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Why No One Uses Your Health, Medication, or Exercise Trackers

Dose of Digital Mini White Paper

Well, I’m back to regular posts once again after a bunch related to the Dosie Awards. It was a fun competition to run with some very interesting results. I’m looking forward to sharing them with you in a few weeks. The winners will be announced live during the upcoming BDI conference “Social Communications & Healthcare: Case Studies & Roundtables.”  BDI is not directly involved in these awards, but have been kind enough to give me a live audience and venue to announce the winners. If you want to be there in person, you can register here: http://bit.ly/aMAlR4. Use promo code “Dosies” and you can get in for just $155. I’ll announce the winners live during the conference and will follow it up with a blog post as well

But enough about the Dosie’s…

A couple of days ago, The Wall Street Journal published a story called: “How’s Your Health?” Here’s the opening paragraph:

“Keeping track of your health keeps getting easier. New gadgets and online tools are giving people a clearer picture not only of how active they are during the day, but also how well they sleep at night. Web sites let users record all kinds of health-related information and see it analyzed over time. Or remind you when you’re due for a medical test. And there are new sites and mobile applications for people with conditions like asthma or diabetes that require regular monitoring and sharing information with doctors. Here’s a sampling of some of the newest ways people can measure and manage their health.”

Sounds great, right? If only it were that simple.

Many of you commented about my past post, “I’ll Build You an iPhone Medication Tracker App for $10,” and today’s post is related to that one. While I said that I could build you a tracker for $10, I didn’t say it would be good or that people would use it. That’s the rub with these trackers, in order for them to work, people have to use them. Who knew?

There are a bunch of trackers out there that people don’t EVER use and new ones introduced everyday that I can tell you have no hope of working simply because people won’t use them. While their concepts may be great (help people track their conditions or medications and correlate with outcomes), the execution is poor in most cases.

The trackers that have poor execution could all be prevented if people asked themselves one simple question: “Would I do this?’ If the answer is “no,” then  stop. Yes, I know that you want to be able to say you have an iPhone app, but, trust me, your boss will appreciate you saving a ton of wasted money. Some of you might be saying that it doesn’t matter if you would use it or not, as long as your “target audience” will use it. Yes, some people might exert more effort than you in some areas, but most times you’ll be right if you apply some common sense. That is, the vast majority of people will only exert a finite amount of effort in these areas. You need to realize this and minimize the effort required to use your tools.

As a demonstration of how easy it is to figure out which trackers people will use and which they won’t, I’m going to give you a very brief rundown of the five trackers that were profiled in the WSJ article. Then I’m going to ask you to tell me which ones people are going to use over time. The trackers were (in order presented in the article): TheCarrot.com, Fitbit, Keas, Zeo, and AsthmaMD.

  • TheCarrot.com — an online journal where use can use one of their 30 trackers for just about every health area. You input all the details by hand via the website or an iPhone app.
  • Fitbit — a clip that you wear around during the day and at night that automatically tracks calories burned, counts steps, and even how long you sleep. Data is captured automatically and viewable on their site when you bring the clip within 15 feet of a basestation attached to your PC.
  • Keas – tracks data that you input by hand about meals, exercise, etc. and also can import records from a few sites (such as Quest Diagnostics to get your test results). It also provides articles based on how you answer questions. Of interest, Pfizer has entered an alliance with Keas to develop content.
  • Zeo – uses a headband you wear at night to automatically capture your sleep patterns. In the morning, the results are instantly displayed on the basestation you place near your bed. More data is available online with additional charts and graphs.
  • AsthmaMD — iPhone app that allows users to manually input their symptoms and peak flow counts related to their asthma. Charting is available in the app.

I encourage you to visit each of the sites to get some more details before I quiz you, but I think you can do pretty well without the extra effort.

Here’s the quiz: rank these five trackers in order based on how likely patients are to use them over time.

It’s one of those honor system quizzes, so score your own.

Done?

