by Cori Albrecht | Jun 24, 2019 | Branding & Identity, Healthcare Branding, Springboard News
Branding Your “Branded” Medical Practice When you hear the word “brand,” your first thought may be a logo or a tagline, especially if you are tied to a branded health system. However, branding your medical practice is much more than that, and more complicated. Your medical practice brand should create a unique space in the minds of your key customers and help you attract new patients. The goal behind a branding campaign is to develop messaging that will raise awareness and engagement among potential customers. It should help you stand out from the crowd and then get customers to use and prefer your practice so that when the need for your services arises, they automatically think of, and choose, YOU. So, what does this mean to your medical practice? Defining your brand will help you identify where you are now, and where you want to be in the minds of your customers. With this information, you will be able to chart your future course, prioritize your plans, use your resources effectively, inspire your staff and stakeholders, and ultimately increase patient volumes. So, how do you go about building a brand for your practice? Here are four strategies: 1. Identify your core competencies You must first identify your where your practice is now, in terms of core competencies, including: competition market trends key services unique benefits target audiences as well as customer knowledge, attitude and usage The goal is to identify the unique equity (your overarching market position) for your medical practice and the appropriate strategy. This includes brand platform, essence, and overall “story” to the marketplace that appeals to the unique traits and needs of your prospective patients. 2. Determine your brand story Uncovering your unique equity will help your practice discover your core brand story. In addition, you have the challenge of complementing the system brand for your enterprise. Springboard’s approach to positioning engenders a greater appreciation of your brand essence and generates an in-depth understanding of your brand promise to the marketplace. Your medical practice story should encompass the common strengths, personalities and competencies of your physicians and office staff. This will help develop the most effective and powerful ideas to communicate the new brand platform. 3. Engage internal audiences Once the desired brand position has been established, you must ensure that brand is reinforced by all members of the practice. Your brand is something your patients feel, hear or see when they visit your office, interact with you or deal with your staff. It includes all touchpoints with of your practice; from the sign over your door and the usability of your website to the educational and promotional collateral you provide to patients, such as brochures and direct mail. The success of your brand ultimately depends on your patients’ experiences, and how they perceive your practice. Energizing and engaging your internal audiences is key. 4. Promote your story to external audiences Now it is time to deliver your story to your target audience. This process involves developing the most effective and powerful ideas to communicate your new brand platform, then promoting your messaging via online and traditional marketing tactics such as websites, landing pages, digital and social marketing, print ads, online videos, etc. In terms of communications, Springboard believes there should be a smooth transition of the brand strategy into creative execution and market implementation. The key here is that the brand strategy does not get “lost in translation” when bringing it to the marketplace. Springboard has full-service capabilities in the development and implementation of brand strategies and communications programs, bringing campaigns to life in all media; traditional and digital. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help develop and tell your brand... by Natalie Wong | May 30, 2019 | Springboard News
Lessons from the Shark Tank Smart marketers will treat C-suite presentations as if they were walking into the “Shark Tank” to sell not only their marketing plan, but the strategic vision and value they bring to the organization. If you’re like millions of Americans, you’ve seen the award-winning television show “Shark Tank,” in which entrepreneurs have 10 minutes to sell investors on their business idea. Now transfer that image to the last time you walked into the C-suite to sell your annual strategic marketing plan and budget. “It can be a similar experience,” said marketing consultant Rob Rosenberg, president of Springboard Brand & Creative Strategy, Ltd., in Chicago. “You have a limited time to give your presentation to a skeptical audience who has typically been sitting in a conference room for hours listening to numerous other pitches involving new investments or the request for more resources.” Read more on SHSMD’s newsletter Spectrum that features an interview with Rob Rosenberg and Paul Szablowski. Contact Springboard for more... 
