Definitive Guide for Healthcare Marketing: 8 Essential Healthcare Marketing Trends 2024

Author: Team WH

Published On: 14-12-23

Last Updated on: 18-12-23

Estimated reading time: 9 minutes

Is healthcare marketing set for the next revolution? The answer is yes. The history of healthcare marketing traces back to the 1970s when pharmaceutical companies and insurance providers penetrated the healthcare sector.  This move led the industry to an increasingly competitive stage, driving a significant shift in the operational model.

The model focused on marketing to attract patients and doctors to healthcare organisations. So, what’s the current healthcare marketing scenario?

According to the Global Newswire report, the global healthcare marketing size is expected to reach USD 4,922.62 million in 2023 and USD 18,522.04 million by 2030. Today, their high-performing healthcare marketing strategies are vital to driving businesses. The healthcare marketing budget for businesses soared by 15% in 2022.

The healthcare marketing trends 2024 pivot on improving the overall patient experience and engaging them with relevant content.

The blog explores the evolution of health and the essential marketing trends for surviving the industry headwinds. So, let’s unfold the narrative!

How is Healthcare Marketing Changing?

In the past decade, there have been several technological advancements, such as telehealth and remote health monitoring. The healthcare industry continuously evolves, spurring a need to adopt new marketing strategies. 

Traditional healthcare marketing strategies have been websites, mobile app technology, emails, and offline advertising. With the rise in social media channels, users search for health-related queries on these platforms. Choosing a single type of marketing is not enough to reach the audience. 

This has led to omnichannel marketing — essentially a combination of all the above marketing strategies for a seamless patient experience.

AI is already making remarkable strides across different industries worldwide. Incorporating AI and data-driven technologies helps to offer personalisation and automate repetitive tasks. So, what’s the future of healthcare marketing? With evolving trends, there is an evident shift in the marketing trends toward improving patient engagement and building trust.

8 Key Healthcare Marketing Trends 2024

The healthcare marketing industry is revolutionising, keeping pace with technology and people’s changing preferences. 

Here are the healthcare digital marketing trends driving the transformation:

Search Engine Optimization and Voice Search Optimization

SEO is an essential trend for healthcare marketers. With 70,000 health searches performed on Google every minute, Google is a repository of health information for consumers. Reportedly, 77% prefer search engines to start their patient journey. Local SEO is a game-changer for healthcare marketing. 

Updating local listings on search engines provides healthcare services with a competitive edge and expands their outreach. For example, creating and maintaining Google Business Pages for your healthcare service helps you forge brand awareness and stay ahead. 

However, the emphasis is shifting to voice optimisation in 2024. With the emergence of voice services like Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant, people are increasingly moving to voice searches. Healthcare service providers must adapt SEO strategies for answering health-related voice queries and rank their pages at the top of search engines. Voice searches are generally lengthy and conversational. For example,” What are the COVID symptoms?” instead of “COVID symptoms.”  

Online Patient Reviews

Experience has evolved to be the heart of marketing. That said, patient experiences matter more than ever. According to Patientpop’s 2021 report, 44.6% of people reviewed their healthcare service online compared to 36% in 2020. 

When comparing services, online services act as social proof and lead patient’s decisions to the healthcare services better.  In contrast, negative reviews highly impact the online reputation of businesses. Further, testimonials, success stories, and a walkthrough of the treatment process humanise the content marketing efforts.

Personalised Patient Experience

Increasingly, personalisation isone of the significant healthcare marketing trends in 2024. Data-driven insights are fueling the personalisation game. Lack of personalised messaging frustrates 76% of customers, according to the 2021 McKinsey report. Depersonalised digital ads and generic text messages drive customers off the healthcare service.

Imagine a situation when a dermatologist’s banner ad appears while searching for acid reflux. Although the marketers reached the target audience, they failed to get the search intent right. Optimise your SEO strategies by the proper placement of ads alongside relevant content. Create tailored messages considering individual’s problems and preferences.     

Telehealth

The pandemic has transformed the healthcare landscape. With convenience and safety being highly valued, telehealth is a preferred treatment method by many. Accessibility is the USP of the technology that allows patients to receive treatment within the comfort of their homes.

Telehealth is a powerful medium for educating and spreading awareness about preventive care measures. Complementing telehealth with standard treatment creates a robust healthcare infrastructure and well-positioned service. Live interactive patient-provider sessions, remote healthcare monitoring, and mobile healthcare technology are critical telehealth applications. 

Artificial Intelligence and Chatbots

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning are barreling across all industries, and the healthcare industry is no exception. AI-powered chatbots are already an essential trend adopted by healthcare services. People use powered chatbots to answer patient queries, schedule online appointments, process insurance claims, and offer 24/7 customer service. 

Why use chatbots? They provide quality service, service available around the clock, save time, and reduce the staff requirement.   Besides, they can precisely understand and respond to queries and reduce the staff’s workload.

Video Marketing

“A picture is worth a thousand words.” The fact holds for healthcare marketing trends in 2024. Today, the average attention span for humans is 8.25 seconds and has shrunk over the last 15 years. 

People are increasingly giving preference to health. And video marketing has gained remarkable significance in garnering patient engagement. Moreover, videos are excellent for sharing educational content, such as wellness tips and dietary recommendations. Through short videos, healthcare providers can share behind-the-scenes glimpses, patient testimonials, and their crucial achievements.

