You’ve got a good idea – which you want to share – in the hope that your audience will act differently – given the eye-opening information you’re about to give them.

Seems simple? And it’s the basic premise of marketing. Tell people about your product – dress it up nicely – make it fit into your audience’s lifestyle – and away you go. With a commercial product that’s great – it’s a simple proposition – buy into the brand – buy the product – try it out – and, if you like what you get, buy it again.

When it comes to changing opinions, habits and culture, it’s not so simple. Straightforward marketing can raise some interest – but just having a message isn’t enough. After all what’s the product? What is your audience actually buying?

Take the public sector. They have a lot of difficult ideas they want to communicate to make the world a better place. Let’s say business – there’s a whole organisation dedicated to business support – Business Link. So when they want to influence change in a business market, they can market the idea – but anyone interested can find out more by contacting Business Link?

Business Link is the product. But what happens if there isn’t a product – when there’s no clear call-to-action? The marketing can’t refer you to any product – it has to become the product itself. One example is the ‘Just say No’ campaign, designed to keep young people off drugs.

Instead of communicating a worthy message – it just came across as telling kids what to do. And there’s nothing the average Brit hates more than being told what to do. As individuals we want to make up our own mind – especially when we’re thinking about doing something new.

And how do we do that? By trying things out – through experience. With the “Just say No” campaign, many people tempted to try out and experience the drugs for themselves, actually found it was an enjoyable experience – totally contra to the message in fact – so there was, at best, confusion or, at worst, no hesitancy in ignoring both it and the negative impacts of drug-taking as well.

The campaign certainly raised the issues of drug abuse, but it was costly and there is still a debate about how effective it was – especially in relation to the budget.

On the other hand, today’s ‘Talk to Frank’ campaign is much more relevant. The message matches the audience’s thoughts. Instead of preaching it provides a space to explore.

The Talk to Frank website, puts forward the facts about drug taking - both good and bad. There’s a bit of a negative slant, but it tries not to moralise, and people can make up their own mind – their attitude towards drugs is their choice – they’re empowered and they own the decision – so it’s much more powerful.

The key difference between the two approaches is that there is a product behind the message. A product like Business Link costs millions to run each year - a product like Talk to Frank, a fraction of the budget.

And that’s the beauty of online. If your idea is really that good – other people will get it and they’ll want to take it on as their own idea – so you’ll achieve the change you’re looking for. You just have to present them with the space to take that decision for themselves.

Of course, you need to present the information in a way the audience can connect with – but that, as they say, a whole different discussion…