How to Use Third-Party Platforms to Increase Engagement on Your HCP Engagement Platform
Your HCP Engagement Platform is the central hub for your scientific content — and a critical opportunity to engage and educate healthcare professionals (HCPs). But when it comes to engagement platforms, the old adage “if you build it, they will come” doesn’t apply. Simply developing a platform, even a great one, isn’t enough to guarantee a robust audience of relevant HCPs.
The upshot: You must find ways to broaden your reach and attract HCPs to your engagement platform. Third-party platforms (TPPs) for healthcare professionals, like Kudos, Sermo, and Figshare represent a great opportunity to achieve both of these critical goals.
To get the most value out of TPPs, you must engage on each platform’s terms while at the same time creating a seamless journey that leads HCPs back to your owned digital resources – your HCP Engagement Platform. Here’s how.
The Benefits of Third-Party Platforms
Third-party platforms are digital spaces for healthcare professionals to access educational content, engage in professional discussions, and stay up-to-date on the latest medical developments. These platforms are becoming more relevant and essential as HCPs choose digital platforms and resources over traditional approaches.
The benefits of embracing third-party platforms are numerous. You can use them to:
- Expand your reach to new HCP audiences
- Provide value through targeted, platform-specific content
- Increase credibility through association with trusted platforms
- Measure the success of TPP activities via engagement analytics and audience insights
- Create engagement-rich opportunities for interactive content and peer-to-peer discussions
- Drive traffic to owned educational resources, including your HCP Engagement Platform
Selecting the Right Third-Party Platforms
With numerous TPPs available, how do you choose the ones that will best serve your goals? As you assess your options, be sure to consider the following factors:
- Audience alignment: Different platforms cater to different HCP segments, so you’ll want to prioritize platforms that are most popular with your target audience. For instance, general medical platforms attract a broad range of healthcare professionals, while specialty-focused platforms target niche audiences in specific therapeutic areas. Research-oriented platforms, meanwhile, appeal to academics and clinical investigators.
- Engagement features: Consider the tools various TPPs offer for interaction and discussion. Given your unique Medical Communications goals, which of those features matter most to you?
- Integration capabilities: How easily can you link back to your own HCP Engagement Platform? Your ability to create an integrated digital experience for HCPs should be a primary consideration.
As you hone in on the right TPPs for your organization, keep in mind that your TPP strategy isn’t about being everywhere — it’s about creating a strong presence where your target HCPs are already most active and engaged.
Balancing Value and Strategy: Content Development Guidelines for Third-Party Platforms
The content you create for TPPs must support a number of goals. It should provide immediate educational value, appeal to HCPs’ evolving content consumption preferences, comply with industry regulations, and motivate your audience to visit your HCP Engagement Platform. To strike the right balance:
Focus on Educational Value
All the content you produce, regardless of channel, should provide your audience of HCPs with meaningful educational value. The assets you develop for TPPs should offer the insights, data, or perspectives HCPs need to make smart, informed decisions and improve patient outcomes.
Understand Your Audience
The success of your content depends on how well you know your audience and their interests. Use audience segmenting and targeting to tailor content to meet the unique needs and preferences of your audience.
It’s crucial that you conduct your own audience research and develop audience personas, but the following guidelines should prove useful as you get started:
- General practitioners might be more interested in high-level overviews, practical guidelines, or content that ties directly to patient care.
- Specialists, may prefer content that delves deeper into clinical evidence, cutting-edge innovations, and disease-specific breakthroughs.
- Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) often seek robust data presentations, including trial designs, population details, post-hoc analyses, and broader study narratives. Providing a comprehensive understanding of the data’s story requires easily accessible and well-organized content.
Don’t “Give Away the Farm”
TPPs are an essential tool to reach new audience members and funnel them to your HCP Engagement Platform — just as you’re likely already doing on LinkedIn and X. Consider which assets make the most sense for each TPP, but save some of your most compelling pieces for your engagement platform.
Incorporate clear calls-to-action (CTAs)
Use clear, compelling CTAs to entice HCPs to deepen their engagement by visiting your HCP Engagement Platform. For instance, you might:
- Link to in-depth resources on your website
- Driving awareness of upcoming webinars hosted on your platform
Tailor Your Content
Each third-party platform has its own unique culture, much like social media platforms. By understanding the unique culture and format preferences of each TPP you’re using, you can develop content that aligns with each platform’s personality.
Experiment with Content Formats
Try out various content formats to learn what does and doesn’t resonate on each third-party platform. Options include:
- Digital-Friendly Content: Formats such as infographics, short videos, and interactive media designed for quick consumption.
- Publication Extenders: Publication extenders are condensed learning resources that communicate key findings of a publication.
- Novel Content Types: Content that resonates with HCPs’ preferences for on-the-go learning, such as microlearning modules or case-based discussions.
Use Visuals Strategically
Visuals excel at capturing attention and conveying complex information quicker. Increase engagement on TPPs by developing infographics, charts, and interactive elements.
Leverage platform-specific features
Use polls, Q&A sessions, or live discussions to boost engagement and create opportunities for platform cross-promotion.
How to Create a Seamless Journey From TPPs to Your HCP Engagement Platform
Your ultimate goal is to use TPPs as stepping stones that lead HCPs to your HCP Engagement Platform. Here’s how to create a seamless and compelling journey:
- Tease exclusive content: Offer previews or summaries on TPPs, with full access available on your own platform.
- Develop a multichannel content series: Start discussions or educational series on TPPs that continue on your HCP Engagement Platform.
- Promote personalized learning: Give HCPs personalized content recommendations based on the TPP content they’ve already engaged with.
- Boost content visibility and engagement: Engage strategically to increase your success. For instance, you might time posts based on platform analytics, use relevant hashtags and keywords to improve discoverability, and engage actively in comment sections and discussion boards.
Using Data to Optimize Your Third-Party Platform Strategy
Your TPP strategy should be informed by metrics, evolving over time as data yields meaningful insights.
Plan to regularly review performance data across platforms to optimize your strategy. You should:
- Set specific, measurable goals for each TPP initiative
- Track both quantitative metrics (e.g., engagement rates, traffic) and qualitative outcomes (e.g., HCP feedback, relationship-building)
- Calculate cost-per-engagement and compare it to other channels
- Present ROI data in a clear, compelling format to stakeholders
Focusing on these areas ensures that your TPP efforts translate into meaningful engagement and drive traffic to your educational website.
One note of caution: Because different TPPs have different ways of gathering and reporting metrics, it can be difficult to get a clear overall view of your TPP strategy’s performance. Rather than piecing together metrics from platform to platform each time you review data, consider building a central metrics dashboard that aggregates all the data in one place.
Harness the Power of TPPs for Effective HCP Engagement
As HCPs spend more time engaging with digital resources, the line between third-party platforms and pharma owned HCP Engagement Platforms will continue to blur. Your best bet moving forward? Develop a unified digital ecosystem that spans multiple channels and platforms to meet HCPs where they are.
By carefully considering platform selection, content strategy, user journey design, and compliance requirements, you can create a powerful synergy across channels.
As you develop your TPP strategy, remember that the goal isn’t just to be present on multiple platforms. It’s to grow your audience, connect them to your engagement platform, provide value to HCPs, and support improved patient outcomes.