1. How Did All These People Get Here? Looking
Beyond Level 1 Outcomes in Live Events
Michael Baffuto, CCMEP
Director, CME Programming
Integrity Continuing Education, Inc.

2. Disclosure/Disclaimer
• Disclosure:
– Employee of Integrity Continuing Education
• Disclaimer:
– Information presented, unless otherwise noted, is
derived from my own professional experience.

3. Objectives
At the conclusion of this session, participants should be
better able to:
•Describe key considerations for developing an audience
generation plan
•List expected return rates for common audience generation
methods
•Develop audience generation plans in accordance with activity
expectations and allotted budget

4. What Is Audience Generation?
• For clarity, audience generation in this
presentation refers to promotion of a free,
live CME activity to a targeted group of
physicians
• Audience generation forms for discussion:
– Direct mail
– Email
– Fax
– Database marketing

6. Social Media
• Application of social media to CME is becoming increasingly
worthwhile1
• Creates large opportunity for innovation2
• Data related to social media use by healthcare providers is
inconsistent3
• Merit of social media as audience generation tool requires
further investigation
• Very important to overall digital strategy, but adjunctive to
traditional audience generation
1. Wang AT, et al. Mayo Clinic Proceedings. 2012;87(12):1162-1170.
2. Cheston CC, et al. Academic Medicine. 2013;88(6):893-901.
3. McGowan BS. Available at: http://www.slideshare.net/cmeadvocate/utilization-of-social-media-outlets-to-
enhance-medical-education-impact-0102bsm. Accessed February 27, 2014.

7. Expected Rates of Returns
According to Google
Delivery Method Expected Rate of Return
Mail1
1%-4.4%
Email2
1.73%
Fax3
0.5%-8%
Database
Marketing
??
1. Direct Marketing Association of America.
2. DMDatabases.
3. Quirk’s Marketing Research Review.

8. Strengths and Weaknesses: Direct Mail
Strengths
• Consistent response rates
• High degree of
personalization possible
• Printing and database
advancements have
increased ease of use
• Data is readily available
Weaknesses
• Expensive
• Relatively slow
• Time consuming to manage
• Requires heavy production
involvement

9. Strengths and Weaknesses: Email
Strengths
• Inexpensive
• Fast
• Popular form of
communication
• HTML affords high degree
of customization
• Green
Weaknesses
• Open and click rates are
imperfect measurement
• Advanced production
requires design knowledge
• Requires regulatory
knowledge
• Have to keep opt out
records
• Spam/image filters

10. Strengths and Weaknesses: Fax
Strengths
• Highly customizable
• Fast
• Inexpensive
• Requires less development
• Quality of data well known
Weaknesses
• Personalization may
increase costs
• May require equipment
upgrades or outsourcing for
high volume
• Have to keep opt out records
• Involves Telephone Consumer
Privacy Act

11. Strengths and Weaknesses:
Database Marketing
Strengths
• Prior relationship
with recipient
• Fast
• Free
• Possible to template
• Regularly scheduled
• Strong data
Weaknesses
• Repeated communication
often unwanted
• Not always relevant
• May require dedicated staff
• Requires opt-in and
management of opt-out
records

12. Data Matters
• Purge duplicates
• Ensure correct names, titles, and addresses
• The more cleaning you can do before sending out recruitment materials
the better
• Removing inactive contacts from mailing lists goes a long way to
improving deliverability
• There are services available to assure clean data, such as the National
Change of Address Service
• For data purchased, expect 95% deliverability or better
– Less than 95% - change your vendor
• Highly specific data criteria will lead to exponentially fewer records
Derived from: www.frugalmarketing.com and Direct Marketing Association of America.

13. Registration Collection
• Make registration simple
– Web forms (3 click rule!)
– Toll-free phone number
– Perforated mail/fax back forms
• Collect all required information at the point of
registration
• Use the registration period as an opportunity to collect
communication preferences
• Ask them about the method of discovery
• Provide opportunity to opt in to future communication

14. Follow-up
• It is imperative that you follow-up with a prospective
participant after they have registered
– Use preferred method of contact
• Provider confirmation with all meeting details and
contacts/URLs for additional information

15. Comparison of Registration Attrition
Rates with Follow-up vs No Follow-up
Percent of Registrants who Participated in Live Meeting – Asthma Series
Date on file. Integrity Continuing Education.

16. Assessing the Effectiveness of Mail, Fax, and Email
Invitations for Live CME Event Audience Generation
• Retrospective analysis of registration and participation data
for 153 US regional CME workshops
• Methods used for audience generation:
– Integrity CE internal database email marketing
– Direct mail invitations
– Email blast marketing
– Fax invitations
• Objectives:
– Which audience generation method was most successful?
– Did the method of program discovery effect the likelihood of
participant attendance?

17. Data Inclusions
• Compared data inclusion criteria:
– 1.0-2.0 hour live regional workshop activity
– Primary care physician target audience
– Physician registrations only
• Total programs included in analysis: 153
• Total registrations included in analysis: 8,407
(4,707 participants)

18. Number of Invitations Sent
Date on file. Integrity Continuing Education.

19. Method of Registration and Discovery
Method of Discovery Method of Registration
%ofTotalRegistrations
%ofTotalRegistrations
Date on file. Integrity Continuing Education.

20. Audience Generation Mechanism
Return Rates
Date on file. Integrity Continuing Education.

21. Rate of Attendance Based on Method
of Discovery and Registration
Discovery Method Registration Method
%ofRegistrantsAttending
%ofRegistrantsAttending
Date on file. Integrity Continuing Education.

22. Cost Per Registration and Attendee By
Audience Generation Mechanism
Reflective of per invite costs of $0.75 for mail, $0.275 for email, and $0.31 for fax.
Date on file. Integrity Continuing Education.

23. Assessing the Effectiveness of Mail, Fax, and Email Invitations for
Live CME Event Audience Generation Conclusions
• Database marketing was the most effective method of
audience generation and had the highest rate of attendance
• For first-time registrants:
– Mail offered the highest rate of response
– Email was the most frequent method of discovery
– Fax invitations had the lowest cost per registrant and attendee
• Attendees who:
– Discovered the activity by fax had the highest rate of
attendance, followed by mail, and email
– Registered via online registration portals were least likely to
attend the session

24. Best Practices for Live Meeting
Audience Generation
• Know your audience
• Have good data, but don’t get lost in it
• Give yourself enough time
• Allocate adequate budget to achieve your attendance goals
• Make your marketing materials the best that they can be
• Set realistic expectations for rates of return
• Be concerned with the correct outcome: registrations and
participants
• The registration process does not end when the participant
signs up

25. Thank you!
Questions?
Twitter: @mbaffuto
Email: mbaffuto@integrityce.com
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