• Marketing Mojo: Insights from Myomo CMO Cliff Conneighton

    Jesse Ciccone, VP and managing director at Matter recently spoke with Myomo CMO Cliff Conneighton to discuss B2B marketing, measurement and more. Check out the video from the interview and read below for the full conversation.

     

    Jesse Ciccone (JC): Tell us a little about yourself and about Myomo.

    Cliff Conneighton (CC): I’m Cliff Conneighton, I’m the Chief Marketing Officer for Myomo Inc. located in Cambridge since it was spun out of MIT about ten years ago. Myomo is a wearable medical robotics company. Our patient is someone who has their arm, but they’ve lost use of it due to stroke, nerve injury, brain injury or spinal cord injury. Turns out that is about 1% of the population.

    Personally, I started as a software engineer then moved into product management and finally into marketing where I have been for, pretty much, the rest of my career. Much of that has been in the software market for enterprise eCommerce systems. I was Chief Marketing Officer for four companies; three of which sold to larger companies and Myomo is the fourth.

     

    JC: Myomo obviously has a *very* specific target customer. How does this impact your marketing strategy? How is it different from your previous roles?

    CC: We have a portable, robotic brace that fits over your arm and reads the faint muscle signals that are not enough to move the arm, but are readable by the device. We then amplify those signals and use it to drive motors. It restores the mobility and a person’s ability to do daily activities like feeding and dressing themselves.

    Our go to market channel strategy is very complex, compared to what I’m used to. Our customer is orthotics and prosthetics (O&P) practices who fit patients for artificial limbs. The problem is that these people don’t generate business so we must get the patients to express the need for the brace. To do so, we market directly to patients as well as to physicians and therapists who will recommend or prescribe our product to patients. On top of that, the brace is paid for by insurance companies, and it’s not cheap. Therefore, we educate insurance companies about the benefits so they will cover it. The whole ecosystem of players working together is complex: the patient needs to want it., We then need to determine if the patient has sufficient signal for the product to work. Are they healthy enough otherwise for it to be a good fit? A physician needs to prescribe it.  Back to the O&P practice to fit and deliver it.  Finally, there needs to be a therapist lined up to teach the patient how to use the product.

     

    JC: What marketing initiatives and technology within Myomo will you invest more heavily in over the next year? What will become less of a priority and why?

    CC: Early this year we began a robust CRM system to track the players we work with. We invested in not only configuring the software but also enhancing the data we’re capturing. Not just the opportunity data, but the clinical data, meaning we need a system which is HIPAA compliant, patient privacy law compliant, and we needed to educate our salespeople and clinicians on how to use the system. In addition, we continue to invest more and more in direct to patient marketing. We’re finding social media and Google AdWords is a great way to reach patients.

     

    JC: How do you measure your social media?

    CC: When we advertise on social media, we drive all the clicks back to our own site, rather than an O&P. That way, we know who clicks through, and we can follow the patient through the qualification process. In some cases, if the patient went directly to an O&P, we could lose track of the patients and not know what ads are performing. We have a pre-qualification that we do on the phone. If somebody clicks through on the website from an ad, Facebook ad or a Google ad, we call that patient and do a brief pre-qualification on the phone to make sure they’ll be medically qualified.

     

    JC: Why is a genuine commitment to social responsibility an important aspect of marketing? Is Myomo doing any initiatives?

    CC: Our whole mission is to conquer upper limb paralysis. And that in itself is social good. This is the first company where I can actually see, one patient at a time, how the product changes people’s lives. We had a young woman, 26 years old, who suffered a stroke and couldn’t use her arm. She left a message on our website and said, “I watched your videos and I cried.” That is moving. Not just to her, but to us. We are doing our best to contribute to society by the very product that we sell.

     

    JC: What differentiates Boston as a tech hub and how do you see that evolving over the next five years?

    CC: Boston as a tech hub has pros and cons. On the downside, it’s hard to find good people as they’re in demand and we have to pay a lot more for good people. But on the plus side, there are many good people in Boston. How it will change depends on what companies like Amazon do. If Amazon really wants to hire thousands more engineers, it’s going to make it tougher for companies like Myomo to find people.

     

    JC: What content works best for you when marketing your product?

    CC: The content that works for us is patient stories. So, videos, case studies, when we do PR, it’s all about telling a patient story. We’ve had very good luck getting patients’ videos on local news channels here in Boston, we’ve had WBZ, Chronicle , NBC Boston, we’ve been on TV in Cleveland and Kansas City, and it’s all about patients. That’s our content.

     

    JC: What KPIs are most critical to your executive team and board? How are you being asked to measure the effectiveness of your marketing and PR programs?

    CC: The KPIs that are critical to us in marketing are the same as they are in sales. We have a tight relationship between marketing and sales. What we measure sales and marketing on is how many patients are moved into the insurance reimbursement process. So, it’s actually not revenue that we’re measured on directly in sales and marketing, because revenue comes later in the process when the insurance company actually accepts the claim and pays for it. But in terms of sales and marketing, we’re measured on what we call an “add to insurance”. That means finding patients who are medically qualified and want the device, an O&P that wants to deliver it, and we just need insurance to pay for it. So, putting them into that process is our primary KPI for sales and marketing.

