Making Medical Marketing a Little Easier to Understand
According to the PEW Internet & American Life Project 80% of American Internet users have searched for health information on the web. Most start at a general search engine to find health information, but eventually narrow their search to a health portal or a disease specific site. Finding health information on the web is easy, but finding the RIGHT information, and information that can be trusted or easily understood is another story.
According to the American Academy of Physicians (AAP) there are now more than 24,000 medications on the market, and many have Websites with reams of product and disease information. Combine this with the many health portals such as WebMD.com, CDC.gov and MayoClinic.com, and consumers often have more information than they can handle. This means drug marketers need to be more and more careful about the information they provide online and how it is presented. Is it enough? Is it too much? Is it easy for the target audience to find the Website, read the information and to understand it?
Most "brand.com" sites are clever in design and include all of the most up-to-date marketing tricks and bells-and-whistles that are designed to catch the consumer's attention. However, even with these great features and a lot of important information, consumers can feel overwhelmed, confused and even frightened by what they read. Obviously, the information on pharma "brand.com" Websites must meet all FDA regulations, and provide truthful and complete information.
But, beyond these regulations, marketers should also consider how their audiences read and process the information provided. When writing new content for a "brand.com" site, marketers should think about the audience: What level of education are they likely to have? How engaged are they going to be in the Website content provided? Just because the copy sounds simple and clear to us marketers, is it really? Or, as my colleague, Steve Lynch, likes to say, is it just CIPU (clear if previously understood)?
If you think your site is easy to read and understand for the average person, consider this: The National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NAAL) recently provided a benchmark study showing that roughly one-quarter of adult Americans are only able read, understand and act on the most simple and basic medical information.
So what is the solution?
As marketers, we must provide well-written copy that provides simpler, easier to understand product descriptions and disease explanations so we can help a larger population. This type of foresight can only help the pharmaceutical industry’s image both with consumers and with health professionals. And, it may also help sell more products along the way.
