Digital Marketing and Communications Trends for 2023
As the end of the year approaches, many of us are starting to wonder what the digital trends of 2023 will be, what our consumers will expect and how we can plan our business strategies accordingly.
Here are the trends that will mark the new year, so you know how to plan your communications and digital marketing strategies in 2023.
TIKTOK ADS
It's no secret that TikTok is a social network with a high level of engagement, a wide reach and a large number of users that are growing exponentially. This is why it is considered a good channel to generate awareness and brand consideration.
This social network allows for ad campaigns similar to Facebook but allows for greater segmentation to reach the desired target with advertising. In addition, there are many different ad formats that provide options for message delivery and customization for each business.
Considering that it is a widely used platform today, it is advisable for your company to join the digital transformation and start communicating and creating content on this social network if it is not already doing so.
PRESENCE IN THE METAVERSE
To understand this trend, it is important to first understand what the Metaverse is. This new digital world consists of a virtual space that extends the physical world into the digital world. It is similar in style to video games, but its purpose is different. The metaverse aims to replicate our everyday realities in the digital world through the use of virtual reality (with virtual reality devices), creating an immersive space that allows the user to enter this new world through their personalized avatar.
Through interconnectivity, it will be possible to carry out social activities in different universes, with the possibility of moving freely from one space to another. It will also be possible to carry out industrial development work for companies interested in the sector.
Among the first companies to start betting on this new digital world is Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg (CEO of Facebook) announced in 2021 the transformation of his social networking company into a metaverse company, presenting Horizon Workrooms, a virtual reality platform for teleworking and changing the name of his company to Meta.
But it is not the only company looking to enter the metaverse. Although it is not yet 100% created, it is advisable to bet on communication and the creation of campaigns in this new digital world. Until its launch, we can research the subject and expand our knowledge for this not-so-distant future.
NATIVE ADS
Another trend for 2023 is native advertising. According to Cyberclick, native advertising consists of "ads that adapt to the online medium in which they are published. Their main characteristic is the way they are displayed, always adapted to the environment in which they are found, avoiding being invasive for the user" (Cyberclick. "Native Advertising").
We can find different formats for this type of advertising: advertising on websites, on blogs, suggesting content similar to the one the user has accessed in order to attract his attention in a more natural way. The main advantage of this typology is that it is not perceived as an advertisement since it is integrated into the digital environment and respects the format and style of the web page in which it is located.
If your brand is not yet using this type of advertising, we recommend working with this medium to reach potential customers with content in a less invasive way. By using native ads, you can improve brand perception, reach audiences that do not normally respond to traditional advertising due to its saturation, receive a higher volume of traffic compared to other ad formats, and enjoy other benefits.
PODCASTS
Over the past few years, podcasts have become increasingly popular, and their audience has grown steadily. This format offers flexibility to the user, as it is a program available on online platforms that can be listened to at any time and as often as desired.
By frequently uploading content in this format, you can build user loyalty by providing them with relevant and valuable information. It is also a great alternative for attracting prospects, convincing them of the program, and generating quality leads. It is recommended to complement podcasts with other social networks in order to reach all the brand's followers and distribute them properly.
In short, it is important that brands consider this format as it can help them build customer loyalty, create a sense of trust with users, provide a different content that allows them to deliver the message with voice and personality, and increase brand awareness.
For this new year, it is recommended to rethink digital communication strategies. Faced with such a changing landscape, it is important to know how to use the tools in the best possible way to take advantage of the opportunities that arise.
At Global, we would like to accompany you on this digital journey. We can help you integrate these tools into your brand so that you are not left behind and are prepared for this new scenario.
What is mHealth and why is it important to the healthcare industry?
Mobile Health, also known as mHealth, refers to the use of mobile devices (tablets, mobile phones, monitoring devices, etc.) to manage health, covering the different phases that affect patients: prevention, management, diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up.
The mHealth is part of the digital health ecosystem, eHealth, so it is an element of great importance to take into account by those brands in the health sector.
Today, we live with the rapid growth of information and communication technology, and we can observe its permanence and improvement since the Covid-19 pandemic. The eHealth sector is also in a growth phase that parallels the rise of technology. mHealth makes it possible to reach users more directly and allows them to participate more actively in their own health by providing them with tools that help them understand the importance of a healthy lifestyle.
Currently, many mHealth users connect to available applications through smart devices, such as a smart watch, sensor-enabled sneakers, monitoring bands, and others. Through these devices, real-time data can be collected from the user, allowing for the creation of a record of information and contributing to Big Data.
The use of big data can help to cover the different stages that patients go through, due to the large amount of information that it handles. In this way, patient care services can be perfected and improved, providing greater accuracy and quality.
