Mormon ad campaign draws attention in 9 U.S. markets

SALT LAKE CITY — The Mormon church recently launched an advertising campaign in nine U.S. markets, including St. Louis and Pittsburgh, that has generated buzz in news reports and blogs in those areas.

The campaign includes ads on television, radio, billboards, bus platforms and in the interior of transit vehicles that feature everyday Mormons talking about their regular lives and their faith. The profiles reach an international audience through mormon.org and via digital and social media, Internet ads, Facebook and YouTube. As part of the campaign, church members are invited to share their profiles on the mormon.org website.

The ads evolved solely from public reaction to past church campaigns, said Scott Swofford, director of media for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Swofford provided answers to recent questions from the Deseret News.

Deseret News:These ads have a very basic message: "This is my life, this is who I am, and I am a Mormon." What message are you trying to help people understand with that kind of message?

Swofford: Well, you can go on and on all day long trying to define yourself in the minds of the public, or you can, in fact, connect them to members of the church. When you do that you see the incredible diversity, the various walks of life that Latter-day Saints are involved in, and they see that Mormon thinking can be as diverse as it needs to be to live their life. Yet surprisingly, if you read the 3,000 mormon.org profiles, you will find those people are very unified in the understanding of what they believe. It is shocking. I expected responses to be all over the place, and they are not. People in their own words are articulating their beliefs better than perhaps we could.

DN: How did the themes emerge or the idea that the Missionary Department needed to introduce Mormons as "regular folks"?