Communicating your brand voice online has never been more readily available, and with websites, social media, email campaigns and other digital methods, online brands have become a cornerstone in a company’s identity and reputation. One of the best ways businesses work to expand their brand identity is with a brand voice. Brand voices offer people the first impressions that are vital towards potential success, and for medical practices, brand voices work to imbue it with the practice’s mission, values, and personality to reach its audience effectively. It’s a challenging process though, as maintaining a consistent brand voice across different platforms can be clogged by writing styles, content formatting, and other various factors. But with the healthcare industry being increasingly competitive, we’re here to help provide a better understanding of how you can develop a consistent brand voice for better patient engagement.
What is A Brand Voice?
From the moment a practice establishes itself, it gives physicians a unique opportunity to provide a consistent experience to their patients the moment they connect. One of the best ways to help establish yourself as part of your patient’s experience is through a brand voice. A brand voice uses a specific tone, language, and even personality to convey information and messages to your audience – and it’s considered one of the most difficult aspects of content to develop, especially in a wide-reaching industry such as healthcare.
The Importance of Consistency in Brand Voice
Having a consistent brand voice means knowing your image inside and out—what topics your practice focuses on, how you and your staff members interact with your patients, and how people outside of your current patients perceive you. It also means establishing yourself as an authority in your line of healthcare and understanding the nuances of how you best communicate with your patients.
In short, your brand voice is part of your identity as a practice. It should convey who you believe you are as a medical professional, starting with looking at the variables surrounding your medical practice. Some ways to find or even redefine your brand voice can be sought out through these factors:
- Target Audience: Analyze your target audience and learn who you treat and speak to regularly. Are you working with younger generations, families, senior citizens, or a mixture of those demographics? Learn what demographics you are currently caring for and what your intended target audience is for your practice.
- Services and Treatments: Some of the best ways to identify your brand voice is through the specialty you service. What treatments and services do you provide? What circumstances in healthcare do you face regularly? Take the experience you’ve honed over your career and use that as the basis of your brand voice – your certifications and experiences will help create the voice of your practice and help establish you as an authority figure in your field.
- Social Media Presence: Your presence reflects your brand voice and can significantly influence how your audience perceives you. Review your social media interactions, your posts’ tone, and the content that most engages your followers. Are your posts more formal or casual? Do you focus on educating your audience, or do you also incorporate humor and lighthearted content? The feedback and engagement you receive on social media platforms can offer valuable insights into what resonates with your audience, allowing you to fine-tune your brand voice better to match their preferences and expectations.
- In-Office Patient Experiences: Patients’ experiences when they visit your practice play a crucial role in defining your brand voice. Every interaction contributes to their perception of your brand from the moment they walk in. Pay attention to the language used by your staff, the ambiance of your office, and the overall patient care approach. These in-office experiences should align with the brand voice you project online.
How To Develop Brand Consistency
Brand consistency is considered one of the most difficult facets of business development because it requires a deep understanding of yourself as a practice. Common issues include consumer confusion, negative customer experiences, and miscommunication about the brand. Overcoming these challenges can be done, but it takes some steps to ensure that all of your platforms are aligned with your brand identity:
- Develop a Style Guide: Once you can refine your brand style, one of the best ways to keep track of your brand’s voice or persona is through a style guide. This style guide can be used for all staff members, partnering marketers or visual designers, and other business relations you intend to work with to grow your practice. Stylization guidelines such as language, use of practice names, copy principles, and even emojis can be defined in this guide to help reinforce consistency.
- Use Consistent Visual Elements: Your visual elements should also reflect the tone and perceptions of your brand. Color theory can be an excellent resource for learning how colors can impact emotions and thoughts. When designed or chosen correctly, it can add a unique take on your brand voice that helps empathize with the messages you wish to convey with your content.
- Document Everything For Consistency: Your brand voice should always be documented. Documenting your content, writing styles, visual images, and other facets of your practice means you have content that can be used to find patterns and aspects of your brand that you wish to improve on, keep, or remove to better serve your community. You can also use this to tailor your content to different channels and further visualize your brand for consistency.
- Monitor, Review, and Adapt: One of the best ways to define your brand is by simply monitoring it throughout your content. See what areas of your content succeed and which falter, then outline what works best. Continuously adapting to the circumstances of your target audience and what they’re attracted to from their healthcare can make it easier for you to craft a style closer to your imagined brand’s voice.
Medical Brand Voice Examples Offering Valuable Insight
One of the best ways to further develop your brand voice is by looking at examples that people know best. There is a wide variety of recognizable medical names in healthcare that people visit daily for reliable information, and they offer valuable lessons in branding and patient engagement. Here are some notable examples:
Mayo Clinic
Brand Voice Characteristics: Authoritative, Compassionate, Educational
Mayo Clinic has established itself through its trust and authority in the medical community, providing a brand voice that balances professional expertise with compassionate care. Mayo Clinic offers an online health library, blog posts, and a social media presence, and its focus is to provide research-backed health information in an accessible, empathetic manner. Their content often features patient stories for a personal touch, making the brand more relatable and trustworthy to their audience.
Cleveland Clinic
Brand Voice Characteristics: Informative, Patient-Centric, Engaging
Cleveland Clinic creates informative and engaging content with a strong focus on patient-centric care. Their Health Essentials blog covers a wide range of health topics in clear, easy-to-understand language that appeals to a broad audience. Cleveland Clinic provides content that addresses common patient concerns and questions and focuses on providing an easy-to-understand, accessible resource for patients.
Zocdoc
Brand Voice Characteristics: Friendly, Innovative, Convenient
Zocdoc focuses on its technological advancement and has a brand voice that emphasizes convenience, innovation, and a friendly tone. The purpose of their platform is to help people find and book appointments with healthcare providers, and they use a straightforward, jargon-free communication style. Everything about their brand voice is service-orientated and focused on solving common patient frustrations with the healthcare system. Therefore, Zocdoc’s messaging resonates with those seeking a more user-friendly healthcare experience.
Planned Parenthood
Brand Voice Characteristics: Empowering, Supportive, Inclusive
Planned Parenthood focuses on providing medical care through empowering, supportive, and inclusive language, aiming to provide safe, judgment-free information and services related to sexual and reproductive health. The brand’s educational materials, social media content, and advocacy work all communicate a message of empowerment, emphasizing the right to make informed healthcare decisions. The inclusivity of their brand voice is particularly noteworthy, as they make a concerted effort to address the needs and concerns of diverse communities, including LGBTQ+ individuals. This approach strengthens their brand identity and fosters community and support among their target audience.
Each of these examples focuses on the areas of care that they perform best. Whether you’re a small medical practice looking to get started or a larger health group trying to define yourself, it’s important to have a clear, consistent brand that aligns with your patients’ values and highlights your best features. By taking the time, your medical practice can have a strong, recognizable brand voice that’s memorable and trustworthy to the patients who need you most.
Craft Your Distinct Brand Voice with Optimized360
Developing a distinct brand voice goes beyond trying to stand out in the healthcare market; it’s also about making genuine connections with your patients. At Optimized360, our medical marketers and SEO experts can provide marketing resources to help you better resonate with your target audience and distinguish your services within the healthcare landscape. We offer marketing solutions from content creation and website sites to SEO campaigns and social media management to help you develop and improve your brand voice. For more information, use Optimized360 today to learn more about our services to give you a brand voice that represents your values, connects with your patients, and drives your practice forward.
