Enhancing health by means of massive open online courses in Social Marketing in action: cases from around the world

Abstract

The current case study refers to a project that attempted to develop a social marketing plan to enhance engagement in co-creation of a series of massive open online courses (MOOCs). The purpose of the social marketing plan was to encourage several target groups (people with diabetes, pregnant women and breastfeeding mothers, the elderly, children, and teenagers), in select countries (Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Holland, Ireland, Italy, Spain, and Sweden) to co-create massive open online courses (MOOCs) for public benefit. With the aim of implementing suitable promotional strategies for each target group in every country, a survey was carried out, and so, the structure of the social marketing problem was described as a planning process whose antecedents were three key variables: digital literacy, health literacy, and digital health literacy. The most successful recruitment methods were implemented by the national coordinators, who played a crucial role in promoting engagement in the co-creation activities. In the end, this social marketing plan was useful in helping to promote and improve e-health literacy for the sake of the “European dream.”