What is Healthcare Marketing?
Healthcare marketing is a process which identifies, foresees and meets the consumer’s or the patient’s needs efficiently and profitably within healthcare. It deals with understanding the consumer’s needs, doing market research, developing good quality healthcare products and services, managing their promotions and targeting the concerned audience. Healthcare marketing can be done for:
- Healthcare products – These include medicines, medical devices, prosthetic accessories etc.
- Medical / Healthcare services – Doctor’s consultation, hospital health checks, laboratory investigations etc come under medical services.
- Medical events – These comprise of medical conferences, seminars, medical camps etc.
- Places – Medical tourism is a classic example of marketing of places. A city or any particular area can be marketed as a place for specific treatment and attract tourist from across the world.
- Medical information – In this medical information is gathered, packed and sold to the audience. For example, market research, medical consultancy, medical tourism facilitation etc.
- Persons- An eminent specialist or surgeon, who has exceptional caliber in a particular field, can be marketed.
- Healthcare organizations – Any healthcare or pharmaceutical company, hospital, or other medical institution can be marketed to create an image and get recognized.
The concept of marketing remains the same for healthcare marketing too. However, healthcare is slightly different and a little more delicate as it deals with real consumers and tries to meet their everyday needs.