Physicians are increasingly recognizing the advantages of using digital tools and technology to support patient healthcare. A recent digital health report by the American Medical Association spotlights shifting physician attitudes toward digital health solutions over the past six years. For medtech companies and those marketing to physicians, this research provides new insights and opportunities for strategic initiative and audience development tactics.
Here are six notable statistics from the study that can guide medtech companies and physician marketers in their marketing efforts:
Statistic #1 | Closing the Gap Between Digital Tools and Patient Care
From 2016 to 2022, both primary care providers (PCPs) and physician specialists in all age groups grew in affinity for digital health solutions – a continual increase from 85% to 93%. Medtech companies employing digital outreach strategies to reach their target decision-makers can leverage this trend to increase digital literacy and enhance engagement with online messaging and marketing efforts.
Statistic #2 | An Inside Look Into Digital Utilization
Among the 1,300 physicians surveyed, the average number of digital tools increased from 2.2 to 3.8. This figure remained consistent across age groups, gender, and years of practice. Furthermore, those who were particularly enthusiastic about adopting technology used an average of 4.2 digital tools for their practice operations. These statistics highlight that physicians are increasingly moving towards digital solutions in their practices, and it can be safely assumed that this pattern extends beyond professional settings.
Statistic #3 | Characterizing the Digital User
The physician groups with the highest interest in digital tools include practices that are mid-to-large-sized, partially owned, in a multi-specialty setting, and those offering primary care services. Medtech companies who can activate their physician marketing strategy now have the opportunity to capitalize on this current interest with these audience segments..
Statistic #4 | Top Drivers of Digital Adoption
The three most persuasive benefits of digital health solutions include:
Improved patient outcomes (88%)
Streamlined workflow (88%)
Stronger diagnostic capabilities (83%)
Knowing the value propositions that resonate with each audience can help marketing teams focus on associated pain points and offer powerful solutions to address them.
Statistic #5 | Roadblocks to Digital Engagement
In addition to identifying what your audience does want in their ideal health solution, an equally important strategy is understanding what your audience doesn’t want. The three highest ranking red flags in digital tools include:
Tools that do not improve the standard of care (80%)
Additional training requirements (78%)
Any device presented without peer-reviewed research confirmation (73%)
These key elements will be hurdles if they are not cleared before employing your medtech go-to-market strategy.
Statistic #6 | Pinpointing The Decision-Maker
Despite growing interest in digital tools and health solutions, physicians prefer the passenger seat in the decision-making process. Overall, there was an 11% decline in physicians interested in spearheading these initiatives – most would rather be consulted or simply informed. Historically, physicians took the wheel for these decisions – now, the best audience may be other leaders in the same practice. However, sole practice owners remain the most invested in this process, with 27% more interest than partial owners. Physician marketers must carefully consider how this information impacts targeting efforts and suggest strategy shifts.
These are just some of the insights provided from this study. Meanwhile, the team of marketing experts at Jairus specializes in being on the leading edge of medtech market research and go-to-market strategy like this as we provide successful outcomes for our clients every day. We’d be pleased to meet with you to discuss how we can partner with you to elevate your medtech marketing efforts. Let’s talk.
As author Robert J. McKain once said: Strategic planning will help you fully uncover your available options, set priorities for them, and define the methods to achieve them. In the fast-paced worlds of marketing, technology and healthcare, options change and new opportunities surface continually – making it imperative for MedTech companies to avoid the antiquated model of annual strategic planning, casting in dense concrete 12 months’ worth of unalterable focus and effort.
The ability to not only recognize new opportunities in the marketplace, but to act on them with agility, is what sets successful companies apart today. By making strategic planning more than a once-a-year effort, you set yourself up to do precisely that – and the process is more effective today than ever, thanks to the advent of digital technology and all of the data that comes with it.
What goes hand-in-hand with that shift? Ensuring your sales and marketing teams are not only aligned, but fully intertwined. The traditional model of downstream vs. upstream strategies, with clear divisions between sales and marketing, is less functional (and less effective) now thanks in part to digital innovation and changes in the healthcare marketplace. While the teams may still be separate, both have an equal place at the strategic table – and should be gathering around it much more frequently than once a year.
