Cochlear

Extending the Reach of a National Media Win to Build Widespread Understanding of a New Hearing Technology

By matching a moving video of a young boy hearing for the first time with his Cochlear Nexa™ smart implant with strategically selected national media targets, Linhart spurred a viral story that helped Cochlear reach more than 1 billion people with a message of hope – and a new solution – for other families navigating hearing loss.

Challenge

To help reach and educate potential cochlear implant recipients, as well as their families and caregivers, Cochlear was looking to create a breakthrough media moment around the first major development in cochlear implant technology in 20 years: the new Cochlear™ Nucleus® Nexa™ System, the world’s only smart cochlear implant. Nexa allows recipients to access future innovations through firmware updates that happen automatically on their implants, redefining lifelong hearing care.

Strategy

When Linhart watched one of the first Nexa recipients hear clearly for the first time with the help of his new device via a video captured by his hearing health clinic, the team knew it had discovered something special. Linhart and Cochlear developed a focused media outreach strategy capable of catapulting the authentically joyful and moving clip into virality and driving widespread awareness of the benefits of cochlear implants.

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Execution

Pitch materials included the device activation/hearing video, key product messaging and details surrounding the recipient’s heartwarming hearing journey to maximize the current moment. We then customized outreach to specific national broadcast outlets and segments that feature uplifting people stories. The team also decided to share the raw, unedited video footage that captured the moments before and after the device was activated for the first time, allowing producers to exercise their own creative discretion and fill time parameters as needed.

1B+

impressions

Tens of millions of video views and shares across Instagram and TikTok

PR Daily Award finalist in the Media Pitch category

Results

The approach resulted in a tearjerking Morning Boost segment during the first and most-watched hour of the TODAY Show that showed the video and named the new smart cochlear implant system. The piece also mentioned the technology upgrade was needed after years of wearing hearing aids that were no longer delivering sound clarity to the recipient due to his progressive hearing loss.

The Morning Boost segment then generated:

163 stories on NBC stations from coast to coast for a total audience of 2.28M+.
9 stories in Oklahoma where the recipient is from, plus Newsbreak syndications for 30.4M+ impressions, and cochlear implant inquiries to his Oklahoma hearing clinic.
Tens of millions of views and shares across Instagram and TikTok due to TODAY posting the story and video to its social channels.
A USA Today feature, syndicated to Yahoo! Life and AOL, for a total of 542M+ impressions.
A showing during the American Cochlear Implant Alliance Conference that received widespread positive feedback from hearing professionals.
This work has been recognized by the PR Daily Awards as a finalist in the Media Pitch category.

The final result? More than 1B impressions and a story that resonated with and touched the hearts of many. Watch the young boy hearing with Nexa here: https://www.today.com/video/young-boy-has-emotional-reaction-to-hearing-for-the-first-time-260995141630

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