March 22, 2022
35 Questions to Make Job Applicants Sweat
We’re all familiar with the basic questions at the heart of most job interviews. Where do yourself in five years? What are your greatest weaknesses? And why do you want to work for our company? The questions and the answers are predictable.
But, when you come for your interview at Biotica, you should come prepared with answers to all 35 Proust questions. In the middle of the conference table, you’ll find a wicker basket that contains the questions written on small slips of paper. At the end of the interview, you’ll be asked to select one and answer it.
In addition to the probing questions, Proust was also the author of the longest novel, 1,267,069 words (twice the length of “War and Peace”, and the longest sentence, 847 words. Diagram that in your spare time! Writers use the questionnaire to interrogate and develop their characters. It’s also used in modern job interviews. Since 1993, “Vanity Fair” has published the questionnaire answered by notables from popular culture, including authors Joan Didion and Norman Mailer, singers David Bowie, Johnny Cash and Ray Charles, actors Sidney Poitier, Tom Ford, and Carrie Fischer, activist Monica Lewinsky, and primatologist Jane Goodall.
You’ll find the Proust Questionnaire brimming with insight and questions that don’t lend themselves to glib, one-word answers. Here are a few of our favorites:
- What is your greatest fear?
- What is your greatest extravagance?
- Which living person do you most despise?
- What is your most marked characteristic?
- What is your current state of mind?
- What is your idea of perfect happiness?
- What talent would you like to have?
- What do you consider your greatest virtue?
- Where would you like to live?
- What is your greatest regret?
Comments: Bill Abramovitz
Funny Bones Discovered in Healthcare Professionals
Do you know who has a sense of humor? Doctors. And lawyers, bus drivers, CEOs, lumberjacks, accountants, etc. (Okay, maybe not accountants.) But most people out there, including those of us in the medical and healthcare field, enjoy a good chuckle.
And when humor is combined with advertising, it sticks with us, just like it does for most other humans, no matter their career field. It’s just how the human brain works. (Check out this study on how humor impacts memory and recall.) Think about the most memorable Superbowl ads. Chances are, it’s either comical or plucks at your heartstrings.
Q: How many eye doctors does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: One... or Two....One…or Two.
What’s this mean to you? Don’t be afraid to use a little wit when marketing to medical professionals. If it’s done well, your healthcare marketing resonates more deeply with your intended audience, makes an emotional connection, and gives them a smile.
Want more proof? Check out this clip of doctors reacting to doctor jokes.
Source: National Institutes of Health
Comments: Ben Singleton
Biotica Marketing Astronauts Want You
Is gravity weighing your brand down? We'd like to talk to you during a Mini-Meeting, 15 minutes or less. See, here at Biotica, we're in the soaring business. We're a creative marketing agency that helps healthcare companies reach escape velocity with campaigns that draw attention, communicate on-brand, and deliver measurable results. For the receipts, check out our portfolio. https://bioticahealth.com/portfolio You'll find that we shoot for the moon, whether we're designing a small trifold brochure or an all-out media campaign. Also, keep us in mind for your next global effort, and that project you need to be completed scary fast.The Marketing Astronaut Service Station
Meanwhile, here are a few things you can depend on us from our Marketing Astronaut Service Station:
- Blog design and blog content that speaks medical
- Copywriting for everything from whitepapers and social media to email newsletters and email campaigns
- All things digital, including website design, digital ads, and landing pages
- Product launches for medical devices and healthcare services
- Planning for media, marketing, and social media
- Trade advertising
And, as they say, much, much more. See our services section for the full rundown.
So, give your brand some pop, or heck, join the Biotica Marketing Astronaut Corp and launch it into orbit.
Schedule a Mini Meeting
If you would like to talk about a project or that global campaign or chat about things marketing, call Susan Abramovitz at 513-967-6480 to schedule a Mini Meeting. We promise to keep your meeting at 15 minutes or less, about the length of a venti latte break.
