Tag: consumer marketing

“Build it and they will come” might work for 1980s movie characters, multinational coffee franchises and beloved sports teams, but it’s not a great engagement strategy for most consumer-facing organizations – especially in healthcare. Take patient portals, for example. Giving your patients a way to access their health records can help improve their health outcomes, increase compliance with care plans, and create a more positive healthcare experience overall. But do your customers know the portal exists? Do they know how it could serve them? Do they trust it? You’ve built it, but how many patients are actually logging on? In 2017, over half the US population had access to a patient portal. Around half of those people used it at least once in the previous year. Of those who didn’t, 59% said it was because they didn’t feel they needed to access an online medical record, and 25% were worried about privacy and security. This tells us two things: If healthcare providers want to increase the number of patients using their portal, they need to proactively communicate the benefits to those patients, and healthcare providers could do more to reassure patients they take portal security seriously. If patients discover that using the portal is better than not using it, and that they can do so securely, they will be more likely to log on. You can address both in your patient engagement and marketing strategies. Perhaps the better mantra is: “if you solve their problem and tell them about it, they will come”. Balancing portal security and patient convenience Your patient portal is more than just a platform for patients to access test results, sort out bills or schedule appointments. It’s a way to nurture the patient-provider relationship. And at its heart, that relationship is about trust. One way to build trust is to ensure your portal meets the strictest of security measures without creating an excessive admin burden for patients. You can do this with a security strategy that layers up several protective measures to help you tackle common areas of vulnerability, including weak ID verification, over-reliance on password-protection, and failure to encrypt sensitive data. A few practical ways to keep your patient portal secure include: using ID verification when someone signs up for the portal using device intelligence and identity proofing when a user signs in to the portal deploying extra security checks where the risk of identity fraud is higher putting systems in place to flag and respond to security breaches as fast as possible. A solution like PreciseID® can help you take care of your patients’ privacy and security behind the scenes. They’ll see just enough to reassure them that you’re taking their security seriously, without any protracted log-in process that puts them off using the portal altogether. Marketing your patient portal so more patients benefit from it Solving your patients’ concerns about security is just one route to boosting portal utilization. Another important way to ensure more patients use and benefit from the patient portal is to actively encourage them to access their online records regularly. Research suggests individuals who are encouraged to use their online medical record by their provider are almost twice as likely to access it, compared to those who weren’t actively encouraged. So how do you convince your patients of the benefits of regularly logging on? That it’s not just a convenient way to manage their medical journey, but could result in better health? The answer lies in consumer data – the lifestyle, demographic, psychographic and behavioral information that gives you a fuller understanding of what drives your patients. Experian Health’s ConsumerView data analytics can capture insights that let you reach out to your consumers with the right message, in the right way, at the right time.  Do they live a busy lifestyle? Reassure them that the portal can save them time. Are there lifestyle factors that may hinder their adherence to medication? Encourage them to use the portal to make sure their prescriptions are up to date. If you discover your consumers are big social media users, you might target your portal engagement campaign through those channels. Equally, if a consumer doesn’t have any social media accounts, there would be no point investing in Facebook ads. Personalization makes your patients feel taken care of, leading to greater trust, loyalty and satisfaction. Increase patient portal engagement today In the wake of consumerism and IT transformation across many other industries, a tailored and digitally secure healthcare service is a must.  “Consumers now expect to be provided with a turnkey, individual experience that is fast and seamless,”  said Kristen Simmons, Experian Health’s senior vice president of strategy and innovation. Your patient portal must be seen to provide a valuable and secure service. While there’s a way to go to increase the number of patients making full use of portals, the tools exist to support healthcare providers’ engagement goals. Learn more about how your organization can leverage consumer insights to improve patient retention and engagement. 