Traditional healthcare sales and marketing efforts – cemented around in-person physician calls, bulk print collateral and tradeshow appearances – may still be somewhat effective in select scenarios, but offer sloth-like insights and results. MedTech companies that integrate digital strategies, in turn, can more nimbly gauge audience interest and demand, measure adoption and, ultimately, better predict growth. Not only that, digital strategies are often more cost-effective than traditional channels, which historically required a large, widespread sales force and significant investment in collateral, travel and media.
All of that data – generated more quickly and more accurately than ever before through digital channels – should be regularly evaluated and applied to strategic decision-making at the organizational level. To do so effectively, medical device and other B2B healthcare companies should implement more frequent strategic planning efforts. Typically, we recommend 6-month or quarterly strategic planning for Jairus clients, which provides an opportunity to evaluate growth and key marketing metrics, review market shifts and organizational changes, and re-align priorities for all teams based on those factors. These conversations also shine a bright light on efforts that are less effective, allowing companies and marketing partners to pivot resources quickly to more successful channels.
Interested in learning more about strategic planning or how Jairus partners with MedTech companies to improve sales and marketing outreach? Let us know.
Trying to find better ways to inspire engagement with your brand?
Remember this simple fact: no one wants to be told what to do.
In other words, your target audience does not want to be pushed towards contacting you — they want to be pulled. The most effective marketing strategies in the healthcare industry are the ones that make such a strong case for your brand that physicians and clinical decision-makers can’t help but learn more or schedule a demo.
A good way to understand this is to put yourself in the shoes of the provider. They care immensely about personal relationships, as these drive the business necessary to improve patient care and grow revenue. So, if you’re pushing content to your audience in an impersonal and not entirely relevant way, they’ll reject what you have to offer.
Formula for Pulling in Leads
The first step is characterizing your value propositions, possible objections, and the sales process. Be aware of how each element can and will affect provider interest. Identify your ideal customers so you know exactly who to target and how to address their specific needs.
The next step is building assets that take these factors into account. Capitalize on the overlap between provider pain points and your value propositions — this is your best opportunity to generate and convert leads. Decision-makers want to know exactly how your technology will improve their practices. A better practice means higher patient satisfaction, which ultimately leads to greater success for the provider. This is part of the “pull” mentality — presenting interesting and engaging content that doesn’t force their hand. Prospects will spend more time learning about your brand after seeing assets that speak directly to their interests.
The third step is surrounding your audience with content on all relevant social media platforms and online channels. Reach providers in both professional and personal settings — the desire to improve their practices will be the same at home as in the hospital, office, or lab. Tie all social media platforms together so activity on one affects what they see on another, creating a hyper-personalized experience. This interactive digital conversation raises the chances of your prospects accepting calls-to-action.
The final step is following up when your audience engages. This step hinges on the ability to track which assets inspired each prospect to further interact with your company. Monitoring this information lets you see where each provider is in the buying process so you can tailor your assets to meet them where they are. Prospects who engage have clearly liked what they’ve seen so far, so the job of your sales team is to finish strong and convert that interest into a sale.
Set Your Sales Team Up for Success
Center your digital marketing strategies around pulling in leads, but focus your sales efforts on pushing those leads to a sale. After your marketing team qualifies leads and fills the pipeline with strong prospects, your sales reps can take charge and hone in on converting leads to customers.
Empower your sales team by sharing which value propositions (and their corresponding pain points) motivated each prospective client to reach out. When sales reps can dial in on what each provider specifically cares about, their conversations are much more fruitful. Equipping your reps with this information means greater success moving prospects through the sales funnel.
Creating a personal and relevant buying experience lets your audience know that you care about their needs and want to help them succeed.
Pull in qualified leads who are ready to buy. Jairus can help you implement “pull” tactics to attract warm leads primed for productive sales conversations.
Healthcare business practices have evolved. Face-to-face interaction is no longer the leading sales tactic, and MedTech companies must adapt to the reality of unreachable decision-makers. With stagnant sales pipelines and restricted access to countless providers, healthcare innovators are scrambling to find new ways to generate leads.