by Mike Chapman | May 1, 2019 | Healthcare Branding, Healthcare Marketing, Hospital Branding, Hospital Marketing
One of the benefits of working closely with hospital C-suites on branding initiatives is developing a deep understanding of their goals, motivators and pain points. Here are some of the techniques (strategic and tactical) that we’ve employed on behalf of healthcare B2B clients to reach this audience: 1. Focus on their business goals Understand that the end goal for hospital C-suite leaders is improving revenue, quality and safety. And these all impact patient satisfaction and reimbursement. This audience is also focused on competitive advantages, growth through strategic partnerships, mergers and acquisitions, sustainable cost control and reducing risk. Your messaging must speak to their goals, not your features and functions, to get their attention. 2. Develop hospital C-suite personas Understand who these decision makers are, and develop personas that outline their individual goals, motivators and pain points, relative to your product or service. Having this deep understanding will help craft the right messages. 3. Your value proposition must resonate Use the information gathered in the personas to create a unique promise or value proposition for each member of your target audience. Understand what will resonate with them, based on their motivators and pain points, and put that to work in your communication and messaging strategies. 4. Tell them something they don’t know How can your thought leadership enlighten and help the C-suite make smarter decisions and achieve their business goals? Do you have proprietary research, a relevant blog, white papers or webinar series they can follow? Develop a goal-based content strategy to get their attention and demonstrate value for your insights. 5. Meet them where they are going, literally While we’ve found traditional marketing tactics, like email and direct mail can still be effective, this audience values personal interactions. Develop opportunities to engage with them face-to-face. Event marketing can be a great opportunity to present, exhibit and even take small groups to dinner. Get creative to get in front of the hospital C-suite at conferences and other events they attend. 6. Make an influencer the hero Sometimes the hospital C-suite decision maker is simply unreachable. Engage the beneficiary of your product/service; this could be a service line director, head of population health or another administrator and get them excited about the opportunity. Arm them with the ammunition they need and enlist this influencer to gain approval for your solution. This kind of “pull-through” can be an effective “sell-in” strategy. Getting the attention and having meaningful conversations with C-suite leaders is difficult. and you may only have one shot – so know your audience, understand how your product or service will help them achieve a business goal, do your strategic homework, put on your consultant and C-suite hats, and get creative when it comes to personal engagement. For more information on how Springboard is helping B2B companies succeed, please visit https://www.springboardbrand.com/clients/b2b-healthcare-marketing/ or contact me at mike@springboardbrand.com to discuss your opportunity. ... 
by Rob Rosenberg | Apr 16, 2019 | Branding & Identity, Healthcare Branding, Healthcare Marketing, Springboard News
During an annual exam, your physician can get a good sense of your heart health with an EKG. As healthcare marketers, a Brand EKG can also give you a quick read of your brand’s health. Several years ago, this model was introduced to help hospitals, namely C-Suite representatives, understand consumer research findings and implications. As indicated above and based on the classic consumer marketing behavior model, a brand has to have established a strong sense of awareness and preference before leading to trial. This model has been expanded to include brand attributes such as likability, intent to recommend, and other layers of behavior. Based on an analysis of nearly 100 consumer studies, and validated by leading healthcare researchers, we concluded that a “healthy” brand EKG would have a variance of 12-15 percentage points between key indicators. A larger number would indicate an “unhealthy” brand that is not converting on the preceding attitude. For example, a brand with a preference score 20 percentage points higher than usage is not converting market share. This could be the result of many factors including accessibility, customer service, and operational considerations (schedule, capacity, etc.). Those brands not converting awareness to preference indicate a lack of differentiation or strong consumer brand relevance. Fast forward to 2019, and the same model can be used to assess the health of your digital marketing efforts. Springboard’s Digital EKG Healthcare marketers can add to their digital dashboards by providing a Digital Brand EKG indicating the level of conversion being established from a preceding behavior. For example, if impressions served (or similar metric) are significantly higher than CTR, you’ve done a good job targeting and delivering your digital message but you have not enticed anyone to take action. If you’re creating an action and people are clicking through but not engaging, then your landing page, website, or other content “hub” is not compelling enough. Adding an EKG to your current digital dashboard will help you and your team understand the layers of consumer behavior that are taking place with each online activity. Better yet, you’ll be able to develop content strategies and tactics to improve upon your ability to convert consumers through the behavior model. Better still, you’ll be able to strengthen the other metrics on your dashboard and impress the C-Suite with the health of your brand and EKG in terms (and formats) they’ll understand and appreciate. You might even be able to include B.D. initials after your name – Brand Doctor. Happy to help you assess your brand and digital health. Contact us... by Rob Rosenberg | Feb 22, 2019 | Healthcare Branding, Healthcare Marketing, Integrated Marketing
