Creating Content Marketing That Converts Consumers Into Patients
// By Susan Gullion //
The health care sector lacks the rich marketing history of industries like retail or automotive, but today’s patients are more empowered than ever and the behaviors they display when seeking health care services or products largely mirror their shopping journeys for apparel, electronics, or any other household product. That is to say, they are rabid information seekers who put a great deal of faith in authentic messages and will quickly abandon brands that fail to meet their expectations quickly and efficiently.
And why wouldn’t they? They are aware of the many options at their disposal and are easily frustrated when faced with obstacles to the experiences that they seek. This has massive implications for health care providers because the days of waiting weeks for an appointment because a certain doctor is “the best” are diminishing quickly. Modern patients place a higher value on selecting providers who meet their quality expectations, are available when and where they need it, and provide impeccable service throughout the entire journey.
One key advantage for health care providers is that they do not have to work as hard to create awareness as players do in most other industries. Health care is a high-priority issue for most patients. They are willing to spend more time researching to make an ideal selection. Some 72 percent of U.S. consumers look online for health-related information and 80 percent of all health inquiries start with a search engine. This puts content marketing front and center for health care providers because creating awareness in the marketplace isn’t about canvassing the market with your message—it’s about making those messages easier for prospective patients to find when they search for it.
Delivering valuable content that establishes providers as authorities creates the brand identity that converts leads into patients over time. Digital is the ideal platform for this content because it is where consumers already seek information.
In this article, we’ll look at: the correct balance of digital channels for your content, the dividends paid by quality content, the cadence of content that nurtures your prospective patients, and calls to action that maximize engagement. Log in to keep reading.