Among the benefits of mHealth, we can highlight the following:
- Accessibility. Users can easily access various mobile applications without having to go to a hospital, clinic, or medical center. This allows them to view their medical history, get test results, schedule appointments, and more from the comfort of their own home.
- Ease of use. Because mobile applications are similar to what users already know and use, they are easy to use with an intuitive user interface (UI).
- Personalization. Having a digital record of each patient's medical history allows for a more in-depth understanding of the patient, optimizing consultations and improving diagnoses.
- Speed. Information is updated faster, enabling early detection and prevention, as well as real-time patient follow-up.
Given that users are frequently connected to mobile devices, it is convenient for healthcare companies to take advantage of this opportunity. In this way, they will be able to be present in the daily lives of patients, accompanying them in each of the important phases (prevention, management, diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up) and improving their healthcare.
If you are interested in discovering the world of mHealth, we will be happy to help you plan a strategy and discover together the future of healthcare.
Understanding the importance of properly measuring paid campaigns
Why is it important to measure the results of paid campaigns?
When running paid advertising campaigns, it is very important to use tools that allow you to analyze the information collected in order to ensure the optimization of each campaign.
Users surfing the web leave a digital footprint that provides valuable information for decision making. Thanks to this data, it is possible to understand each consumer in depth, which helps the company to identify the strategies that are relevant to the target audience and to adjust its campaigns accordingly.
When running a paid campaign, it is essential to have web analytics metrics and clear parameters to be able to compare the results with the pre-established objectives. The data obtained allows us to know what is working and what needs to be changed to achieve the desired success. The metrics depend on the objectives to be achieved, but in general they are the basis for understanding the results of the implemented strategy.
Google Analytics is one of the most widely used tools for analyzing and monitoring website activity. It allows you to visualize collected information such as: unique users, pages visited, bounce rate, session duration, conversions, user demographics, devices, etc.
If social networks are also available, it is advisable to install the social media tracking pixel to obtain better data measurement. This pixel, also known as conversion pixel, is inserted in the source code of the web page and allows to obtain information on the activity of the same, as well as other quantitative and qualitative data of the users. Its purpose is to know the performance of the campaign and to measure the return on investment. This information is important to optimize the paid advertising campaign.
It is crucial to have analytical tools to obtain a quality database that will help the company maintain a long-term relationship with its customers, improve communication and increase profitability. By analyzing the results obtained, we can obtain the following information.
What users do. The results obtained throughout the campaign will help to better understand the customer, as information is obtained about the customer's journey on the website, knowing in detail both the points of interest and the points of abandonment. This will help to focus the strategy on the user to provide a positive experience and improve the UX and UI.
Who visits this site. It allows to know demographic and geographic data of users, as well as more personal data such as their interests. This is of utmost importance to know who you are targeting and to achieve better performance when capturing the segment.
How they arrive at the site. The origin of the visit is very important to know where to put the communication effort to achieve greater traffic to the site. This information will also help to redesign the strategy to focus more frequently on the source of the traffic and thus achieve greater effectiveness of the campaign.
Frequency of interaction. By analyzing the results, it is possible to get information about how many users visit, how many sessions they have, and how long they stay on different pages of the site. In this way, it is possible to know what content is most relevant to them and discover opportunities for improvement for future campaigns.
In this way, the use of analytics tools makes it possible to closely monitor the performance and results of campaigns in order to optimize performance. In this way, it is possible to adjust the strategy in time to better reach the selected segment, modify parameters to achieve better results, and discover opportunities for improvement. In addition, measuring results is fundamental to running remarketing campaigns, creating new audiences, and serving a new interested segment, while building a long-term relationship with existing consumers.
At Global, we have more than 20 years of experience in healthcare marketing, including managing paid advertising campaigns as part of our services. We have the expertise to help you plan, manage, and optimize your paid campaigns.
We look forward to helping you achieve better results at a lower CPC.
SEO Strategy for the Healthcare Industry
What is SEO and how does it affect the healthcare industry?
SEO (acronym for Search Engine Optimization) is the process of optimizing a website to drive traffic organically, i.e., through unsponsored results from Google and the other search engines. Although Google does not share exact data, it is estimated that about 6 billion searches are performed every day, and about 7% of those searches are related to health, according to David Feinberg, vice president of Google Health.
