PR Friend Press Releases

Brussels, 15 October 2009 – HELPISODES EU launches provocative, audacious and humorous anti-smoking campaign

Media promotion page: www.helpers-eu.com/press

As part of the HELP For a life without tobacco campaign a new and innovative animated web series called Helpisodes has been developed. The viral campaign is aimed at enhancing the reach of the campaign amongst young people raising their awareness of tobacco issues.

The development of Helpisodes continues the participative strategy of the HELP campaign in 2009 and will be reinforced by the use of conversational and community sites such as Facebook and Bebo. A partnership with the Daily Motion video site also plays an integral role in the campaign.

In order to ensure the relevance and pertinence of Helpisodes to its audience the concept and development of them was carried out in cooperation with a variety of European Youth Organisations who are partners of the HELP Campaign.

A total of 12 Helpisodes have been created. Each episode is one and half minutes long with the exception of the pilot which introduces the main characters (Helpers) and how they came to be together and were transformed into anti-smoking super heroes. Each Helpisode will show a young European confronted with a tobacco related issue. In order to get help, they call on an efficient and determined trio of Helpers. To assist them, the three heroes will successfully offer original and crazy solutions to the problem.

The Helpisodes operation will be provocative and audacious, in order to capture the attention of todays increasingly fickle young audience. The humorous shock tactics and quirky graphics, are common currency in web operations, which employ a freedom of expression and humour which are a world apart from traditional TV campaigns.

The aim of these absurd and, above all, humorous Helpisodes is to communicate with young people in a language they understand and appreciate, making them aware of tobacco issues and improving their connection to the Help message, and then leading them to real tips and advice available on the main Help website.

The series is closely tied into, and reinforces, the HELP Campaigns tips to quit strategy, with each Helpisode showing an absurd tip, addressing one of the key themes of the Help campaign: prevention, cessation and passive smoking, and will finish by leading the Internet user to real tips available on help-eu.com

Over the course of 2009 young people across Europe have been contributing their own video tips to quit, either directly through the HELP website or at roadshow events across the European Union. In the UK the HELP Roadshow attended a number of youth and sports orientated events including NASS (an action sports and music festival), the British Beach Volleyball championships and the Edinburgh Marathon.

The web-series will be hosted on the Help website, in a specific section entirely dedicated to the Helpisodes campaign. This section will display the content in a simplified and intuitive structure: one very long page which immediately shows all the available content – increasingly popular on websites for young people.

The Helpisodes (and mini-site) are launched on 15 October 2009 and will be broadcast until September 2010.

Further information

Pictures of the Helpers: attached. For more images or video content please contact us (details below)

Website: http://en.helpers-eu.com Media promotion site : www.helpers-eu.com/press

Press contact

Kestrel Worldcom (UK)

Niall Dologhan or Naomi van Moppes

Tel : +44 208 789 2587

e-mail : n.dologhan@kestrelcomms.co.uk

Ligaris Europe (Brussels)

Emile Clemens

Tel +32 647 24 00 – +32 475 71 37 70

e-mail: e.clemens@ligaris.eu

HELP For a life without tobacco

The HELP For a life without tobacco campaign of the European Commission aims at convincing people not to start or to quit smoking with a TV and Web campaign and different activities in the 27 European Member States. The press releases, press kits, logo and images from the HELP campaign can be downloaded from the Web site www.help-eu.com Login: help Password: pressdesk

WebChat TV

On Friday 16th October the Help Campaign will be broadcasting a live WebChat featuring Professor Gerard Hastings, Director of the Intstitute for Social Marketing, and Alison Walsh, Youth Presenter and Advisor for Quit, an independent charity which helps smokers to stop. The interactive web chat invites viewers to contact the show with questions and their own stop smoking tips. It will be broadcast at 3pm at www.webchats.tv and relayed on a number of other youth related websites.

