As marketers, we talk about branding a lot, it seems to come up in every other sentence, so you may be wondering, what’s all the fuss about?
This is why we’ve created this complete and comprehensive guide to branding in medical devices, to help you and your company keep your marketing on the right track.
We’ll talk you through what medical device branding is, how to get started implementing it into your marketing, and asking the all-important question “Do you even need it?”
By the end of the article, you should feel more confident discussing branding and deciding how much of your time and money you should invest.
What is medical branding?
Branding is so much more than just a logo and a few brand colours. It’s a persona, a personality given to your company to help represent yourself and connect with your audience.
To put it simply, a branding strategy boils down to defining your company or product’s uniqueness into a single recognisable identity.
Many believe that healthcare branding is solely about how companies present themselves, and although that is a vital part of branding, it’s also about the feelings that all that external presentation provokes.
However, what makes up this identity? Your brand’s personality can be formed of many different things such as:
- Brand design: This is made up of logo design, colours, typography, images, and any other visual elements.
- Brand messaging: How you talk to your audience in your marketing copy and tagline, including brand identity, voice and tone.
- Brand archetype: A brand archetype is a personality that you give to your brand that reflects its values.
- Brand story: A narrative that reflects where you have come from and why you are doing what you are doing.
- Brand promise: A commitment that you’ve made to your audience to help them achieve something.
Why is a medical branding strategy important?
Some medical companies might not prioritise healthcare branding when it comes to their medical device marketing strategy as it isn’t something that creates instant results, and it isn’t easily measurable.
So, what’s the point?
When strategic branding underpins all marketing activities, it forms the foundation that everything else is built on, providing direction on what your company should talk about and how you should interact with your audience.
Without a strong medical device brand strategy guiding decision-making, there’s a risk of becoming a ship lost at sea with no real direction.
Here are some of the other reasons why it’s important.
Building a connection with your audience
Your consumers want more from brands than ever before; in fact, nearly two-thirds of consumers seek a connection with a medical brand.
Connections breed trust, which in turn creates customer loyalty, the importance of which can’t be overstated. Look around your home at the brands you buy and consider why you buy them.
For example, if you’re looking to buy a pair of new trainers would you rather go with a strong brand you understand and know such as Nike or Adidas or one you don’t?
People tend to pick the one with the stronger brand presence as it breathes trust, reliability and authenticity. They understand who they are and what you’re going to get from them.
When it comes to a company without a brand there is an uncertainty and mistrust around them as you don’t know what their intentions are, if they’re reliable and what you’re going to get from them.
Your brand gives your customers a reason to intentionally buy from you over others. It’s far too easy for potential customers to compare multiple companies at once to decide which one to buy from, so when one stands out as having values and beliefs that are relatable, it makes a big difference.
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Brand awareness and recognisability
One of the best ways of creating effective branding that works for you is by having a strong set of brand guidelines that includes everything about your healthcare brand, from tone of voice and logo design to who the brand is. This will ensure that all materials, whether online or physical, are consistent.
But why do you need to be consistent?
Consistency is the key to being recognisable, which leads to being memorable in the minds of your potential customers. With audiences estimated to need to come into contact with your brand 15 times before they take action, being inconsistent in your presentation will reset your count back to 1 every time.
Inconsistency reduces your audience’s ability to recognise you and will slow down their buyer’s journey, lowering your conversions and sales.
What’s the best way to implement your medical device branding?
Now that you’ve created all of your materials and developed your brand messaging you might be asking yourself how can you introduce your new branding but still remaining consistent?
The answer is slowly.
A hard launch of your new branding might be good for smaller brands with a small digital presence, but for bigger companies that have already garnered a following you need to introduce your new healthcare brand bit by bit.
It’s good to create an introduction timeline that might look something like this:
- Week 1: Update the messaging on your healthcare marketing channels.
- Week 2: Partially introduce new brand elements e.g. medical logo.
- Week 3: Add in your new brand colours.
A slow launch will help your audience adjust and follow your brand transition ensuring that you don’t leave anyone behind.
What are the problems with a medical device brand strategy?
As with everything in life, branding isn’t perfect. It’s not the one marketing activity that is going to turn your company into a raging success overnight, rather you’re creating the strong foundations to build upon (without which, your building may crumble).
As well as all its bright sides, branding does have some drawbacks that are worth discussing.
Time-consuming
Doing medical branding in the right way, where it will be most impactful and effective, is not a quick task. It involves a company workshop and interviews, multiple ideas sessions and in-depth market research.
It can take months to reach a point where your healthcare brand is correctly defined and ready to implement, you can’t consider it a quick win marketing task. However, once it’s done, it can positively impact all your digital marketing activities and last for years.
Not directly measurable
Measuring the impact of branding can be challenging because it doesn’t produce quantifiable metrics. As a result, it can be hard to see the point in spending all that time developing it.
Many metrics, such as customer engagement, number of leads and revenue are certainly influenced by branding, but their success or failure cannot be directly attributed to it.
Surveys and interviews can give an insight into how your brand is viewed by your audience and therefore how it’s performing, but all of that information is subjective and will change from person to person.