Marketers should make physicians' lives easier

Marketers who target physician audiences should consider taking a page from B2C businesses that tout the time-saving advantages of their products. Think back to the last advertisement you saw for a kitchen appliance, for instance. There's a good chance the ad mentioned time-saving features, whether they be quicker cook times, reduced clean-up time or a more efficient way to chop, dice and mince.

While those aren't verbs you'd want to use in a medical advertisement, the sentiment may work well. Doctors would rather use their time to treat patients, not read through pharmaceutical promotional materials. To learn how to apply this strategy in your next advertising campaign, read on.

Don't rush your message

Doctors are busy, but they will make time to peruse marketing materials if they believe the products or services will ultimately benefit their patients.

Marketing group Bloom Creative recommended delivering your message in small doses to give the whole picture. This is especially important if your product is novel or complex. An explosion of unfamiliar concepts may cause the reader to turn away. Instead, give your audience time to read, digest and consider your marketing materials before going in for the hard sell.

Specifically, Bloom Creative suggested the following thought exercise: Think about how a physician would deliver your message to their patients. Often, a reader will comprehend a new concept well, but still struggle to reframe the new information for the benefit of a third party.

If your marketing material can break down the product's appeal into a concise message – backed by science – you're in a good place.

Consider how doctors will relay your message to patients.

Target your message by specialty, then role

Each specialty works a little differently than others. A podiatrist in Seattle has a markedly different life than an ER doctor in Chicago. But even when you break down your message by specialty, you may not be going far enough.

You still need to consider which role you're appealing to with your message. GlassCanopy suggested these three roles as launching points:

• Doctor-as-physician
• Doctor-as-businessperson
• Doctor-as-human

Saving personal and professional time appeals to the doctor-as-human role because nearly everyone wishes they had more time. But if the main draw of your product is related to compliance, you need to address a business-minded persona. When speaking to the doctor-as-physician role, every claim you make must be backed up by science and reviewed by a legal expert.

Doctors may make up only a small percentage of the population, but their needs are just as human as the rest of us.

To learn how to leverage a peer-reviewed, multi-channel approach to reach a targeted physician audience, visit ELSMediaKits.com today.