It’s Not Just Ink is a new video series highlighting the personal journey of Kody Green, a schizophrenia patient advocate and content creator with 2M+ followers. After being diagnosed with schizophrenia in his early 20s and struggling with both addiction and incarceration as a result, Kody sought out peer support to learn more about how to manage the condition. Ultimately, Kody became a renowned mental health community leader and advocate, helping reduce stigma and show others that hope is possible. By sharing Kody's personal journey with schizophrenia, this video series educates audiences about signs and symptoms of the condition, the importance of having supportive caregivers, and the crucial role that peer support can play. Additionally, the series aimed to inform audiences about the treatment options that are available for adults with schizophrenia, including long-acting injectables.
The It’s Not Just Ink video series includes three unique videos about Kody Green's life with schizophrenia, all told through stories about his tattoos. Throughout his journey, Kody has selected tattoos with meaningful messages and images that serve as crucial reminders of insights he’s learned about mental health, caregiving, and self-love along the way. Each episode starts and ends with the story behind his tattoos
In Episode 1, Kody shares his experience from initial diagnosis to overcoming addiction and his determination to advocate for mental health. Episode 2 features Kody’s wife Allyson, who is Kody’s caregiver, and they share invaluable insights from their respective journeys with schizophrenia and caregiving. In the final episode, Kody is joined by Dr. Tony Thrasher, a psychiatrist, and Mary Kay Battaglia, Executive Director of the Wisconsin chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, to gain additional insights on the important role healthcare professionals and advocacy organizations play in patients’ mental health journeys. Kody’s experiences aim to inspire and educate other adults navigating schizophrenia.
The series lives on J&J's new Hope for Schizophrenia YouTube, which serves as a hub of information for patients, caregivers, and loved ones navigating their own journeys with schizophrenia. The full-length episodes were promoted through video teasers on Kody's social accounts across Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts. Given Kody’s dedicated follower base that seeks out information about schizophrenia, this paid promotional campaign reached an audience that was looking for just the type of information that the It’s Not Just Ink video series was providing.
Over 14.1K people have watched Kody’s journey in the It's Not Just Ink three-part video series to date, garnering over 48.5K impressions. The series aimed to educate viewers on schizophrenia signs and symptoms, the importance of having supportive caregivers, and available treatment options. As a result, the episodes particularly resonated with those aged 25-34 and 65+, highlighting how the focus on these topics helped provide actionable information for an audience that likely takes on caregiving roles for newly diagnosed loved ones.
Additionally, the corresponding promotional social media campaign has driven over 4.7M+ impressions across Kody’s Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and YouTube channels, including 1.6M+ video views of the video teasers for each full-length episode. Throughout the campaign, comments across Kody’s social accounts were overwhelmingly positive, with the audience emphasizing that they were previously unaware and uneducated on the topics discussed in the series and that they appreciated the opportunity to learn more about schizophrenia (examples below):
