Share Moving Media

Social Media Isn’t Enough: Why You Need Content to Feed Your Media Mix

By

Social media is an effective way to connect with and engage your online audience. However, when it comes to an impactful content marketing strategy, social media isn’t enough. 

Today’s consumers spend nearly 3 hours a day on social media. It’s a great way to reach a highly targeted audience with custom messages, and users can share information easily for an even broader reach. But social media posts are just one aspect of a successful content marketing strategy. To reach more people in the healthcare supply chain, medical sales, and hospital purchasing, you should create an omnichannel media mix that will attract attention, drive traffic to your site, and generate revenue.

Keep reading to learn about content marketing and why social media isn’t enough to feed your media mix.

Quick Takeaways

  • Content marketing is the creation and distribution of information that provides tailored solutions and answers to users’ unique needs.
  • Social media should be one element of an omnichannel content marketing strategy.
  • There are five main reasons why social media isn’t enough for a successful content marketing strategy, from limited visibility to hindered conversions.

What Exactly Is Content Marketing?

Content marketing is the creation and distribution of useful information that answers users’ specific questions and addresses their unique needs. Forms of content marketing include:

  • Email campaigns
  • Blog articles
  • Social media posts
  • Videos
  • Newsletters
  • Print materials (like direct mail and brochures)

Today’s consumers are more discerning than ever before. With the help of the internet, they’re able to conduct their own research and find the brands and products they feel will best meet their needs. For this reason, content marketing is extremely important. Content that resonates with readers delivers numerous benefits. It helps to:

  • Raise brand awareness
  • Set you apart from the competition
  • Deliver valuable resources to your readers
  • Establish your business as a thought leader
  • Provide expert information
  • Drive traffic to your site
  • Solidify brand loyalty and repeat business

Content marketing is an impactful way to establish and foster relationships on a deeper level. People will think of your business for their solutions and will be more likely to recommend you to their network of contacts. This helps build a successful media mix that drives business, increases sales, and continues to grow your company. 

The following video explains the ins and outs of content marketing and the best approach for optimal results:

5 Reasons Why Social Media Isn’t Enough

Although social media is an effective channel to incorporate into your content marketing plan, it cannot singlehandedly sustain your efforts. Here are five reasons why social media isn’t enough.

1. It Doesn’t Reach Your Entire Audience

It’s true that 82% of the U.S. population actively uses social media. However, by using social posts as your sole means of content distribution, you could exclude a significant portion of your prospective customers. Social media use differs between demographic groups. If you’re targeting people between 18 to 29 or 65 and older, you’re not reaching them through this medium. That’s why it’s important to include social media as an omnichannel approach. 

Social media use varies by demographic.

Image Source

For maximum results, it’s best to reach people where they’re spending their time. This means sending email campaigns, publishing blog articles, and posting on social platforms to ensure a wider reach. The more channels you use, the more people you’ll connect with and deliver content that resonates. 

2. It Limits Visibility

Social media platforms use algorithms that affect who sees your posts in their timelines. Organic posts that don’t boost through paid ads offer no guarantee that your audience will see them. As a result, tracking reach and overall impact of this aspect of your content marketing campaign can be difficult. Email campaigns and display ads not only increase visibility but also provide trackable data that can help improve the effectiveness of your efforts. While social media can limit your visibility, including it as part of a media mix is a good way to engage your audience while increasing brand awareness. 

3. You Don’t Own Your Content

Any time you share content on social media, the platform obtains ownership of the material and can redistribute it for its benefit. If your entire content marketing plan revolves around social media, then you don’t own any of your material. Expert blog posts are an effective way to create original content your company owns. You control who sees it and how it’s used. You also reap the financial benefits. 

Losing ownership of social media content isn’t detrimental as long as you have other material in your content marketing arsenal (like blog articles and whitepapers) that belongs to you and is under your control.

4. Online Experiences Begin with Search Engines

Studies show that 93% of all online experiences begin with a search engine. When healthcare suppliers or group purchasing networks are looking for products and services, they don’t immediately head to social media platforms. They enter their question into a search engine, which directs them to websites that provide answers and solutions. If you’re only focusing on social media posts as your content distribution method, you’re unlikely to appear on search engine result listings. That means you’re losing business to companies who appear on the listings. 

