The conservative nature of the healthcare industry and its highly regulated environment has meant that it has been slow to adapt to digital communication.
"There has been slow adoption of multi-channel marketing campaigns globally with the complexity of the audience making it difficult to adopt." Says the author of the article (link below) who has taken the time to look at what he believes are the 5 key challenges within the Healthcare solutions industry.
One particular point that seems to stand out in every piece of research I've looked at for the industry is this "Ensuring the right channel is used to reach the right audience at the right time is key".
'It maybe that digital is the correct method for a specific campaign targeting a specific audience, while a combination of digital and traditional may be more effective for another campaign. Connecting with different consumers across different touch points has proven to be successful across other sectors; healthcare must embrace this fundamental shift and invest more in digital communications to create a deeper connection with their customers'.
Did you see the word 'campaign' cropping up a few times in that last paragraph, well I did, and we see it everywhere when it comes to the healthcare industry, its meaning is 'intent advertising'.
And therein lies one of the biggest problems, they still see it as a way of 'broadcasting' their message, its just an advert dressed up as content, we can can see right through it which is why we're skipping and blocking those ads in as many places as we can.
A simple message for the industry;
'Social' is about being 'Social', and when your being social you don't butt in and try to sell me something, you listen, engage, inform and generally help the conversation along. It's not all about YOU, its about me, and us.
We are active 'practitioners' of what we do, we already know and can evidence the ROI of a robust and internally aligned 'Social' strategy.
Part of that evidence it that you are reading this blog, just like many others - including your competitor!
We also don't do outbound pushy, salesy marketing, so if you would like to explore more, please contact the author of this blog.
There is also the importance and overwhelming need for patient confidentiality, with data security often flagged as the main reason why there is caution around digital adoption.
