Purpose – This paper aims to explain how the principles of marketing can be applied to the planning and implementation of a social marketing campaign. Design/methodology/approach – A wealth of secondary sources are reviewed and discussed, including academic literature, market research and campaign data. Findings – The planning and implementation of socialmarketing campaigns is complex and requires a wide range of tasks. For one, the case study illustrates that identifying the right themes is crucial in order to reach the desired target audiences to create attitudinal and behavioural change. Further, a coherent implementation of the marketing mix is necessary in order to ensure campaign effectiveness over time. As social marketing campaigns often need to reach a wide range of audiences, the task of managing marketing initiatives in these contexts is more complex and requires constant evaluation in order to identify levels of effectiveness and areas for improvement over long periods of time. Originality/value – Applies marketing theory to an interesting real-life social marketing campaign and highlights the complexity of the tasks involved.