How proprietary research fuels thought leadership and business growth
By Marian Temesvary
If you create, or are responsible for creating, thought leadership for your company, ask yourself these questions. Is our content unique? Is it ownable? Does it provide value to prospects that they can’t find elsewhere?
Gone are the days of simply publishing a blog post and measuring engagement. We now live in a world of subtle, or not so subtle, value exchange. Today, successful B2B brands offer up their knowledge, insights and a peek at their expertise in exchange for engagement and permission to start an ongoing relationship.
So, what do smart B2B brands use as the foundation for that exchange? Our experience shows that proprietary research is a rich resource for relationship-building content.
Mining research for value-based content
Yes, proprietary research requires an investment of money and time. However, it’s proven to be a powerful tool for B2B marketers. According to a 2020 study by the Hinge Research Institute, the fastest growing B2B service businesses were 3x more likely to use original research in their content marketing strategy.
From audience attitudes and behaviors to state-of-the-market assessments, key insights are crucial to demonstrating subject matter expertise to your customers. Obviously, there are some proprietary learnings you may wish to keep to yourself, or gate for a higher value exchange. But, in general, research data is valuable currency within your content marketing ecosystem. The key is to make sure your research is truly unique or additive to what is already available. When used strategically to meet a prospect’s need to connect, learn or evaluate your product or service, proprietary research is pure gold. Here’s how one Health Mavens client reaped the benefits.
A telehealth provider’s story
The last year was a windfall for the telehealth space with literally hundreds of new entrants flooding the market following the pandemic. The accelerated growth was unique and gave everyone a crash course in change management and rapid adaptation. One client in the telehealth space commissioned Health Mavens for a quantitative study to understand attitudes, behaviors and expected innovations among its target audience, pediatric clinicians.
The study was conducted in 2021 with 787 physicians. Health Mavens then synthesized the data into actionable insights on telehealth use, attitudes and expectations for the future. Additionally, the data was cut as a comparison between current users and competitive users, building a valuable customer profile for our client.
But there was even more gold to be mined. Insights gleaned from the State of Telemedicine Report served as rich content for a robust, value-driven, thought leadership campaign for our client which included:
- Press release and follow up
- Digital communication to download the report
- Infographic and webinar
- Series of social posts reinforcing the key data points
- Material for multiple industry presentations and seminars
The results
- Key insights, attributed to the client, have been featured by associations, EMR companies, clinician groups, and medical policy organizations
- Surpassed current benchmarks for multiple-step engagement
- Over 70 customer inquiries
- Interviews in key publications and with customers
- Promotional value and new customers
- ROI of 238%
In summary, proprietary research places valuable insights at the forefront of messaging that, in turn, drive business. A single investment in research creates marketing and communication elements that span multiple media and channels. Key, ownable insights drive customers through the buyer journey. They create engagement, credibility, customer conversations and, more importantly, business partnerships that lead to business growth.
For more information on how you can apply research insights for more robust content marketing and new business, read about our Solutioner Research approach to driving your business forward. Or contact our Chief Strategy Officer, Marian Temesvary marian@health-mavens.com
If you’d like to view the State of Telemedicine Report, you can download it here.
