Differentiating your products and services at the HIMSS 2013 Conference

Differentiating your products and
services at the HIMSS 2013
Conference
John Lynn & Shahid N. Shah

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Influential Networks
www.influentialnetworks.com
About the Presenters
John Lynn, Managing Partner Shahid N. Shah, Managing Partner
Shahid Shah is a Gov’t 2.0, Health IT, and
Medical Devices software expert with over
22 years of technology strategy, software
engineering, entrepreneurship, speaking,
and writing experience.
He’s an advisor to the Federal Government
SBIR programs where he mentors
companies on commercialization,
marketing & sales
He runs several blogs including the
healthcareguy.com and HITSphere.com.
John Lynn is the Founder of the nationally
renowned blog network Healthcare Scene.
The HealthcareScene.com blog network
currently consists of 15 blogs containing
5000 articles with John having written over
2000 of the articles himself. These EMR
and Healthcare IT related articles have
been viewed over 10 million times.
John can be found @techguy and
@ehrandhit on Twitter.

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About Influential Networks
30+ Influential
Websites and
growing
InfluentialNetworks.com
represents a broad
assortment of influencers
and is a one-stop shop for
delivering your messages
across all of them.

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www.influentialnetworks.com 4
What we’ll cover
• Communications strategy
• What to do before the HIMSS Conference
• What to do at the conference
• What to do after the conference

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Why do people go to HIMSS?
Discover health IT
products and services
Meetings Education
How does your social media and marketing strategy match your
audiences expectations for the conference?

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It’s hard to notice you at HIMSS
How you hope customers perceive you How customers actually perceive you
Source: The Matrix (1999)

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The reason it’s hard to notice you
What you think you’re saying What your customers are thinking

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Nobody cares about you
Other than your mom, nobody
cares about you until you explain
why you matter to them.
Put the needs of your customers
first and give them a reason to
care.

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Buyer vs. User vs. Benefiter
Do you know who’s
buying vs. using vs.
benefiting from your
solution?
Your customer does.
Buyer
Benefiter
User

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Solve real, not perceived problems
Problems you’re solving
• Meaningful Use EHR
• Better electronic
documentation
• Patient access to records
(PHR)
• Medical device for vitals
tracking
Customer’s real problems
• Money from the
government
• Get paid for outstanding
AR
• Declining reimbursements
• Increasing payroll costs
• Inability to hire a medical
tech

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• If most of your
potential customers
have never heard of
you, you’re not a
leader
• Show examples of how
you’ve solved the
problem(s)
Be not a “leader” but a “solver”
Your customer doesn’t care if you’re the leader in your field if you don’t solve their problems

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Educate before you sell
• Teach users what they
should be using
• Teach buyers why they
should be buying
• Map your solutions to
customer problems

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Customers
Anytime you can use a
customer to speak for you, do
so. It will be more impressive.
Influencers
Use spokespeople
Instead of your own company personnel
If you can’t find a customer to
speak for you, find or hire an
influencer to speak for you.
If you’re exhibiting, have a customer or influencer nearby. If you’re just
attending take a customer or influencer with you to meetings.

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Figure out your message

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Focus on your image and value to customer
Myth Reality
I need to tweet a lot so that people will
follow me
I need to tweet something that will get
retweeted
I need to keep blogging and reminding
people about me so one day they’ll
finally buy from me
I need to blog so that I can help my
customers see patients, get them paid
faster, understand regulatory challenges,
etc.
I need to quote other smart people all
the time
I shouldn’t quote others, I need to come
up with my own valuable quotes
Aggregating content is enough to show
value
Aggregating and curating some content
is good for SEO, not brand
Create content so valuable that they will want to share it with others

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Tips for reaching bloggers and influencers
Myth Reality
All press releases matter Targeted press releases matter
The super cool CEO or SVP you just
hired matters
Unless they just landed on earth
from a successful moonwalk, we
don’t care
The fact that you just signed a brand
new client matters
Unless that client you just signed is
part of our audience we don’t care
Bloggers aren’t people, just conduits
for my messaging
Relationships matter
Influencers always need content Influencers are overloaded with
content
We don’t care about the same things as “traditional media”

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To Create Content and Conversation!
The best way to reach your audience and boost the visibility of your
products and solutions is…

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Long Term Strategy
• Influencing People Takes Multiple
Touchpoints
– What to do Before HIMSS
– What to do At HIMSS
– What to do After HIMSS
• Integrated Strategy

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Marketing Options
• Blog Posts
– On Company Blog
– On Influential Blog

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Marketing Options
• Twitter Chats
• Tweetups
– In Booth
– Sponsor Existing Tweetups

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Marketing Options
• Webinars
• In Booth Talks
• Video Interviews
– G+ Hangout
– YouTube

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Marketing Options

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Content strategy
• Prepare Content before the Conference
– Blog Posts to Share
– Tweets with Good Customer Data
– Create or Repurpose Content
– Highlight Other Tweets
• Have Someone at the Office Manage Your Social Media
– Give them Direct Access to Top Execs and Company Resources
• Capture Content for Post-HIMSS
• Be a Good Member of the Social Media Community
Social media should push to some content

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Content Strategy
• Bad Tweet:
– “Come to our booth and learn more about our EHR.
We’re at booth #1000. #HIMSS13”
• Better Tweet:
– “Holy Cross Hospital just spoke at our booth and said
that their EHR saved them $3 million. #HIMSS13”
• Best Tweet:
– “@drsmith I see that you’re at #HIMSS13 and have been
looking at EHRs. What are you looking for in an EHR?”

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Social Media Effect
• Influencer Tweetup
– Announcement
Post
– Tweet
– Tweetup
– Wrap Up Post
Tweetup
Attendees
HIMSS
Attendees
Non-HIMSS
Attendees
Exhibit Hall
Visitors
Social
Media
Followers
Post HIMSS
Connection
Influence

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Integrate social media into booth
• Tweet for Swag
• Targeted Promotions
– Press Only
– Doctor Only
– CIO Only

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Leverage Google+, LinkedIn, and Twitter Chats
Create online events before, during, and after HIMSS

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Sponsor customer / prospect mixers

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Make content visual
Don’t just show photos of your booth
Consider using videos, infographics, cartoons, and other visual content.
Reduce the text in your content and increase screen shots, demos, etc.

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Be provocative

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Make fun of the industry
In 2011 Extormity
stole the social
media spotlight

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Explain your product in a fun way
Cartoons below from simplifyMD.com

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Explain your product in a fun way
Cartoons below from imprivata.com

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Create Engaging, Shareable Microsite
Microsite from CDW
Healthcare
www.cdwcommunit.com/#home/solution.himss

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Influencing not Advertising
[email protected]

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Advantages of Influencers
• Existing Relationships with Readers
• Second Level of Search Marketing
• Cost Effective
• Rise Above the Noise
What’s the solution?

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Problems with Influential Websites
• Small Scale
– Not Enough Traffic
– Pain to Manage
– No Standards
• No Editorial Oversight

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Don’t focus on Advertising
• Premium Ad Network is One Component
• Email Newsletters
• Sponsored Content
• Webinars and Events
• Sponsored Tweets
• Product Reviews
– Product Promotion
– Customer/User Feedback

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Thank You
[email protected]

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Differentiating your products and services at the HIMSS 2013 Conference

Differentiating your products and services at the HIMSS 2013 Conference

Shahid N. Shah

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