The power of storytelling: Making storytelling content for healthcare marketing

Main takeaways

• Storytelling has been widely used for content making especially in the context of promoting products.
• In healthcare marketing, storytelling can help patients connect with healthcare providers on an emotional level.
• Healthcare workers or Public relations officers of any health institution need to understand how to create content with a compelling story that touches the heart of their audience.
• Six questions to answer before making content are
  • What are your goals?
  • What is your Key Performance Index (KPI)?
  • What person(a) do you want to show?
  • What type of audience do you target?
  • Who are your competitors?
  • What are your content theme and pillars?
• One of the marketing models that can be implemented to create storytelling content is AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action).

What is storytelling?

Cambridge Dictionary Online defines storytelling as “the activity of writing, telling, or reading stories”. In the last decade, storytelling has been widely used for content making especially in the context of promoting products. Storytelling in content marketing refers to the use of narrative techniques to communicate the brand message and engage with the target audience. Not just consumer goods, storytelling content is also powerful for promoting health information and products.

Storytelling content for healthcare marketing

Storytelling is a way to communicate a message through a narrative. In healthcare marketing, storytelling can help patients connect with healthcare providers on an emotional level. Patients want to feel heard, understood, and cared for. By sharing stories that resonate with patients, healthcare providers can build relationships and trust with their audience.

Storytelling for healthcare marketing is also powerful for promoting healthcare products in a more persuasive way. Selling drugs and healthcare services is not as easy as selling consumer goods as it needs to resonate with the consumers’ needs and desires. Therefore, healthcare workers or Public relations officers of any health institution need to understand how to create content with a compelling story that touches the heart of their audience.

Training on creating storytelling content for health marketing

Two lecturers from the Communications Program, Binus University International were invited to be the facilitators in Pelatihan Storytelling, Video Pendek & Fotografi untuk Konten Kesehatan (Training on Storytelling, Short Video, and Photography for Health Content) that was organized by Fotografi Medis Indonesia on 2 and 3 November 2023.

The two lecturers are Dian Ayuria Sarwono and Lily El Ferawati, representing Binus International Content Lab. by Communications, who delivered the topic The Power of Storytelling. Ms. Dian explained the uses of storytelling and the characters of good stories while Ms. Lily guided the participants in developing storytelling for health content. For the introduction, Ms. Lily shared about what research says about storytelling and health content. 

What does research say about storytelling and health content?

• A study in Malaysia found that 75% of health information consumers believed the obtained online health information had either a minor or major impact on their health treatment decision-making (Maon et al., 2017).
• A cross-sectional study in Saudi Arabia identifies that 85% of the sample sought health information using social media; of whom 293 (78.3%) used WhatsApp, 237 (63.4%) used YouTube, and 46 (12.3%) used Facebook (Marar et al., 2019).
• Narrative fidelity (relevance of stories to the audience’s experience) had a positive effect on the audience’s intention to adopt health information on social media (Li et al., 2018).
• One of the keys to successful health communication on social media is identifying narratives that reveal the needs, personal experiences, and questions of different subgroups to tailor messaging to produce targeted behavioral change (Anat Gesser-Edelsburg, 2021).

Questions to answer before making storytelling content

Before making content for health marketing, the marketing team needs to understand the questions that can help them in developing storytelling content. In the training, Ms. Lily shares 6 questions to answer before making content.

• What are your goals?

Whether for spreading awareness, increasing sales, or growing communities, the goal of marketing must be determined in the beginning. For example, if the hospital wants to promote its brand-new CT-scan equipment, obviously the goal would be directly to increase revenue by persuading more patients to choose the hospital for their service. 

• What is your Key Performance Index (KPI)?

When marketing a product, especially on social media, a content specialist is guided by the Key Performance Index (KPI). The KPI could be expanding the content reach, increasing audience engagement, or achieving conversion. A content creator for a health institution should choose content KPI based on the goal.

• What person(a) do you want to show?

Health Institutions usually present a professional or corporate look in their social media content. That is because health institution is seen as an authoritative persona. However, it is also good to present another persona that resonates with the service of the hospital. For example, a Kids Hospital might want to be seen as a friendly premise that can present a cheerful persona in their content. Knowing the content persona can assist the content creator in identifying the style of language and content delivery that fits their audience.

• What type of audience do you target?

After determining the goal and the persona, a content specialist or a content marketer needs to identify the target audience for their content. It is important to know the age, gender, educational background, and economic income of the target audience to determine how the story is delivered in terms of language and style of delivery.

• Who are your competitors?

It is also important to identify the close competitor our our product or brand when creating content for health marketing. However, the competitors are not necessarily in a bad way. Competitors could be your fellow health workers in other hospitals or clinics or company partners who share the same market. Competitor analysis could be done by identifying their social media followers and following as well as the main theme of their content.

• What are your content theme and pillars?

After learning the competitors’ content theme, we can come up with our own content theme and choose the content pillars or the content categories for our social media page. These content pillars help health content creators to derive message ideas for their storytelling content.

Storytelling structures for health marketing

After the preparation is made, content ideas should be realized into storytelling content. One of the marketing models that can be implemented to create storytelling content is AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action). Here are the structures of storytelling content using the AIDA model.

• Attention

The attention element in storytelling content comes in the form of HOOK. It is important to hook your audience with a compelling story. 

• Interest

The interest element in storytelling content presents a problem as a plot. Keep the audience engaged with a compelling plot. 

• Desire

After addressing the problem, your content must offer a solution to raise the audience’s desire. Therefore, it is important to create desire with emotional/rational appeal. 

• Action

Lastly, close the content with Call to Actions. Encourage the audience to take action with a clear prompt. 

To better understand the use of AIDA model in creating storytelling content for health marketing, here is the example.

You, a pediatrician, are asked to create content related to stunting in the context of National Nutrition Day, and at the same time, you are asked to promote the child health consultation services provided by the hospital you work for.

After running competitor analysis and keyword research, it was decided that the topic of the content is “Pocket-friendly stunting prevention food” (makanan pencegah stunting yang ramah di kantong)

Here is the example of the storytelling copy in Bahasa Indonesia

Contributor: Lily El Ferawati

Editor: Lily El Ferawati