time to talk. It’s time to change’ campaign was devised and managed by MediaCom Beyond Advertising, with the creative produced by The Outfit.

Neil Murdoch, joint managing director of The Outfit, said: “The focus of the campaign is that it's often the little things that people can do that provide support and really make a difference. The TV spot and online films highlight that it can be easier to start that conversation than you think, it could be just texting regularly or as simple as putting the kettle on and finding the time to listen. We worked closely with Time to Change networks to cast people with some really inspiring stories, and often some very simple advice to help us find ways to make it easier to talk more openly about mental health.”

Last year, Time to Change collaborated with Channel 4 on their mental health season, 4 Goes Mad, and is now working with the channel as well as media owner IPC to show the bespoke digital content.

Features will run in IPC owned magazines such as Marie Claire, Now, Nuts, NME, Cycling Weekly and Rugby World; while radio stations Heart, XFM and Capital will also discuss the issue of mental health.

A radio advert featuring the voice of Gary Beadle will air from 21 January.

Time to Change director Sue Bakeradded: “Over the last year in particular we have started to see more people talk openly about mental health including high profile people disclosing their own experiences of mental health problems and recovery.

“We know that in order for us remove the stigma that still plagues this very common health issue, we need more conversations and to keep this momentum going. We have generations of misunderstanding and prejudice to overturn.

“We look forward to seeing the results of this new approach to co-creating the adverts in the house style of the media groups, but still based on the insights in our core target audience.”

Channel 4 Time To Change

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