The Art of Business: Designs on the Healthcare Windfall
Here’s a sobering statistic: Sometime during the next year, the percentage of the U.S.’s Gross Domestic Product spent on healthcare will top 18 percent (up from 14 percent last year). That’s nearly $2 in every $10 spent on doctors, hospitals, medications, and insurance. Simply put, there isn’t a bigger industry in this country, and spending on healthcare is projected to continue to rise for years to come. At the same time, the healthcare industry faces a number of challenges, not the least of which is competition for lucrative healthcare dollars in a fiercely competitive landscape.
For creative professionals, of course, there’s a silver lining in the confluence of spending and competition, particularly for those looking for a recession-proof portfolio; billions of marketing dollars will be spent in the healthcare arena, and while much of it is untouchable for small shops, there are plenty of small hospitals, physician groups, clinics, employees, small insurers, and other healthcare concerns looking for marketing partners.
“Marketing is becoming more important than ever to healthcare organizations. Consumers are becoming more educated about their healthcare options and that means marketing will be a larger factor in an otherwise apathetic industry,” writes Paul Barsch healthcare services marketing director for EDS, in HealthLeaders Magazine.
Healthcare Strategies
Following are the some of the key marketing fundamentals driving the healthcare market, according to Joy Scott, a healthcare marketing expert and owner of Scott Marketing & Public Relations.
1. Patients and potential patients will move to the top of the list in terms of priority audiences. When patients — not health plans or physicians — make care decisions, they are the ones to be courted and influenced to build and keep market share.
2. The type of information that consumers will require will include not only information on services but also on quality and price. They want to know what they are buying and why it costs what it does. Healthcare companies will have to communicate value — including quality measures — in meaningful terms. Consumers will take the “Consumer Reports” approach — evaluating rankings and third party endorsements — to making healthcare decisions, much like buying a car.
3. Communications channels will become very cluttered as companies vie for the attention and wallets of the newly empowered consumers. Healthcare companies will begin using creativity in message and media to break through this message clutter.
4. The Internet will emerge as the most viable and flexible communication channel. Healthcare companies are learning to master the Internet for communications, product delivery, and conducting transactions. Successful companies will develop their own portals to accurate, safe, and accessible healthcare information.
5. At the same time marketers will continue to use more traditional media — direct mail, printer and broadcast advertising — to reinforce Internet communications and to reach those market segments without Internet access.
6. Healthcare firms will form alliances directly with employers to communicate and market to their employees in the workplace. They will also collaborate with employers in educating employees on the process of new benefit designs as well as on their own services.
7. Price negotiations with consumers will be part of the healthcare marketplace. With their own money at stake, patients will want to bargain as well as to shop, to get the best deal.
8. Customer service will become an even higher priority as companies attempt to keep their patient base and maximize profitability of each patient. Healthcare organizations will increasingly turn to portals and personalization of all communications.
9. To keep patients over the long term, companies will provide unbiased and detailed information to those who are critically ill or facing major healthcare decisions. Patients in these situations are often making life and death decisions.
10. Healthcare marketing will be directed toward women, who compose the majority of consumers of healthcare in the United States. Women spend 66 cents of every healthcare dollar and make 75 percent of all household healthcare related decisions. Two-thirds of all hospital procedures are performed on women and 7 of 10 most frequently performed surgeries in the US are specific to the gender.
Prescription for Profit
The trend is clear: Healthcare companies are embracing marketing with a passion and will spend an unprecedented amount in every conceivable medium in the next few years. If you’re looking to build a solid foundation upon an industry won’t go away, start courting that healthcare company right down the street.
This article was last modified on December 14, 2022
This article was first published on May 3, 2004
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