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Dear Colleagues,

Next week, CDC will begin airing Tips From Former Smokers™ (Tips™) campaign advertisements on national television, in magazines and online. The campaign features hard-hitting ads from previous years that focus on health issues caused or made worse by smoking or exposure to secondhand smoke. These include conditions such as throat and lung cancer, heart attack, stroke, periodontal disease, asthma, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The ads will begin running on January 9^th.

Please take a moment to review the following information to learn more about the campaign and how you can help support it. We hope these resources will help your planning efforts and further support people in your own community who want to quit.

Key Messages

Attached is a set of key campaign messages to help you discuss and describe the media campaign to your various constituencies.

Campaign Overview

Attached is a brief summary document that provides an overview of the 2017 Tips campaign.

Social/Digital Media Activities: We Need Your Help!

OSH is planning social and digital media activities for the campaign launch.

• Here’s an easy way to show support for the 2017 campaign. We have provided a zip file and the attached Partner Guide that includes ideas and resources to help show your support for the campaign. On January 9^th, please use the Proud Support of Tips image included as a temporary profile image on your social media platforms. You can also post this or any of the other attached images on your social media pages the day of the launch encouraging fans and followers to proudly celebrate and champion the campaign.  

• To take advantage of all the activities OSH has planned on our social media profiles, you may wish to “like” and “follow” CDC Tobacco Free on Facebook and Twitter and subscribe to the Tips From Former Smokers playlist on YouTube. Doing so allows you to receive and share status updates and profile updates as they are posted.

• We’ve included campaign images along with recommended copy in the Partner Guide for Facebook and Twitter. The content celebrates the 6^th anniversary of the Tips From Former Smokers campaign and highlights the impact it has had over the years.

On January 9^th, a feature article, “Tips™ Campaign: Still a Best Buy for Public Health” - will be available on CDC.gov.  This article profiles a variety of Tips campaign participants who have appeared in ads over the years. An e-mail will be sent on January 9^th with a live link to the article. This feature also includes helpful, free quitting resources. Please be sure to send this article to the members of your listservs.

The OSH features page also provides a convenient link to the CDC feature article as well as to quitting resources and social media tools.

Materials for Public Health Professionals, Health Care Providers,
Faith Leaders, and Military-Serving Organizations

The campaign offers many free resources for public health professionals to help educate people about the dangers of smoking.

• Download Tips print ads, including posters available in English and Spanish, and place them in community locations, including healthcare settings, to reach smokers.

• Use matte articles for placement in your organization's newsletters.

Health Care Providers can help their patients quit. Tips ads may inspire some of your smoking patients to think about quitting. For those patients who are ready to quit, you can be the motivation they need to become former smokers themselves. There are many resources available:

• A fact sheet about Tips and how health care professionals can get involved and support patients.

• A handout for patients giving “Reasons to Quit Smoking”.

• A printable, pocket-size intervention card lists steps for conducting a brief tobacco intervention with your patients.

Faith leaders play an important role in fighting tobacco use. There are specific resources for your audiences that can help members of your community quit smoking for good.

• Faith-Based Fact Sheets provide information about tobacco use in your state.

• The faith-based webinar, ‘It Takes Faith - Addressing Tobacco Use within the Faith Community’ features presentations from national faith leaders; those working in health ministry; and the CDC.

Military members and veterans need support to quit smoking. Now is the time to promote smoking cessation to military members. You can help with these and other resources.

• TRICARE is dedicated to helping users quit tobacco and live a healthier life with Tobacco Cessation

• A Department of Defense-sponsored website offers free help for those of you who are on active duty or who are retired at Quit Tobacco-UCanQuit2.org

Tips Web Site Resources

CDC.gov/tips has comprehensive resources for you to use and promote, including:

• Biographies and additional interviews with the ad participants

• Overviews of the health conditions featured in the campaign

• Spanish-language content

• “I’m Ready to Quit” practical tips for quitting smoking

• Web badges to post on your site to link readers to the compelling personal stories on the Tips Web site

• Printable Tips ads to hang in your workplace

Materials From the Tips From Former Smokers Download Center

Access free materials at plowsharegroup.com/cdctips. These include low-resolution TV ads, radio, online, print, and out-of-home ads; and public service announcements.

CDC’s Media Campaign Resource Center (MCRC)

CDC.gov/tobacco/MCRC offers broadcast-quality Tips ads and other tobacco countermarketing ads for paid campaigns.

We hope these products and tools will assist your efforts to promote the 2017 Tips From Former Smokers campaign. If you have additional questions about the 2017 Tips campaign, please contact TobaccoMediaCampaign@cdc.gov.

Sincerely,
CDC’s Office of Smoking and Health