This means that worldwide (and in all languages), there are more than 400 million searches on Google every day that are directly or indirectly related to health and healthcare in general. This is undoubtedly a huge traffic potential, even if it is limited to the Spanish language and the geographical area of Spain, since this figure translates into approximately 2.6 million daily searches in Spain. It is clear, then, that for companies in the medical sector, pharmaceuticals, veterinarians and, in general, all health professionals, SEO is a fundamental channel within the digital acquisition strategy. This virtually inexhaustible traffic potential and brand visibility is the key to generating sales, leads or reaching a wide and diverse audience that would be very difficult (or at least more expensive) to reach with other channels.
For many healthcare companies, attracting new users (e.g., unfamiliar with the brand) is more difficult than ever, as there are now many players competing for the same keywords, including scientific publications, generalist blogs, forums, and of course other competitors in the same industry. For this reason, it is essential for healthcare professionals and companies to provide a compelling digital experience for their users. The first step in achieving this is to invest in SEO in order to reach those users (or potential patients) who use search to clarify their doubts, get information, or look for products and services. A solid SEO strategy that generates organic traffic in the long term requires an investment of time and money (which can vary greatly depending on the complexity of the keywords, the search environment and the behavior of competitors) to get a website on the first page of Google. SEO requires a constant effort, both in the optimization of the site at the technical and semantic level, as well as in the generation of new content and the acquisition of links from other domains, in addition to a quick reaction to the algorithm changes that may occur (Google alone has stated that between 500 and 600 minor changes are made to its algorithm every year).
Let's see below what the best SEO strategies for the healthcare industry are.
Publish quality content
One of the most popular SEO aphorisms is "content is king". This statement has been circulating in the digital marketing industry for years and is as true today as it was years ago. The algorithm of Google and other search engines is based on natural language and semantic understanding of queries, so it is normal that the content of a website is one of the most important elements in the totality of positioning factors (which, remember, are more than 200).
It could be said that high quality content is the most important factor in an SEO strategy. For a website to appear in search results, it must have content, it's as simple as that. It is therefore important to ensure that the content is comprehensive, high quality and accurate (very important in the healthcare sector to avoid penalties). Depending on the complexity of the keywords we are targeting, our site could be competing with other domains with higher authority, seniority, or relevance (other factors that determine positioning), so it will be important to include the so-called "long tail keywords" in our content strategy. Long-tail keywords are usually variations or synonyms of the main keyword, which usually have a lower monthly search volume, but also less competition. In addition, this type of keyword is much more likely to define the user's search intent, so it usually has a better CTR (click-through rate) and generates more interactions. Tools such as Google Keyword Planner, Ahrefs or SEMrush can help find the best keywords to optimize existing content on a website or generate new content.
Crawling, Indexing and Technical SEO
Having unique (original) and high-quality content is of little use if Google is not able to find it and therefore add it to its index to return it as a result of one or more queries. Having the correct indexing and crawling instructions in the source code of our website, with a robots.txt file and an XML Sitemap, are the basic requirements to facilitate indexing by search engines. A good SEO practice is also to submit our Sitemap to the Google Console
(Search Console) so that we can also monitor the indexing rate and possible crawling problems on our site.
A hierarchical URL structure that facilitates crawling will also have a positive effect on indexing and therefore positioning.
Core Vitals
A website's loading speed, security (https protocol) and compatibility with mobile devices (mobile first indexing) are also important positioning factors. For Google and the other search engines, the user experience is an increasingly important element, so over the years they have put a lot of emphasis on this aspect and have provided webmasters with several tools to meet the requirements, summarized in what are now called "Core Web Vitals". Google's PageSpeed Insights tool is an excellent resource to check the loading speed of a website and provides a lot of information and suggestions to improve the overall score. Another important SEO factor is the security of a website. The SSL certificate (which allows you to switch to the https protocol in a browser) allows you to encrypt a domain, ensuring that your visitors' information is always protected.
Last but not least is the compatibility of a website with mobile devices. Most searches are done on mobile devices, and if a site is not optimized for them, users are likely to leave quickly (increasing the bounce rate) and go to a competitor's site instead.
Off-Page SEO
Another of the most important elements to consider in an SEO strategy for healthcare websites are the so-called "off-page" signals, which are usually not under the direct control of the webmaster. The two most important elements of off-page SEO are inbound links (links from other domains to ours) and social signals (likes and shares of our content from social networks).
External links pointing to our domain help increase its authority. Search engines view links as a vote of confidence in a site, but not all links are created equal. It is important to get high quality links from semantically relevant and authoritative domains, possibly finding a natural balance between the attributes of the attributes, the anchor text (the text used to generate the link) and the other elements that define the link profile, in order to avoid penalties. Above all, it will be necessary to avoid spam links, link farms, low-relevance sites or links obtained in a massive and automated way. Social networks, although not a direct positioning factor, can have a significant impact on user behavior and indirectly on positioning, since they can improve visit quality metrics, brand awareness, and other factors that together have a weight within the positioning factors.