YouTube, Instagram, and even TikTok have a global reach and are the perfect platforms for video marketing. A practical approach combines videos with relevant content to target potential patients. 

Social Media Marketing

With 4.9 billion users, social media is the next-generation marketing trend. Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok are millennials’ preferred social media platforms.Adopting healthcare marketing strategies targeting these platforms helps to establish direct-in-line communication with the audience.

Humanising content marketing efforts has recently been essential for healthcare services. It makes them approachable and visible in the competitive marketing realm. Sharing industry expertise through physician interviews, Q&A sessions, and patient testimonials on social handles increases patient engagement. 

However, create short videos of about 30 to 60 seconds to retain the viewer’s attention.

Influencer and Micro-Influencer Collaborations

Influencer marketing is garnering importance in the healthcare industry. Collaborations with influencers and micro-influencers help to expand the reach, gain new customers, and build trust. 

Effective communication of brand values, mission, and services is essential. Influencers support creating brand awareness and compellingly spreading the word, given their existing reach. Collaborations with prominent micro-influencers in the neighbourhood greatly influence patient decisions and improve lead generation.

Successful Healthcare Marketing Campaigns

Although the healthcare industry is a slow adaptor of marketing trends, there is no shortage of stellar marketing campaigns. Occasionally, a masterpiece enters the marketing scene and creates ripples in the healthcare realm.

On that note, let’s explore the successful healthcare marketing campaigns that can inspire your next campaign:

Carilion Clinic’s #YESMAMM

Carilion Clinic is a leading non-profit healthcare provider in Virginia. The trusted provider is prominent for its comprehensive healthcare services, best-in-class treatment, and dedication toward people. #YESMAMM was an innovative campaign initiated by Carilion to create breast cancer awareness and encourage mammograms for early diagnosis of the disease.

As a part of the campaign, social media users had to change their profile pictures and use #YESMAMM to answer queries during Breast Cancer Awareness Month, observed in October. 

The campaign was a big hit and drove traffic to the service provider’s website. It steered a massive movement as people leveraged social media platforms to share their stories and show their support for breast cancer. Subsequently, the repository of user-generated content helped women going through similar crises. It enabled them to find valuable healthcare services nearby, schedule appointments, and overcome breast cancer.  

Takeaways: Power of social media channels, people-led movement, effectiveness of user-generated content

Max Healthcare’s More to Healthcare

Leading healthcare service in India, Max Healthcare created an innovative campaign under the “More to Healthcare.” The campaign’s goal was to bring to light the lives of healthcare providers and their “spirit of service.”  

Max Healthcare shared short videos on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube. Moreover, it featured the lives of healthcare service providers, emphasising their hard work to change people’s lives.

A robust healthcare system works on an integrated model. Here, each member has a specific role-play that contributes to improving the quality of the patient’s life. Physicians, nurses, clinical experts, OT technicians, ICU staff, housekeeping team, administrative team, ward boys, and security staff work as a well-coordinated, unified force to make a difference in society.

Takeaways:  Humanizing content marketing efforts, power of social media, importance of patient engagement

New York-Presbyterian Hospital’s Patient Stories Series

The patient stories series by New York-Presbyterian Hospital was a powerful campaign capturing patients’ real-life stories and experiences. The healthcare provider offers specialised healthcare services with a touch of innovation. Besides, they are known for adopting a patient-centric approach.

The personal narratives depicted through the campaign struck an emotional connection with the audience. Further, it highlighted the hospital’s commitment and its services’ positive impact on people’s lives.

Takeaway: Striking emotional connection with patient experiences, how to humanise content marketing efforts

Conclusion

Healthcare marketing is different from other marketing realms. Here, the selling point is — health and services to render a quality life. With technological advancements and the pandemic, there is a remarkable shift in the functioning of the healthcare industry. However, the goal of healthcare marketing remains to expand the outreach, guide patient’s journeys, and engage them with relevant content regarding the services.

The critical healthcare marketing trends in 2024 revolve around defining patient experience and convenience. Humanising content marketing through online reviews, testimonials, and success stories helps to increase the online reputation of the healthcare service and, ultimately, build trust. In contrast, negative reviews significantly impact the healthcare provider’s services. 

Analyse the essential market trends and adopt omnichannel healthcare marketing strategies ideal for your business to stay ahead of the competition!

FAQs

Q1. Why is healthcare marketing different?

Unlike other marketing forms, the product healthcare marketers are selling is health and the healthcare provider’s services to improve the quality of life. 

Q2. What is the aim of healthcare marketing?

Healthcare marketing aims to execute an effective marketing plan to attract potential customers, help in a patient’s journey, lead the final decision towards your brand, and engage them.

Q3. What are marketing strategies for healthcare?

The essential healthcare marketing trends for 2024 are AI-powered chatbots, SEO and voice optimisation, video marketing, social media marketing, and online reviews.

Q4. How many segments are there in the healthcare market?

The healthcare market primarily has three segments: provider, supplier, and payer.

Q5. What is the future of healthcare marketing?

Healthcare is a continuously evolving landscape. The future of healthcare lies in leveraging technologies based on AI and robotics to deliver the best healthcare service.