Good.

So, was that so hard? How did you decide which was most likely to be used over time and which was least likely? My answers in a moment, but first, let me explain my framework for evaluating these types of tools.

What I’ve realized over the past few years is that there’s a simple framework that will show you which trackers might work better than others. When you apply this framework to our quiz, you’ll find that it’s pretty simple to rank the trackers.

Here’s my framework:

Basically, the less work it is for the patient, the more automatic the inputs AND data aggregation or capture, the better. There are a number of different levels within these three broad areas that, when taken together, put every tracker in a nice, neat category. The list below is ordered from most likely to be used over time to least likely:

  1. “Fully Automatic” — sensors detect every input and automatically update and aggregate the data. You don’t have to do anything except look at the results.
  2. “Semi-Automatic” – close to “Fully Automatic,” in that sensors capture everything but you much attach the device manually to a computer (or otherwise sync the data) in order to get the data off the sensor and see the results.
  3. “Routine Integrated” – this requires you to input the information manually, but you input the information using platforms you already use. This might mean updating an application while you’re using Facebook or sending a Tweet or email about your progress. This may or may not include reminders to track your information. Data is automatically aggregated.
  4. “Handheld” — focuses on inputting the information using a smartphone such as an iPhone. This utilizes an app-based approach where a user must open an app to input the information. Data is automatically aggregated. (PS: here are 28 other iPhone health trackers)
  5. “Desktop” — uses widgets and gadgets that are embedded on your computer desktop so that you are reminded to manually input your information, but can do so without having to go to a website (or even be online in some cases, as it can store your info). Data is automatically aggregated.
  6. “On the Web” – users must visit a website (or section of a website) to input their information manually. This may or may not include reminders to track your information. Data is automatically aggregated.
  7. “Old Fashioned” — users download (or are given) a paper tracking sheet that they must fill out with their information. Data has to be aggregated by hand. There are no reminders to track your information.

Every tracker fits neatly into one of these seven different levels.

Taking a look at our example trackers (TheCarrot.com, Fitbit, Keas, Zeo, and AsthmaMD), let’s see into which level each of these falls:

  • TheCarrot.com — “Handheld” — you have to input all the information on your own, but can use their iPhone app to do it
  • Fitbit — “Fully Automatic” — just attach it to your body and then walk past your computer to download all the data
  • Keas — “On the Web” — the only way to input information is online, on their Keas website [UPDATE, 4/23: I just found out that you can also input information via SMS. I didn't find this after spending 15 minutes on the site, but the people at Keas sent me this link: https://www.keas.com/plan.html?planId=keas.sms. It let's you text something like “My Weight 180″ to record a new weight of 180 pounds.]
  • Zeo –”Fully Automatic” — wear it at night and when you wake up, all your information is displayed on the unit near your bed
  • AsthmaMD — “Handheld” — same as The Carrot: you have to input all the information on your own, but can use their iPhone app to do it

Now if you have to order these from most likely to be used over time to least likely, I’d order them this way based on my framework:

EDIT (3/1/11): After learning a bit more about Fitbit, I realize that I have a couple of oversights in my original ranking. I originally had Zeo before Fitbit, but have just updated this to reflect my better understanding of the product.