As we anticipated above, there are more than 200 positioning factors (at least the ones we know, possibly even more), but these are of course the main ones that should be taken into account when defining and implementing an SEO strategy for websites in the healthcare sector (and any other niche). Defining and implementing a successful strategy takes knowledge, time, and dedication.
At Global, we can help you do just that, and we want to be your partner in this adventure. We are a healthcare-focused digital marketing agency with a long history of success in SEO, having helped dozens of brands achieve their traffic and acquisition goals through our organic acquisition strategy.
Healthcare Marketing on Google Ads: Challenges and Tips
Advertising on Google: Challenges for the Healthcare Industry
According to Google's 2021 data, 27% of website traffic comes from paid search and advertisers are expected to spend nearly one hundred billion dollars annually on paid advertising by 2024.
With over 7,000,000 advertisers worldwide using it to raise awareness of their business, drive sales through their e-commerce or get business leads, Google Ads has undoubtedly become an indispensable source of traffic for many (especially in sensitive or highly competitive industries).
Google Ads is undoubtedly the fastest way for a brand to increase its search engine visibility. However, advertising on Google can be quite challenging for healthcare companies.
Not only from the point of view of the investment required for Google Ads campaigns, since the healthcare sector is one of the sectors with the highest average acquisition costs (*), but also and above all because of a whole series of restrictions that Google imposes on companies that want to promote certain products or use certain health-related terms in their ads.
(*) The average cost per conversion in the health sector is estimated at $68.94 on the Google Search Network and $101.50 on the Display Network.
Let's look at some of the key challenges for pharmaceutical, veterinary, or medical and health information sites that want to advertise on Google Ads, and the best practices to follow to ensure a successful paid advertising campaign.
Some services and products cannot be advertised
The first challenge for those in the healthcare niche is that some products and services cannot be advertised at all, while in other cases the audience that can be reached is limited.
Depending on the products and services being advertised, Google Ads campaigns (display or search) may only be available in certain countries.
Learn more about Google's healthcare and medical advertising policies.
Ad and landing page content
In order for ads to be accepted and run, anyone advertising with Google Ads in the Healthcare sector must include certain phrases in the ad copy or on the landing page to which traffic is sent.
For example, if testimonials or before and after pictures are shown, it is important to use phrases such as "results vary and are not guaranteed".
It will also be important that the ad text matches the content of the landing page, otherwise the Google Ads algorithm will detect this inconsistency and block the ads (with the risk of even banning the account).
No retargeting
This is undoubtedly a major challenge for healthcare advertisers, as retargeting is probably the most effective way to keep leads in the sales funnel.
One of the limitations of Google Ads for healthcare advertisers is that retargeting lists to re-engage with potential patients is not allowed (this does not apply to all types of healthcare ads, but it is something to keep in mind).
This is one of the reasons why it is important to have a landing page designed for conversion, so that people who visit the landing page after clicking on the ad can be easily converted into leads (e.g. after simply filling out a form or using a call CTA).
Know your audience
Because of the limitations mentioned above, it is critical for healthcare advertisers to know their buyer persona or target audience.
It will also be critical to keep in mind that there will most likely be different audiences that will need to be targeted in different ways.
For example, if our ads are targeting medical professionals, the keywords chosen for the campaign, as well as the copy for the ads and landing pages, should use a tone of voice and lexicon that is used by professionals looking for the service or product being promoted.
Find a digital partner who can help!
At Global, we have more than 20 years of experience in healthcare marketing, including website design focused on healthcare communications and management of paid advertising campaigns in Google Ads.
We can help you plan and manage your paid Google Ads campaigns so that they are as optimized as possible and allow you to stay ahead of your competition, getting more leads and traffic at the best CPC.
Multichannel Healthcare Marketing | GLOBAL EHEALTH
How to define a digital multichannel strategy
In a digital environment that is changing and innovating at an ever-increasing pace, it is essential to have the right tools and mindset to deal with the inevitable changes in the landscape. There are many factors that today's digital-first companies must consider in order to stay competitive, regardless of the channel(s) on which they focus their marketing efforts and budgets. Each acquisition channel can be an area of influence to capture your potential audience, either to build brand awareness and value, or to generate sales or business leads. All of this applies to every industry and sector, including, of course, pharmaceutical and healthcare.
This is why Global has created the new eHealth division, whose mission is to provide our clients with a view of the digital environment in order to offer and develop an effective communication strategy. A strategy that not only has the set of tools and services to achieve the goal set, but that is also a sentinel in the market and its evolution, to be able to react immediately and promptly to the changes in the scenario that will inevitably occur.
