touch point podcast

In this episode, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer dive into the the latest study from Greystone/Klein Partners:”The 4th Annual State of Digital Marketing for Hospitals,” an annual survey or more than 200 healthcare marketers and digital professionals from various healthcare organizations. From websites, social media and CRM, the hosts discuss their perspective on how digital has evolved over the y...

Hospital and health system digital marketers focus much of their attention on ensuring their website is the authoritative source of information about their organization. However in the new digital environment, the information on third-party websites often has a bigger impact on the online customer journey. In this episode, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith discuss how organizations can begin consid...

Building trust with customers online is difficult, particularly when customer expectations are continually changing and competition for trust is growing. But for hospitals and health systems, gaining trust is critical to branding and patient loyalty. In this episode, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer discuss methods in which health systems can use digital to build brand trust. They are joined by gu...

User experience (UX) refers to a person's emotions and attitudes when they interact with and experiences a product, service or solution. As UX continues to grow in importance for healthcare digital marketers, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer discuss the four U’s of online experience: User Experience, Usability, Utility and Usefulness. In addition, they discuss how these factors (along with Desirab...

Whether you are creating your content calendar or planning your content production, it’s important to determine if you have all the elements of a robust content strategy. In this episode, Reed Smith and Chris Boyer discuss the concepts of front-end and back-end content strategy and share their experiences working with hospitals and health systems on their content development efforts. They are join...

With the increasing impact consumerism is having on health systems, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith weigh in on the potential influence “digital natives” can have on new online strategies - both from a consumer and employment perspective. From virtual care offerings to social media training, they even attempt to bust myths about digital natives. They are joined by Dr. Farris Timimi, the Medical D...

For hospital and healthcare marketers, the challenge of determining the right balance of online advertising spend is challenging. Paid search, display ads, social media advertising, native and video advertising - the options are numerous and confusing. In this episode, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer discuss various techniques they have found to help budget and plan SEM efforts to effectively sup...

In this annual “Best-of” 2018 show, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer reflect back on 2018, sharing some of their most favorite topics, guests and episodes from the Touchpoint podcast and countdown listener’s top voted categories, including: best cold-open, best episode topic, best guest expert and the coveted Top Fan of 2018. Congratulations to Bridget Thomas (best guest), Mitch Holdwick (biggest...

In the final episode of 2018, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer offer a “sampler platter” of all the great shows available on the TouchPoint Network. They begin with an episode on interoperability from the Connected Hospital (hosted by John Mason). Then they feature a clip from the Intersection Podcast in which Bobby Rettew interviews a humanitarian working at the Texas Border. Dr. Bryan Vartabedia...

Digital marketing continues to develop methods to measure consumer preference, leveraging consumer data and digital footprints to help identify customer’s needs and intent. In this episode, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith discuss the latest benefits and risks health systems might face using data footprints to personalize their marketing. They also explore the potential consumer backlash to levera...

Hospital and health system marketers realize that social media is an important part of their digital efforts, but given the recent shift in social platforms to a “pay to play” model, are we overstating the importance they have on your brand? In this episode, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith analyze the positive and negative impacts that social media can have on your brand, and are then joined by C...

Hospitals are eager to use marketing automation as part of their technology stack, but are they doing so correctly? In this episode, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith discuss the history of the marketing automation and share 11 use-cases on how health systems can apply this technology effectively in their efforts. They are joined by Dana Cutter, Sr. Solutions Consultant for Marketo, in which he sha...

Are we failing enough? In this episode, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith discuss how building a culture of failure is an important component of developing a growth mindset, and how hospital and health system marketers are using digital strategies to build a framework that embraces failing forward. They also interview Jess Columbo, CEO of MedEd Digital, in which she shares her  “fail-case” of a fun...

Recorded live from the Mayo Clinic Social Media Network Annual Conference in Jacksonville, Florida, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer are joined by fellow (and former) Mayo Clinic social media alums Jason Pratt, Randy Schwartz and Shawn Bishop. Together, they discuss how social media has evolved and changed over the last decade and how the way hospitals and how hospitals and health systems have had...

Based on a listener request, the second “live” recording live from the Healthcare Internet Conference is an insightful conversation of how health systems and academic medical centers have approached a website redesign effort. Topics range from exploring the business drivers behind the website change, understanding website user’s needs, and developing an information architecture that can support bo...

Recording live from the Healthcare Internet Conference in Scottsdale, AZ, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer head outside to record a show with Healthcare Internet Hall of Famers, Ed Bennett, founder of MarTech Health,  and Lee Aase, Communications Director at Mayo Clinic. They discuss how they have seen digital and the internet evolve over the years. They reminisce on the early days of developing h...

Hospital and health system marketers are facing more and more pressure to measure and track their efforts. The need for data fluency is becoming critical for CMOs and marketing professionals. In this episode, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer are joined by Greg Matthews, host of Touch Point Media’s new show DataPoint, in which they discuss their experience in becoming more familiar with analyzing d...

The term “digital front door” has been been often used in healthcare -  by those in marketing, patient experience, IT, patient access and many other departments within a hospital. But what does it actually mean? In this episode, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith explore how the digital front door is defined, what tools and strategies make up a front-door strategy and how to structure different appr...

This week, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer come to you live from the Fifth Annual Thought Leadership on Access Symposium in Boston, MA. They are joined by a panel of experts, including Chi-Cheng Huang of Wake Forest Baptist Health System, Jennifer Melby of Piedmont Healthcare, and Chris Gervais of Kyruus, in which they discuss the concept of “systemness,” how consumerism is impacting health syste...

As health systems  continue to focus on digital transformation efforts, the question often arises on which is the right digital team structure to use, Newer digital technologies and a focus on consumer experience are blurring the lines between digital, clinical and IT. In this episode, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith discuss the current state of digital within hospitals and health systems, and sh...

Over 55 percent of website content worldwide is written in English. For hospitals and health systems, this can present a challenge when communicating with audiences that do not speak English as a primary language. In this episode, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer discuss the challenges of building digital programs and websites with language localization. They are joined by Tiffani Helberg, VP of C...

In hospitals and health systems, the concept of “decision support” is often restricted for clinical areas. In this episode, hosts Chris Boyer and Reed Smith expand on this concept to explore ways marketing (and digital marketing) can be used to help support consumers and patients throughout the customer journey. They share challenges with developing online decision support systems and also explore...

The technology and medical community were abuzz with the latest release of the Apple Watch - particularly the ECG functionality - wondering the impact this wearable device would have on hospital admissions. In this episode, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer revisit the topic of wearables and medical devices, discussing how the FDA categorizes “general wellness products” vs.regulated medical devices...

How hospitals and health systems engage in targeted communications and marketing, they use a variety of tools to help them understand their audiences better. In this episode, hosts Reed Smith and Chris Boyer explore how organizations are using market segmentation - along with personas and personalization - to improve their go-to-market strategies. In our expert interview, we are joined by Suzanne...

As healthcare marketing continues to extend past simply promotion to building engaging and loyal audiences, the responsibility of community management is becoming more important than ever. In this episode, Reed Smith and Chris Boyer discuss the four types of online communities and share the best characteristics of a good community manager. They are joined by Dan Hinmon, principal at Hive Strategie...