A quick #HITMC thread about measuring marketing ROI in healthcare inspired by @cagefreesingh and @NimaRoohiS Plus, this is a popular and challenging topic for the @HITMarketingPR community.
One of the biggest challenge in healthcare marketing is attribution. In the consumer realm it can be much easier and you can run marketing programs with great attribution. The reason for this is that in many consumer categories, there's only one buyer. #HITMC
If you convince that person to buy, they have the power and authority to buy it. In fact, you can even create a situation where they do an impulse buy. Of course, this isn't easy, but because of this fact you can track attribution much better. #HITMC
How then does healthcare buy something. Usually there are committees of people who come together to evaluate any health IT purchase in healthcare. There are long RFPs often and even when there's not an RFP, a whole committee of people have to approve it. #HITMC
The tough reality of healthcare marketing is that any of the people involved in the HIT buying process can hijack the entire purchase. And many of these people are experts at hijacking a purchase they don't like for whatever reason. Even if the reason is it's more work #HITMC
Of course, a good leader can and should overcome this, but that can be very tricky for leaders. Especially if it's an influential member of the committee for which you're working on 10 other projects with. Needless to say, it gets messy really fast. #HITMC
And going back to there being no impulse buys, there may be some edge cases. And there might have been some impulse buying during COVID-19, but that's not the norm. And this is mostly talking about hospitals and health systems and not ambulatory practices. #HITMC
In some ambulatory practices, the doctor is the single decision maker. Although, solo docs are nearly extinct it seems and even in a small group practice you have to get multiple docs and usually a practice manager on board to make a purchase. So, it still applies here. #HITMC
To be honest, it's amazing a purchase in healthcare is ever made, but that's a topic for another day. #HITMC
Going back to marketing and attribution, once you understand that the sales process requires a committee of people to be on board with the purchase, it's not hard to see how attribution is hard in healthcare marketing. #HITMC
For example, how can you measure the impact of a well done article that led the chief privacy officer to your site to see that you've done a great job securing your product? That didn't drive the purchase decision, but it did make it so that person doesn't hijack it. #HITMC
How about a CIO that saw a presentation (virtual or otherwise) from a respected colleague of theirs that off hand mentions using your product. The CIO doesn't drive the purchase off of this mention, but the mention gave the CIO comfort when your product is mentioned later #HITMC
How much attribution should a search engine for healthcare chatbots that arrives at your site be valued by a member of the team that is sourcing the top healthcare chatbot companies? But then because your website is poor, they put you on the "other options" list. #HITMC
What about the product manager that is active on social media and has heard his peers so great things about your company and suggests that your company should be moved from the "others" on to the short list of companies to evaluate? #HITMC
I could keep going, but I think you get the idea. However, I will highlight that part of your marketing efforts need to include the evaluation process as well. #HITMC
For example, how much is that video testimonial with a customer worth if it's discovered during the evaluation process and really drives the purchase decision because of what the customer shared? #HITMC
I won't continuing belaboring the point. I'll just highlight it by saying that a purchase decision in healthcare is hard work and complicated. There's no single entry point to making a purchase. The closest thing you have to a buyer is an advocate or internal champion #HITMC
An internal champion is often key to the success. If you don't have an internal champion, then unless you're the market leader, it's going to be hard for you to make any ground in the healthcare sales process. #HITMC
How then can you use your marketing to create internal champions? Well, that feels like a thread for another day since this thread is long enough. However, doing so is often the key in healthcare. #HITMC
However, it's worth noting that an internal champion is not enough because most champions will stop their efforts of pushing your product if they meet with too much resistance. So, the more you've influenced others on the committee, the easier you make it for the champion. #HITMC
A good approach to marketing that influences all of those on the committee of decision makers is key to making it so that the internal champion can be successful. If the committee hasn't heard of you, you don't need an internal champion, you need a miracle. #HITMC
Of course, I bet @Colin_Hung could do a deep dive thread on how to look at things like marketing qualified leads (MQLs) & sales qualified leads (SQLs) and how they relate to what I've shared, but all of those efforts contribute to how you've influenced the buying process. #HITMC
Plus, many health IT leaders love to look at leads and leads are a good thing. However, given the above, leads are just one element of the buying process and if you don't do more than drive leads, your making life really hard for your sales people. #HITMC
And there's something more powerful about building a marketing engine for your company versus paying for leads. The former is like learning how to fish. The later is paying for fish. A mix of both is generally a better strategy for a healthcare given the above info. #HITMC
Of course, not to fully cop out on attribution, there are some ways, but it generally requires a sophisticated effort to measure all of your marketing efforts. That includes tracking on your website, links, marketing automation, etc etc etc. Just realizes it's imperfect. #HITMC
If you want to see one of the best I've seen in this regard, talk with @tjustincampbell He's spent a lot of work on this so he can know the value of SEO, vs email, vs ads, vs content marketing, etc. Again, it's not perfect, but he's gotten deep into the tracking #HITMC
To wrap up this long thread, good luck finding direct attribution for any marketing effort: SEO, PR, Ads, Content Marketing, Events, etc. Instead, focus on building a marketing machine that will influence your target audiences from multiple angles. #HITMC
Given the complexities of the buying process in healthcare, it generally takes more than just one marketing approach to really accelerate the buying process for a health IT company. #HITMC
Healthcare marketing is more like hacking down a big tree with an ax. Wack after wack it feels like you're making little progress. Then, about half way through the magic happens and the tree comes crashing down. #HITMC
And this is a big reason why a lot of people move from the tech world into healthcare and then leave. Healthcare marketing and sales is hard work. #HITMC