There are many variables that can change the digital "playground" in which a company moves: from a new strategy of its competitors (which could be more aggressive and therefore take its place to other players), through intrinsic changes in the Google algorithm (the main traffic driver for companies operating in the digital environment in Spain and the rest of the world), both at the level of organic and paid visibility, or even political or socio-economic changes in the offline world (as we are living, for example, with the current pandemic of Covid-19 or the geopolitical situation in Ukraine). For these reasons, it is necessary to be able to count on an arsenal of services and resources that can adapt in an agile way to the changes in paradigms and scenarios that inevitably occur in the market.
It should be noted that it is of little use to be able to count on the latest digital marketing tools and even a large investment budget if all this is not linked to a solid strategy and clear objectives. For this reason, Global's eHealth division always advises that the first step is to carry out a thorough analysis of the digital ecosystem in which we will be competing as a player and to define a multichannel acquisition strategy that takes into account the objectives to be achieved, the resources available and the competitive environment we face. Once this strategy has been defined, which, as we have said, must be flexible and able to adapt in an agile manner to changes that may occur, the next step is to define which services or specialties must be activated to help us achieve the objectives we have defined. Knowing where our target audience is also key to developing a successful strategy, as different platforms require different approaches and often very different levels of investment or engagement.
Social marketing, for example, is an excellent channel to connect directly with a brand's audience in a specific language and tone of voice. It is also an excellent tool for promoting and disseminating campaigns and promotions and helps to dramatically increase brand awareness. LinkedIn, Twitter, or even in many cases Facebook and Instagram, are usually the ideal candidates for deploying social marketing campaigns.
Search engine traffic is another excellent way to reach the target audience, through organic positioning (SEO) or paid search engine optimization (SEM). Both allow to reduce the distance between the search intent and the results provided by search engines (we refer mainly to Google), since their logic is based on keywords. Therefore, we can get the URLs of our site to appear for certain queries, making sure that users are served content that satisfies their search. This increases the chances of converting that visit into a lead, sale, or whatever our goal is.
Speaking of SEO and SEM, we have mentioned content, and in this sense, marketing automation (or automated content programming) is another (if not the most important) tool of vital importance in any marketing strategy, as it allows us to establish lasting and consolidated relationships with the target audience, improving engagement and loyalty.
All of these efforts would be frustrated without an optimized website at the base of the digital acquisition channels. At Global, we take a strategic approach to web development, developing sites for the healthcare sector that have optimized and relevant content, meet technical and web performance requirements, are mobile friendly, and take into account best practices in usability (UX) and user experience (UI). Beyond web or social communication, at Global we are aware that a digital strategy cannot do without being able to include in its arsenal all possible channels to contact the audience. For this reason, we are also specialized in the development of mobile applications in the health sector (mHealth), as they represent a powerful tool that can fulfill several functions, such as connecting health professionals with their patients or helping users to monitor and control their pathology.
In addition to mobile applications, which are becoming increasingly capillary, social gaming or gamification is another channel through which brands can effectively connect with their audience, in this case using a fun and entertaining dynamic that encourages participation and loyalty.
Whatever the objective of your marketing campaign, Global's eHealth division has the know-how to effectively implement your strategy and activate the channels necessary to achieve your goals.
The Impact of Marketing Strategies in the Healthcare Industry
Why is marketing important in healthcare?
Like other industries, healthcare and pharmaceutical companies cannot do without a solid marketing strategy to reach a wider audience, communicate brand values, or improve market penetration.
The impact of healthcare marketing strategies is growing, as evidenced by the increased investment in digital media by brands in the sector.
In addition, studies show that approximately 88% of people now search for relevant health information on the Internet, a percentage that continues to grow year after year, along with computer literacy.
For healthcare and pharmaceutical brands, taking advantage of this trend represents a unique opportunity, as well as a necessity, linked to the creation of marketing strategies to reach the target audience.
In this article, we will take a closer look at the impact of healthcare marketing strategies that we have observed in numerous successful projects for our healthcare clients.
Goals of Healthcare Marketing Strategies
The objectives and impact of healthcare marketing strategies should be closely linked. These can range from disseminating medical information to educate patients and help them make informed decisions, to driving traffic to a brand or product's website to reach a specific target audience (such as medical or veterinary professionals).
Here we look at some of the objectives that a good digital marketing strategy should achieve and the impact they have on the business, visibility, and reputation of healthcare companies.
Reach
Marketing strategies allow healthcare companies to reach a wider audience that may be interested in the brand directly or indirectly.
