Key Opinion Leaders: Who are they and why do you need them?
Key opinion leaders or KOLs are becoming a fundamental part of any business strategy with more organisations using KOLs to promote their brand, products or services. With their industry insights, KOLs can make you stand out from your competitors and have a positive impact on your ROI.
What is a KOL?
A KOL is someone (or organisation) who has expert knowledge and a strong influence in their chosen field. They are highly regarded amongst their peers and their insights are used to shape important business decisions - not to be confused with an influencer, KOLs are known for their professional/academic achievements and knowledge.
KOLs are predominantly well-known within the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry, including doctors, academics, consultants, and professional advisors.
Why are they important to your business strategy?
KOLs (key opinion leaders) play an important role in any organisation’s business strategy, as they provide key insights into the development of trends, regulations and policies that are essential for businesses to be aware, especially when implementing their marketing strategy.
Engaging with a KOL can have a huge impact on your organisation by raising awareness of your brand, product or services, so it’s important to partner with the right KOL that suits your business requirements.
KOL mapping is a key part of the process when finding your KOL, as it allows you to identify the most relevant person on an international scale. You can find out more about the basics of KOL mapping in our blog here.
How they engage with their audience
KOLs engage with their audience in various ways depending on what information they are sharing. Traditionally, you would find KOLs at conferences, events and publishing white papers on certain topics, which is how they build up their influence amongst their peers.
Social media can no longer be overlooked as a means to communicate new advancements, procedures or products, so you will find KOLs have a presence on Twitter or LinkedIn - an important way of sharing updates about your business or product.
Things to think about before engaging with a KOL
When looking to engage with a KOL as part of your business strategy, it’s important to think about what it is you want to achieve and how they can help you get there.
There are many influential KOLs but that doesn’t mean they’re all right for your business and your goals, so we recommend thinking about these 3 things:
Are they relevant to your goals and objectives?
Who are they already working for?
How influential are they within the field?
Are they relevant to your goal and objectives?
What is it that you want to achieve and how can your KOL help you get there? This is something you need to have defined before you begin your KOL journey. By having a clear understanding of what you want to achieve, you’ll be able to ensure you identify the right KOLs during your KOL mapping phase.
Although you want to choose the right person for your business, it works both ways so you want to ensure your offering is enticing to the KOL - that way you’ll get the most out of your partnership.
Who are they already working for?
You’ll need to understand who they are already working with closely, are they working with a direct competitor of yours or perhaps an organisation that you’d like to work with?
Conducting research into who they are connected with will mean you can identify the right KOL for you, whilst also monitoring competing KOLs to see what they are discussing and how.
How influential are they within the field?
The better the KOLs influence, the better it is for your business or product, so make sure you do some research on their credentials - how many papers have they released? How often do they speak at conferences? etc.
You’ll also want to look at their online presence, with social media becoming more prevalent, more information is shared via these channels. Some people may refer to these as DOLs (digital opinion leaders) but there is a slight difference between them (read more here).
Look at their following and how often they engage with their audience will give you a good indication as to how often they post and what their followers' responses are like.
What are the benefits?
There are many benefits to using KOLs in your marketing strategy from helping you to reach a targeted audience in your industry to increasing your brand awareness and products you offer - therefore increasing sales for your business as well.