Big data is helping every industry take giant leaps forward. Healthcare should be no exception. Household names like Amazon, Netflix and LinkedIn have made personalized consumer experiences the norm: predicting your next purchase, suggesting products you’ll love, and tailoring your news feed to your preferences. The modern consumer experience is intuitive and frictionless. Patients have come to expect the same of all the companies they do business with – including their healthcare provider. Like these consumer-driven industries, information about lifestyle, interests, purchasing behavior and even social media activity can all help create a more comprehensive picture of each consumer patient, and how they choose their provider. By understanding patients as individual customers, providers can use consumer data insights to offer personalized experiences, creating loyal customers and brand advocates. From building awareness about your brand to customer support interactions, these insights ensure your efforts resonate in the right way with the right consumers at the right time – and in a way that makes the consumer feel like they’ve chosen a provider that ‘gets them.’ We’ve all seen headlines about bad players using consumer data in a negative way, so compliance is key to avoid any mis-steps. Making sure you stay compliant with consumer privacy and data protection laws will keep your organization safe. Data-driven healthcare marketing is a huge opportunity The providers who thrive in the era of value-based accounting will be the ones who embrace a consumer insight-based approach throughout the customer journey. In fact, research suggests companies that leverage consumer insights outperform peers by 85% in sales growth and more than 25% in gross margin. But here’s the rub: while it’s a massive opportunity, using consumer data must be done safely and securely. Consumers don’t want to think about their data being traded in the shadows, even if they’re happy to live-tweet the data from their smartwatch. Trust and transparency are paramount. So, what’s a consumer-centric, security-conscious healthcare provider to do? 3 ways to stay safe and secure using healthcare marketing data Working with consumer (or marketing) data is somewhat new to health. The rules for how you source, store and use it bring a whole new set of compliance concerns. Failure to comply can result in eye-watering fines, not to mention the potentially devastating loss of trust. If you’re handling it in-house, beware of vendors popping up with data solutions that don’t quite make the grade. Here are three ways to practice good data hygiene and keep your organization compliant: Safe sourcing First things first: know where your consumer data comes from. Is your vendor collecting this data from original sources, or via a third party? Do consumers know their data was collected, and how it would be used? Can you point to the original source’s privacy policies? When you use consumer data, make sure you know its source and can quickly point to the privacy policies associated with the data. Working with original source compliers of consumer data, like Experian, can ensure you meet privacy policy rules. Consumers should always be told their data is being collected, why, and by whom. Despite the challenges around the introduction of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), its main requirement is actually pretty simple: don’t use consumer data without active consent. GDPR may or may not apply to your organization, but it’s a good model to work to, especially as others are following its lead (like the California Consumer Privacy Act). Safe storage Tales of data breaches at Yahoo and the English National Health Service send a shudder through healthcare C-suites everywhere. And no wonder – a Ponemon Institute Study found the average cost of security breaches is around $3.62 million per incident, while consumers are reported to be more worried about data privacy than losing their main source of income. Safe to say, secure data storage and processing should be a top priority for your organization. Writing for Law Journal Newsletters, Mark Sangster says: “Privacy and data responsibility must be as important to the officers of a business as profitability is to the investors. As such, privacy and compliance blur together, and security becomes the guardian, keeping the others in check.” Familiarize yourself with the rules around storing marketing and non-medical consumer data, such as ensuring you have a written data security policy, identifying data protection officers, and having strict controls on access to data files so that it’s never shared with anyone who doesn’t absolutely need to see it. The Direct Marketing Association and American Marketing Association both have handy resources on ethics, regulations and data privacy. It may not be light bedtime reading, but it’ll keep you right. Appropriate use of data Marketing data is there to help you find promising prospects and keep them interested. Use it to guide your messages and content. It should never be used to deny services to anyone or create unequal access, so always keep an eye out for potential adverse effects. People love to get useful information, but when it’s a little too specific about their lives, that’s verging on creepy! Don’t give the impression that you know solid facts about them. For example, instead of writing “Dear Family of 4”, choose images that would resonate with that family, or offer health fair invites focusing on pre-teen or infant health, according to what marketing data tells you is more relevant. With marketing data, you can avoid wasting time and money (and the embarrassment of) sending your geriatric services promotion to young newlyweds. Or you can connect the dots between services that marketing data suggests will appeal to the same demographic, such as women’s clinic patients who are interested in fitness, who may appreciate a poster about your orthopedics or dietetics promotion. Mastering healthcare marketing best practice Using customer insights to drive your marketing strategy has huge payoffs for patients and providers. Partnering with a reliable data steward will help you take your data analytics to the next level, and stay compliant at the same time. As the gold standard for consumer data privacy, Experian Health offers access to clean, original-source data and robust analytics platforms that give you the most comprehensive view of your health consumers – and peace of mind when it comes to compliance.

