When the COVID-19 global pandemic resulted in stay-at-home orders and employees began working from home full-time, we knew the way we worked was starting to evolve but had yet to grasp its full impact.
Now, as states slowly start to reopen, healthcare sales and marketing professionals must develop a strategy for reaching buyers, whose mindset and work style has changed drastically.
Let’s dive into ways that healthcare technology buyers have changed over the past few months and why:
- Connecting virtually isn’t going away anytime soon
- Building trust is more important than ever
- Preparing your clients for future unknowns is critical
Tried and true marketing tip: clear brand messaging and product positioning is key to meeting your buyers’ needs and expectations.
Virtual relationships are here to stay
From senior citizens to preschoolers, if there’s one skill people have improved upon during the pandemic, it’s how to join a Zoom meeting!
For the past few months, business development and sales reps have been connecting with prospects, onboarding new customers, and guiding leads further along in the sales cycle virtually.
Some businesses have even found deals are closing faster and without the added cost of travel expenses.
While the spread of COVID-19 has slowed in some locations, it’s unlikely that hospitals and their associated businesses are going to throw open their doors and welcome sales teams as they did just a few months ago. Certainly, trade show season has dried up this year as well.
Reducing in-person contact and minimizing the risk of infection is now a top priority for everyone. Future deals will depend on meeting your buyers in the environment they’re most comfortable with.
If you haven’t already done so, start designing those professional Zoom backgrounds and honing your virtual relationship-building skills.
Centering trust
Motivational speaker and salesman, Zig Ziglar said it best: “If people like you they’ll listen to you, but if they trust you they’ll do business with you.”
Acknowledging the elephants in the room, everything from the economic uncertainty, and the fact that we’re all working from home, goes a long way to establishing trust with your buyers.
Recognize your healthcare buyers’ jobs to be done have changed. Can your prospect trust that your product or service meets this changing job?
Does your product or service prepare buyers for the next unknown?
The COVID-19 pandemic has permanently changed healthcare buyers’ priorities.
Many businesses, even those in the healthcare industry, were ill-prepared for a global pandemic that shuttered offices and grounded planes.
Today’s brand-new healthcare buyers want to feel confident that you have a disaster recovery plan in place and have seriously thought about potential unknowns that could impact their day-to-day ability to meet patients’ needs and expectations.
Product positioning
As you consider how your work has changed, have you thought about how your product positioning meets today’s healthcare buyers’ evolving expectations?
Want to get the conversation started? Contact us today!
