Why Health Care Companies Need a Digital Marketing Plan

Until recently, marketing hasn’t been a top priority for health care companies — in fact, many companies still believe the misconception that advertising their services takes the focus away from providing high-quality care. But in the crowded health care field, marketing is essential to grow your business, stay competitive in the industry and acquire and retain new customers.

Not only do health care companies need an efficient marketing plan, but they need to incorporate digital marketing strategies into their overall program. Today’s public is increasingly located online, and many companies have already stepped up to provide greater access to health care in the digital environment: services like telehealth, online scheduling, online forums and electronic medical records continue to expand.

You can use digital marketing to support your overall goal of providing high-quality care. Digital tools can help you tap into customer wants and needs, publish educational content for a wide audience, enhance customer experience and improve care processes and outcomes. Today, customers are choosing high-quality care providers based on the research and information available to them.

Here are 5 reasons why health care companies should invest in digital marketing this year.

5 Reasons Why Health Care Companies Need Digital

1. To meet your audience where they’re looking. Today, the search for a health care provider frequently begins in the digital environment. Customers perform extensive research and compare multiple providers online before scheduling an appointment. According to a study from Pew Research Center, 80% (approximately 93 million people) of all adult internet users have used the internet to search for health and medical related topics. And in most top health care fields, over 60% of customers run an internet search before scheduling an appointment. If you’re not promoting your brand and services online, you’re likely missing out on a large section of your audience.

2. To manage your online reputation. According to a 2019 study by the consulting firm PatientPop, 69.9% of people reported that a positive online reputation is important when choosing a health care provider. The top 3 factors that helped a potential customer choose a doctor or health care provider were: online reviews from other patients, information found on other websites (such as Google, Yelp and Healthgrades) and the company’s website. Tracking and responding to online feedback and reviews (especially negative reviews), maintaining accurate location and contact information online and creating an easily navigable website are all important steps you can take to cultivate a positive online presence.

3. To build relationships between potential customers and your brand. Today, people expect to find information and reviews about a brand online; your first interaction with many new customers will take place in the digital environment. Your company can use digital platforms to publish educational content, promote your brand value proposition and engage with potential customers. One great digital platform that drives engagement and relationship building is social media. Utilize social media to share relevant content, address feedback openly (especially if it’s negative) and provide customer service. Greater online accessibility will improve your public brand perception.

4. To launch, monitor and track effective marketing campaigns. Digital marketing campaigns provide a wealth of data that you can use to track campaign effectiveness. In the long term, analyzing data from digital campaigns allows you to prioritize marketing efforts that perform well, trim or cut funding for inefficient campaigns, make media investments based on performance and ultimately measure ROI. In the short term, digital marketing campaigns allow you to analyze ongoing data and make real-time changes to advertising and brand messaging for optimal performance.

5. To streamline the customer acquisition process.Health care is a crowded and competitive field and today’s customers have more information than ever at their fingertips. Digital marketing campaigns produce data that you can use to identify your target audience demographics. Targeted advertising ensures that your brand is reaching the people who are already looking for your products and services, which drives more high-quality leads to your business. Digital campaigns are flexible and allow you to make ongoing adjustments to optimize conversions across all points of the acquisition cycle.

NewGen Marketing Has Experience Leading Performance-Driven Digital Campaigns

At NewGen Marketing, our team has decades of experience in leading performance-driven marketing and sales campaigns for top brands in the health care industry. We offer broad-spectrum marketing services across a variety of print and digital media channels. Our goal is to use performance-driven marketing campaigns to grow your brand and increase revenue and sales for your business.

Performance-based marketing will drive more to your bottom line. Contact NewGen Marketing today for a free consultation to discuss marketing and sales strategies.