Written by: Jeffrey Freedman, Executive Vice President at blulava.
People often ask me why podcasts are an effective medium for medical education. Simply put, podcasts fit the current lifestyle of HCPs now.
The pandemic has forced many professional fields to pivot and develop innovative, digital ways to reach their audiences. These virtual pathways have become especially essential—critical—within the medical professional world. Mobile med ed is now one of the leading pathways in disseminating new learnings and therapeutic data to HCPs.
The genius of podcasts is their ability to educate in entertaining, “on-the-go” ways. And since HCPs today are on-the-go workers AND learners, podcasts really allow them to digest the material on their own terms and time. So whether a HCP is listening on a run, in the gym, in the car, or café, content is being delivered in “bite-sized” ways. So here at blulava, we’re making content “snackable.”
Recently, one of our branded podcasts airing on ReachMD reached 35,000 HCP listeners. So, we know they’re listening–and enjoying–this type of activity. Podcasts work particularly well for disease ed content, and we’ve had great success placing the content across a wide array of different podcast channels, from Spotify to Apple to Google podcasts or any sort of website. For some of the branded podcasts, especially those that have a black box warning label, we’ve distributed those podcasts across HCP-only channels, like ReachMD and other congress-affiliated websites.
The bottom line is podcasts work well across all types of content, and numerous statistics across the board support this. In fact, ReachMD conducted a series of preference surveys to their users, and 60% of physicians reported that they plan to listen to more podcasts over the next year. Another insight from Kantar Media reports that over 75% of current HCPs are using smartphones to listen to podcasts. So, what this shows us is that these podcasts are being listened to on the go, on the move, and when HCPs have the time to tune in.
The exciting thing about med ed podcasts is that they’re just the beginning of a whole new digital movement within the medical, healthcare, and pharmaceutical world…one that has traditionally been slow to adopt technology and innovation due to its regulatory categorization and oversight. And here at blulava, we’re getting ready to the lead the change.
