Part 2 Jim Lefevere: Social Media and Healthcare: Why You Need To Create a Crisis?

I am thrilled that Jim Lefevere is willing to write a guest post. He is an award-winning marketing and technology leader for the healthcare, medical device, and consumer goods industries. His breadth of expertise spans traditional marketing and pioneering initiatives that have increased profits, engaged customers, and promoted cohesive brand awareness for start-ups to Fortune 100 companies. You can read his blog on digital strategy, interactive marketing, and connected healthcare at: http://www.jlefevere.com.

In my previous post, we discussed the shift between traditional and digital mediums. Below starts where we left off in the previous post.

Knowing this little bit of sociology, you have to create a situation that shows some consequential action (good or bad) and/or will make the person identify with your proposal. Essentially, you must create a crisis. So how do you create a crisis?

1. Know Your Customer.

You need to know your customer and understand in what quantity they spend their time online in digital environments and in social networks. Hopefully your customer is there in quantity and is spending a measurable amount of time using online media (20%+) If so, proceed to Step 2.

2.  The Status Quo must be Scary.

You have to make the status quo more dangerous than the change you are proposing. Doing nothing is never a strategy. Digital and Social Media is the greatest change to marketing in a generation, do we want to be on the sidelines? Proceed to Step 3.

3.  Hope is Not a Strategy.

You have to articulate that hope is not a strategy, as in “I hope social media goes away.” Doing nothing will put your company at a competitive disadvantage, struggling to survive. ¬†Doing something can put your company at a competitive advantage. The case study has to be ¬†pretty dire in order to get attention. Make it realistic, but don’t pull punches.

4.  The Trend is Your Friend.

You have to show market research and trends that demonstrate that your customers are online and will continue to go online in droves for the foreseeable future. Compare and contrast your customer media time in offline channels versus online channels. Use examples that are easy to understand: instead of a print ad in Health magazine with a circulation of 100,000* that perhaps 1,000 act on, I can guarantee that 25,000 people will see my digital ad, and I only have to pay for the people that click on it.  Furthermore, I can do it for less money and provide direct measurement of what we get for it. Compelling, no?

5.  Hit Home with a Customer Story.

Make it real by telling a customer story (can be allegorical) and draw comparisons to those who are doing it well. Using a listening platform (hopefully you have a listening platform by now) find customers, find customers tweets, posts, etc. and share examples. Indicate that there is a conversation taking place online and that conversation will take place whether we like or not. Do we want to be involved or like an ostrich do we want to put our head in the sand? Your punch line will be if we put our head in the sand we will get kicked in the butt.

6. Look to the Leaders.

Reference what leading companies are doing. I typically refer to leading CPG companies such as Proctor & Gamble and Unilever since they often are out front in driving change. That provides a comfort level because if the leading companies are doing it, then that must be where things are going‚ĶBut also be prepared to answer how Unilever applies to your business. This is where you’ll want to have a stat handy such as, Age 55+ is the fastest growing demographic on Facebook to allay any immediate objections that may come up about the difference between laundry detergent buyers and ¬†patients.

7.  You Would Rather Ride the Wave Than Be Under It.

Make sure that it is well understood that this is the first wave and that the bigger waves are coming right behind it, because they are….so action is required now.

8. Avoid the Dreaded Competitive Set Benchmark.

It is common to request a competitive benchmark to see what competitors are doing. While this type of competitive intelligence has a place; in this case benchmarking yourself against competitive activities does little good unless you have a competitor that is employing digital and social media activities that you want to highlight. If not, then you run the risk of creating a scenario where Executives believe dramatic change is unneeded.

9. Beat the Drum–Frequently.

Hit the message as often as possible. We train sales people that you have to hit the same message 8 times before it sticks. Same applies here.  Creating a crisis is a skill that every two year old masters in an attempt to get their way.

IMHO, digital and social media falls into that category if you find yourself struggling to get organizational focus on digital marketing. Because today digital and social media is the rule, and you want to be thought of as a leader and person that tackles tough problems.

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Do Patients Know Why You Are “Different?”

The key to growing patient volumes is selling something “different” so that prospects can make a choice. But the things we think are different are usually irrelevant to patients seeking a medical provider.

“Best Doctors” is not different. “Our New Da Vinci,” or any other medical technology, is not different enough.

HealthGrades…not really different. ¬†(Nobody removes the oxygen mask in the ambulance to ask the EMT what the “grades” are of the nearest hospital.)

Different: Escaping the Competitive Herd, by Youngme Moon has been getting some raves in the consumer marketing world. We sometimes learn important lessons from consumer marketers.

Check out this video about Moon’s book. It may start an important conversation within you…and around you.