  1. Fitbit — the auto-sync that works when you get near your computer is a winner and makes this completely automatic. In addition, you can see your stats for the day displayed right on the device. To see longer trends, you’ll need to go online.
  2. Zeo — Like FitBit, you can get your basic results at a glance of the device. Unlike FitBit, you need to remove the SD card from the unit and upload your stats to see longer term trends. Fitbit does this simply when you walk past the sensor.
  3. AsthmaMD — there’s a big drop from #2, but I give AsthmaMD the nod simply because it’s less confusing than The Carrot. It does one thing reasonably well
  4. TheCarrot.com — close to #3, but falls slightly behind because there are too many options and trackers, which may lead to confusion. Sometimes less really is more. I also came across A TON of bugs using this thing.
  5. Keas — while an interesting concept, it relies on the least reliable digital technique to get data from you meaning it’s a tough habit to keep up with since you have to go online to a website to log information. [UPDATE, 4/23: Based on the fact that you can track your information via SMS, I'd be inclined to move Keas up bit, but only for those who use SMS, of course. I like the SMS addition, which I’d actually categorize as “Routine Integrated”, which is even better than “Handheld.” Here’s why: among those who use SMS and are likely to use this feature, SMS is a ubiquitous part of their life. They probably send and receive a bunch of messages per day meaning that they have it SMS open and active pretty regularly. So, it’s pretty simple to send one more SMS message. It’s similar to the Tweetdeck example I mentioned.]

How’d you do on our quiz? I’d bet you had #1 and #2 the same as my list and probably #5 the same. #3 and #4 were a bit trickier I suppose, but what fun would an easy quiz be?

For completeness, here are some examples of the levels that weren’t covered from the five above. Nike+ is a good example of “Semi-automatic.” The sensor in your shoe captures you running data automatically, but you have to manually connect your iPod (which captures the sensor data) to your computer to get the data. Contrast this to Fitbit, which you don’t have to manually connect to anything because the information is sent automatically when you get near the basestation. Maybe that’s the next killer feature for Nike+. An example of “Desktop” comes from Cimzia and their “Wellness Widget.” They’ve also got the “Old Fashioned” example covered with paper-based version of the Widget (link opens PDF).

“Routine Integrated” trackers are still fairly rare, but I think they will grow massively in popularity in the near future. The main idea is that you use the platforms you use all day anyway to track your health instead of adding a new platform (and trying to create a new habit). So, if you’re a big Twitter user and have Tweetdeck open all day, then Tweetwhatyoueat or FitClick might be perfect for you. The main idea of each is that you send a direct message (i.e., private) to a special Twitter account with what you ate and the site aggregates it all for you. So, while your eating lunch at your desk and keeping a close eye on Tweetdeck, you simply send a DM to @fc8 (for FitClick) like this: “Subway 6 inch turkey sub; 2 oz. Doritos”. That’s it. Information tracked. FitClick even tries to add calorie, fat, carbs, protein, etc. information to each entry automatically. This is much simpler than having to go to a site or even use an app since you’ve already got a platform (Twitter in this case) open and active.

I should also add that there are even finer divisions within each level. For example, looking at the “Handheld” level, different iPhone apps can range from fairly automatic to completely manual. AsthmaMD is completely manual. If you don’t input the info, it doesn’t get captured. In contrast, take an app that allows you to track the food you eat each day. One app might have input all the data including the name of the food, portion size, calories, fat content, carbs, and the other nutritional information all by hand. Where you get it from and how much of your life you spend inputting it is your problem. On the other hand, while not fully automatic, is something like PhotoCalorie. This app offers a bit of automation to the process. You take a picture of the food you ate, type what it is, and then the app automatically adds the nutrition information. It’s a nice addition of some automation that saves some steps. No one is going to consistently input nutrition information by hand over time, so this prevents that. A more automatic version would be where the picture alone was enough and the app automatically identified the food and included all the nutrition information. Still a bit beyond the technology we have for image recognition for personal use (the military could probably do this), but something to look for in the future. Point is, the less people have to input on the their own, the better.

One more point, to be fair, the Zeo costs $250 and Fitbit costs $99. All that automation and technology comes at a price. Both Keas and AsthmaMD are free, while TheCarrot.com’s basic services are free, but it has a “premium” version for $5 a month. The cost of the Zeo and Fitbit opposite the others doesn’t come as that much of a surprise when you consider that they are the only trackers that include a piece of hardware, which comes with some manufacturing costs opposite something that’s software only. Plus, you’re paying for the convenience and automation.

