As a healthcare marketer, I always felt like I was fumbling in the dark when it came to content strategy. I could never get enough data to correctly determine what people were reading. I only had access to what content was being consumed on our own sites, which of course is completely biased. Back then, I tried to get a group of companies together to pool and share our marketing data, but very few were willing.
This gap in marketing data became the impetus behind the creation of HITMC Insights – a new monthly report that takes headline data from 15 healthcare media outlets (including our own) and combines it with performance data from Healthcare IT Today’s emails, social media and website.
I wrote an article explaining that backstory of HITMC Insights.
For the first report, we took a deep dive into COVID-19 and how it was impacting (dominating) Health IT headlines. Below are five of the surprising results from that report (see link at the end of this article).
COVID-19 instead of Coronavirus
Looking at the 40 most recent headlines from 15 healthcare media outlets (including Healthcare IT News, Health System CIO, and Fierce Healthcare), the term “COVID-19” was clearly favored over “coronavirus”. In the headlines analyzed, COVID-19 appeared in 180 headlines vs 54 for coronavirus.
Perhaps we prefer the more precise term for the virus in industry press or perhaps it is just simpler to write. No matter the reason, there is a significant preference for COVID-19 – something to keep in mind as you develop your own content.
Free COVID-19 products & services generated visitors
Of all our articles in the month of April, the one that generated the most visitors was our List of Free COVID-19 Health IT Products and Services. The listicle and “free” combination was a definite winner with readers. Even today, this article is still generating a significant number of visitors.
Telehealth, interoperability and communication are popular
Although COVID-19 dominated the headlines and news coverage in healthcare media, there were several topics that were “bubbling under”. Looking across headlines, article content, social media and emails, we found the following to be popular:
- Telehealth
- Interoperability
- Communication
Telehealth isn’t surprising given the rise of adoption and the need for virtual solutions. Interoperability was surprising. I thought this would be one of the things pushed aside as healthcare organizations dealt with the pandemic. Hopefully this means that IT leaders are keeping interoperability in mind as we continue to quickly adopt new technology solutions to deal with remote workforces and safety protocols.
EPIC and HIMSS subject lines draw attention
Analyzing email subject lines is a guilty pleasure of mine. More accurately, I love looking at the different open rates of emails. It’s always amazing to me how much the subject line makes a difference.
When we looked at our April emails two in particular stood out from the sea of COVID related emails:
- No Refunds from HIMSS 2020 Annual Conference Exhibitors…
- Is Epic Building Its Own Telehealth Solution Using Twilio?
This just goes to show that even in the middle of a pandemic, people are curious to know what is happening with EPIC and HIMSS.
You can download this special HITMC Insights – COVID-19 report for free via this link.
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