The evolution of loveLife

loveLife’s ‘Talk about it’ campaign was launched in 1999 to introduce the organisation to South Africa. The campaign was designed to spark discussion and inculcate a sense of talking among South Africans. It evolved through several phases and sub-campaigns, culminating in a call to action for people to face up to HIV and highlighting young people who had done just that in 2007.

However, loveLife believes that basic behaviour change cannot be achieved by media campaigns alone – and so one-on-one connections and programmes are used to unpack the overarching messaging contained in the campaigns.

1999 - 2002:
The ‘Talk about it’ campaign launched with ‘foreplay’ billboards featuring celebrities to get people talking, progressing with provocative statements and questions to keep the conversation going. The message moved on to say HIV infection messes up your future – but it doesn’t have to be part of your future.

1999	2000
2001
2002

2003:
Making the connection between risky sexual behaviour and HIV infection.

2003-2004: ‘2010 Love to be there’

In 2003, South Africa decided that it was going to bid for the 2010 Soccer World Cup^TM. This sub-campaign was designed to get young people excited and motivated to be around to witness the first World Cup^TM on African soil, encouraging youth to make concrete choices about their lives and futures.

2003	2004

2005: Get attitude

The promotion of a go-getter type attitude for individuals and society – a nation determined to prevent new HIV infection.

2006: HIV: Fact it!

When it became clear than many South Africans had still not faced up to HIV, we issued a stark call to confront HIV (Face it!) and take action. loveLife set about keeping people focused on the primary sexual behaviours driving the HIV epidemic in the country with a fresh creative treatment, zeroing in on the tough issues of faithfulness, protection, testing, peer pressure, and talking to your children about sex, sexuality and gender relations. We also renewed the call to parents to talk to their children about sex. loveLife portrayed young people who had taken action – who would not be pressured into sex, who were intolerant of partners sleeping around, who protected each other and who knew where they stood with HIV by regular testing.

2007: loveLife generation

These young people were part of ‘the don’t want HIV generation’ and the ‘loveLife generation’ – a movement our billboards were encouraging all youth to become a part of.

2008: ‘Make YOUR Move’

loveLife’s campaign shifted to a more integrated approach to prevention in 2008, focusing on the tolerance-of-risk as the main cause of the epidemic . Young people know about HIV; we needed to address the social determinants of the epidemic. At the heart of this strategic shift is the belief that young people need to feel complete to navigate daily pressures and social expectations and make their move.

But, to make their move, young people must first believe they can and know who they are. The campaign was therefore built on three key pillars: To build young people’s sense of identity and self-worth; encourage them to look for and seize opportunities rather than waiting for opportunity to come to them (personal initiative); and develop a whole cohort of young people connecting with one another and within networks to become leaders in their own right and join the mainstream of society.

The campaign was unrolled through TV and radio Public Service Announcements (PSAs) in four distinct phases, and unpacked in loveLife’s various media platforms. Each phase posed tough questions, without providing the answers, to spark an internal dialogue within young people:

1. “Who are you?” was geared to getting young people to look within themselves and question their identity.
2. “Do you disappear without your gear?” aimed to get young people to think about who they are beyond the material – it’s not what you have, but who you are (self-worth).
3. “Who are you without your crew?” addressed the issue of peer pressure, asking young people to think of themselves beyond their ‘friends’ and negative influences.
4. “I am somebody!” provided a conclusion to the questions that were asked in the first three PSAs. It highlighted the individual’s resolve to move beyond negativity and constraints to realise their worth and make their move.