    Jesse Ciccone

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  • Best Practices for Conducting Professional Video Interviews

    Best Practices for Conducting Professional Video Interviews

    In today’s visual and digital world, a video interview is a key strategy used by companies to get their messages across to their audience. These interviews are used on homepages, landing pages, social media pages, and often played at large scale meetings or events. However, to be most effective in reaching and engaging a target audience, these video interviews need to tell compelling stories. Here are some of our favorite tips to help you get from the research phase to the filming stage as smooth as possible, and conduct a conversation that results in captivating interview content.

    Tips for Question Development

    The first part of the interview process is to develop the questions. You should never walk into an interview unprepared and you need to be ready for anything that can come your way. Follow these tips when working on question development:

    1. Thoroughly research your subjects. Find out as much as you can about your subject(s) from Google and LinkedIn, so you can demonstrate you’ve done your homework and develop rapport more easily and quickly on-site. 
    2. Order matters. Begin the interview with “softball” questions and questions about the subject can answer about themselves to warm them up. You don’t want to jump right in with the hardball questions.
    3. Keep the story front and center when creating your interview questions. Allow for the spontaneity that produces unexpected gold while making sure you get the storytelling scaffolding you’ll need to bridge everything together. You should either be setting your subject up to tell an interesting, emotional story with your question, or setting them up for a clear and succinct answer you know the answer to in advance.
    4. Ask questions that begin with “Tell me about…,” and “Paint a picture of…” Use words like how, why, where and what to avoid simple answers and to get the subject speaking in story.
    5. Don’t neglect the problem of the story. You don’t have a story if you don’t have conflict, so make sure you’re asking plenty of questions like, “What was the frustration with the old way?” or “What were these issues costing you?” Sometimes people are reticent to go into this, as they don’t want to seem incapable, so phrase those questions delicately.
    6. The shorter and simpler your interview questions are, the better. Instead of asking long winded questions, ask follow up questions such as: “What do you mean by that?” “What did you learn from that?” “Why is that important?” “Why?”…  “Why?” … “Why?” (until you get to the underlying point).
    7. Your questions are not an instruction manual. You shouldn’t hesitate to drop them (at least temporarily) to go off-script.
    8. Your demeanor/attitude is just as important as your questions. If you’re not invested, energetic, personable and courteous you shouldn’t expect your interviewee to be either. Even if you’re not in the best mood, you can’t let it affect your interviewing. As the interviewer, you’re more of a coach and cheerleader than anything else. Help them find a relaxed comfort, or even a sense of pleasure, in talking to you.
    9. Always close by asking if they have anything to add that you didn’t ask about. Often some of the best material comes from these open-ended moments.

    Tips for the Pre-Interview Spiel

    As you and your interviewee settle in and the crew is finalizing camera positioning and lighting, we like to deliver a short “pre-interview spiel” that goes over critical context and background to help ensure a smooth and productive conversation. At Matter, we keep it very conversational ensure the talent is relaxed and excited. Here are a few points we find it helpful to include: 

    1. Tell the talent to look directly at you throughout the interview, never at the cameras. Consistent eye contact is one of the best ways to come across as confident in the final video. 
    2. Explain how the interviewer’s voice will not be heard in the final video so the talent will need to provide context when answering a question. 
    3. Assure the talent not to worry about any mistakes and that the video will be edited with the goal to make them appear as credible and confident as possible. 
    4. Encourage the talent to be energetic as it translates positively on camera. What can feel a bit silly or exaggerated in person often feels appropriate for the heightened reality of the final video. 
    5. Ask if there are any questions or clarification needed before beginning, and always provide them with a glass of water to avoid dry mouth.

    Tips for Common Interview Challenges

    Even if you are well prepared, the interviewee is prepped, and the cameras are rolling, things can still go wrong along the way. Here are a few tips on dealing with common interview challenges:

    1. If they’re psyching themselves out or getting nervous remind them to relax and tell them they’re doing great. 
    2. If they’re not giving you enough energy to be compelling, try to kindly cajole them out of their shell a bit. If you are excited and interested, then they will be as well.
    3. If they’re rambling, ask if they could be more succinct. This can help them reframe how they approach their answers and is usually an easy ask. 
    4. If they’re speaking too formally and not to the intended audience, ask them to imagine you as whomever is relevant (a prospective client or employee, for example) and use words like “you” and “yourself” rather than “they” and “them.” This is more compelling because it engages the audience more directly. 
    5. If you know the interviewee flubbed on an important point, for example they cleared their throat or slurred their words, make sure to ask them to repeat their answer.

    Ready to start creating with our award-winning video producers? Fill out the form below to schedule a free strategy call with our team.

    Gabe Gerzon

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  • How to blog like a lobster dealer

    My favorite blog isn’t a newspaper site. It’s a blog by a lobster dealer who started working on the docks when he was 9 years old. Good Morning Gloucester gives a daily snapshot of life in Gloucester, Mass., the nation’s oldest fishing harbor. It’s hugely popular, with 22,000 to 30,000 page views per day.

    The main reason Good Morning Gloucester connects with readers around the world is because it’s so real. The language is how real people talk and the people on the blog come across as real, likable people with interesting stories. There are lessons there for those of us who communicate for a living. Use simple, clear language. Be likable. Tell a good story.

    My friend Joey Ciaramitaro is the lobster dealer behind Good Morning Gloucester. We interviewed him for ideas on ways to engage readers, build an audience and create, as he would say, “a blog that doesn’t suck.” Here are his tips.

    What do you think? Which tips did we miss?

    Matter

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