Launch Plan Proposal Beth Knabel March 1, 2013
Strategy DiscerN The job of marketing is to maintain healthy customer flow and find out where and how to entice customers or help them find you. The strategic thrust in healthcare needs a specific strategy so that the decision makers at Fortune 500 companies know and inexplicably accept the advantages of choosing WillowTree Apps. The advantages must be visible and substantial, difficult to replicate, and robust enough to change the market environment. How are these tag lines or features helping the healthcare market discern these advantages? We Build That app. © We Make Mobile Beautiful© . . .all development done in the United States We help you build your complete mobile presence Your prospects consider expected results of the greatest importance. They are also concerned about hiring superior expertise, general customer service, and affordabilty in terms of end value.
articulate Your prospects need to hear a validatable story, a case for hiring you over another firm or for keeping the development work in-house. Awards, volume of paid downloads, rankings, and other recognition help to frame the credibility of WillowTree Apps. WillowTree need to be excellent at: • exposing the problem and possibilities • making the prospect familiar with all the possibilities • showing competence through case studies • removing the risk of paying for the wrong result
Action What else could or should be said or demonstrated to clients so they can trust you? Building the healthcare industry vertical will take concurrent action in public relations, social media, conferences and trade events, sponsorships, community visibility, blog traffic, and industry affiliations. This proposal outlines the tactics to articulate your advantages and act on the strategy. Optimistically, the investment in the tactics will pay for itself by acquiring two new client projects.
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
Website Posture and Purpose Web copy alone doesn’t sell. It plays a supporting role to convince the reader that your company is the trusted expert. In the healthcare vertical, the readers are IT management and in-house development staff, the senior decision maker in the C-suite, and ultimately, the user community. Yes, it is important to have a keyword-laden text that educates the reader about how and why your solution solves the client’s problem. If your copy doesn’t strike an emotional chord and address the reader’s hot buttons, your message will not stand above the competitor. Platitudes are the death of webcopy stickiness. Worse yet, a platitude takes a space that should be filled with facts, examples, user quotes, and proof that WillowTree App’s approach is the standards bearer of the industry. Web copy about the Johnson & Johnson user and physician mobile app will demonstrate: • WTA understood and solved the client problem • Is familiar with all the options • executed and delivered an app that optimized the client mobile strategy • removed the risk of back-end user interface challenges Links in the web copy enhance the SEO and will lead the reader to additional proof: infographics, photos, bios, and related Web pages and external sites.
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
Website Sample Copy How Mobile Technology Puts the Patient at the Center of Healthcare Delivery Johnson & Johnson Healthcare understands the value of patient access and engagement through technology. That’s why they consulted with WillowTree Apps to develop and launch an app for smartphone and tablet users that allows the patient and the physician work in tandem to produce the best treatment outcomes for blood glucose management.
The app is designed to give the patient a way to unobtrusively send their blood gucose levels directly to their physician then allow both the patient and the physician to see the history, alerting them both when there are abnormalties. WillowTree Apps applied encryption technologies to First Mobile Monitor to keep the patient / physician portal secure.
The mobile app, named First Mobile MonitorTM, was launched nationwide on March 1, 2013 through Johnson & Johnson Healthcare for patients with either iOS or Android smartphones and tablets. Between these two operating systems, the First Mobile Monitor app is enabled for 82% of the nearly one billion smartphones and tablets in use around the globe. [Demo]
“Our testing included role-playing with the app,” explained Blake Sirach, vice president of design at WillowTree Apps. “It is important to us that an app is intuitive enough for a novice, but robust enough behind the scenes to work for a physician’s patient record system or a patient billing system. The development team thinks of themselves either as a patient or a physician to understand how that person will interact with the screens and options.”
Global implications for Diabetes Care PLAY
First Mobile MonitorTM was developed by WillowTree Apps in 2012 and is owned by Johnson & Johnson Healthcare.