  How well do you know your customers? Do they have kids? Do they drive an electric car? Are they working two jobs? Do they use social media? Are they more likely to watch the Beyoncé documentary or live stream the PGA tour? The more you understand your patients and their inclinations, the more you can customize their experience with your brand. You can match your marketing messages to their personal preferences. You can refer them to information that’s relevant, and not bother them with stuff that’s not. When your patients feel taken care of as individuals, your brand will be top-of-mind next time they need healthcare services. This kind of personalization is at the heart of healthcare transformation. When you see your patients as customers and prioritize their experience above all else, in your services and your marketing, you’ll see returns in the form of increased patient satisfaction, rock-solid brand loyalty, better patient outcomes, and growing revenue. Consumer insights give you the competitive advantage In our Digital Onboarding Report 2017, we found that 60% of organizations considered customer experience to be the number one way to stand out from the competition over the next three years. Healthcare brands can learn from other industries and use data-driven consumer insights to personalize their marketing strategies and enhance the customer experience. In an example from the leisure industry, Adi Clowes, Head of Data & Analytics at Center Parcs said: “Influencing customers’ decisions, buying behavior and loyalty cannot be achieved in silos – it’s about using data to make a difference, connecting the business with their customers across the entire customer journey. At Center Parcs we’re committed to our vision of delivering the most personalized and proactive guest experiences at every single touchpoint. That relies on our ability to bring together millions of interactions, combining the voice of the customer with good quality data, and delivering it back to the business.” Harvard Business School points to big consumer brands like Under Armour, Rent the Runway, Peloton and Uber as examples of how consumer data can be used to make sure their brand is in the right place at the right time with the right message about the right product for each individual customer. From predicting a style of training shoe based on previous athletic purchases, to letting you know how long you’ll have to wait for a cab, other industries are leveraging data insights to optimize pretty much all aspects of the customer experience. The value for customers is immense, and so is the payoff for brands. There’s an untapped opportunity for healthcare to enjoy the same benefits. Kathy Giusti, co-chair of the Kraft Precision Medicine Accelerator at the Harvard Business School observes: “When I worked at the Gillette Co., we lived and breathed market research and consumer dynamics. We studied consumer behavior like crazy and we’re not necessarily doing that on the healthcare side as much.” Other sectors don’t think twice about leveraging consumer insights, like demographic, lifestyle and behavioral data, so why should health? Three ways to use consumer data in healthcare marketing From attracting new customers and supporting existing ones, to customer retention and future planning, insights offer value at every stage of the customer journey. Here are three ways to leverage consumer data for a stand-out customer experience:     Attract new customers Think about how many healthcare adverts you see featuring a happy family with two parents, two kids and a golden retriever, playing sports in their sunny garden. Now consider how many of your patients actually fit this image. Healthcare content often doesn’t match the reality of the condition or the patient’s life. When you learn what ‘real life’ looks like to your target population, you can throw away the tired clichés and stop relying on hunches. Insights help you determine what type of messaging and communication channels resonate best, so prospective patients feel like you’re speaking directly to them. Personalized marketing becomes a time-saver, a trust-builder and a problem-solver for your audience. The bland ‘voted best’ slogans mass mailed by your competitors won’t stand a chance. So how do you build a relationship with consumers you don’t yet know? You need good marketing data, directly from the consumer, and managed carefully by a data partner who bridges healthcare and marketing.     Segment and target your current customers Personalization is a proven way to boost retention. Research shows customized emails convert at a rate six to seven times higher than generic messages. Healthcare payers who tailor members’ experiences see five times higher retention rates. It’s a no-brainer. Consumer data lets you separate out the married couple with teenagers, who make buying decisions on impulse and like spending big on hiking and fishing gear, from the empty-nesters who enjoy horror movies and consider themselves savvy researchers when it’s time to choose a provider. How would your outreach messages differ for each family? Should you emphasize convenience or reliability? Safety or cutting-edge technology? Should your images reflect an active lifestyle or a cosy home? You could guess, or you can let the data guide your decisions and put the most relevant messages up top in your communications.     Gain consumer insights to optimize your offerings Another important way to leverage consumer data is in analytics. Let’s say you’re rolling out a new healthcare app to let patients set up appointments or check test results. Working with quality consumer data can help you identify the early adopters, and build models to help predict likely next adopters, allowing you to allocate resources accordingly. When you know a segment of your audience is uninspired by new technology, you know not to waste effort or budget trying to sell it to them in the early stages. Instead, you can give them alternatives that better match their preferences. You won’t get this from simply knowing their ailments. Clinical and claims data tells you plenty about what’s gone before, but it’s only when non-medical consumer data is pulled into the mix that we see real predictive power. Healthcare consumerism means putting patients first Perhaps it’s time to ask what’s missing from your healthcare consumer marketing strategy. Is it the consumers themselves? If so, you’re not alone. Healthcare marketing isn’t new, but marketing based on consumer insights is something that many healthcare providers aren’t fully tapping into yet. This is about using data to make a difference and connect with your customers in a meaningful way at every touch point. A one-size-fits-all approach just isn’t going to cut it.