How Cardinal Health is Creating a Holistic Content Strategy
Content still rules the roost as a pillar of digital marketing and companies are finding new ways to use the format to inform their audience, become thought leaders, and promote their brand.
The medical device industry is no exception to this rule, and Cardinal Health is crafting a solid content strategy designed for all.
Essential Insights
The core around which Cardinal Health’s content strategy is built is a subsection of its website dubbed Essential Insights. This mini site serves as a content hub through which all Cardinal Health’s articles can be accessed.
The hub publishes a wide range of articles on a diverse selection of topics and is designed to communicate to healthcare workers at all levels of the industry. Cardinal Health understands that whether you’re a health system professional, pharmaceutical manufacturer, retail pharmacist, or a general physician working out of an office, you are the people it needs to reach. Topics include state of play pieces, predictions on where the industry is heading, news articles, statistics, technology, and more.
Articles can be filtered by profession, making sure visitors to the site can access the content which is most relevant to them without having to sift through pages of material outside their field of interest. Visitors can also sign up to a curated newsletter of relevant content which also unlocks access to exclusive material only available to subscribers.
Cardinal Health also uses paid for distribution to help increase the reach of its content and reach a wider audience of potential customers than would have previously been thought possible.
“We were just doing organic distribution before, so we might be lucky if we had five hundred views on an article,” said Corporate Communications Manager for Cardinal Health, Stephanie Pavol. “We worked through the process to make sure every kind of headline was in line with industry guardrails. Once that was worked out, it really helped us drill down into our niche audience within health systems or pharmaceutical companies and optimise our campaigns. Now we can take all of this knowledge into the organisation and share that our marketers and communicators are creating successful content campaigns.”
A Combined Strategy
Having got its content house in order, Cardinal Health wants to become more than simply a supplier of medical device products. Instead it wants to use its reputation and products, together with its content hub to establish itself as a one stop shop for insights, information, products, research, and all manner of healthcare related functions.
At the core of this strategy will be a single unified eCommerce presence which will help Cardinal Health serve its customers better than ever before, whether they are visiting for information, or to stock up on branded essentials.
“EDI is the traditional way customers place orders and is for the majority of our customers today,” said Director of eCommerce, Medical Products, and Services at Cardinal Health, Matt Wingham. “Most customers who use EDI still log into our website and research products. That’s our chance to engage with them and help them find the right products, to show how we can solve their need. More than 90% of Cardinal Health orders are electronic, counting EDI, and to date only a small percentage of orders are placed on the eCommerce site.”
The new eCommerce site will cover all three healthcare categories and grant the ability to tailor product listings by customer segment and personalise the online buying experience depending on who is using it and which sector of healthcare they represent.
It will also be responsive and mobile friendly, meaning users can place an order at any time, whether they are sat at their computer, or on the go on their smartphone or tablet.
“Our eCommerce experiences did not fully meet our customers’ needs and products are hard to find,” added Wingham. “Our customer wants to use the site to search, find and purchase products. The new site will provide better product information and enable ordering through an efficient shopping cart and checkout experience. We’re not trying to influence the way they purchase, our strategy is to present products in their best light by investing in product content, and to be there when the customer wants to search.”
Final Thoughts
Bringing its innovative content hub and eCommerce site into a single customer experience is a great way for Cardinal Health to boost engagement, gain new customers, and drive revenue through a simpler and more streamlined shopping experience.
Content strategies in the medical device industry are set to be a hot topic at MedForce 2019, taking place in June at the How Hotel Berlin. Please download the agenda today for more information and insights.