How to Sell Your Boss on Healthcare Content Marketing

If you’re a marketing professional at a B2B healthcare organization, you’ve got a fight on your hands.

Unless you’re at one of the few organizations in our industry that’s embraced and excelled at creating business content, you face the same challenge I frequently do, and that’s helping healthcare leaders understand what they’re missing out on by procrastinating on content.

There are ways to get over that hump though, which is why I wanted to share with you what I’ve noticed motivates my clients to finally move into the world of modern business and invest in content marketing.

Recruit your competition.

This is the biggest one. If you’re working with a CEO or manager who keeps putting off content, nothing will change their pace like seeing one of their competitors becoming more active online.

Pick out your biggest rivals and check out their LinkedIn, Twitter, and YouTube activity as well as any blogs, white papers or case studies they’ve issued on their site.

Flaunt this info.

The hardest thing about convincing someone to launch a content marketing campaign is giving them a good reason. If we’re going to be honest “everybody else is doing it” isn’t enough. That’s ok though, since there’s plenty of bits of info out there to support at least some investment in a content presence. Here are some of my favorites.

White paper covering B2B content including buyer views, what types of content buyers trust most, and more.

Useful facts on content marketing from Kapost

Case studies demonstrating how content marketing drives ROI

Pay particular attention to Optum in that last example and the results they saw…

The successful campaign earned a 23.5 lead to conversion rate, 475% increase in website traffic, 2,500+ resource downloads, 28% increase in YoY blog followers, and $52 million in contract value of new business with less than $1m invested.

Document the big players.

OK…sometimes being a follower actually makes sense.

Healthcare does have taste-makers and we’ve seen in the past that they influence how the industry reacts to everything from federal regulations to patient trends. Even in an age of patient-centered care, these tend to be the big boys. If you want to make a point that your organization needs to keep up with healthcare, don’t be shy about mentioning the content presences at these leading companies

• GE: Blogs, case studies, videos…pretty much everything
• Samsung Business Insights: Their Insights program (who I write for) includes articles and news updates that occasionally tie to their product and service offerings.
• HIMSS: HIMSS isn’t technically a business, but they have an admirable collection of publications, courses, and even podcasts.
• IBM: A solid and growing library of case studies
• athenahealth: Insights, their Cloudview blog, video…they’ve got a lot going on

Mention “thought leadership”

I saved athenahealth for last because their CEO, Jonathan Bush, is writing the book on healthcare thought leadership. He holds a spot as a LinkedIn Influencer and is regularly found around healthcare media giving his opinion on industry news and business.

Building thought leadership is popular right now, and for good reason — it simultaneously builds the brand of the executive’s associated business while also serving as a nice addition to their career overall.

If you’ve run into any objections to launching a content marketing program at your company, let me know! I might be able to help you get over that hurdle.

Megan Williams, MBA

(530) 346-3244

growth@locutushealth.com