In the six months since the beginning of the pandemic, marketing professionals have learned to take the consistent shifts in stride. The once chaotic market changes that spurred re-evaluation of healthcare marketing efforts have now become the catalyst to fuel future plans to help us stay connected with our audiences.
To navigate the ongoing transformation, healthcare leaders must look at lessons learned from this period, seek out new opportunities to meet audiences where they are now, and evolve marketing strategies to remain relevant in today’s digital world. However, it is critical to do so in a way that is authentic to your pre-pandemic brand.
To ensure you are staying relevant with your audiences and meeting changing demands in the new normal, pose the following three questions about your current digital marketing strategy to yourself and your team:
Question: Are your digital marketing efforts helping your brand remain credible?
Having the right message is important, but the key is looking beyond just content. With “wider” digital front doors, business and consumer audiences are online more—and they seek reliable information and insight into how to take the right next step. 76% of companies are now increasing their investments in organic and paid digital marketing. You must ensure your brand is able to be found when your audience is looking for you to be the credible source of the information they seek.
Opportunity: Leverage SEO and SEM to build brand credibility.
Revisiting SEO and SEM campaigns with branded keywords that target only true categorical intent for your brand or industry can help ensure you show up in relevant searches and associate your organization with the valuable information your marketing teams create to connect with your audience in their current state.
Question: Is your outreach plan true to your existing brand?
With your audience busier than ever trying to balance additional responsibilities between work and life in the new normal, many are searching for solutions and answers to support both personal and professional decisions. While other industries have seen ad spend drop this year, healthcare has seen a 21% increase in shift to paid digital ads in 2020 over 2019 in an effort to reach and influence decision makers. It is getting harder to break through the noise, but to remain a trusted source, do not take advantage of the additional visibility by inundating your audience.
Opportunity: Review inbound and outbound channels.
Constructing targeted campaigns through intentionally designed inbound and outbound channels is key. Inbound channels should drive your audience to the information they need, and outbound channels should showcase your understanding of your audience’s needs to ensure your brand remains authentically helpful and engaged.
Question: Are you following the continued shifts in digital traffic?
Digital traffic for some sites increased as much as 60% in March; however, while the increased traffic has remained, users are not viewing the same content over and over. To stay in front of your audience, you need visibility into traffic shifts on your website and other digital channels to ensure you are reaching them in the right way.
Opportunity: Use analytics to understand your audience and meet them where they are.
More deeply integrating analytics into your marketing toolbox can help to better understand user behavior shifts week-by-week to subtly remarket to them where they are headed as opposed to where they have been.
Remaining relevant, authentic and engaged during this time is a unique journey for each organization and audience. Ready to dig in on where to start, refocus or reprioritize your digital marketing efforts? MERGE has a methodology to help you design a plan to get you from where you are to where you need to be. Contact us to learn more: mergecomms@mergeworld.com.
Sources:
https://tech.co/crm-software/best-customer-retention-strategies