Note

Neither the European Commission nor any person acting on behalf of the Commission is responsible for the use which might be made of this information

Washington, USA, April 10th, 2009 – Whenever you are smoking addictively you should understand that you are mostly doing it as a form of leverage to your actual feelings and intentions. So when you are smoking after a meal, when you feel bored or lethargic, feeling stressed, nervous or anxious, these are sure signs that you are abusing your emotions by suppressing them through smoking. Toy with ideas where you can replace smoking with something healthier in order to take off the edge of the uncomfortable feeling that you are having.

If you learn to adopt ways where you can face your feelings and feel them anyway, then they have a way of taking exit from you on their own. You might have to take recourse to taking advantage of inside work and take away the focus of your addictive behavior. One trick is to do something you really like and be engaged in that in such a way that your feelings and attention shift there. You will soon find that there have been mindless ways with which you might have been sabotaging your own life. Instead go out and enjoy what you have and what you have to give to the world in order to quit that habit. You can successfully do it when you believe that you can.

www.stopsmokingquitforever.com has endless support systems in place that will help you cross this hurdle easily. You will find experiences of ex chain smokers sharing their story of victory and on their path to liberation. When you are free of addiction that can actually cost your health and life in the long run, you are truly in celebration of life, love and yourself. When you get healthier in physical and lifestyle choices, you automatically bring in more interesting, fun and fulfilling aspects in your life.

So create a greater space of self honor and growth and let the cigarettes take exit from your life.

Media Contact:

Douglas Grahame

PO Box 14760

Mill Creek

WASHINGTON

98082

www.stopsmokingquitforever.com

douglasgrahame03@gmail.com

Tacoma, WA  ( Prfriend ) January 5, 2009 — StopSmoking.net (http://www.stopsmoking.net), the website of the Stop Smoking Foundation, has launched an informative series of pages aimed at helping people around the world stop smoking. The Stop Smoking Foundation’s efforts are focused on outcomes-based solutions for anyone who is serious about stopping smoking.

“We want everyone to know that there’s support,” said Rachel Jeffers, the Stop Smoking Foundation’s media relations expert. “No one who wants to stop smoking today should ever have to worry about not having free stop smoking aids, free stop smoking programs, the benefits of stopping, and what to expect when you stop smoking,” Jeffers said.

Stop Smoking Foundation staffers spent hundreds of hours polling former smokers to discover which methods helped them stop smoking. A surprising variety of quitting methods was used, including hypnosis, nicotine patches and nasal spray, nicotine patches, shots, prescription medications like Chantix, Zyban and Wellbutrin, and even herbal remedies and acupuncture. The results surprised the staff.

“No one knew how many methods there were to stop smoking,” Jeffers stated. “Each of us had stopped smoking on our own, using differing methods. We’d discussed how we had stopped smoking among ourselves. But no one really knew how many different ways there were to stop smoking.” Jeffers went on, “We were also really surprised by how effective some of the remedies were.”

“The prevalence of herbal remedies, and their apparent effectiveness, really came as a shock,” Jeffers noted. “It is clear to us that there are highly effective herbal solutions available over the counter to help people stop smoking.” Furthermore, Jeffers said, “If a friend or relative of mine were to ask, I’d recommend stop smoking herbs (http://www.stopsmoking.net/herbs.html) in a heartbeat.” Key herbal ingredients include lobelia, passion flower, ginger root, skullcap and eleuthero root.

With New Year’s Day Eve imminent, and the subsequent renunciation of smoking and related resolutions, the Stop Smoking Foundation is bracing for a deluge of visitors. “The first week of the new year sees the biggest spike in searches related to stopping smoking, quitting smoking and the easiest ways to kick nicotine addiction. We want to make sure we’re prepared to handle the flood of traffic — and help every single visitor stop smoking.”

The Stop Smoking Foundation is a non-profit organization dedicated to the goal of a smoke-free America, and a smoke-free world. The Stop Smoking Foundation is staffed primarily by former smokers and people who have left big tobacco corporations to work together to help everyone who wants to stop smoking. Do you want to stop smoking? You can get free help online, 24 hours a day, at http://www.stopsmoking.net

Contact:
StopSmoking.net
Tacoma, WA

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