Marketing a new medical device in today’s competitive healthcare landscape demands not only innovative strategies to drive HCP adoption but also a keen focus on measurability to understand real-world impact among healthcare professionals. See how one medical device company took a digital-first approach that yielded impressive results, harnessing peer social engagement to overcome key challenges and achieve remarkable success with their new diagnostic tool.
The Challenge
An industry leader in medical diagnostics faced a significant marketing challenge introducing their new diagnostic device capable of rapidly differentiating between bacterial and viral infections. With limited awareness and familiarity among Emergency Medicine, Infectious Disease Specialists & Pathologists, they sought a digital-first strategy to educate their audience and drive adoption.
Leveraging Sermo’s holistic HCP engagement platform, the client rapidly informed, deployed and measured an impactful engagement solution to our global HCP community. The results exceeded expectations, showcasing deep engagement metrics and substantial shifts in brand familiarity, likelihood of usage, and recommendations from HCPs.
This Medical Device client was up against the following challenges:
- Low Awareness – HCPs were generally unaware of the product’s availability and how it compared to existing tools.
- Perception vs. Education – While the few HCPs aware of the product perceived it as superior in accuracy, cost implications remained a misunderstood barrier.
- Need for Impact Measurement – Taking a digital-first approach, they needed precise metrics to evaluate program success and guide future marketing investments.
- Engaging a Niche Audience – With a specialized tool targeting a narrow audience of physicians, they needed a highly strategic approach to capture attention and drive adoption.
The objective was clear but ambitious—elevate brand familiarity, educate HCPs on its unique benefits, and encourage long-term adoption while ensuring every step was measurable.
The Solution
With a clearly defined problem, Sermo developed a multi-phased, high-impact HCP engagement program that integrated awareness-building solutions with measurable insight strategies. Here’s how the solution unfolded:
1. Strategic Baseline Analysis
To ensure a data-driven approach, Sermo initiated the program with a Brand Pulse Study targeting HCPs. This provided baseline data, confirming low familiarity with the product and revealing strong conversion rates among those aware. The study showed:
These insights shaped the program goal: drive awareness and familiarity while educating physicians on the product’s real-world benefits, all grounded in measurable KPIs.
2. Multi-Channel Engagement Solution
To achieve these objectives, Sermo launched a 6-month HCP engagement campaign with the following core components:
- Engaging Sponsored Posts: Two targeted posts with polls were crafted to showcase the tool’s revolutionary features and real-world impact. Poll questions enabled us to glean additional insights to further inform strategy and gain HCP feedback on the content.
- Educational Message-Based Tactics: Dedicated emails targeted high-value HCPs to share product details and clinical data, extending brand visibility in a crowded market.
3. Deeper Engagement with On-Demand KOL-led Educational Events
During months 4 and 5, the strategy culminated in an 60-minute Sermo Rounds event, hosted by a panel of KOL experts. This event underscored the tool’s clinical value through:
- Validation studies verifying the accuracy of the tool
- Insightful case studies highlighting real-world implementation impacts
- Practical strategies for incorporating the tool into patient care
The event’s dual function as an educational resource and proof of clinical efficacy resonated strongly with attendees.
4. Measuring Program Success
To assess the overall impact, Sermo deployed a Program Impact Study targeting a test group of HCPs exposed to the program elements against a control group. The study evaluated:
- Brand familiarity and recognition
- Likelihood of adoption and recommendations to peers
- Behavioral shifts in diagnostic testing patterns
The program’s success not only exceeded engagement benchmarks but also highlighted meaningful shifts in how HCPs perceived and interacted with the product.
Key Performance Metrics
Program Impact on HCP Behavior
- Familiarity: Physicians exposed to the program reported significantly higher familiarity with the brand.
- Increase Favorability: 33% of HCPs exposed to the program were more likely to recommend the brand.
- Future Orders: Physicians exposed to the program were more likely to increase diagnostic test orders in the next 6 months.
- Among those exposed to the program on Sermo:
- 50% are likely to research the tool further
- 1 in 4 will make it their first choice diagnostic tool
- 30% will recommend it to colleagues
This 6-month HCP engagement program harnessed the power of strategic insights and a robust omnichannel HCP-social approach to turn low awareness into enhanced familiarity, deeper engagement, and proven behavioral shifts among physicians. By blending targeted educational content with measurable performance strategies, the Medical Device Company achieved not only increased adoption, but a solid foundation to build long-term brand loyalty among HCPs.
The Road Ahead
With the foundation in place, the team is set to expand their efforts by applying insights from this program to refine messaging and implement an omnichannel strategy (now that they’re digital experts!). By utilizing triggered engagement journeys, they aim to activate this well-prepared audience, delivering a more relevant and meaningful brand experience.
Let’s chat about how we can do the same for your medical device brand! Click here to book a demo.
On behalf of Sermo, thank you for checking out our success story on how a medical device company increased adoption with a holistic HCP insight & engagement solution. This is just one of the many examples of engagement opportunities and insights available with Sermo.
At Sermo, we turn HCP experience, expertise, and observations into actionable insights for the global healthcare community. Engaging with more than 1 million HCPs across 150 countries, we provide triple-verified physicians, advanced practice provides and pharmacists with a social platform that fosters impactful peer-to-peer collaboration & discussions about issues that are important to them and their patients. Sermo offers on-demand access to HCPs via a suite of proprietary technology to provide business intelligence that benefits medical device companies, pharmaceutical, healthcare partners and the medical community at large.
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To explore our exclusive business solutions, please visit us at sermo.com/business or email us at business@sermo.com.