Image Source

To stand apart from the competition, you need to create a well-rounded content marketing campaign that includes multiple sources for content. This enables search engines to identify you as a helpful resource for their users and rank your company among their recommendations.

5. Doesn’t Drive Traffic Straight to Your Website

To get people to make a purchase, you need to drive traffic directly to your website. While social media posts can help build brand awareness and increase audience engagement, they don’t necessarily help conversions. To reach your site, social media users must click on one more link, adding another step to becoming a customer. While social media posts can be a tool to help guide people to your website, they don’t directly boost conversion rates. 

Develop an Effective Content Marketing Strategy 

Share Moving Media is a media and content company that provides communication and educational resources to healthcare businesses. Whether in group contracting or hospital distribution, our experts can help you create a content marketing strategy that gains market share and positions you as a leader in the healthcare industry. 

Contact us today to learn how we can help you create an effective content marketing strategy!

4 Things to Tell Trade Magazine Editors About Your Brand to Boost Your Healthcare Marketing

By

The internet has changed the face of healthcare management. Now that people can do their own medical research online, they’re empowered to make more informed, proactive decisions about their healthcare. As a result, healthcare suppliers must work harder to set themselves apart from the competition.

From hospital distribution to medical sales, healthcare marketing is a must in gaining brand awareness, building a loyal following, and increasing revenue. Trade magazine marketing in healthcare can be a highly effective tool in a brand’s development strategy. You’re able to use a reputable source to target an audience who could be interested in your products or services. 

But trade magazine editors aren’t all-knowing. While they can do some basic research, they don’t know everything about every brand. You’ll have to supply them with the information they need to promote your services, attract your audience’s attention, and help you stand out from the competition. 

What Makes Trade Magazines an Effective Healthcare Marketing Tool?

People who want to gain industry insights into the latest trends and products rely on trade publications to keep them updated. These magazines are continually evolving to meet readers’ needs, sharing information that resonates based on the feedback members provide through trade forums and workshops.

Trade magazines can be an effective healthcare marketing tool because:

  • They have a long shelf life. Many people collect trade magazines and businesses leave them on lobby tables for future reading. By publishing information about your company in a trade publication, you not only reach people right away when the magazines are first distributed. You can reach even more people in your industry days, weeks, and even months later.
  • They introduce readers to companies and individuals who are leaders in healthcare. Through articles, ads, interviews, and research findings, trade magazines help companies build a relationship with a targeted audience. You can position yourself as an authority in your field, creating opportunities for customer loyalty and increased traffic to your pipeline.
  • They offer more than publications. They provide virtual networking opportunities, online forums, downloadable resources, and libraries of content. They’re an invaluable resource to industry professionals and can help boost brand awareness and drive sales.

What Should Trade Magazine Editors Know About Your Brand?

You’re not the only healthcare supplier trying to reach people through your industry trade publication. Lots of other companies will take out ads, provide interviews, and contribute content to the same magazine in which you want to appear. So why should prospects pay attention to you? 

Customers are always looking for a solution to a problem. Let your editor know what your brand can do that others can’t. Share information that makes your organization unique. Here are four things editors should know about your business to maximize this brand awareness opportunity. 

1. Your Story

Nothing is more uniquely you than your company’s story. How did your business get into this industry? What motivates you to be the best at what you do? When people better understand who you are as an organization, it gives them a chance to make a connection with you. Transparency builds trust, and people tend to do business with companies they trust. 

In addition to sharing information about your background, use this opportunity to highlight things about your business that are unusual in the industry. Tell about any state-of-the-art techniques you use. Discuss your values or mission statement. Promote your lower rates or faster shipping times. Whatever it is that you can do differently or better than others in your industry will give you a competitive advantage. 

2. Your Archetype 

Part of your individuality is your brand’s archetype, a recognizable way people can relate to your organization’s personality. Maybe you’re the visionary, the likable company next door, or the hero. Whatever it is, your archetype can help shape your brand’s story. It can stir emotions within your audience, help you to resonate with potential customers, and leave a lasting impression.