This can have a positive commercial impact in both the short and long term by associating the brand with specific issues and (through the marketing campaigns carried out) influencing an audience that previously did not know or associate the brand.
Retention
Retaining existing users (and/or customers, in some cases) is just as important as attracting new ones, which is why healthcare marketing focuses on building a positive relationship between brands and their target audiences.
Of course, all of this is only possible with the right marketing strategies that help build a positive connection between brands and their customers and/or users.
Inform and educate
Through marketing, healthcare and pharmaceutical companies can have a significant impact on raising people's general awareness of health issues. Health marketing can promote medical information through the dissemination of scientific articles and other informational materials based on truthful, validated data written by health professionals.
Thus, health marketing is not just about promoting a product or brand, as is the case with most traditional marketing strategies, but also about raising awareness and empowering people with information and data to make informed decisions about their health. Indirectly, it is a tactic that allows you to build a bond and a level of engagement with the audience you are reaching, making them interested in the brand and ultimately considering it as an option when choosing between different competitors.
Reputation
Another important impact of healthcare marketing strategies is the creation of reputation and brand awareness. In many cases, brand awareness is the first step in achieving marketing objectives such as new leads and sales.
If the audience coming to our website is more knowledgeable about the brand, it will increase the chances of generating conversions. Research shows that 75% of shoppers prefer to buy from a company they already know.
For this reason, marketing adds value when it comes to generating this brand awareness by improving a company's online visibility through better organic positioning, paid advertising campaigns on search engines such as Google or on social networks, and other strategies focused on other communication channels.
Bottom line
Only an effective marketing strategy can make an impact and allow a healthcare company to retain its users or reach new audiences.
In a previous article, we highlighted some free digital marketing tools that can be used to implement some healthcare marketing ideas to define a winning strategy and reach a wide audience, whether for healthcare professionals or end consumers of products and services.
For healthcare companies, finding a digital partner to help them define and implement their online marketing strategy can be a complicated task. There are very few marketing agencies that specialize in healthcare marketing and have a team of experienced professionals. Global Healthcare is one of them.
There are very few marketing agencies that specialize in healthcare marketing and have a team of experienced professionals. Global Healthcare is one of these.
2022 Veterinary Online Marketing Tools
Nowadays, all businesses and sectors need to be present on the Internet and therefore need to have a good digital strategy. The case of veterinary clinics is no exception. Moreover, people who have a pet generally consider it a member of the family, and when they have to go to the vet, they will choose one that has a positive online reputation, because no one will want to go to a veterinary center that has negative comments, an unprofessional website, or an unfortunate communication on social networks.
Therefore, regardless of the size of your veterinary clinic, it is essential that you consider digital marketing as an important factor for the proper functioning of your business in the present and for its growth in the future. You will be happy to know that digital marketing is more cost effective than traditional marketing because you get better results with less investment.
To start managing the digital marketing of a veterinary clinic, as in most cases, you need to take into account these three basic steps:
- Planning: You need to define goals, strategies, and actions. Think about what you want to achieve, how and when. Once these objectives have been set and a budget has been defined, it will be easier to segment the actions necessary to achieve the goal we have set.
- Action: Plans need to be translated into concrete actions. It is important to put our plan into action. If we do not have the knowledge or the time to dedicate to our digital strategy, it is advisable to count on professionals in the sector who can help us.
- Measure: it is not enough to do; it is essential to analyze the results. Through data analysis, it will be easier to make informed decisions based on the behavior of our website users or the way our audience interacts with the digital content we publish.
To cover all the bases in your digital strategy, your practice will likely need SEM, SEO, social media, email marketing, content marketing, and link building efforts. And for this, there are a number of free digital tools that will facilitate your tasks and optimize your efforts:
Google Ads: is the basic tool for SEM (Search Engine Marketing) on the main search engine, Google; that is, to optimize the visibility of your veterinary clinic's website. It is used to manage paid campaigns and your ads will appear together with the results of organic searches. There are several formats to choose from, from the classic text ad on the search network to text, image and video ads on the display network, including more interactive platforms such as YouTube.
Google Analytics: Thanks to this tool, your veterinary clinic's website can give you a lot of information. Which pages are the most visited, what content your readers are most interested in, how long they stay on your site, and so on. This will give you clues to make content marketing, essential to generate content on your website that really interests your potential clients and is useful to them about the world of pet health.
Google Search Console: another fundamental tool for veterinary marketing (and not only), as it allows webmasters to check the status of the indexing of their sites on the Internet by the search engine and optimize their visibility, as well as providing much more valuable information about positioning by keywords, traffic segmentation by country, usability on mobile devices, etc.
