If you want to write amazing content, you need to know who you're writing it for. And to do that, you need to know who your audience is, and what sort of content they're looking for.
Knowing your audience will inform your decisions around content more than anything else. It will also make it so much easier to create your content offerings.
As a pharmacy, you're kind of lucky this way.
After all, you're not starting from scratch; you know who your patients are. You see them every day, you talk to them. You understand their problems and concerns. You know the questions they ask, what makes them anxious, and what makes them happy.
Which means you're gearing your content offerings to someone you already know. But while that gives you a starting point, you've still got some experimenting to do.
You've already started working on this to a certain extent in your buyer personas. But now it's time to dig a little deeper in your ongoing quest to know your audience.
As you build your content, continue to work with your buyer personas. You'll need to fine tune your knowledge of what your patients will respond to. Will you get more engagement with health-related infographics or articles? What types of content do your readers find easiest to digest?
Understanding your patient base in context of your content marketing will help. To get a better understanding of what your patients want to see on your blog, consider the following:
· What Are Their Demographics?
Your readers' gender, income, where they live, and other demographics are important. Since you work with your patients every day, you've got a good idea of some of these things. If you feel you'd like more clarification, ask.
Get a better idea of how your content can best serve your patients in their day-to-day lives. Then you can begin by developing a buyer persona that you’d like to start with.
· Where Do They Get Their Information?
When your patients are looking for information online, where do they get it? Are they reading the Mayo Clinic blog? Dr. Oz? Are they in any Facebook groups relating to specific conditions? Who do they follow on social media?
Chances are, habits vary in your older patients vs. your younger ones. By knowing where your patients go for health-related info online, you know what they like. Which means you can create content that appeals to them.
· What Type of Content Do They Prefer?
Now that you know what sources your patients like, you can delve a little deeper. Do they love blog articles? Videos? Podcasts or infographics?
The best way to figure this out is to experiment on your own blog, by posting in different formats. Doing a webinar on natural healthcare products in your front shop? Post an article and an infographic too, and see what gets the most engagement.
By posting different types of content, you'll learn more about what your patients love. Just try to get a general idea for now; we'll dig more into this on Day 5.
· What Problems Can You Solve for Them?
By knowing what issues your patients are looking up, you'll find it easier to stay relevant. You'll know what solutions to offer, both in the products you feature and the content you create.
You have a great advantage here in that you speak to your patients every day. They're real people to you, with real lives and real issues, and to some extent you already understand them.
This is invaluable when it comes to writing content that will connect.
Answering questions about your target market will make it so much easier to know who they are. Building out your buyer personas based on these answers will help you to connect with them.
Start slow and experiment. Begin asking questions and picking up clues about what your patients would like to see. And you don't need to be cloak-and-dagger about it.
You can tell your patients outright that you're working on a new initiative to serve them better. Ask them what they'd find useful. Chances are, they'll appreciate your efforts.
Your mission for today, is to consider your target market. Answer the above questions, and ask a question or two when speaking to patients. Start gathering more information to include in your buyer personas.
And don't forget to get your staff involved; they deal with your patients every day. I've no doubt you'll find invaluable insight there.
Be sure to have fun with it, and we'll see you back here for Day 4!
Comments