Say ‘no’ to boring research deliverables – some ideas to inspire
By Hayley Mangan, Senior Research Director and Emilie Genero, Research Director
Emilie and I were privileged to run the BHBIA webinar on ‘How to deliver exciting, engaging and long-lasting content’ on Friday 13th October, 2023.
We created a session to inspire fellow researchers to challenge themselves to push the boundaries of how content is delivered, to create entertaining, memorable and immersive experiences for clients.
We’re all human, we like to be entertained and clients are no different, so how can we, as researchers, make sure our outputs entertain?
Now stop for a second, and think about a film that you love… What is it about it that makes it your favourite film?
This is pretty much how we encourage you to think – like a film director, a script writer, an actor…
Taking inspiration from what makes a great movie experience, we applied those principles to the work that we do, looking specifically at how to tell your story, sell it and share it.
Story telling – creating a gripping narrative
The basic principle is simple – an image can speak a thousand words. It can convey the emotional, drama and realities of a scenario at one glance, plus it’s more entertaining.
You could use an artist to visualise your insights real time, bring to life debrief session or create a visual map of actions from a meeting. Creates a buzz, simplifies complex stories and a lasting record of achievements
Use AI imagery to generate visual metaphors, concepts or themes to showcase insights and create a lasting impression
Give your presentation a bold theme e.g. turning treatments into superheroes, for a unique, memorable and fun experience. Your client will remember if their drug was perceived as Batman or Aquaman!
Story selling – immersive experiences to bring insights to life
How can we deliver our stories to inspire action? You can have a great story but if delivered in a ‘boring’ way no one will listen or act on it.
An immersive experience, using sound, imagery and action will ensure insights have impact and move clients to action.
Create ‘in their shoes’ experiences using sensory techniques to bring drama to your delivery.
Make the client an active participant in the insights delivery by role playing dialogue, or use actors to play out insights, recommendations or perform the project journey you’ve been on
Simulate participants being ‘in the room’ together. Various AI platforms can create virtual themed 3D spaces for everyone to feel immersed in the presentation. It’s an exciting way to convey your brand experience, and certainly memorable for pitches!
Story sharing – content that lives and breathes on its own
People want to share great stories so your ‘story selling’ should generate high talkability, driving clients to want to work with you and gain that experience for themselves
Ensure that story selling experience is continued in the deliverables clients share internally, creating opportunity for your work to be exposed beyond your direct client. Word of mouth is still very effective in this day and age!
Create themed online microsites where patient journeys are brought to life via video and animation, and stories from tracking data and multi-data sources can be posted and regularly updated as insights evolve, providing the agility to act on insights as needed
Generate content for ‘on the go’ such as podcasts using music and dialogue, allowing clients flexibility on how, when and where they engage with the insights.
The Future
We also had a look at what the future could bring for client interactions. Below is a video where Lex Fridmen and Mark Zukerberg interact in the metaverse, using 3D headsets, making them feel that the person was actually just in front of them- as close to an in-person meeting as you can get remotely!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVYrJJNdrEg
That’s it. We hope we’ve left you with some inspiration to take forwards, thinking about how you can best deliver an immersive experience to ‘story tell’, ‘story sell’ and ‘story share’.
Hayley – h.mangan@dayonestrategy.com
Emile – e.genero@dayonestrategy.com