Cycle against suicide: The creation of a community-based social marketing programme to promote mental health in Ireland

Many social marketing programmes aiming to promote sustainable behaviour change are based around information-intensive campaigns and rely heavily or exclusively on media advertising (McKenzie-Mohr 2013). However, a community-based social marketing (CBSM) approach (McKenzie-Mohr 2000) is not only an attractive alternative to ‘expert-driven’ solutions but can also be used in conjunction with other behaviour change tools and involve local communities in the co-delivery of programmes. Community-based interventions involve multiple, often simultaneously implemented, levels of interventions or ‘programmes’ (as opposed to a single intervention such as individual psychotherapy). The main advantages of a CBSM approach are its cultivation of the community’s local 433knowledge, its efficient and effective use of a community’s resources and its empowerment of the community in the process of social change.