An Approach to Engage Physician Practice EHR End Users

Electronic Health Records (EHR) product marketing professionals understand that ongoing relationships with qualified leads are crucial to success. Sales take time in the EHR industry, and leads must be nurtured. And constant communication will often result in more satisfied customers. And the way the EHR market is expanding with ever-increasing competition, those who communicate best will succeed the furthest.

Here’s an approach to engage physician practice EHR end users:

1. Know your ideal customer

Get focused here. It can seem that every website visitor is a potential client, but that isn’t the case. If you target your efforts on all of them, you’ll skimp on the attention those real potential clients deserve. Identifying your ideal customer is the critical first step toward effective lead nurturing. Pull the marketing team together and create accurate Buyer Personas to represent your ideal customers. For example, you might have “Clinician Carol,” “Hospital Administrator Alex,” and “Physician Philip.” Each will represent the roles of the clients you will target. And then it’s time to get to know them. Answer the following questions for each:

• What is their role and responsibility in their organization?
• What are their objectives within those roles?
• What workplace obstacles prevent them from achieving their goals?
• What are their motivations?
• What does their buying process look like?
• Where do they go for more information?

Accurately answering these questions will prepare you with many advantages for personalized engagement. Just be specific when answering. Don’t think buyer personas are worth your time and effort? Well, an ITSMA study found that only 44% of businesses are actually using them – and they’re making a difference. Strike now and gain an edge before your competition is using buyer personas to win those clients before you do.

2. Use LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a powerful tool for nurturing prospects and converting them into buyers. Start with a LinkedIn summary that reveals the value you can bring to customers. Make it clear that you understand their challenges and are able to provide solutions. And include a call-to-action (CTA). For example, you might request prospects share their email or call for a free consultation. You can also engage leads through LinkedIn by sharing blog content to your news feed. Unlike posts in other social media, you’ll want to present content that is professional and educational. This will establish your authority with prospects. Hootsuite is a great example here. This B2B company leverages LinkedIn by sharing lots of high-quality content. And remember to keep an eye on LinkedIn notifications for important dates and events. For example, acknowledge prospects on their career advancements, anniversaries, and birthdays. And include a CTA with your acknowledgment to foster further conversation.

3. Personalize email correspondence

Firing away those emails to prospects isn’t the way to succeed these days. Personalize those emails for maximizing engagement. For starters, personalize your emails using your recipient’s name. A study by Experian found that personalized emails yield as much as 6 times more revenue. Subject lines should be short and attention-grabbing to encourage your recipients to open them. And stay away from those tired and overused subject lines like “Newsletter No. 13.” No one is going to open that – at least, not many will. And let’s not forget the all-important content of your email. Emails should be less about self-promotion and more about educating prospects. Again, include a call to action at the end of your email, offering a free eBook, case study, etc. Lastly, optimize those emails for mobile devices, too.

4. Leverage webinars

According to Content Marketing Institute, over 60% of B2B marketing professionals leverage webinars as a key tool in their strategies. Whereas traditional content doesn’t put you allow you to gauge prospects’ reactions right away, webinars are real-time engagement through audio and video. Coordinate with your marketing team to inform potential clients of topics that interest them. And why not deliver a demonstration while you’re at it? Also, a live Q&A after the webinar provides an excellent opportunity to respond to any questions and concerns immediately, turbo-charging your sales cycle.

5. Nurture leads with valuable emails

Personalized emails delivered from your private accounts (Gmail, Outlook, Etc. ) is a great touch, but you should also collaborate with your marketing team to pull from the best on the company’s website (blog posts, eBooks, white papers, etc.) to generate quality Lead Nurturing Email Campaigns. Such a campaign is a sequence of HTML emails that deliver valuable content your prospects desire, usually sent out once every week. The goal here is, again, not to be “salesy” or sing the praises of your company, product, or service, but instead to simply deliver the informative content your prospects desire and come to your website in search of more. Such emails, when coordinated through email marketing automation system like HubSpot, will provide valuable marketing data to your sales team.

6. Promptly follow-up with prospects

Timing is critical when communicating with prospects. A research by the Harvard Business Review found that too many companies were taking far too long when following-up with prospects: 24% of these companies waited over 24 hours to follow-up, and 23% never followed-up at all. How quickly you respond could mean the difference between creating satisfied customers and losing a prospect for good. So, needless to say, when prospects engage with your company – opting-in for your mailing list or requesting additional information – rapid response with appropriate content is crucial. You can simplify this process with automated email marketing. Remember to engage comments on your blog and social media quickly, too. Few things in online marketing will establish trust more rapidly, and that could translate into converting prospects to customers.

The Bottom Line

Everything we have talked about here is part of the methodology called Inbound Marketing. Your EHR company can harness the Inbound Methodology for effective communication with your prospects, more accurately qualify them, and dramatically shorten the sales cycle. Obviously, this can be daunting to do alone. That’s why we here at Responsify team up with EHR marketers to develop strategy and provide the support to implement a comprehensive Inbound Methodology. When you partner with Responsify, we assist your marketing and sales team draw the right visitors to your website, qualify them as leads, and convert them into loyal customers. We’ve helped countless marketing professionals optimize their lead engagement flows and accelerate sales times. Request your free strategy session now. We’ll help evaluate your assets, offer free insights, and provide custom recommendations to get you moving in the right direction.