As you’re developing the next tracker for your brand (or getting one pitched to you by someone), keep these ideas in mind. It’ll save you from creating something that while well-intentioned, isn’t something that people are going to use consistently and over time. If this is the case, then it really doesn’t matter how fancy the tracker is, people have to use it in order for it to work.

By the way, if you really like the Zeo and wish you had one, but don’t want to part with $250, then I’ve got an answer for you. Register now for the  2010 e-Patient Connections Conference. Turns out that everyone who registers gets a free Zeo. Yes, everyone. Readers of this blog also get another 20% off (that’s about $320) if you use code “rx2010” when you register. I’ll be chairing the social media track of the meeting along with Shwen Gwee.

Why Cataloging and Calculations Should Be King

Dose of Digital Mini White Paper

norway map

Do you know all of your national capitals?

Quick.

The capital of Norway.

Got it? Stumped?

Stay tuned for the correct answer.

For those of you who learned and remembered this type of information from your grade school days, congratulations. Geography is a tough subject for most of us. There was a time (not too long ago) when it would have been pretty challenging to find the answer to this question if you didn’t learn it at some point in the past and remember it. For those who didn’t know the answer and “Googled” it, accidentally stumbled upon the point of today’s post.

Recall a time not too long ago when you didn’t have Internet access. If you wanted to find out a capital of a country, you didn’t have much choice but to look it up in a book. If you had some encyclopedia’s on hand, you could find it there. You might even find it in one of those giant unabridged dictionaries or an almanac. If you didn’t have any of those, you were out of luck. You could call a friend to get the answer, but you certainly couldn’t send them a tweet or even an email.

Things have changed very dramatically in the past 15 years or so, such that it isn’t necessary for you to have a set of encyclopedias in your house should someone challenge you on the capital of Norway (which is, of course, Oslo). To find the answer today, you just search for it online. We even have a new word to describe it: “I Googled it.” For you youngsters out there, there wasn’t always a company called Google, much less a verb based on it. Today, of course, you can find out the answer to any factual question almost instantly no matter where you are. With mobile technology advancing very quickly, you can do much of what a desktop PC can do with only an iPhone. If you compared the guidance computers used for the Apollo moon missions to an iPhone, the two wouldn’t even appear to have been developed by the same species, much less separated by less than 40 years. One stat: the Apollo computer’s speed was 1.024 MHz. My iPhone’s is 600 MHz (my laptop is 2.53 GHz, which is about 2000 times faster than Apollo’s). Enough geek talk, what’s the point?

The point is that there’s no reason to waste your time learning capitals of countries. With this type of  information at your fingertips in an instant, wouldn’t your time be better spent elsewhere versus the hours required to memorize information you might never need? Yes, there’s value in learning, but not memorizing information like this. The value come from learning how to remember things and how to process information.

Let me put it more plainly. Basic information has no value. It has no monetary value and very little time value. Since you can get it anywhere for free, almost instantly, it’s a waste of resources to learn it and have it cataloged in your own head.

Instead, what you do with this information is far more useful. That’s what people pay money for. That’s why we hire consultants. For example, we don’t pay them to tell us the capitals of countries, but rather which ones are likely to have the biggest influence in global economics in the next 10 years.

The question for content producers (and if you’re reading this and have a website, you’re one of them) is what this means for your content creation strategy and what value you provide to people. If you’re giving them information they can get elsewhere, then you aren’t adding value. I’ve already shown you “How Google and Bing Plan to Eliminate the Need for WebMD” by providing basic disease state and medication information, such that you never have to even leave the search engine to get it, much less dig through your website.

This change is happening now and will only exacerbate in the future. Less and less content will be stored in people’s heads and we’ll focus more on interpretation. Less and less value will be placed on basic information, as it will be everywhere, easy to access, and completely free. As a marketer, do you know how you can prepare for this future and to lead the change as it’s happening now?

That’s what I’m here for.

