• by P.J. Bednarski  @pjbtweet, July 29, 2020

Captivate, a large, location-based video network, has been presenting TV fare like news, weather and sports to apartment and office building elevators for 25 years. But it was missing a big chunk of another adjacent market: the doctors’ offices at the other end of many of those rides on the lift.

That changes now, as Captivate enters a strategic partnership with PatientPoint, which has been presenting medical information videos to doctors and patients for 30 years.

Captivate won’t have anything to do with the medical content, but in waiting rooms, Captivate will be selling  advertising around the consumer-focused content that PatientPoint will present.

In doctors' and medical staffs' back offices, while Patient Point provides medically oriented information, Captivate will also be selling advertising for the whole gamut of consumer products, from packaged goods to vacation spots and automobiles.

Instead of those quick ads that are a necessary feature of their elevator fare, the ads in offices can take a little time to get their points across.

“The thing that really drew us into this idea was being able to take two leading providers, both with similar services, and create a much bigger brand-safe, fraud-free messaging platform,” said Lorenzo Papa, the chief revenue office for Captivate.

There are lots of companies already beaming video into doctors’ offices. Papa says by concentrating on consumer brands, this partnership sets itself apart. Captivate isn’t trying to be a B-to-B service for health care providers.

It is, he says, a wide open opportunity for  consumer brands to reach customers, and since patients’ visits often lead to shopping and dining plans afterward, the doctors’ office systems reach consumers at “the last touch point.”

Captivate also gets to interact with doctors, presumably  “high net worth individuals,” which  ought to be interesting to marketers of luxury products.

The partnership creates a new audience of about 9,000 waiting rooms with thousands of visitors, and 4,000 screens in doctors' and nurses 'offices. And by the end of this year PatientPoint says it will be reaching 77,000 health care providers on its platforms.

Doctors and staff have a 10-digit code to access information from PatientPoint to get information via mobile devices. That also allows advertisers to keep in touch with those doctors, nurses and staff.

Meanwhile, PatientPoint is testing Point of Care Anywhere, in which it’s  presenting relevant medical information to virtual patients waiting for their appointment to begin, or looking for more information afterward, as that company responds to the pandemic.

Captivate’s response to the health crisis might create more headlines as its breaks out. It just introduced Captivate Scan, an all-in-one display and screen that features video content and a temperature scanner, hand sanitizer dispenser and a face mask detector. The company  thinks could be turnkey response to necessary safeguards that may become part of the new normal at office lobbies and sports arenas, apartment properties, retail stores and, of course, medical offices.

“It’s an idea born out of the pandemic,” Papa says.