GtMetrix: This tool, on par with Google's Page Speed Insight tool, helps you analyze the loading speed of your website, which is an important factor for positioning. If it takes too long to load, users will lose patience and leave your site. In addition, GtMetrix not only gives you a score for your site's load time, but also provides tips and recommendations on how to fix the problems it identifies, helping you improve your site's performance.
Hootsuite: A truly indispensable tool for managing your social networks. With Hootsuite, you can not only schedule social media posts and monitor what is happening on your Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter pages, but you can also save a lot of time by responding to comments directly from the platform.
Canva: This is a very versatile and easy-to-use tool for creating graphic content without any design skills. Canvas offers a variety of free and paid resources and templates that allow us to create content in minutes without having to be an experienced graphic designer.
Mailchimp: Thanks to Mailchimp, you can easily manage the sending of your veterinary clinic's newsletters to your database, sharing with your clients the latest news or any valuable information you deem necessary. This tool will help you manage your email marketing efforts by providing you with data on email open rates and more, so you can optimize the sending of your communications.
Survey Monkey: This is the ideal tool to send any type of survey to clients, target audience, employees... Knowing your audience's opinion about your veterinary clinic and the services you offer is key to improving and growing.
Have you seen all the options? Take a look at these digital tools for your veterinary clinic and start now to communicate and position yourself better in the digital world. Most are free and easy to use, so choose the ones that are most useful to you.
Digital transformation in healthcare
Society is changing and adapting to digitalization in leaps and bounds, and the healthcare sector has no intention of being left behind. More and more healthcare professionals, institutions and organizations are using digital media to improve the communication of the services they provide. This is due to the advantages that have made these channels increasingly used, such as reach, immediacy, proximity, and personalization. If society demands a more humane, more digital, or more preventive healthcare, healthcare professionals must do the same.
It is appropriate to highlight some of the key points made by Kate Dion, health communications expert at 3D Communications, and Maturin Tchoumi, manager at the pharmaceutical company Roche Finland. In the talk, they discussed why the future of healthcare digitalization is so promising and how the pharmaceutical industry should contribute to the digital health revolution and growth. Below we highlight some of the ideas.
The digitization of healthcare has been with us for a long time, but the COVID-19 pandemic has greatly accelerated this process, not only in healthcare, but in all aspects of our lives. It can be argued that digital disruption connects and improves the quality of life.
The digitalization of the healthcare sector has shown that it can improve patient care services and ensure better patient continuity. This opportunity presented by the pandemic must be used as a method of learning in a way that serves the transformation of healthcare. For this to happen, all components and constituents of the healthcare system must be aligned and working toward the same goal.
Digital transformation and new technologies can facilitate the early detection of diseases and symptoms, a more exhaustive control of pathologies. In other words, to improve the quality of life of patients. Visits and monitoring that used to be strictly face-to-face are giving way to digital check-ups and phone calls that speed up the process and offer the same or better quality of service. While it is true that face-to-face care is essential in healthcare, many cases of follow-up and monitoring are favored by digital transformation as processes are streamlined and patients are more open to having this type of consultation on a more regular basis. Studies show a high level of patient satisfaction with this type of consultation, and all agree that it saves time and avoids logistical problems.
The emergence of applications for the control of various pathologies, such as diabetes, or the use of augmented reality and the metaverse for disease detection is becoming increasingly common and a clear trend for the coming years. It is estimated that the global digital health industry will reach an investment of $1 trillion by 2030. If it follows the same trend and upward curve of digitization of the sector, it will not be uncommon to extrapolate and increase the US data, where in 2019, 42% of patients claimed to use digital health follow-ups to the entire first world.
The real value of digital health lies in patient education. The digital transformation that the sector is undergoing will mean that all those patients who want to can have the same knowledge about their pathologies and clinical history as their doctors and nurses. The high flow of information that can be received will help to improve and prevent many diseases, resulting in a significant improvement in the quality of life of patients and their families. The healthcare sector will also clearly benefit from all these changes that are coming in the not-too-distant future.
All these upcoming changes need to be communicated so that patients can feel part of this growth process. Some of the goals of the digitalization of the healthcare sector:
- Become more patient/consumer focused.
- Increase online services.
- Attract and retain all patients more efficiently.
- Create a strong communication strategy that differentiates you from the competition.
- Communicate that we, as professionals, have adapted to their needs.
- Promote health-related information: news, advances, products, goods, and services within the reach of patients and consumers.