Before we go any further, you have to accept the fact that “content is king” isn’t really true anymore. While Bill Gates coined the term (good trivia question BTW), it’s been adopted by entertainment companies most recently. Ironically, you don’t need to look much further than these companies to see that this phrase no longer holds true. They have been the first to have their business models turned upside-down simply because the content itself isn’t as valuable as it used to be.

There are two different areas that you need to look for a future “king.” Cataloging and Calculation. Try these on for size: “Cataloging is king” or “Calculation is king.”

Cataloging is King

For as much as I might talk about how wonderful it is that content is available everywhere, in massive amounts, and for free, there’s a problem. Content is available everywhere, in massive amounts, and for free. That’s right…it’s good and bad. You already know the benefits, but here’s the downside. With all the content out there, it becomes very difficult for people to find exactly what they need. It’s simple to find the capital of Norway, but what about finding how many people lived in Norway in 1980 compared to 2000. That information exists, but not all in one, nice, neat place and not in this format. At best, you’d have to look up the populations in both years and break out your calculator to do the rest. Or do you? The evolution is already in up and running: WolframAlpha. While it’s still a little hard to use if you’re not familiar with it, it’s a powerful computational tool that does more than just math and was able to instantly give me the answer to my question. The power lies not in the data, as it comes from free, open-source databases, but rather in how you access the data. Here, WolframAlpha saved you two steps, as you don’t have to look up the population information for each country or do the math on your own.

Companies that make it easy for people to sift through the data that’s available will lead in the future. For healthcare companies, this means being able to take information about a certain disease and personalize it. Picture this: I want to find only information that’s relevant to my condition and treatment stage and history. Let’s say a patient has stage IV non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). I’ve already taken carboplatin and Gemzar (together) and then Taxotere after progression. His question is simple: “what treatments are now indicated and what’s the average time to progression for these treatments?” If you think about it, that’s really a simple question, but it would be almost impossible to find out the answer online quickly and easily despite all the information needed to answer the question being freely available.

If this person visited the average website, he’d have to sort through all the different stage information to find stage IV, then look through each of the treatments and data to see what’s applicable to him. The WolframAlpha-style solution would allow him to type (or use drop-down selections) in his stage and past treatments, what parameters he needs to know and then spit out an answer. The companies who present the data, the content, in this format will lead in the future. How hard would it be to create this tool? Answer: not very.

The second part of aggregation is alerting people when information has changed. To take our example above of the NSCLC patient, if a new treatment is approved or studied that matches his current status, he needs to know about it immediately. He shouldn’t have to go online and dig around everyday for new news. It needs to come to him. That’s the idea behind RSS, but this needs to go even further to make feeds automatically from any source, not just pages that happen to have feeds already. This exists in many areas, but for customized data like we need here, it’s not that simple. Making new, relevant information available to people that finds them instead of the other way around is the future.

When you wrap all of this together, whoever is able to simply and effectively catalog and deliver all the content that’s out there will win the day.

Calculation is King

I take this theory very much to heart and have tried to practice it here on this blog. Rarely will you ever see me simply stating a bunch of facts or statistics (that you can get anywhere else) without an interpretation of that information. The statistics and facts have no value. I hope the interpretation does. That’s the reason why some posts (like this one) run a little long. I try to present the data, what it means, and what it means for you. That’s calculating.

The main point here is that you’re trying to help people make choices. This is what Bing’s entire “Decision Engine” positioning is based on. They don’t want to just give lists of information (i.e., links) leaving you to pick which is the right one, they want to guide you to the answer. Here’s how they’re promoting this concept via a series of clever commercials:

If you want to see the actual features that Bing is touting to deliver this new type of searching, then you can check out the video here (big points off for Microsoft since I can’t embed the video here). While I’m not totally sure that Bing delivers on this big promise (helping you make decisions) just yet, it’s a step in the right direction. What Bing understands is that the content (in this case, links) isn’t as important as helping you find the information. When you search for something on Google (or Bing), you aren’t doing it to see what links come up, you’re doing it to find the answer to your question. Think about that for a minute.Today, both of these search engines are trying to do this for basic searches. That’s why, for example,  if you type “define” followed by any word in Google, you get the definition as the first listing, so you don’t have to go to another page on another site to find the answer. You don’t want links, you want answers.

