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Creating the Customer Avatar in Pharma and understanding Healthcare Personas – Doctor Personas
Have you defined the target audience for your pharma brand?
Do you know who your ideal customer is?
Who is the primary customer of pharmaceutical companies?
Who should pharmaceutical companies market to?
A general answer to this question would be doctors, consumers, or paramedics.
And if I were to ask you to describe them more specifically – you might state them as general physicians, pediatricians, dermatologists, pharmacists, patients, etc…
And that’s it.
That is what we probably knew about our target market and were satisfied mentioning that in our pharmaceutical marketing strategy slides.
In the digital world – this could be termed more as a stranger approach.
A product-centric way of target marketing where we are more interested in positioning our pharma products intelligently and competitively in the market.
Maybe in the traditional method that was sufficient, but digital has given us the opportunity to customize our selection, communication and offerings to a select group of target customer.
Following such a blanket approach of targeting customers, will create fuzzy marketing strategies and communications. And also compromise the pharmaceutical brand’s ROI.
But why do I need to build a healthcare persona for my pharma brand?
Having a health persona will give a strategic direction to the target marketing efforts of the pharmaceutical company
‘WHO‘ is your customer?
This important question will provide directions to your overall strategy like –
WHAT you need to do in terms of content and strategy.
It will also guide you on Where you can find your customer,
Which digital channels you will need to adopt and
How you can approach your customer
Isn’t it amazing how your marketing strategy can unfold by just knowing, “Who your ideal customer” is?
In short, basically, all your marketing strategy depends on this basic understanding.
Your messaging and offerings will then be so laser-focused that it will resonate with your target customers.
Importance of Health Personas in Pharma Marketing
External Problems vs Internal Problems
With the traditional, product-centric approach, we focused only on the EXTERNAL PROBLEMS.
That is, we would try to position our product in a particular indication or problem area for a specific disorder. And we strived, for the doctor to remember our brand name in that particular indication.
And you know what?
Every brand in the market also focused on those same External problems.
As Donald Miller explains,
Companies tend to sell solutions to EXTERNAL problems, but people buy solutions to INTERNAL problems.
Only when you are able to identify with the INTERNAL PROBLEMS of your customers,
– Will you be able to develop a sense of empathy and understanding
– And want to serve your customer at the highest level
Not in terms of the product, you have to offer.
But much more than that.
All with an empathetic understanding of what your customers are striving for – which could be knowledge, decision making, guidance from KOL or improving their skills?
Ultimately, an understanding of Health Personas will give a competitive edge for your brand
Healthcare Persona Example: An ideal physician persona for a pharmaceutical companies target market segment
Now I want you to give a thought to the following description of a customer.
“My customer is Dr. Harrison, a surgeon, who is well known and has good patient reviews. He likes to play tennis. And is very active in an online social group of medical professionals. Dr. Harrison likes to read journals like BMJ and newsletters by NEJM. He consults many patients for a disorder, but he is not satisfied with the results of the current drugs available in the market. His patients are also unhappy with the side effects of these drugs. Dr. Harrison is committed to giving the best patient experience and fears having a bad reputation. He always seeks to improve his knowledge and skills. He has a good twitter following and has a personal blog, where he regularly shares his medical experience and knowledge ….”
Just imagine how you could elevate your communication to such targeted market segment.
You will naturally just know what you need to SAY and DO for this customer and thus always feel connected.
And you will communicate like your speaking to them directly!
What are the benefits to using Healthcare Personas in Marketing?
- Provide deep customer insights which will help in creating highly targeted messaging and the most relevant content.
- Healthcare personas will help in addressing customer needs to ensure high customer satisfaction.
- Driving high customer engagement and meet customer expectations along the customer journey.
- Help in personalizing customer experiences and providing more positive and meaningful interactions.
- Where do I start if I want to create customer personas for my brand?
How do I create healthcare personas for pharma marketing?
Customer Avatar
Creating the buyer persona, or the customer avatar is where it all begins.
The customer avatar represents your ideal customer in the target market of your pharma brand. Your dream customer!
Creating a customer avatar is usually the first and important step in creating your digital marketing plan of action.
The parameters for knowing your customer in the digital world calls for closer analysis. Not just the regular superficial ones like demographics, age, gender, or income but going much deeper and being able to closely know the internal struggle, pain point, fear, frustrations and the Real needs of the customer.
How do I get the information to build a persona for my healthcare brand?
Yes, I agree it will take some effort and time on your part. You would need to study your internal customer data, talk with your sales/customer support team, do some online research – study the forums, competitor blogs/sites, comments, etc…conduct interviews, surveys, ask on social media groups.
Here are 9 essential tools for Pharma Marketers, interested to know about their target market audience. These tools will help them in gathering information for creating the health personas. Click Here
Sometimes you will be intimately familiar with the characteristics of your ideal customer and sometimes you will just have to make assumptions.
You will be making changes to your customer avatar and fine-tuning it as you proceed,
but the important thing is to just take that leap and get started with the process of creating the avatar.
Steps to creating the Customer Avatar for the Primary Customer of Pharmaceutical Companies
(with Doctor Persona Templates)
Step 1. What does your customer look like
Think of a fictional name for your customer avatar. You can also give this avatar a face, that represents them. Hang this picture on your wall.
Can you bring in a few real quotes used by your customers (during interviews or calls) that would define them, inspire them or that would bring in their struggles, frustrations or outlook toward life?
It is just so amazing how your perspective changes when you have a physical picture of your ideal customer – instead of a hazy, half-formed image in your head.
– Russell Brunson
Step 2. General background and Demographics
These are pretty basic information that will be easier to fill in. But it will help, when you are selecting the targeting options for social media ads.
Step 3. Sources of information
This will help you know where your customers usually hang out and which digital channels you can consider to reach them. Important questions to look into are,
Step 4. Attitude and Outlook
This will give you a direction on how you can approach your customers and also help set the tone for your marketing. The questions you can consider looking into are,
Step 5. Personal goals
This step reveals the hidden personal aspirations and motivations of your customer. Finding answers to these questions will let you know, how your company can help them and be an important contributor in your customer’s journey.
Step 6. Internal struggles
These are the sticky areas, which will give you an opportunity to bond with your customer. You can effectively bring them into your marketing copy – and compel them, to take an action!
Step 7. Around your product
You might want to look into the thought process and indicators on why a customer would select your product or choose your competitor’s product.
How many health personas should you have?
You can have Multiple Avatars
Consider doing this healthcare persona building exercise separately for patients, physicians, consumers and whichever other categories of customers you wish to target.
Also do note that within a segment of your targeted doctors, you may have 2-3 customer avatars.
So having multiple customer avatars is absolutely fine!
Physician Persona Building Tool for Pharma Marketers
In addition to the above customer avatar templates, the Persona building tool (given below) will be of use to pharma marketers interested in engaging physicians digitally and personalizing customer experiences.
Simple checklist tool for developing persona for the primary customer of pharmaceutical companies – the healthcare providers
In summary,
Good digital marketing practice calls for such an in-depth understanding of your customers.
And if you’re going to spend a ton of your time as well as money on crafting marketing strategies and running promotions for the customer.
Then crafting a CUSTOMER AVATAR profile is going to be a crucial component. Definitely don’t miss on this step.
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