Finally, we look at how healthcare communication has adapted to the new needs of society, moving closer and closer to the communication and value propositions of the mass consumer sector. Today, it is more creative and uses the same tools and strategies that can be used in any other sector. However, communicating health today still requires experts who understand the scientific sector, its audiences, and its characteristics, because although the tone may change, the content must always be rigorous and scientific.
At Global, thanks to our multidisciplinary team, we help our clients in a 360º way, offering all points of view. From planning to design and execution of digital communication strategies. We develop customized strategies to achieve success and complete digital and communications integration for our clients.
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8 Pharmaceutical Marketing Tips and Ideas for 2022
When it comes to pharmaceutical marketing, it is important to have the right strategy in place to maximize visibility and stand out from the competition. It is therefore essential to develop a multichannel approach that generates interest and visibility and helps build or consolidate brand trust.
We have compiled a number of online medical marketing ideas to help you stand out in 2022.
But before we get into the details of the ideas and the channels we recommend for a successful omnichannel marketing strategy, let's briefly define what healthcare marketing is and how it differs from other industries.
How is pharmaceutical marketing different from other industries?
The healthcare and medical sector is one of the most regulated and therefore it is necessary to take into account the restrictions and requirements of this industry when creating an online advertising strategy.
Promoting the products and services of companies in the pharmaceutical sector requires a special strategy that can be developed in several channels, as long as the requirements of pharmaceutical marketing and its differences from traditional advertising are taken into account.
Below are a number of ideas and tips to help define a winning strategy and reach a wide audience, whether healthcare professionals or end users of products and services.
- Segment the target audience
How a company chooses to communicate, whether in the pharmaceutical, medical device, or other industries, is largely determined by its target audience and how it plans to reach them. Taking the time to define who that audience is and what motivates them is key to developing an effective marketing plan. Getting the audience segmentation right, based on common characteristics such as geography, buyer type, interests, etc., is an extremely important element in establishing a successful marketing strategy. - Implementing a SEO Strategy for Pharmaceutical Marketing
An effective medical SEO strategy will help generate traffic from Google and other search engines and improve rankings for specific keywords related to the industry. The SEO strategy should include a detailed plan that includes the key pillars (among the more than 200 ranking factors recognized by Google), including content marketing, link building, and technical SEO. Hiring a pharmaceutical marketing agency with SEO expertise to ensure your company's website is truly optimized is an investment that can help you achieve your defined marketing goals. - Maintain an active blog
For any business, regardless of industry, having a blog can be a great marketing tool that can have a significant impact in terms of awareness and traffic, as it allows for a much wider range of keywords to be covered compared to landing page content, which is usually designed to communicate a much more direct and simple message. A blog also helps the brand position itself as an expert in its field, providing an opportunity to demonstrate its knowledge and identify itself as an authority, as well as being an effective means of engaging in a conversation with the brand's audience. Another option, in the event that maintaining an active blog is complicated, can be the creation of a news section to present important company news and recent press releases that mention the brand. This signals to users and search engines that the brand is active, builds trust, and ensures that new content is indexed. - Run paid traffic campaigns with Google Ads
Google Ads is a fast, efficient, and scalable way to reach your target audience. Paid advertising allows you to show your services or offers in specific locations in search results or with search and display ads, and remarketing allows you to "recapture" traffic that was not directly impacted on the first visit by showing specific ads only to people who have already visited your site or performed a specific action on your site. - Email Marketing
Email marketing campaigns are sometimes the big forgotten part of an omnichannel strategy. But the possibility of segmentation offered by this tool is unique among marketing tools, and a newsletter targeted to the right audience can bring excellent results, in addition to helping to connect with the audience either for informational or promotional purposes. - Open a channel of communication with the public through social networks
Social networks, whether professional ones such as LinkedIn or "mainstream" ones such as Instagram or Facebook, are the privileged place to connect with the public. Both the end consumer and the medical or pharmaceutical professional use them. For healthcare brands, it is important to be able to maintain an active conversation with their own audiences through social networks, which are also an extraordinary tool to generate greater trust in the brand, either by generating brand awareness or by positioning themselves as an authority on certain topics. - Develop a professional website
Having a professional, well-designed website that meets usability and user experience standards is critical to creating a solid first impression and laying the foundation for all of your medical digital marketing efforts. Engaging the services of a pharmaceutical advertising and marketing agency to redesign your website could help provide the final push for more traffic, visibility and leads. - Tracking and Reporting
Installing Google Analytics script on your website to track traffic and see the evolution of quality and quantity metrics on visits is critical. This will help you make better marketing decisions and allow you to understand if the traffic you are generating is having a significant impact.
If you need help implementing these ideas into your pharmaceutical marketing strategy, don't hesitate to contact us.