It’s the same thing for any other type of question. Going back to our NSCLC patient, he doesn’t want  bunch of links. He wants to know the answer to this question: “what treatments are now indicated and what’s the average time to progression for these treatments?” The answer(s) should be easy to find and immediately available (that is, he shouldn’t have to dig through tons of pages to find the answer). That’s a good first step and is why “Cataloging is king.” To deliver “Calculation is king,” you need to be able to not only answer this question, but to then tell our patient which treatment of the possible choices is best and why.

Of course, this already exists. We call them doctors. But a doctor isn’t always available to answer these questions. When you’re researching, you’re probably doing it to educate yourself so that when the doctor does recommend something, you understand why. I’m not recommending that we cut doctors out of the equation or that they won’t be important in the future. Rather, I’m saying that the “calculations” they do based on their knowledge and experience is what is valuable and what people need. But it’s not the sole domain of doctors or any other expert either. The companies that can effectively find the information and analyze it for people are the ones who will win in the future. They will win because they will be the go-to source for answers. If people come to you for answers and you can supply them, then you’ve provided something of almost limitless value and will have created a very powerful bond with your consumers.

Contrast this to the information and content you supply today for people visiting your sites or through brochures or any other medium. How far are you away from being able to provide calculations and not just content? I know that there are limitations to what pharma companies can recommend, but that’s narrow thinking. It’s not the way the world works now and certainly not the way it will work in the future. Far from being a starry-eyed optimist, I’m even more of realist. If you can’t figure out a future where you can provide this service to patients in some form, then you will be left behind. The good news is that you have some time to figure it out. The bad news is that it isn’t that much time.

Remember: content isn’t king anymore. Cataloging and Calculations are king.

10 Sneaky Marketing Tactics You Need to Avoid

Every once and a while, I get approached to write an article for a non-healthcare publication. I like to do these because they help ensure that I don’t get too narrowly focused on healthcare and pharma and lose track of everything else out there in digital marketing. When iMedia Connection asked me to write an article about deceptive digital marketing tactics, I knew it was right up my alley.

The article was just published today as an “In Focus” article, which they do twice a week. That means you can see my mugshot right on the homepage of iMedia Connection if you head over there right now. If you missed it, here’s what you missed…not too exciting, I know.

Jonathan Richman iMedia Connection Article

The article is entitled: “10 Sneaky Marketing Tactics You Need to Avoid.” Suffice it to say, if you work for a pharma or healthcare company and you’re doing any of these, you need to stop immediately. I think the industry is already lacking enough in the trust department that you don’t need anything else to cast you in a negative light. The 10 sneaky tactics include: AstroTurfing,lucky guesses, anonymous cleanup, image manipulation, trapping visitors, an inability to cancel, stealing credentials, bundling, pulling the switch and, crafty SEO. Clickthrough to the full article to see what all these mean and to ensure you’re not doing any of them: “10 Sneaky Marketing Tactics You Need to Avoid.”

2010 Resolution #1: Stop Talking About Social Media

With a new year starting, so do new resolutions. I’m probably a little late on these, but I thought I’d share them with you anyway. I’m going to spread these over a few short (really, I mean it this time) posts with a handful of resolutions for you. I’ll do my best to keep these resolutions as well. I think that if a group of people commit to a goal and work together to encourage each other, they tend to have more success, so let’s work together. Think of it like a marketers support group.

Before we begin, I wonder how you did with last year’s resolutions? Here’s part 5 of last year’s set of resolutions, with links to the other four parts so you can score your progress.

Onto 2010…

2010 Resolution #1: Stop Talking About Social Media

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I bet I know what you think my next line is going to be. You’re thinking I’m going to say: “Stop talking about social media and just do it!”

