Today’s health care field is more crowded and competitive than ever, especially in the digital landscape. In response, health care companies are making digital marketing a top priority in order to meet customer demand for access, credible information and resources, convenience and value-based care.
But as companies move marketing and advertising online, they face new digital marketing challenges. Here, we’ve analyzed a selection of the biggest problems facing health care marketers today.
Lack of Investment in Digital Marketing
One of the biggest digital marketing challenges facing providers is a lack of investment in digital advertising strategies. While marketing spend in most industries is increasing year over year, the health care industry continues to spend the least amount of money on digital advertising.
Federal laws like HIPAA restrict how companies are allowed to target audiences and promote messaging, which is one reason why health care companies invest very little in digital marketing. Health care marketing language must carefully monitor managed expectations, false claims, inflated results and unverified buzzwords in advertising.
However, equally important is the fact that many health care companies are not taking advantage of the cost-effective digital channels at their disposal. Businesses can and should use platforms like social media and blogs to build credibility and authority in their field, and they can and should use digital software to make electronic medical records and medical forms available to more people online.
Insufficient Tracking and Analyzing of Marketing Metrics
Tracking and analyzing key marketing metrics is essential for health care marketers, but many have been slow to adopt digital campaign tools that simplify the process of collecting and monitoring data, like customer relationship management (CRM) programs. CRMs are data-driven tools that can help health care marketers:
- Identify and segment targeted quality audiences
- Identify and segment targeted behaviors and demographics
- Streamline the customer acquisition and customer retention processes
- Determine brand positioning and promote brand awareness
- Provide a positive customer experience through personalized messaging and communication
CRMs offer a wealth of data that marketers can use to attract quality leads within target audiences, communicate effective messaging across multiple platforms, gather insights to improve customer care and satisfaction and ultimately measure how marketing efforts are impacting ROI.
Evolving Customer Expectations
Today, customers have more power to drive the kind of health care experiences they want. People use the research, reviews and competitive analysis at their fingertips before they ever make a health care decision. Today’s customers are looking for more than the cheapest or closest service; they are looking for value, a personalized experience and quality customer service.
New standards for customer care create digital marketing challenges for marketers who aren’t rising to meet new expectations for access and convenience, including:
- Access to online medical records
- Ability to schedule appointments and ask questions online
- Ability to fill out forms online
- A mobile-friendly website
- Quick and helpful responses to online comments, reviews and emails
With multiple choices available to them, today’s customers feel empowered to select the health care services that will provide the best value — not just the least expensive products.
The Customer Trust Gap
Unfortunately, the health care and pharmaceutical industry as a whole has a reputation for lack of transparency, which creates a trust gap between customers and providers. In order to gain back the trust they’ve lost, health care companies need to use the digital marketing tools available to practice better storytelling. Companies should use real-life testimonials and case studies to showcase their products and services, as well as tactics like video marketing to drive higher engagement with customers.
Today, customers don’t trust advertising that looks like advertising. Businesses must be able to clearly and factually articulate the unique benefits their products and services will provide. To do this, health care businesses should use their website and social media accounts to publish rich, relevant and useful content that drives education, authority, credibility and trustworthiness.
Lackluster Online Reputation Management
90% of people read online reviews before visiting a business and 84% of people trust online reviews as much as they do a personal recommendation. Health care companies run the risk of losing revenue when they ignore the power of online reviews — in fact, online reviews impact 67.7% of purchasing decisions.
Health care companies need to be vigilant about monitoring and responding to online reviews and comments on social media, review sites like Yelp and Google, and health care specific review sites like Healthgrades, WebMD and Zocdoc. Fast and responsive reputation management gives health care companies the chance to combat a bad review with helpful solutions and great customer service.
Let NewGen Marketing Help You Plan Your Digital Marketing Strategy
At NewGen Marketing, our leadership team are marketing and sales experts who have experience driving sales and revenue for leading health care brands. We offer professional help to guide your business through digital marketing challenges. Our solutions use performance-driven strategies and investment to launch traditional and digital marketing campaigns across multiple media channels. We allocate your marketing spend to the campaigns and channels that are generating data-driven results, conversions and sales. At the same time, we streamline your customer acquisition process to identify and nurture quality leads to grow your customer base.
If you’re ready to learn more about performance-driven strategies to increase your bottom line, contact NewGen Marketing today to schedule a free consultation.