“There are some thorny patient privacy issues with using wireless technology and smart phones,” said Alonzo Garza, CIO at Johnson & Johnson Healthcare (NYSE: JNJ), but we wanted to lead the field in partnering with our patients on health information, treatment paths, and staying healthy. Patients don’t want another cumbersome step added to their daily treatment. Doctors are skeptical that the data will be accurate, timely, and secure. These issues were in the forefront when we began the project.” Enter WillowTree Apps, the only mobile app development company that never outsources project management and coding. “When WillowTree sat down with us, I sensed they were reading my mind,” explained Garza. “Their experience with mHealth was apparent by the questions they asked as we explained our expected outcomes.”
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
Betty Sims Graebel, is a Type 1 diabetic. As a member of the prelaunch test group, she tried First Mobile Monitor while it was in development. Graebel said, “. . . it reassured me that my readings and treatments were accurate and all in one place. It was fast. I felt more connected to my doctor and didn’t have to go to his office.” “Simply put, the patient is now more vested. Phyisician and patient engagement is up 56%. The payors are equally pleased at the indicators that costs of treatment and patient management will be reduced by as much as 35%, ” said Garza. First Mobile Monitor can be downloaded for free from Johnson & Johnson Healthcare with a passcode generated by the prescribing physician.
Blogs where is the sandbox and who owns it? Weblogs are a powerful tool for the WillowTree Apps brand. Harness that power and the WillowTree App could become ubiquitous in the mHealth industry. An Alexa page rank analysis of the top eight ranked firms for mobile app development identified by Best Web Design Agencies, February 2013, and Sourcingline revealed that WillowTree Apps is underleveraged in blog traffic. Based upon the keywords and other data listed in Alexa Page rankings, the visitors to Willowtreeapps.com are skewed toward 45-49 males in the IT or development realm in the U.S. What is missing is visitors from the senior ranks of marketing, management of Fortune 500 companies and industry analysts: Gartner Group, Forrester, Pew Research, and mHealth. A short term goal for WillowTree is to broaden the reader audience for the WillowTree wire. Leverage the firm’s three core competencies through stories in blog content.
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
Include Big Players in Your Sandbox Each vertical business specialty should have its own blog. You’ve heard this before: content is king—but you don’t have to write all the content to increase your reputation rating in Alexa. Two parallel strategies: • Associate with industry thought leaders. Contribute to other blogs and repost (with permission) relevant blogs rich with your keywords. Brian Dolan, mobiHealth News or Sarah Lane, Tech News Today, iFive • Content curation. There are a number of good inexpensive subscripiton tools: Curata, Scoop It, Lingo Spot, and Scribe.
Tactics to Own the Sandbox • Watch page rank and reputation trends in Alexa • Develop a list of broad topics on healthcare and mobile computing. Document the keywords • Encourage and track blog replies • Produce video blogs with Brainshark or Animoto • Create infographic on the top sites for data on mHealth • Push blog content (developed in-house, or curated) to prospects via email and social media • Invite guest bloggers to contribute
Blogs expanding Willowtree Wire Daddy, Where Do Smartphone Apps Come From? The Best Blogs start with a human angle or an industry trend or pain point . . . 7 Killer Apps all Hospital Administrators Should Evaluate [more] Top-10 Must-Have Apps for Healthcare Sales Organizations [more] Will Mobile Apps Replace Pharmeceutical Education? [more] How a Mobile App Can Help Healthcare CTOs Get a Handle on Patient Records [more] Patient Engagement Goes Further with Mobile Devices [more] Reaching the Medicaid Generation via Smartphones and Mobile Apps [more]
by Dr. Alonzo Garza, endochronology editor, AMA Journal I’m sure we can all agree that technology can solve a problem. Working on a home improvement project this weekend, I realized a simple job of suspending a mirror could be solved with wire, or a with an anchor and mount designed for suspending a mirror on a brick surface. Naturally I didn’t have quite the right anchor system to secure the mirror. So off to the home improvement store I trudged. Staring at the wall of cement/brick/plaster anchor systems, I realized there were must have been others who had gone before me, tried and failed, or at least tried and needed a different result. A helpful staff person guided me through the selection—some required simple tools to solve my problem; some required a new drill bit, or possibly a drill different than the one I own. Terriffic. Technology foiled me. I really don’t need or want a new drill, I just want a hole for the anchor that will hold a mirror securely. But an inexpensive drill bit, specially designed to solve my problem, is the just the slice of technology I need. I’m relieved. Isn’t that the way smartphones apps work? A smartphone alone doesn’t make our life easier or solve all our [unknown] problems. It is the imagination of a user who has tried and failed, or tried and been disappointed, that makes the application (forgive the pun) of the technology magic. Just like the drill, the underlying technology for collecting patient blood glucose levels and storing the data for study by the treating physician has been around for ages. Johnson & Johnson Healthcare and others have commercialized these solutions.
