Doctor’s Orders: The Physicians Perspective on Meetings & Events
by American Express Meetings + Events

Recap & Key Details that Apply to Destination Marketing Organizations Most

With the healthcare industry seeing continual growth, destinations across the country are focusing on how they can expand their medical meetings market.  With this growth has come a litany of regulations on medical meetings from the AMA and FDA guidelines of the 1990s to the PhRMA code changes in 2002 and the Sunshine Act of 2010.  Meetings held by pharmaceutical companies with physicians requires significant planning, tracking and management to ensure the rules are followed.

For destinations looking to grow this lucrative market segment, understanding the challenges and regulations medical meeting planners face is crucial when developing the meaningful relationships that will drive business opportunities.

American Express Meetings + Events published “Doctor’s Orders: The Physician’s Perspective on Meetings and Events” to provide planners with a better understanding of the perspective physicians have on meetings and their preferences for choosing which events to attend. The study surveyed over 500 physicians who attended a medical meeting in the last 12 months.

The study’s top finding is in alignment with what we see across the meetings industry.  The most critical element in attracting physicians is content.  Focusing on delivering the promised content experience stood out among the results.

Destinations that are working to identify the key local speakers and knowledge experts in the medical fields will help meeting planners meet this content promise. Medical meeting owners, while they have compliance and regulations to manage, will have to focus on designing and living up to the promise of each meeting to continue to attract physicians to their meetings and events.

While physicians consider content to be a critical factor when deciding to attend a meeting, they also select this as the most important element meetings organizers should work to improve.

Other top findings:

• Physicians are invited to twice as many meetings as they attend.
• Physicians most frequently attend speaker dinner, symposium, congress (listed in order).
• Preferred sources of new information seem to evolve with age and experience. Younger physicians tend to prefer referring to clinical practice guidelines and medical textbooks to a greater degree.
• Three-quarters of respondents say accessing information such as clinical trials results will help their practice.
• Medical meetings that focus on creating networking opportunities will have a distinct advantage in attracting physicians.
• Associations, societies, universities and hospitals are seen as superior to other meeting organizers when it comes to delivering against expected learnings.
  • This is a key point of which DMOs should take note. Creating partnerships with your local universities and hospitals will help you identify medical meeting opportunities.
• Meetings owners and planners have the opportunity to improve both design and execution to meet the needs and expectations of physicians better.
• Physicians see a great deal of utility in a mobile app for a specific meeting, especially those under the age of 40.

If your DMO is seeking to grow your medical meetings segment, find the nontraditional methods for reaching and helping medical meeting planners.  Digital Edge has worked with several DMOs on their medical meetings campaigns. If you’re interested in some support to grow this market for your destination, contact us today