GE:
Healthymagination.
GE / Big Spaceship
The Brief
GE had a massive footprint in health technology but a very specific problem: they wanted to help people live healthier every day without getting anywhere near the political firestorm of the healthcare debate. Which meant talking about health without talking about healthcare — a distinction that sounds simple and isn't.
Healthymagination was their initiative to explore innovative, unexpected ideas in everyday health. My job was to help develop the brand voice, direct strategy, and produce the lion's share of content that brought it to life.
My Role
- Copywriter
- Brand voice
- Strategy
- Content
Agency
- Big Spaceship
Recognition
- Clio Award
- Communication Arts
- FWA
- W3 Award
The Tightrope
The interesting creative challenge here wasn't making health content — it was making health content that didn't feel like a corporate wellness campaign. GE's audience was real people, not policy wonks. The tone had to be curious and accessible without being dumbed-down, and optimistic without being preachy about it.
The data visualization work — interactive surveys and tools that let users explore health questions and compare their answers against the broader population — required a specific kind of writing: short, precise, inviting without being pushy, and smart enough to hold its own against the actual substance of the data.
Yes, that's an iPhone 3G. This project was a long time ago. The Clio is timeless.
A Note on Context
This was my first advertising project after several years of freelance editorial writing — which meant I came to it with a reporter's instincts and a copywriter's learning curve. The awards suggest the instincts were more useful than the curve was damaging.
It's also the oldest piece in this portfolio. It's here because the brief was genuinely interesting, the work won things worth winning, and it's a clean illustration of a skill that hasn't changed: figuring out how to talk about something complicated without making it sound that way.