Archetypes make your brand more identifiable and memorable. They help set a level of expectation for what kind of experience prospects can anticipate from your brand. Archetypes help you stand out in a sea of competitors. They’re invaluable to building authentic connections with your audience that lead to loyal customers and increased sales.

3. Your Market Research 

Market research is another way to show how your company stands out from the competition and adds value to your industry. In healthcare, confidence is essential to sales. People want to know the products they’re buying are tested, trusted, safe, and effective. If your company has conducted medical research, share those findings. 

Not only does this position you as a knowledgeable resource in your field. It shows that your brand makes educated, informed decisions. You’re proactive about ensuring that your products meet quality standards, and you’re willing to educate others in your industry. All of this solidifies your position as a healthcare leader and useful resource that benefits your trade as a whole.

4. Reviews from Brand Ambassadors

The involvement of stakeholders can be highly influential when educating people about your brand. From group purchasing networks to physicians, people are undoubtedly satisfied with your products and services and willing to share their reviews of your business. These first-hand accounts and experiences are likely to impact the purchase decisions of others. 

Be sure to include reviews from brand ambassadors especially when they’re from a known individual or company. If someone is already trusted and respected in the industry and recommends your business, it lends authenticity to the review and credibility to your brand.

Tell Share Moving Media About Your Brand

Trade magazine editors want their publications to contain meaningful information that brings value to readers. By giving them important information about your brand, you help them craft useful articles that provide valuable resources to their readers while promoting your business. 

A full-service content company, Share Moving Media creates and distributes quality content like articles and publications for the healthcare industry. We know the right questions to ask to learn what makes your brand different from others and help you reach a wider audience and grow your business. 

To learn more about how to generate brand awareness through trade publications, contact us today.

Why Choose the Journal of Healthcare Contracting for Healthcare Marketing?

By

The B2B healthcare sales process is much longer than the average sales process, making many of your healthcare marketing strategies challenging to navigate. Newly available technology in marketing and sales also means the industry is changing, adding another challenge to your process. When you stay on top of the latest changes in marketing and healthcare, you can speed up the sales process and see greater returns.

The Journal of Healthcare Contracting is a publication created for the healthcare supply chain and offers solutions for your marketing team to handle the above challenges and more. Learn five ways you can benefit from the publication.

Key Takeaways:

  • The Journal of Healthcare Contracting is Share Moving Media’s publication devoted to the healthcare supply chain.
  • The insights from the magazine will help you create quality, relevant marketing content for your audience.
  • The publication offers advertising options that place your brand before leaders in the healthcare supply chain.

What Is the Journal of Healthcare Contracting?

The Journal of Healthcare Contracting is a publication by Share Moving Media covering news and updates from the healthcare supply chain. The content provides industry insights from healthcare experts to help marketers and purchasers find new opportunities and make data-backed decisions.

Over 12,400 critical stakeholders in the healthcare supply chain receive the publication. It specifically addresses four primary positions within the supply chain:

  • Healthcare systems
  • Healthcare suppliers and manufacturers
  • Hospital distribution
  • Group purchasing networks

How the Journal of Healthcare Contracting Helps Marketers

Marketers can gain unique value from The Journal of Healthcare Contracting because of its targeted content and industry updates, which are foundational to a successful healthcare marketing strategy.

Here are five specific reasons why marketers should use The Journal of Healthcare Contracting as part of their research and marketing efforts.

1. Provides Information You Can Use to Create Quality Content

The information and reports you receive in the publication help you create quality healthcare marketing content that adds value for your clients. About 55% of marketers saw their greatest marketing success from creating quality content.

Quality content is content that:

  • Answers your audience’s questions
  • Is easy to read and understand
  • Dives deeper into a topic
  • Shares valuable insights
  • Provides actionable content your audience can use

Many of the articles and content you read in The Journal of Healthcare Contracting are more in-depth than what you would find through a Google search. You can also find statistics and case studies you could reference in your marketing content to support your claims and add greater value to your audience.

