Top 3 Ways to Differentiate Your Healthcare Brand
Today’s healthcare landscape is bursting at the seams with innovation, ingenuity, and promise. We’re poised to see more changes in the next three-to-five years than we’ve seen in the past 25. In this exploding industry, branding and marketing are more important than ever. You have an amazing product or service, but how are you making sure your potential customers know or care?
Branding is the first glimpse consumers have into your company, and marketing is how they receive your message. Companies that fail to recognize and pursue these truths may find themselves struggling to break through the healthcare haze. This list is not exhaustive, but here are a few ways to differentiate your healthcare brand.
1. Make Trust a Standard, Not an Exception
We know that it’s critical to form a real connection with all stakeholders, including patients. So what’s the single strongest connection we can foster with our fellow humans? Trust. How do we establish that our brand is worthy of a patient’s trust? Trust emerges when we share a set of common values and beliefs. Trust is the key ingredient to building healthy relationships before, during, and after the sale. Trust is the new currency.
In order to gain the trust of prospective patients, you need to show them why you’re worthy of their trust. After all, healthcare patients are literally trusting providers with their lives. We can’t sit idly back and assume that they understand our motives. It’s our responsibility to build, foster, and grow the bond of trust. And that starts the second they learn about your company and see your branding.
2. Understand and Embrace Technology
Technology has revolutionized the way we communicate with each other and consumers. With more people using technology and social media to learn, share information, and connect with each other, it’s critical for us as brands to be involved in the conversation.
At first glance, technology may seem impersonal and disconnected. It’s true that a Facebook “like” can’t replace a handshake. But the key is that technology isn’t here to replace the fundamentals of forming real, personal connections. It’s here to facilitate these connections through a new, unique element. Healthcare brands are using technology as tools to connect with patients, strengthen relationships and foster loyalty. More and more patients and consumers are seeking to engage with their healthcare providers through technology.
3. Balance Service and Customer Service
Even in the incredible shift toward a digitized world, patients have not abandoned their expectations for customer service. They want to be greeted with a smile and given time for a quality conversation with their providers. I understand that this can be tough in a fast-paced environment where the top priority is to deliver critical healthcare with swift speed and impeccable efficiency.
But it’s also important to make sure that patients are fully informed and that they understand that you care. They need to understand how your services and processes relate to their health and wellbeing. When providers fail to ensure this strong communication, they’re losing pivotal opportunities for trust and overall patient satisfaction—brand attributes that can help you differentiate your brand and break through the healthcare haze.
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About the Author Roxie Mooney is the Founder and President of Legacy DNA Marketing Group, an Aster and FHSPRM award-winning marketing firm that offers the highest level of personal and creative strategic planning and development for healthcare brands, products and services. Experienced in business strategy, digital health marketing and communications, and leadership, Roxie has a passion for helping clients drive growth, revenue, and innovation in healthcare. Follow her here by clicking the yellow FOLLOW button, on Twitter, @Legacydnagroup, on Facebook,www.facebook.com/legacyDNA, or digitalhealthDNA.com.
Agent/Owner, Mansfield Insurance Group
10yI visit more sites for Home Health Care companies a day then I can count! You hit it on the head with people who choose us (health care type companies) are literally choosing us to help protect their actual livelihood! I do not know the exact statistic but there are a flood of HHC companies, with that comes the need to really differentiate. Using the electronic "like" as a way to pre-connect is just the way of the world now, but business is personal, healthcare is personal, and branding yourself to prove your the right one to take care of me or my loved one is hopefully always going to be relationship based not tech based. You might be able to reach me via social media, but my clients each know me because I believe in the value of the relationship!
Build a Strategic, Repeatable Marketing Process That Increases Google Visibility, Generates Leads, and Grows Revenue
10yYes Roxie Mooney ♦ MSOL ♦ DBA Candidate! I’ve been preaching this one pretty hard. Get really, really clear about the single-minded point of difference that some narrowly defined ideal patient cannot live without and you’ve got the secret to medical practice marketing success.
Copywriting | SEO | Social Media | Online Reputation Management | Media Intelligence | Customer Service
10yNothing to argue about this article. Trust should always be the goal for every healthcare companies. Having a customer service team is like having a representative of your company talk to patients, providers, etc. With technology on the rise, customer service can now be integrated with social media for faster solutions.
SVP Patient Integration at MEDx eHealthCenter.BV
10yNothing of the IRS ?..... you might want to revisit that.
Innovator, Digital fighter. Founder. E-commerce, Fintech, digital banking maker, advisor, investor, NED. Founder & CEO Design Italy.
10yYou may read health care but think banking and financial services...