Comments: Bill Abramovitz
The Beauty of #EveryDayAds
Advertising agencies don't have a lock on great creative work. Some of the best are the handiwork of "normal" people. You'll find them in the signs at the carwash, chalk-written menus of an outdoor café, graffiti, or in the example below, a dentist who fashioned his mailbox into a toothbrush. On a trip to San Francisco, we found a group of homeless people asking for donations. One sign held up proudly said, "Visions of a Cheeseburger." That one caught our eye. In three short words scrawled on a piece of cardboard, the ask was clear, enough money for a cheeseburger, and we found out the purpose of the donation. It was clever, and it popped out from the other signs. A stroke of brilliance, we say.
We call these Accidental Ads (#EveryDayAds), and we want to see more! We plan to collect them and share them on our Twitter account, @BioticaHealth. Attach your snaps and send them to billa@bioticahealth.com. We'll credit you and your Twitter handle unless you tell us not to.
Do you see Accidental Ads in your community or travels? Share them so we can all appreciate the creativity that burns inside everyone.
Comments: Bill Abramovitz
Celebrating World Doctor's Day
Doctors' Day is coming up quickly on March 30. Given what healthcare professionals have endured through COVID, this Doctor's Day is an especially great opportunity to celebrate the doctors, surgeons, nurses, and physicians who helped us through it. The holiday is marked by delivering greeting cards and the traditional red carnations. It's also a marketing opportunity to touch in and thank healthcare professionals for their contributions. There's still time!The History of Doctor's Day
We can credit Eudora Brown Almond, a doctor's wife in Georgia, for the founding of Doctor's Day. She believed her husband and other physicians deserved more recognition for their hard work. The first observed Doctors' Day occurred on March 30, 1933. Almond sent greeting cards to doctors, and their wives laid flowers on the graves of deceased physicians. The flowers were perky red carnations and became a tradition when the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate officially approved the resolution to create the holiday. And, on October 30, 1990, George W. Bush signed the legislation into law to make it a legal holiday.
Healthcare Observances present unique opportunities to reach out and recognize your customers. So, don't let Doctor's Day pass you by.
Comments: Bill Abramovitz
Webinars to Amplify Your Medical Marketing
Remember when a pandemic put a screeching halt to trade shows, seminars, product training, in-office demonstrations, and all the other in-person tools we healthcare marketers helped our clients develop? Yeah, we're still living it, too. And while many methods of medical marketing had to be shelved, there were some methods whose time in the sun had come. Enter the Webinar. Webinar marketing engages an interested audience in your product or service online in real-time and is tailor-made for medical marketing. You can introduce your latest medical device, detailing how it works and the problems it helps solve. A webinar is low-cost for the attendee, too. All they need is an internet connection and the time it takes to log in, and they don't feel the pressure of an in-house sales call. They get to see the product in action and ask questions, all from the comfort of their home or office. Plus, the session can be recorded and live on your website or landing page as added marketing value. SUBHEAD: Here are some tips for making the most of your webinar.- Provide valuable content. Time is money, and you don't want to waste your potential customers' time. This should be more than just a sales pitch. It should provide good information. Make sure your webinar is engaging, thorough, and don't forget to make it fun!
- Practice. You'll want to run through your webinar with a test audience (bribe your spouse and kids) to work out any bugs, both technical and content-wise. You want your webinar to be professional and not look like something you just threw together.
- Promote it. Use your connections to spread the word. Send some marketing emails, blast it on social media, and promote it with banner ads. And give yourself a long enough timeline to make sure interested folks can get it on their calendars. And make sure you send reminder emails to everyone who's registered so they remember to tune in.
- Follow up. Send out follow-up emails to the attendees, invite further questions and provide any information promised in the webinar. Make the webinar recording available online for any who signed up but may not have been able to attend. If you have another webinar scheduled for a new topic, invite them to attend.
Comments: Ben Singleton