Perspective shapes everything. It changes how we see brands, audiences, creative, strategy, and even the problems we’re trying to solve. Unlock Health Perspectives exists to explore the ideas, campaigns, trends, and conversations shaping healthcare marketing — and what they reveal about the way people connect, communicate, and make decisions.
This ad from Claude “There’s hope in hard questions” has us taking another look at a topic that makes all the difference when you’re trying to make authentic connections, the message and the messenger.
Let’s check in with our experts
Kris Wickline, VP of Strategy
I understand it’s hitting hard questions and has some arresting imagery. But I think it’s a fantastic example of what it means to:
- Be based in human truth (real concerns about AI)
- Use simple, but powerful visuals and sound to capture attention and provoke thought
- Flip the script, but not in an entirely rosy way (they’re still saying “what if”)
There’s a message/messenger issue, which I thought was problematic in the Pfizer Caitlin Clark ad, but the difference is that Anthropic is clearly addressing the issue. Pfizer just produced an ad about exercise and health without owning the reality of making money off of people’s unhealthy habits.
Christian Barnett, Group Lead for Strategy and Creative
I saw the ad during a break at a conference and was intrigued. One of the people watching with me was a retired Vanderbilt healthcare worker and was definitely a “no.” I didn’t really catch on until about halfway through, but I liked it. It made me notice. It felt a bit too upbeat towards the end, and I think that is what irritated my co-commentator.
Nathan Juarez, Executive Creative Director
My initial thoughts:
- What’s this ad about?
- Ok, it’s about AI concerns.
- But now people are talking about cool things they could do with it.
- But what about the concerns? Should we not care about those because AI can also do cool stuff?
- And those questions about AI really weren’t that hard. They’re the most common questions.
- And then “keep thinking?” I know it’s their tag, but it felt like it was telling me how to think about AI vs. me arriving to that thought myself.
Ultimately, if the point of the ad was to get me to sway my thinking like Google did back in the day with their “Don’t be evil” messaging, it really didn’t work, at least not on me.
For more of Nathan’s thoughts on AI, check out his post AI and creativity: the capability behind the tool.
Does the ad fit the bill for authentic marketing?
This isn’t healthcare marketing, but the principles around how to connect effectively with an audience have applicability beyond healthcare. So, let’s look at this ad through the four principles in our healthcare authenticity index, which are:
1. Human truth: Does it speak to something real that people actually experience, feel, fear, or believe?
Kris said it best, people have questions, concerns, and fear about AI and the ad doesn’t shy away from it.
Verdict: Pass
2. Meaning: Does it matter to the audience? Does the message connect to something consequential in their lives?
Given the prevalence of AI in the media, the topic certainly matters to the audience. Presumably they believe the ad will help people focus more on the potential medical breakthroughs than on the threat of uncontrolled AI.
Verdict: Pass
3. Believability: Is the message credible coming from this organization? Can the audience reasonably believe what it is saying?
TechCrunch titled an article about it “Anthropic’s newest ad is creeping people out.” Comments from the public at large were more like weird, dystopian, what on earth, and even sinister. One commenter on the YouTube short said, “The music is fire,” next to the video of the burning house. Ahh, the internet.
Verdict: Fail, according to the court of public opinion
4. Trust: Has the organization earned confidence through what it says and what it actually does?
This one’s tricky. Press coverage of the model that slipped out of the evaluation environment and then hacked three separate organizations was extensive. It’s probably going to take more than a campaign encouraging people to keep thinking to counteract that.
Verdict: Incomplete
What do Unlockers think about this ad?
I was pretty neutral about it until the question about being a better mom. They lost me after that.
I like the transformative angle it takes of sharing what is possible and how it can grow with you. Reminds me a little of the Google Paris Search ad.
Claude’s approach seems more philosophical*, as if they are taking a stab at an AI Hippocratic Oath — one that should’ve been developed years ago in conjunction with other AI platforms. At the same time, it feels like preemptive damage control being that they have autonomous agents running amok bypassing safeguards, etc. Call me skeptical of the niceties and the dark-to-light imagery within the ad which seems the opposite of where reality is headed.
Taking the concern of AI and moving it to hope of the future of AI… interesting.
*Compared to Open AI’s current ad
