4 Steps for Marketing Your Hospital-Branded App — With Examples!

You’ve successfully launched your hospital-branded app. Congrats!

Now what?

Now you gotta market it. Apps live in a separate universe from your other digital marketing properties. Find out how to make your offering stand out, get downloaded and become a must-have consumer resource.

Hospital-Branded Apps … and Why Marketing Them Is So Important

Most people are comfortable interacting with businesses via apps. It’s become second nature to use one to get a pizza, stream music, order groceries and more. But hospital-branded apps have not had as much luck.

It seems just about every major health system has an app. But clunky user experiences and limited features have slowed their adoption. Fortunately, the tide is turning thanks to savvy hospitals taking a fresh look at branded-app marketing. They’re including more of the features people want and ensuring a better user experience.

For anyone to reach your app, they first need to visit a digital marketplace. Whether it’s Apple’s App Store or the Google Play store, these vendors play a significant role in the success of your offering. And competition is fierce. There are currently more than 50,000 healthcare apps available on Apple’s platform alone.

What marketing magic is necessary to be seen, downloaded and used?

Step 1: Create a Landing Page

Create a smooth transition from your website to app stores with a dedicated website landing page. When users want to learn about your app, they’re more likely to want information from your organization first. It feels “safer” than jumping into the abyss of an app store. Once they understand the benefits and are ready to download, your landing page shows them the way.

Your branded app landing page should:

1. Highlight key features: The primary motivation for users to download a healthcare app is to make their lives easier. Let them know the many ways your offering can do this. Take a look at how Mayo Clinic promotes their app via a landing page.
2. Provide a video explainer: It’s one thing to tell users your app is easy to use. A video explainer lets them see it for themselves. Create a short video showing them what the app looks like and how to access key features. See the video Ohio State Wexner Medical Center uses to explain their MyHealth app’s features on their landing page.
3. Assure privacy: Remind users that personal health information is protected by law. It is only shared with necessary parties, like their doctor or your organization’s billing department.
4. Be brief: The landing page is just that. One succinct page. Prioritize what you want to convey so that users have a clear path to conversion. And the bottom of the page should include links to app stores.

Step 2: App Store Optimization

You can’t just list your offering on the app stores and assume it will get downloaded. Each online marketplace has its own in-site search function. You need to position your offering to appeal to app store search engine algorithms. Fortunately, many web content optimization practices can also elevate the profile of your mobile app.

Improve your app’s search engine findability and the likelihood of being downloaded:

1. Identify appropriate keywords: Use them liberally, but not in a spammy way.
2. Optimize everything: This includes your app name, meta description and URL.
3. Leverage the subtitle: In the search results listing, there’s room for a subtitle. Use it! It’s roughly 30 characters, which should be just enough room to work in a keyword phrase.
4. Create visually appealing content: Encourage users to click on your app’s download page with high-resolution graphics, including the thumbnail and screenshots.

Want to see some examples? Check out Cedars-Sinai and Stanford Healthcare’s MyHealth profile.

Step 3: Make It Easy to Like, Share and Comment

In high-performing apps, social gusto fuels the fires of popularity. To use app marketing terms: Social features increase the likelihood of your offering appearing higher up on in-app search engine results pages.

Apps that are easy to find expedite trial and adoption. But this fire needs constant kindling in the form of user interactions.

Propel your app’s social gusto:

1. Add in-app prompts: Create prompts that make it easy for users to review or share your app. The best way to do this is a pop-up with one-click sharing or rating capabilities.
2. Don’t be aggressive: Be careful about how soon and often you ask for reviews and shares. Give users enough time on your app to have recognized its benefits.
3. Earn your reviews: Don’t fall for offers of bulk app reviews. People are savvy enough to scout out fake reviews. Instead, focus on providing an outstanding user experience that generates stellar, authentic reviews.
4. Foster communication: New users are likely to have questions and need assistance. And if they don’t get it, they may ghost you. So be there for them by enabling your app to receive feedback. A chatbot that troubleshoots common issues is a great option. You can also build an in-app messaging feature.

Step 4: Track How Well Your App Is Performing

Many factors contribute to the success of your app. High download volume is a step in the right direction. But what happens after users download the app is critical to achieving your goals. Does it provide a user experience that’s share-worthy? Can users easily complete tasks that are important to them? How many people drop off or uninstall after a few sessions?

With mobile app analytics, you always know where you stand. But analytics reports provide a lot of data, making it easy to get bogged down. Start by focusing on a few key performance indicators:

1. Ratings: Hopefully, most of them are favorable, meaning close to 5 out of 5 stars.
2. Screens per visit: This is a great indicator of whether your content is engaging.
3. Retention rate: Not everyone who downloads your app will keep using it. But there should be far more downloads than uninstalls.
4. Number of shares: App ranking algorithms favor options that are shared often.

Finally, one of the best ways to make sure your hospital-branded app gets downloads and rave reviews is to make sure you have the features consumers crave. Read our previous post, Make a Habit-Forming Hospital-Branded App: 10 Must-Have Functions.