If you are new to healthcare content marketing strategy, the following video outlines some of the best methods for creating quality content.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l84ETfVheOM

2. Helps You Build a Customer-Centric Strategy

The Journal of Healthcare Contracting is the only publication dedicated to the healthcare supply chain. It contains the latest industry data, client behaviors, hospital purchasing trends, and marketing insights specific to your industry. These insights will help you create relevant content for your audience.

Relevant content connects with your readers by showing you understand who they are and their most significant challenges. For example, a supplier needs to know what healthcare workers face daily before offering solutions that resonate with the facilities they market to.

Since the pandemic hit, empathy has been a driving force for many marketers. An empathetic marketer builds authentic relationships with their customers, acknowledges challenges, and pushes sales to the backseat of their marketing efforts. However, you can’t empathize with your audience if you don’t understand where they are today, so audience insights from the industry are vital for a customer-centric marketing strategy.

3. Supports a Data-Driven Marketing Strategy

How do you make your healthcare marketing decisions? If you have been in the business for several years, you might pattern your current efforts off past results. However, times are changing quickly, and what worked last year might not be as effective this year or in five years.

Staying on top of industry trends doesn’t just mean changing as the industry changes. It means predicting where it is heading in the next few years and preparing for that change in advance so that when it arrives, you aren’t left blind-sided and scrambling to catch up with your competition.

A data-driven marketing strategy uses insights from the past and present to predict future trends so that you can have proactive marketing efforts. However, the data from your company only paints half a picture. When you also incorporate predictions and insights from other experts and businesses, like what you can find in The Journal of Healthcare Contracting, you can see the larger picture of where your industry is headed for more accurate marketing predictions.

4. Connects You to Your Target Audience

About 79% of marketers say generating quality leads is their top priority. To attract valuable prospects, you have to place your content in front of the right people. The healthcare supply chain sprawls across various marketing channels. The few channels that contain all your target leads also have thousands of other readers that aren’t prospective buyers.

Advertising through The Journal of Healthcare Contracting puts your content in front of leaders in the healthcare supply chain, which ensures most readers are also quality leads, increasing the return of your marketing efforts.

Some of the readers in the healthcare supply chain you will reach with your content include:

  • 4,200 executives in healthcare contracting for over a thousand health systems
  • 2,500 hospital supply chain executives
  • 700 sales, marketing, logistics, and contracting executives
  • 3,700 suppliers and manufacturers

5. Provides a Greater Return from Your Advertisements

Despite today’s digital advertising and marketing trends, nearly half of U.S. adults still find print advertisements most trustworthy. Marketing campaigns that combine print with digital advertising see a 400% increase in effectiveness.

When you advertise in The Journal of Healthcare Contracting, you can maximize your return by reaching your target audience through one of the most trustworthy mediums for marketing and advertising.

Expand Your Healthcare Marketing Strategy

Share Moving Media has provided valuable training, information, and advertising opportunities for the healthcare supply chain since 1994. You can become a prominent name in healthcare by investing in more significant marketing insights and channels to get you in front of your target audience.

Contact us to learn more about how to market through The Journal of Healthcare Contracting.

Lead Scoring in Healthcare: How to Build an Effective Qualification Model

By

While generating leads is an essential goal for all healthcare suppliers, qualified leads that convert are critical to a company’s success. Knowing where prospects are in the sales journey— whether they’re motivated to buy or are at the right time for a follow-up— helps build a reliable sales pipeline.

Lead scoring in healthcare provides useful insights to help you rate your sales leads for a more efficient and effective sales process. An effective lead scoring qualification model can help you hone in on qualified leads with a higher likelihood of completing a sale. This allows you to increase sales and grow your business faster.

Lead Scoring in Healthcare and Why It’s Important

Lead scoring in healthcare enables you to gather data for a particular lead and use that information to assign it a point value. Typical models use a scale of 0 (least qualified) to 100 (most qualified) to determine which leads are most engaged with your brand. The more you learn about each lead, and the more they interact with your business, the higher their score should rise.

