Byte Digital delivered NHS App promotion for South East London Integrated Care System across campaigns in 2023–2025. The work combined audience research, paid social, search, video, audio, print and a mobile-first campaign landing page. Byte produced the audio advert and edited the campaign video, bringing NHS footage and the audio together in a short, recognisable message.
Campaign purpose
The brief covered both discovering the NHS App and rediscovering what it could do. Some people already had the app from the COVID pass period but were less familiar with its everyday functions. Campaign messages explained uses such as ordering repeat prescriptions and accessing GP records, with service availability dependent on the person's GP practice.
Byte planned broad awareness alongside dedicated outreach in IMD-priority and lower-uptake areas. Language adaptations and print extended the information beyond a single digital audience. Existing users, people considering a download and those needing more explanation each had a relevant route.
December 2023–February 2024: research, creative and coordinated media
The first programme connected Facebook and Instagram, Google Search, Google Display, YouTube, Spotify and targeted leaflet distribution.
Survey and poll adverts did two jobs: learning about barriers to using the app and introducing functions people might not know about. Search reached people looking for practical information, while social, video and audio explained the app in everyday terms. Leaflets supported local outreach alongside the online activity.
The published main-site case study records that 50.8% of survey respondents said they would use the app more often after learning about its functions. This was a stated intention gathered through the survey.
Audio written and produced for the campaign
Byte produced the Spotify audio advert with a London-based voice-over artist. A direct opening established the NHS App message quickly, followed by examples of useful functions and a clear instruction to find the app in the relevant store.
Listen to Byte's NHS App audio advert.
Video created by combining NHS footage and Byte's audio
Byte edited existing NHS footage into a roughly 30-second YouTube advert and combined it with the campaign audio. Reusing the footage and soundtrack made the production economical and kept the message consistent across audio and video. The opening established the NHS identity and the app's practical value within the first few seconds.
Watch the finished NHS App campaign advert on YouTube (opens in a new tab).
The original NHS footage (opens in a new tab) provided the source material. Byte's role was the campaign edit and audio production.
Published programme result
Byte's main-site NHS App case study reports a 33% increase in South East London NHS App logins in January 2024 compared with December 2023. This is a regional service-usage measure observed during the campaign period. It provides context for the combined communications activity; it is not an ad-attributed installation count.
September–October 2024: familiar creative and practical benefits
The next Meta campaign ran from 27 September to 31 October 2024, with its report issued in November. Awareness messages explained functions, encouraged existing users to reopen the app and promoted switching on notifications. Other activity directed people towards the app stores through the NHS information page or through direct store links.
Byte reused and adapted the established creative approach, including carousel, testimonial-style and “Did you know?” adverts. This carried useful material into another campaign without starting every asset again. The report identifies the benefits-led “Did you know?” advert as the strongest creative for recorded conversions.
The broad download-objective campaign recorded £2.85 in media cost per tracked app-store click. The conversion was a click on the download link, as defined in the report.
November 2025: a dedicated mobile-first destination
The later Meta campaign ran from 3–30 November 2025, with its report issued in December. Byte designed and built nhs-app.co.uk, the campaign landing page (opens in a new tab), giving the adverts a focused destination with clear routes to the Apple App Store and Google Play.
The page was designed around phone use, where people could move directly from an advert to the relevant store. Its layout brings together the campaign imagery, a short explanation of the app's benefits, download links near the opening and further down the page, registration guidance and a reminder about notifications. The mobile layout keeps the journey focused on reading the benefits and taking the next step.
The creative continued to use recognisable NHS campaign material, adapted around repeat prescriptions, everyday convenience and notifications. The dedicated landing page added control over the message, placement of download links and website-level measurement.
The broad download-objective campaign recorded £2.66 in media cost per tracked app-store click. This figure relates to that campaign strand, with no installation or registration implied.
How Byte measured download interest
For these campaigns, NHS privacy requirements meant Byte did not place advertising SDK tracking inside the NHS App. That left a practical measurement question: how could the team identify a meaningful next step after an advert while keeping activity inside the app separate?
Byte used the campaign landing page as the measurable part of the journey:
- A person followed an advert to information about the NHS App.
- They could read the benefits and choose the Apple App Store or Google Play download button.
- Where the visitor had given the required tracking consent, the click was recorded as a campaign conversion.
- Reporting described this as a tracked click through to download the app.
This provided a useful proxy for download intent and a consistent action for campaign evaluation. A store click is the last observable step in this measurement approach; it does not confirm that someone installed the app, registered or subsequently used it.
People who declined the relevant cookies were outside the consent-dependent conversion tracking. Recorded clicks therefore describe the observable, consented part of the journey. They are not a complete count of everyone who followed a download link, and Byte does not convert them into an assumed installation total.
Aggregate NHS App login or registration figures offer a separate view of service usage. They can be considered alongside campaign activity, with their own dates and geographic scope, rather than assigned directly to individual adverts. The measurement guide explains this distinction.
What this demonstrates for NHS communications teams
The campaign series brings together audience insight, reusable creative, audio and video production, IMD-informed outreach, paid media and landing-page development. Each channel has a clear role, and reporting follows the action the campaign can actually observe.
For related examples, see Pharmacy First interactive campaigns, medicine-wastage creative and the mobile-first preconception destination. The NHS marketing guide explains Byte's wider work with communications teams.
References
- Byte Digital: full NHS App case study.
- NHS App campaign landing page designed and built by Byte (opens in a new tab).
- Finished NHS App campaign video (opens in a new tab).
- NHS App campaign audio.
- South East London ICB board papers, April 2024, page 118: Byte named as creative agency partner (opens in a new tab).
- Byte Digital: NHS App adoption campaign toolkit.
- Byte Digital campaign reports prepared for South East London Integrated Care System: February 2024, November 2024 and December 2025. Campaign dates and conversion definitions are stated above.
- Gareth Allen's confirmation of creative production, landing-page delivery and consent-dependent campaign measurement, 20 October 2026.