Wrong. I’m not saying that.

I’m really saying, “stop talking about social media.”

It’s enough already.

To recap, in 2009 we demanded the FDA call a hearing to discuss social media…and they did (and created a website to track it all). We wrote and read hundreds, if not thousands, of articles on social media. We transformed (read: hijacked) every digital marketing conference into a social media conference. We launched a ton of social media programs even if they represent a conservative start. And Dose of Digital almost became Dose of Social (almost).

Meanwhile, we might have left all that proverbial “low-hanging fruit” to rot on the vine.

Which fruit am I talking about? Here are a few…

Search Engine Optimization

I was recently asked by Ellen Hoenig Carlson to contribute to a mini-book that was all about defining the best opportunities for pharma marketing in 2010. In this book, I got to answer the simple question: “Where should I spend my first marketing dollar in 2010?’

My answer was simple: If you can spend your money on only one thing, it should be organic search optimization. Not paid search; organic search.

I’ve talked about this a million times before, so I won’t into it here (but do check out this post “Pharma Search Engine Rankings Need Fixing“). If you’re not doing this well, you’re missing out on far more than any social media activity will ever get you.

Yes, read that last bit again: “more than any social media activity will ever get you.” There are three reasons for this. First, pharma companies as a whole do so poorly in search rankings that there’s really no way to go but up and the upside is huge; the benefits of appearing in the top search results are obvious. Second, pharma is so restricted in what they are allowed to do in social media that it’s going to be a long time before anyone creates a program that generates dollars for a pharma company. Yes, that’s not the point of all social media, but it should have some direct impact on the company’s performance, however tenuous the link. Other industries, with less restrictions, might be able to make a case to go with social media before search, but I don’t think pharma is one of them. Third, did I mention regulatory issues?

Website Enhancement and Fixes

Search marketing not glamorous enough? Well, you’re not going to like this next one either. Fix your website. Yes, I’ve said that companies might even consider getting rid of their website in my post “Ten Digital Marketing Ideas Pharma Companies Will Never Try (But Should),” but for those who remain unconvinced, let’s fix what you’ve got. Not sure where to begin? Check out my post “A Simple Treatment for Your Ailing Healthcare Website” to see how you can use tools like Google Website Optimizer to make your site work better for your visitors and to increase the chances that they actually ask for and/or continue your treatment.

Upgrading Your Content

Whether you distribute all your content on your brand website or, yes, via social media, it doesn’t matter the channel that it comes from if the content is bad. You can come up with the slickest website or distribution model or send it to a massive CRM list that you’ve compiled over the past 10 years, but if your content doesn’t stack up to the rest of what’s available online, then your efforts won’t matter much.

How can you tell if your content is good enough? Simple. I can figure out that answer with one question: “If You Charged for Your Content, Would Anyone Pay?”

Here’s a little bit from a past post on this topic:

Many of the free things we use online, we would pay for if they suddenly required us to pay. A few examples: if Google suddenly decided to charge for Gmail, would you pay for it? I would. If Nike decided to charge for Nike+, would you pay for that? I would and I bet that I most people that use it would do the same.

“But,” you say, “we’re not Nike. We’re not Google. We’re talking healthcare. I don’t have to worry about these types of companies. I’m worried about my competitors.” Well, they are your competitors. Everything online is you competitor. Everything is competing for your customers’ time, so they’re you competitors. Here’s the thing to remember, people ARE paying for your content. They pay for it with their time, which is both very valuable and finite. When they waste their time, they waste their money.

So, resolution #1 is in the books: “Stop Talking About Social Media.” Who’s with me? I’m not saying you should never do social media, but I’m am saying that before you commit a large part of your time and attention (even if it’s only a small amount of actual dollars), make sure you’re doing “the basics” right. Without these it’s likely even the slickest social media program will fall flat or never meet its true potential.

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