Integrated Marketing and Communications (HCMC1-CE)

A critical element in developing persuasive and effective healthcare marketing and communications is a firm understanding of the healthcare ecosystem—both the existing and the emerging players: how they engage with each other and with regulatory authorities, and importantly, why they provide offerings in the way they do. This course provides an overview of the new fundamentals of the healthcare industry, including critical terminology, key processes that create value, emerging consumer dynamics, and developments in technology and policy that are transforming the sector. In this course, analyze the business models and growth drivers for the expanding network of players, which includes hospitals, biopharmaceuticals, insurers, advocacy groups, diagnostics, medical cannabis, and emerging healthcare technologies. Also, examine the history and development of the healthcare industry to identify the foundational insights, needs, and concerns of all stakeholders on which to build marketing and communications campaigns that drive positive patient and business outcomes.

Healthcare products and services utilize many of the same marketing tactics and communication channels used by non-healthcare offerings; however, the complex network of decision-makers and regulatory considerations involved requires a more disciplined and integrated approach to identifying the optimal marketing mix for healthcare brands. This course provides an in-depth review of the essential marketing and communications frameworks and their application to healthcare offerings. Learn how to use tools such as patient journey mapping to uncover actionable insights and unmet needs for different stakeholders and to determine optimal product positionings within current treatment paradigms. This course also teaches how to analyze the different types of influencers and market development initiatives needed to change entrenched healthcare attitudes and behaviors, the messaging frameworks used to cascade complex data to stakeholders with varying levels of health literacy, and the unique pricing practices and dynamics that add to the complexities and disaggregation of healthcare decisions.

A revolution is underway in how patients want to engage with healthcare providers. Increasingly, patients see themselves as customers first, patients second, and are taking more control of their healthcare decisions, expecting the same level of service they have grown accustomed to in other facets of their lives. This course examines the increased use of social and digital media by healthcare consumers, their pursuit of more authentic perspectives from real patients, and the inclusion of nontraditional healthcare providers and spokespersons in their decision-making. In this course, you will evaluate the implications that technology affords healthcare consumers, from democratizing their relationships with healthcare providers to enabling them to age in place. This course provides a deeper examination of how healthcare “brands” need to respond to this communications revolution to remain relevant, and how to use social platforms more effectively to listen, learn, and engage with customers in a way that delivers value for all stakeholders.

In this age of social media and 24/7 news cycles, healthcare organizations need to operate more on a “when-not-if” basis when it comes to crises as public health and well-being are at stake. This course examines the challenges unique to handling crises in the highly regulated healthcare sector as the public is increasingly conditioned by social media to readily accept non-healthcare expert opinions as fact and dismiss formerly trusted sources like the FDA. In this course, evaluate the implications of such trends on crisis communications policies and approaches for a range of healthcare organizations. Through case studies and simulations, this course demonstrates how to use proven communications frameworks and techniques to enable rapid response and how to make the complex simple, medically accurate, and compliant with regulatory and legal standards. This course also focuses on how to avoid and prevent crises and how to work with key opinion leaders and the C-suite to deliver effective crisis communications.

Measuring the impact and value of marketing and communications has become more complicated and sophisticated than tracking media mentions, impressions, unique visits, clicks, and likes, especially for healthcare brands. The plethora of data sources available to different stakeholders at different stages of the value chain both aids and hinders measurement and analysis. This course provides an overview of what types of data sets are available and how to evaluate, choose, and track the right key performance indicators (KPIs) for healthcare brands, depending on their business, marketing, and communications objectives. Use some of the latest qualitative and quantitative techniques, such as attitude and usage trackers to analyze and track KPIs and demand studies to quantify barriers and growth potential. This course also focuses on the opportunities as well as the emerging utilization and privacy challenges that data from wearables creates for organizations in this “age of the quantified self.”

Increasingly, healthcare can now be delivered more cost-effectively in retail pharmacy/ambulatory settings, via phone apps, and at home through remote monitoring, as a result of partnerships with nontraditional players such as big technology developers and online retailers. Compounding the transformation of where healthcare is delivered is the rise in new types of treatments, from medical cannabis to “digiceuticals,” or digital health solutions. This course examines what has and has not worked for the many new entrants to the healthcare ecosystem, and more importantly, why. Analyze the confluence of different market, attitudinal, and behavioral dynamics fueling the disruption underway in the healthcare ecosystem. Also, gain an understanding of what the marketing and communication implications are of these new business models and offerings, and how to translate them into sustainable strategies and tactics that create value for all stakeholders along the patient journey.

The process of developing healthcare products and services shares some similarities with conventional offerings; however, there are many more complexities associated with healthcare offerings given the higher proof of concept thresholds required and the number of intermediaries involved. This course examines the major processes involved in bringing healthcare products and services to market and in building healthcare brands. Learn what is involved in the pre-commercial evaluation phase, including the use of epidemiology data, identification of insights and unmet needs, and the quantification of an asset’s market potential. The course also examines the intricate regulatory approval process, including labeling strategies and the development of promotional claims, as well as the process of developing an asset into a brand in a complex environment of entrenched patient, provider, and payer attitudes and behaviors. Also, review the patient-centric frameworks and marketing and communications techniques and tools that are used to transform assets into healthcare brands.