Digital Opens Doors
Digital marketing paves the way for MedTech companies to get back in front of decision-makers. A recent survey found that over the past five years, digital marketing increased by over 60% in the healthcare industry, with digital taking up 40% of MedTech marketing budgets.1
As healthcare marketing moves online, the next step for MedTech companies is rededicating resources to inside sales growth. However, successfully using digital channels may require extensive internal changes.
Before diving into the “how” of digital outreach, take the time to ask yourself these questions:
How are your sales team, marketing team, and sales operations team working together to drive revenue for your company?
How are you creating opportunities and nurturing leads?
How are you converting prospects?
Your answers will reveal which strategies are digital-ready — and which aren’t.
Rethinking Sales and Marketing
Despite the history of bad blood between sales and marketing, these two entities must be aligned for a successful move to digital.
The goal is to get prospects to later stages of the sales process with the least amount of time and effort. Start by giving your marketing team the front-end functions of the buying process. Marketing — not sales — is best at generating demand and building awareness for your brand. This way, your sales team isn’t responsible for the jobs they don’t want to be doing anyway, like cold calling, and your reps are supplied with prospects who are ready to buy. With just a small number of people who can say “yes” to your company, it’s in your best interest to set your reps up for success before sales conversations.
Measuring Your Success
Assess the progress of your sales and marketing integration with the following metrics:
Length of your active sales cycle
Percentage of new customers who independently accessed marketing materials before or during the sales process
Number of sales-qualified opportunities active in your pipeline
That last metric is a critical measurement of success. A notable advantage of digital marketing is qualifying leads ahead of time. Instead of wasting time and resources on prospects who aren’t really interested in your technology, send your sales team warm leads who are more or less ready to buy.
Achieve this with an omnichannel digital marketing strategy. Develop ads that build brand awareness and trust in your expertise, and embed links to various assets–downloadable content, landing pages, videos, etc. After launching these ads on a number of social media platforms and online channels, follow up with email retargeting to give prospects every opportunity to engage. The final piece is trackable data that shows which assets succeeded in prompting a sales conversation. Prepare your sales reps with this valuable information so they can be more persuasive and help prospects feel confident in their buying decisions.
Although COVID limited access to decision-makers, you can still get in front of your prospects in a way that is both compelling and efficient. Set your company up for success by integrating your marketing and sales efforts before you make the move to digital. Use the strengths of each team to help the other succeed, which in turn will help the entire company gain traction in the new era of post-pandemic sales.
Are your healthcare executive prospects now working from home? Are your target accounts denying access to non-patients? It’s a tough place to be.
Thankfully, social media and an omni-channel marketing approach can help with that.
Digital marketing centers around understanding where your customers are and putting your message in front of them — doctors and life science decision-makers use social media just as much as everyone else. These platforms provide valuable opportunities to surround them with your content, regardless of whether your firm sells hip implants, revenue cycle solutions, clinical trial management software, or any other offering.
Clinicians are constantly looking for opportunities to improve their practices, but they are busy during the day….and thus unavailable to take an introductory sales call. That said, they are likely to engage when you reach them in their downtime — when they actually have time to study your content.
There are a number of social media platforms. How do you know which one to choose?
The answer: all of them.
Social media marketing isn’t about choosing one platform over another; use each to put content everywhere your prospects are looking. At Jairus, we primarily use four social channels to catch the eye of decision-makers:
Facebook
One of the most popular social media sites, Facebook is a leader in medical and life science marketing. Take advantage of the time your audience spends scrolling here in their downtime. With wide-reaching capabilities, Facebook boosts ad views, content downloads, traffic to landing pages, and more. Jairus has had major success using Facebook for the medical side of our marketing outreach efforts, reaching doctors at home, in the office, or between patients. Facebook is often the most effective paid tool for lead generation in healthcare.
LinkedIn
LinkedIn was built for networking — it’s much easier to go “viral” here than on Facebook. Gain traction with an organic following that is both effective and cost-free, leaving your marketing budget intact for very targeted campaigns. Jairus uses LinkedIn for the business side of life science marketing, as decision-makers look here for innovations to improve their labs or practices.