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
Technology improved life for patients who needed to test and record glucose levels several times daily. Technology advanced and expanded wireless communications and the affordable phone, followed by affordable smartphones. Johnson & Johnson Healthcare took a critical look at the intersection of patient need and the logisitics of delivering the optimal care for the conditions of glucose tolerance and diabetes. Smartphones technology had possibilities, even for the non-technical. (remember the inexpensive drill bit?) The What Ifs What if the patient could use their phone to reach a health portal ? How would a health portal containing all the patient history and information benefit both the patient and the providers’ challenge of records management, treatment analysis and compliance? Johnson & Johnson consulted WillowTree Apps, a mobile app development team known for healthcare solutions. The What Ifs started flying. A healthy What IF interchange ensued. A wishlist was developed and a project defined. The result was First Mobile MonitorTM, an intuitive smartphone app that seamlessly links the data from the patient through to the physician and the backend IT interface in the healthcare office. Technology empowers the patient, data empowers the treatment. Smartphone apps not only solve a current challenge, they open a forum to exchange information, channel ancillary services, and engage the patient. The cool factor is way up. So Virginia, that’s where smartphone apps come from. [more award-winning healthcare apps by WillowTree] Dr. Garza bio and byline
Social Media The Pitch, the Punch, and the Payback
Sample Social Media Posts
Pitch
Social media marketing is 90 percent visual and demands interactivity. Whether FB, Twitter, Linkedin, Pinterest, or Meet Up—all are recommended for the technical and non-technical healthcare prospect markets—the content needs to snatch attention in three seconds and be understood visually with little or no explanation. Tweets can be visually descriptive and drive traffic to a blog or WTA web page. Social media is not just about posting. Like blogging, the best use of social media is to influence through conversation. The director of marketing should shepherd the replies to social media posts.
Punch
Readers will stick longer and pass along content with video and content that contain offers like free trials. Practice newsjacking whenever sensible: link your post to a larger current news event or story in mainstream media. Customer testimonials and video news swipes should be posted to a WTA-branded YouTube site. Use hashtags for all keywords to induce trackability. The PR/media list includes FB sites and community portals in the healthcare field. Posting and commenting with these sites is also recommended.
Payback
Social capital is easy to benchmark. Likes on Facebook are one-way and don’t add substantially to your social capital. What is vital is the story views, the reTweets, or the number of people talking about it. Tools to be used to track payback: Google Analytics, Google alerts, FB admin reports, TweetBeep and bit.ly
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
What Happens When Your Smartphone Calls your Doctor? Living with diabetes just got easier with First Mobile Monitor developed by Willow Tree Apps for Johnson & Johnson Healthcare. See demo: http://www. willowtreeapps.com Twitter At #mhealth Congress gathering reviews and user experience swipes on #First Mobile Monitor. Posting on WTA YouTube later. Pinterest (visual portfolio of WTA mobile apps by industry) PinIt board: Gotta Have App Screens
LinkedIn (mhealth group page) Where’s the Paycheck in a Healthcare mobile app? Case study from WillowTree Apps diagrams steps to ROI mobile app concept and development. [download case study] Reply to: M.Pritchard, WillowTree Apps
Healthcare Conference Where prospects go to find out what’s new WillowTree Apps has a dual audience in this medium: the technologists and the influencers. It is all about conducting business in a collaborative way to get the prospects to raise their hand and move to the next step of engagement with WillowTree Apps. Powerful methods to make an impact on brand awareness and product positioning are also available in this arena.
