Responses to a Social Media Campaign Promoting Safe Fish Consumption Among Women

We used a framework to systematically evaluate which Facebook advertisements promoting safe fish consumption increased traffic to our website. Keeping images and headlines constant, we tested 11 message types in 5 categories between 2 audiences over a 24-hour weekday period. We identified clear preferences in 9 of 10 comparisons and evidence to suggest that more women prefer presentation of question format compared with narratives, marketing compared with patient education copy, and uncertain compared with certain copy. Our test of messages on a social media platform is a quick and inexpensive way to select the most engaging public health messages for broad dissemination.