Reading Between the Lines in Health Literacy: 5 Tips from the Experts
// By Lisa D. Ellis //
Are your marketing messages living up to their full potential? If not, you may need to think more about the concept of health literacy and how to reach your target audience on a deeper and more personal level, by talking about things they care about in a simple, direct language that they can understand.
The Value of Health Literacy
Health literacy is a critical component when marketing in health care, but many professionals aren’t exactly sure how to use it efficiently, according to Kat McDavitt, Vice President of Dodge Communications based in Atlanta, Georgia.
McDavitt points out that for many health care marketers in the life sciences and digital health sectors, it can be surprisingly difficult to tell an effective story to the target audience, rather than discussing the science behind a product. Yet she finds that using fewer words actually adds up to more in the end.
Why Simple Is Always Better
Deb Bruce, Senior Content Writer for AVID Design
Perhaps no one knows this better than Deb Bruce, a senior content writer for AVID Design, who also writes for a number of consumer health websites, organizations, and medical device companies. In addition, Bruce has more than 30 years of experience writing health trade books. Over the course of her career, she has seen firsthand how easy it is for people providing medical information for consumers to get too complex with their language, and, as a result, their material doesn’t resonate. Bruce tries to reign in messages to keep them easier to understand.