What I often explain to people is that, in my view, advertising in some ways should be the last resort, not the first thing you do. Remember I used the expression about control. It's when you're trying to control the information. If you do everything you possibly can to get information out there, then advertising becomes an option to be able to reach people, because for some reason you can't do it in all these other uncontrolled methods.
In your particular example, I would suggest that perhaps advertising is not the first thing we should be thinking about. It would be more a matter of looking at all the other options that are involved, such as direct marketing, media relations, and other forms of getting information out there.