Healthcare is not simple. For consumers, it’s difficult to navigate the waters of patient care, referrals, and insurance costs/reimbursements. For physicians, balancing patient care with enterprise-wide business and growth goals is challenging. And for employees of larger health systems, there is confusion as to other providers in the organization and how/when to make appropriate referrals. These issues, along with many others, make healthcare one complex industry. And healthcare brands have become just as complicated. That’s why healthcare marketing needs to be made simple. After all, the simple definition of marketing is “meeting customer needs”. Making a complex buying cycle and multi-layered organizational structure easier to understand are right in line with the basic tenants of marketing. Why simpler is better for consumers Healthcare marketers face a ‘double whammy’ when trying to reach and motivate consumers. First, studies show that the average consumer is exposed to 5,000 – 7,500 brand messages and marketing content a day (depending on which study you read). And with more and more channels being developed to reach consumers, that number is growing dramatically on a daily basis. The School of Human Sciences and Technology estimates that consumers switch between screens up to 21 times an hour and the average person’s attention span is now just eight seconds. Eight seconds! Not only do healthcare messages need to gain consumer attention, they also need to communicate a story, capture their interest, and cause an action, all in less time than a ten second commercial. This leads to the second whammy; healthcare marketing and messaging has traditionally not been that simple, or made that interesting. It’s often complicated, duplicative, and undifferentiated. The big, cliché advertising words alone take almost eight seconds to say: multi-disciplinary, continuum of care, state-of-the-art technology, and other mouthfuls. Not easy to communicate, understand, or capture the attention of consumers who only give it a fleeting moment to resonate. As healthcare systems continue to grow, audiences will only be able to handle so much information. That’s why stories need to be short, memorable, provide an overarching single-minded promise, and be relevant to the lives of those they’re seeking to influence. Why simpler is better for employees and referral sources Enterprise success and growth goals depend on strong internal communications. It gives an organization a strategic advantage. When employees know who is part of the system, how to make referrals, where to access information, and why their role is important (as well as the “why” of the organization), patient leakage goes down and their satisfaction goes up. In the many employee focus groups I’ve conducted, internal team members constantly express their concerns that they are not informed enough to make important patient referrals and recommendations. As a result, it’s not uncommon to see patients go “down the street” to other providers for services that are, in fact, part of the system from which they were referred. The tools that can help with these issues should also be made simple. Brand books, videos, even old-school laminated cards are effective methods for communicating messages to employees and referral sources. Remember, your stakeholders are “consumers,” too, and they give the same eight seconds to different messages throughout the day. Simpler is definitely better. Why simple is better for your C-Suite When presenting your annual healthcare marketing plan and budget recommendations to leaders in the C-Suite, it’s important to stay out of the “weeds”. Meaning, don’t mire them in discussions around length of videos, size of ads, or even dashboards boasting impressions and click through rates. Not only don’t they get it, they really don’t care. Studies strongly encourage marketers to talk in the language that the C-Suite speaks; growth, revenue, and business goals. Marketing is their investment, not your expense or budget. You have to know what the organization’s core goals are and speak (simply) about them in clear, thoughtful ways and how marketing will help achieve growth. Chief Marketing Officers have the shortest tenure among C-Suite members because they often lose, or have little sight of the big picture, and focus too much on the image of healthcare marketing. A SIMPLE brand strategy is the place to start for your healthcare marketing Make it easy on those to whom you are telling your story. Instead of cramming five services into a video message or, worse yet, running five different campaigns with different looks and feels, think SIMPLE: Singular Idea that Motivates People to Listen and Engage. Acronyms make it easy to remember things, so hopefully this one will help you keep things simple. Singular Consumers only have the mental capacity (and time) to remember you by one single name or service, regardless if your brand is a hospital or system, master or endorsed. Campaigns that throw out multiple entities, or play the name game, are not only hurting but also competing with themselves. This thinking supports the “branded house” strategy …if you have a “house of brands,” allow the same time and spacing to give them their freedom to grow in the future. Idea With social and other digital applications of your brand message, content seems to be all the rage. And that’s fine. As long as it still has an idea guiding it – one that is carefully crafted based on research, brand differentiators, and a unique and captivating story. This is the “why” of your organization; it has to be there for people to want to buy a product or service. It also needs to align with their own philosophy and purpose. In more traditional branding and advertising circles, the “big idea” still reigns; born from creative strategy, a competitive assessment, and customer insights. Motivates With barely any time to register, your message still has to create a response. Whether a click, call, or visit, be engaging, entertaining, and interesting enough to motivate desired behaviors. Of that eight seconds, you probably have a third of that time to hook an audience member with an irresistible email subject line, an eye-catching logo, or a tagline that... 
