Welcome 2014 SoCRA conference attendees! 🙂
This blog post is a companion to my presentation on September 20, titled “Digital Marketing For Patient Engagement and Recruitment: Systematic Strategies & Tactics for Research Sites.” You can download a copy of the presentation slides here.
The presentation addressed three major areas:
- The what and why of digital marketing
- The core elements of digital marketing for patient engagement and recruitment
- A process for putting it all together
When viewing the slides, keep in mind that they have been purposefully structured in a “choose your own adventure” fashion. The final few slides describe a process for determining which major element of your digital marketing to focus on next. For each of these major elements you can then choose a strategy to improve that element. And then for each strategy, I describe three tactics of varying difficulty to apply to that strategy. The level of difficulty is denoted using a level icon to the left of each tactic.
For a quick reminder of how to use the slides in the presentation, please refer to the homework slide, which is slide 41.
The goal of this companion post is to point you to 35+ helpful resources that will be of use, regardless of which digital marketing “adventure” you choose. This approach ensures that you have a clear and actionable path to take what you learned at the conference and successfully implement it at your research site.
The resources below are organized to correspond with the presentation slides, with each section focusing on one of the five major digital marketing areas discussed.
I always welcome contact from research sites about their questions, comments, and challenges. If you’d like to discuss digital marketing or anything else, email me at [email protected].
Websites
Ultimate List of Online Readability Tests – Thorough discussion of readability and a list of great readability tools to help you simplify the language you use to communicate with patients
Designing Patient Friendly Website For Clinical Trial Recruitment – 3-part guest series I wrote for the National Cancer Institute’s AccrualNet. Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 (The final part has yet to be published.)
Patient Recruitment Website Checklist – Do’s and don’ts of patient recruitment website design
The Problem With Your Patient Recruitment Campaign – Article about common landing page mistakes that clinical researchers make and how to fix them
39 Factors: The Website Credibility Checklist – List of ways you can improve the credibility of your website for patients
First Impressions Matter: The Importance of Great Visual Design – Describes why visual design is so important in achieving your website goals
Search
SEO 101: Getting The On-Page SEO Basics – Basic tips website for improvements that will improve your visiblity in search engines
An Introductory Guide To Improving Your Local SEO – An introduction to local search engine optimization (SEO), which is different than traditional SEO and is very applicable to local businesses like reserach sites
Google For Business – Google’s page for businesses, which includes guidance on how to be more visible on Google
Bing Places For Business – Similar to the Google For Business page, but for the Bing search engine
Create an AdWords account – Google’s instructions on how to create a Google Adwords account
Adwords Basics – Google’s collection of resources for learning the basics of Google Adwords
Enhance Your Ad With Extensions – Introduction to Google Ad Extensions and how to use them
Setting Up Conversion Tracking – Detailed instructions on how to set up Google Adwords conversion tracking
Adwords Help Center – Google’s help center for Google Adwords, which contains lots of resources and a community
Social
Patient Recruitment: Regulatory & IRB Considerations of Social Media – Introduction to the regulatory and IRB considerations of recruiting patients using social media
Social Media and Patient Recruitment: 6 Factors in Mayo Clinic’s Success – Analysis of the factors contributing to Mayo Clinic’s success recruiting patients for a clinical trial using social media
Social Media for Patient Recruitment: 3 Major Options – Describes three overaching options for using social media to engage and recruit patients
A Social Media Feasibility Model for Patient Recruitment – Article I wrote for International Clinical Trials about a framework for assessing the feasibility of social media for patient recruitment
Social Media category of the Rebar Interactive blog – Access all of the Rebar Interactive blog content written about social media by following this link
Facebook for Business – Website maintained by Facebook to help business owners get the most out of the Facebook platform
Facebook for Business – Facebook Page that is a companion to the Facebook for Business website
Facebook Ads Getting Started – Website maintained by Facebook to help business owners get started with Facebook Ads
How Clinical Research Sites Can Engage Patients Using Facebook – Summarizes Rebar Interactive’s methodology for engaging and recruiting patients using Facebook
The affordable email marketing software services mentioned in the presentation were:
Mailchimp
Campaign Monitor
MadMimi
All of these services have great resources and a blog to help you learn the ins and outs of email marketing.
Analytics
Link Google Analytics and Adwords – Detailed instructions on how to link Google Analytics with Google Adwords
Which Stats Matter: The Definitive Guide To Tracking Social Media Metrics
– Very comprehensive guide to understanding and tracking social media metrics
Facebook Page Insights Product Guide – Brief guide to Facebook Insights, which is Facebook’s analytics dashboard for monitoring your page
Google Analytics – The Google Analytics Website, where you can sign up for GA or access various resources
Google Analytics Training – Training resource page from Google to help you learn how to use Google Analytics
Share Your Resources
Have resources you’ve found helpful? Share in the comments below!
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