A short stack of ideas for leveraging the app at a conference: • Exhibit jointly with Johnson & Johnson • Gage mindshare by using audience response systems (hand held clickers) in your conference session on engaging patients through moblie apps. Use the ARS data to create infographics for WTA website, blogs, and white papers • Affiliate WillowTree with the just-released standards in the Happitique Health App Certification Program. At your booth and in your conference sessions, poll attendees on the importance of certification for mobile apps. Post results to social media. Great way to collect inquiries for the sales funnel. • Create buzz around the launch of the app by hosting a celebrity diabetic in the booth using the app. Schedule times for photos with attendees and press interviews. If the booth space is small, the demo and q&a can be done virtually. • Do undercover work on competitors and perceived competitors. Collect literature and watch demos.
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
Over the top, but not out-of-the-question ideas: • Partner with Apple to provide iPad for each conference attendee. Pre-load the iPads with mobile app for the conference that would be distributed via print materials or on the conference website. Load premium offers for entertainment, restaurants, RSS feeds, blogs and mobile news channels • Showcase video demos of WillowTree healthcare apps • Create virtual and video chat rooms on conference topics. Record the content and repost to WTA healthcare blog channel
Press Relations The tiered plan Beyond trumpeting the release of a new app, press relations take the facts and make them relevant
Google alert: Visual press release on First Mobile Monitor, smartphone app for Johnson & Johnson
Cultivate pre-release contacts • Business pubs: Inc., Fortune, Entrepreneur, Fast Company • Trade pubs: PC Mag, Info World • Industry pubs: MobiHealth News, Mobile Commerce Daily, Mobile Marketer • Niche pubs: Physicians Online, American Diabetes, major hospital system news editors Broadcast in tandem with Johnson & Johnson • PRMac • PRWeb • HARO-Help a Reporter Out • App Review sites Post to Blogs and Social Media • Boost from ZDNet, owners of CBS News, CNET, Smart Planet, and Tech Republic Create a publicity stream • Repost release with revised headline and visuals to encourage blogger to curate content • Recast news after release and user reviews are collected • Repurpose press release for business development. Drop content in CRM system
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
Visual Press release
Tech Audience messages: multi-platform innovation for B2C links last leg of patient engagment client cachet: Johnson & Johnson
Non-Tech audience messages: electronic interactive press release: links to demos. photo heavy. Links to white paper boilerplate emphasize three core competencies of WTA
Other Marketing Initiatives Powerful ways to See and be seen Extending the reach and brand promise of WillowTree Apps will fuel the awareness and efficacy of reach in the mobile healthcare vertica. Big Ideas Worth Considering: • Co-Sponsor a Super Virtual Conference - panelist to include healthcare futurists, academics, computing and mobile tech analysts, and legislators. Global and local focus • Provoke conversation via self-branded news channel - reveal threats, risks, problems, and missed opportunities. Show how the WTA methodology engineers a solution for the client’s desired outcome • Pitch a TED talk. Leverage the session content and visuals in all other media • Become a subject matter expert/visiting professor at Johns Hopkins School of Public Health on the force of mission-specific mobile apps in healthcare. Create podcast content from sessions with students • Support innovation through RockHealth accelerator. Mentor and contribute as a workshop speaker
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013
Success Metrics what moved the needle, and why? Each marketing initiative has its own anectdotal metrics, but none work in isolation. Some pay off long term, some produce tangible results in the near term. Working together with the business development staff (to be named), marketing investment priorities can be set. Depending on what tools WillowTree Apps has in-house and the speed at which the launch will occur, a marketing budget can be developed complete with a cost-per-impression for a launch project. [see my e-portfolio for a sample of how I’ve done this in the past] http://issuu.com/bknabel/docs/e-portfolio-bknabel_112013 A caution: a launch budget is not the sum of a strategy to penetrate a vertical market. The ROI for each initiative listed in this proposal should be viewed as a tool to build momentum in marketshare. Less productive tools or initiatives can be tweaked or dropped, but each play a role in connecting with the buyers and influencers in the healthcare vertical. Let’s have a conversation about what is important to sensible growth for WillowTree Apps. Is it appointments? Nurturing prospects? Sales tools for closing deals? Is brand awareness more important in this fastmoving arena than page visits or inquiries?
Beth Knabel_Launch proposal ideas March 1, 2013