Health Care & Medical

Simultaneous research with target consumers and physicians has been used to track awareness of conditions, disease incidence, presentation of symptoms or indicators, use of screening tests and treatment protocols and the pros and cons of different therapies. Then the first step is to qualify demand, interest, awareness of and knowledge about the drug or device among target consumer segments and physicians.

Second, target consumers are queried about how often their physicians review their condition or how regularly they receive screening tests to identify the need for the drug or device. Third, using telephone or online research methods, we identify physician attitudes and current practices to determine what would motivate or prevent them from using the drug or device and test how to best position the drug/device for optimal receptivity by the medical community.

Finally, we test different messages with both physicians and target consumers. Often times it is difficult to know which strategy or position will resonate with the target audience. So Limelight by Shugoll employs a wide range of qualitative and quantitative tools including its proprietary evaluation tool, AdBeat to identify the overall strengths and limitations of various campaign strategies.

Limelight by Shugoll has evaluated potential patient and physician reactions to new concepts ranging from comprehensive women’s health care and information centers to full-service cardiac centers using our proprietary Product Opportunity Forecaster. First, we use qualitative research to define patient and physician expectations prioritizing essential features, products and services. Then quantitative studies are employed to estimate demand and revenues. In addition, our proprietary AdBeat product has been used to test advertising messages that have been developed to promote these healthcare programs.

Limelight by Shugoll regularly conducts positioning and branding studies for hospitals/health care systems. These involve conducting qualitative and quantitative research with patients, community residents, community leaders and physicians to determine awareness, perceptions and use of area services in order to understand how your institution compares with the competition.

When using qualitative research to explore deeply held feelings about your institution or brand so that you can select an optimal market positioning, we often use metaphorical tools including analogies, personification, situational drawings and picture decks. Other projective techniques used include sentence completing, adjective sorts and storytelling.

The quantitative positioning and branding studies we conduct often use perceptual mapping and gap analysis to provide more substantive and insightful analysis of a hospital’s/health care system’s relative strengths and weaknesses. Forced choice preferences for selected services also provide insights into departments that are strongest. Repeated implementation of these studies provides trend data to measure changes in an institution’s position over time.