Retail, banking, technology, and consumer goods aren’t the only sectors facing marketing challenges in today’s business landscape. The age of the consumer is also creating difficulties for healthcare companies that are looking for effective methods to stay relevant and useful.
In this highly important industry, marketing refers to strategies that can be used by healthcare providers, insurers, suppliers, and advocacy groups to attract and retain new patients and increase the awareness of their business.
Healthcare organizations must find a way to keep up with their customers who expect preferred brands to want them, adapt to their demands, and play by their rules. For this reason, the industry can no longer rely on market share dominance, regulatory protections or legacy brand preference. Success today means re-examining strategic imperatives, anticipating what is coming next, and navigating obstacles and opportunities to capture customer mindshare.
With the ever-increasing number of competitors out there, you need a way to stand out and ensure that your voice as a business is being heard. And while this can be difficult, it’s not impossible. You can start by expanding your knowledge on the new healthcare marketing trends that can be very rewarding for your business. So let’s talk about some B2B healthcare trends that are worth looking at.
1. Digital Transformation
Digital transformation in the healthcare industry is not just about automated processes or new technology—It’s much bigger and more fundamental than that. It entails rethinking business processes and using digital technologies and data to put the customer at the very center of your business. To succeed, you need to focus on the areas of healthcare that are ripe for digital transformation, such as:
Accessibility: The rise of the on-demand economy has given people unprecedented access to everything they need. However, the healthcare industry hasn’t quite caught up with the current economy and finding the right physician in your area, for example, is not yet easy. The fact that people rely so much on their mobile phones to get things done, creates a huge opportunity for healthcare to drive innovation and enable patients to access physicians using their preferred digital technologies. The top goal would be to make house call requests or clinic appointments as easy as ordering an Uber car.
Accountability: Currently, the healthcare industry lacks tools to drive real accountability. For example, when you make an appointment there is no way to see the success or failure rate of the physician you’re going to meet for the first time. It’s no wonder that more and more patients are dissatisfied with the primary care they receive. Healthcare companies need a standard set of procedures they can use to handle patient feedback so they can improve their healthcare products and services.
Financial Transparency: Technology can help the industry give customers the information they need about their healthcare expenses. Right now, the necessity of recommended procedures is often unclear and there is also a lack of consistency as healthcare treatments may vary in cost from state to state and from one hospital to the next.
Usually, patients have no idea how much a procedure costs until it’s done and they’ve received the bill and can’t do anything about it. It’s time for healthcare providers to become transparent about costs, and digital transformation can make this happen through a customer-first approach.
2. Personalization
Do you know what the quickest way to ruin a customer experience is? Treat everyone the same and you will find out. But really, don’t—patients hate feeling like just another number. They desire personalized assistance that encourages them to find the solutions they need. Make healthcare personalization easy by combining the new technology available today with old-school personal interaction and you can solve the problem of disconnected experiences—and drive substantial benefits while you’re at it!
Through the efforts of personalized healthcare, you can generate five times higher retention rates and increase the value of personalization way beyond the financial impact you get. This transformation can lead to breakthrough results and help you win your patients’ hearts.
3. Modern Marketing
Modern times call for modern marketing strategies that are pushing healthcare providers to turn to mobile and social media advertising instead of TV and radio, and email marketing instead of direct mail. For this reason, traditional media is taking a step back, letting online marketing shine through greater reach, engagement, and ROI.
However, to attract and engage patients online, you must follow a few modern marketing rules:
Segment your contact lists: Blasting a general email newsletter to all the contacts in your database is no longer effective. Instead, you should segment your list depending on the needs and interests of your contacts as well as the psychographics, demographics, and behavioral characteristics of your target audience. Slice and dice your email list as much as you can so you can achieve better reach, engagement, and ROI.
Make content digestible and easy-to-read: With shrinking attention spans, your content should be as easy to understand as possible—but valuable nonetheless. Your focus needs to be on short, shareable content that provides the value proposition upfront. Use headers, bolded text, hyperlinks, and images to allow your readers to quickly scan everything and easily find the information that matters most.
Get creative through visuals and videos: Does it really come as a surprise that the most engaging content is the visually engaging one? Make sure that the content you use in your social media posts, ads, blogs or emails also includes images, infographics, or videos.
There’s no denying that good strategies generate an increase in market share. Fine-tune your healthcare marketing tactics and start reaping the rewards.
