As a political junkie and a healthcare public relations professional I have followed the healthcare debate with keen interest, and I have been anticipating the day when we would finally have a serious political discussion about how best to fix or replace the ACA.  Sadly, even as we remained hopeful a decision would be made pre-Independence Day break, the Senate decided to delay the vote and now we are barely having that conversation.

So, I thought it might be useful to use the occasion of the new Senate Republican healthcare bill to bring-up a few relevant issues that seem to be getting left out of the conversation:

As we’ve entered week 10 of social distancing here in Massachusetts, all eyes are on strategies for resuming activities without compromising safety. Working at a healthcare-focused PR agency like Aria during the COVID-19 pandemic has given us insight not only on the acute effects of the crisis, but on the wider-reaching consequences the virus has on the industry. With quarantine and stay-at-home orders in place, people have missed routine and non-emergent medical appointments, forgoing care that they might have sought in a more normal circumstance.

Last month, my fellow SAE Danielle Johns and I had the opportunity to attend INFLUENCEHER Week in the Seaport district in downtown Boston. Organized by the Massachusetts Innovation and Technology Exchange (MITX), the event featured an inspiring lineup of panels (one of which featured Julie Yoo, CSO and Co-Founder of Kyruus, one of Aria’s clients!), presentations, and workshops to promote and further women leaders and entrepreneurs in the technology industry.

As the beautiful foliage began falling from the trees outside, the Aria team was hard at work inside securing top-notch results for our clients which we wanted to share in this blog. Read about some of our clients’ latest PR wins for the month of November!

Halloween came and went, and on top of the plentiful amount of candy in the Aria office, we also secured some sweet results for our clients. So before we trade in our candy for stuffing and mashed potatoes, we wanted to share some of our top PR wins for the month of October.  

This week, our team jetted to Vegas for Aria’s second biggest industry trade show of the year, HFMA ANI. As we announced in our latest press release, Aria represented seven leading healthcare finance and technology companies at the show, including Craneware, Docent Health and Capto. Aside from eating some great food and doing a little gambling, our crew spent their time running around the event floor staffing media interviews, attending sessions, and taking part in all the onsite action. Check out some of our client highlights from the show:

Aria hit the ground running this year, securing excellent coverage for our clients in a number of high-profile publications in Q1. As a leading healthcare IT public relations agency, Aria is driving focused thought leadership opportunities for all of our clients.

Here are some highlights from our first-quarter results:

As the world starts turning after months of lockdowns and restrictions, the healthcare market – and our clients-- saw major developments in telehealth, vaccine rollouts, patient engagement, and the long-awaited Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology rule updates on interoperability. The Aria team tackled a busy few months, meeting every challenge with grace. This last quarter we generated unique healthcare content, and we can’t wait for what the rest of 2021 will bring. Here is a look at some of the client coverage highlights we secured this past quarter:

While some companies may slow down during the summer months, the Aria team turned up the heat and kept our activities flowing - and the results show. We secured noteworthy coverage for our clients and provided them with opportunities to share their expertise in several prominent publications in Q3.

Welcoming in a new year is an excellent time to think about what went well, what didn't, and what we can do to improve the next 12 months. Similarly to how we strategize to be more impactful with our healthcare IT work, we use the new year to strategize and come up with new ways to maximize our own health and wellness. A few years ago, we had the idea to close our offices the week between Christmas and New Year’s; a perk for which we are all still very grateful.

As we close out the first month of 2018, the Aria team thought it would be fun to look back at some of the most cringe-worthy PR debacles of 2017. Unfortunately, there were many to choose from, but we thought these five really stood out from the pack!

Another day, another traveler removed from a plane for seemingly ridiculous reasons, and a statement from the airline that leaves me scratching my head: ‘Our flight crews are extensively trained to ensure the safety and security of all customers.’

Is that really the best we can do? Especially given the hyper-focus in social and news media right now on how airlines treat their passengers?

September flew by, but the Aria team didn’t waste any time getting great results for our clients. Scroll down to see September’s top highlights:

I was asked to write a blog post comparing and contrasting what it’s like for public relations executives to work at a PR/marketing agency vs. working in-house. I think I was chosen for this task because I’ve divided my career pretty evenly between the two and my PR colleagues assumed I had some sage advice on how to select one over the other. Spoiler alert: I don’t. A quick Googling of the topic will result in every pro and con you could imagine, and I don’t think I could add much more to the mix. What I can do, however, is share what I have felt to be the most impactful pros and cons of each, which could help others to decide which is the right path for them.

As the world begins to “return to normal,” there are some innovations, processes and habits we picked up during the COVID-19 lockdown that actually weren’t so bad – in fact, there are a few COVID adaptations I think we should keep.

While podcasts have been around for more than a decade, with the emergence of smartphones, streaming services and virtual home assistants (aka Amazon, Alexa), podcasts have only recently become part of our daily routine. In fact, Apple downloads surpassed 50 billion last year alone!

With over half a million podcasts available in close to 100 languages, this genre of social media is growing daily. I took a step back to figure out what all the hype is about and came up with the following three takeaways:

Happy Halloween! As Halloween is the time to share horror stories, we here at Aria came together to discuss the scariest and most ghastly PR nightmares we’ve seen this year. Bad press can kill, and as PR pros, we got the goosebumps watching these eights stories unfold this year:

Six months ago, Aria Marketing welcomed me with open arms as a new-to-the-industry intern to join their team of PR pro’s, and I have been grateful for that moment every day since. Coming in with little knowledge of healthcare IT, and limited PR experience, Aria Marketing showed me the ropes and introduced me to the ever-changing world of healthcare PR. 

The entire world is experiencing the effects of the coronavirus pandemic as it is impacting every facet of our lives from our jobs, to the way we shop for groceries, to social engagements and more. In particular, the content of the news has changed with the majority of information now being shared through the lens of COVID-19. As a healthcare PR agency, Aria is uniquely positioned to support our healthcare clients (who provide services across the industry) during this period of uncertainty.

As PR professionals, we are constantly working to get our clients in the conversation – from securing press opportunities and speaking slots to announcing new product launches and strategizing social media programs. The goal of all of this, of course, is to get in front of decision-makers that will be moved enough to take out their wallets – but it’s challenging to directly link PR results to sales, or even to leads. Every once in a while, I get a call or email from someone that read an article about a health IT client and wants to discuss purchasing their technology, but it’s a rare (yet oddly satisfying) occurrence.