Twitter
Use Twitter for brand awareness and thought leadership, circulating content that promotes familiarity with your brand as an expert and leader in your field. Focus your outreach efforts less on lead conversion and more on informative content. Twitter can effectively capture the attention of the decision-makers who will advocate for the adoption of your technology. You want to be right there, waiting for them, with strong assets that appeal to their pain points and prove how you can solve them.
Youtube
We all know YouTube is the place to go for videos. You name it, Youtube has a video for it — your audience knows this, too. Upload longer video pieces, 3 to 5 minutes, that are informative and engaging. Examples include product demos and client testimonials. Integrate your videos into ads or landing pages so your audience can learn more without any extra effort. If prospects are not ready to schedule a demo, YouTube provides a strategic alternative that allows you to showcase the same content that builds toward engagement.
With the right content on the right platforms, you can effectively broadcast your brand to your audience right at home. They can see exactly what you have to offer with no extra steps or face-to-face interaction. If your prospects aren’t busy in the lab or distracted by patients, they’re more likely to dive into your content to evaluate if you’re a good fit. Don’t let the recent changes in the industry keep you from valuable sales opportunities — make the move to digital with social media marketing.
Reach decision-makers like never before. Jairus crafts personalized outreach strategies to envelope your prospects with relevant content where and when they want to see it.
MedTech companies are facing major roadblocks in generating demand for their new technologies. Gone are the days of catching doctors scrubbing in for surgery — and the endless sales opportunities that followed. In this new age of medtech sales, many are wondering if we will ever have the same access to decision-makers that we did before.
Even before COVID, there were forces at play limiting access to clinical decision-makers — the pandemic just sped up the process.
Those megatrends include:
Physician employment by IDNs
Vendor credentialing and other access-limiting efforts
Professionalization of supply chain, including Value Analysis Committees
With so many factors curbing the adoption of new technologies, one question is consistently at the forefront of the minds of medtech companies concerning their marketing and sales efforts:
How do we get good sales opportunities in our current environment?
When finding new sales opportunities, the core aspects of prospecting remain the same: your target audience must have a pain point they would like addressed, and you must present your solution in a meaningful way that solves their issue. None of that has changed. What has changed is how you do those two things.
Before we get into the details, there are three things to remember:
Prospects are still as interested as before — you need to get in front of them so they can act on that interest.
Doctors are people, too. Like you and me, they spend much of their downtime on their phones. Name the social media platform, and you’ll find them there.
Doctors always want to make their practices better, and they don’t turn it off at 5pm. Finding ways to leverage that fact will get your foot in the door with key decision-makers.
With all these things in mind, let’s look at how strategically using digital marketing strategies solves the problems created by the pandemic in the medtech industry.
Contextual Marketing
The first thing to do is define your target audience. The healthcare industry has a limited number of decision-makers in each specialty. Your task is to identify the key players who will champion the adoption of your product or service, down to the names, emails, and phone numbers of those people.
The next step is creating relevant and interesting content for your audience. Through a personalized marketing experience, you catch their attention and encourage engagement by appealing to the needs of their practices and patients. Content should be easily digestible, speak directly to their concerns, and promote further interaction with your company.
The “Surround Sound” Approach
Now that you have your content, present it to your target audience in a way that draws them to you without being too forceful. In other words: pull, don’t push.
An omnichannel approach finds clinicians where they are already online. Marketing on channels and social media platforms they use every day, such as Facebook or LinkedIn, generates a high frequency of touch with your content. Supplementing digital ad campaigns with email outreach ensures no prospect is left behind. Surrounding your audience with content holds their attention and encourages them to act. Campaigns should be consistent across platforms, with similar calls-to-action.
Measurable Success
A vital component of digital marketing is identifying strategies that worked — and those that failed to engage. Not only can you focus your efforts and resources more effectively, but you can also provide valuable information to your sales team. That way, when a salesperson prepares to contact a prospective client, they’ll know what led that prospect to request more information. Identifying what leads to success saves you time and money while filling your sales pipeline.
Although the landscape of healthcare marketing has dramatically shifted, digital marketing provides a new path forward that reopens doors to the easy access we had to decision-makers back in 1999.
Implement a successful digital outreach strategy. Jairus can help you create tactics that will generate better prospects and boost your sales cycle.