Lead scores rely on five main data points:

  • Demographics: Qualitative and quantitative information, from age and gender to purchase behavior and job title, guide campaign strategy and retention efforts.
  • Business details: Company size and revenue can impact the language you use to communicate with your prospects as well as the products and price points you promote to them.
  • Online presence: Monitor chats and discussions on websites and social network forums. Look for pain points and opportunities to solve their problems with your products.
  • Social network: If your leads are on social media, consider communicating with them in a more casual, conversational format to build a deeper, meaningful relationship. 

Once leads achieve a particular point threshold, they are deemed qualified and can be directed to the sales department. When a sales team receives a notification about a qualified lead, they follow up to help convert the prospect to a customer. 

The insights you gain from lead scoring and the process of qualifying leads are critical to your success. The more you know about your prospects, the more you can do to create a positive customer experience for them while guiding them through the sales funnel. From customized messaging to useful promotions and educational materials, understanding your audience gives you the leverage you need to build trust, rapport, and solidify brand loyalty for sales growth.

7 Tips for Building an Effective Lead Scoring Qualification Model

For the most effective results, lead scoring should be accurate and consistent. Use the information gathered from the lead scoring data qualifiers to develop a model that follows these seven guidelines.

1. Establish Your Minimum Criteria 

Determine what you require from a lead before they can become a customer. These steadfast qualifications could be age, location, or job title. Maybe you only sell to people in hospital distribution or group purchasing networks. Whatever the criteria, it must be essential to passing them through the funnel. Otherwise, it shouldn’t be considered here. 

2. Identify Your Target Market 

Identify the characteristics of your target market. Unlike your minimum criteria, these are common traits typically held by your preferred audience but are not mandatory. The goal is to identify prospects that are most similar to your existing customers. The more comparable they are, the more likely they are to be interested in your products.

This is a simple process if you’re familiar with your current customers. If not, your marketing team should know these characteristics from their research in developing custom content. You can also rely on your sales team for input since they encounter your audience daily and are in touch with your customers’ needs.

3. Define the Ideal Customer 

In a perfect world, what does your dream customer look like? Think about traits like job title, field of expertise, typical turnaround demand, and budget size. Seek input from your sales and marketing teams to build a more well-defined snapshot of your ideal lead. Once you know what your desired customer looks like, your leads can achieve a higher score.

4. Assess Customer Engagement 

Understanding customer behavior is crucial in assigning point values. Consider all of the opportunities a prospect has to engage with your company.

Assess behavior such as:

  • Website clicks
  • Email opens
  • File downloads
  • Social media comments
  • Completed CTAs

Evaluate website analytics to find such details and observe customer behavior. Critical conversion behaviors, like requesting more information or watching a product demonstration, are indicators that a lead is interested in becoming a customer. The score for these behaviors should carry more weight when you begin assigning points. 

5. Set the Parameters for Your Scoring System 

Although a scoring system of 0-100 is straightforward and widely accepted, incorporating more digits in your structure can help categorize your leads. Consider adding a thousandth digit to signify company size. Weed out weak leads by assigning a certain number of points for leads that meet your essential criteria. If they don’t meet the threshold for quality, they don’t make it to the sales team. 

6. Assign Points 

The point of lead scoring is to identify characteristics and actions that result in a closed sale. Assign points to behaviors accordingly. It is rare that a lead who registers for blog updates becomes a paying customer. That behavior should earn a low score. Leads who click on downloadable files do tend to convert, so they should get a higher score. 

7. Adjust as Necessary

Once you’ve determined your scoring system, try it out for a month. Then reassess and see how effective it’s been. Look for any surprises, like low-scoring leads that converted and high-scoring leads that didn’t. Make adjustments to your system as necessary until you develop a model that yields positive results.

Let Us Help You Build an Effective Lead Scoring and Qualification Model

All businesses in the healthcare supply chain can benefit from an effective lead scoring and qualification model. With this model, you can target the prospects most likely to convert and allocate your resources most effectively. Share Moving Media specializes in helping healthcare businesses generate qualified leads and reach their marketing goals for increased market share.

Contact us today to discuss how we can help you close sales and generate revenue with an effective lead scoring and qualification model.