How to empower your health and wellness customers

Vince Schaller, Managing Director, Schawk (Los Angeles) “Ask your doctor if it’s right for you.” That advice, familiar in the U.S. ever since direct-to-consumer pharmaceutical advertising became legal nearly 20 years ago, is still sound. But today, consumers are increasingly asking themselves, before they even schedule a doctor’s appointment, “What are the right choices for me?” Call it the increasing consumerism of health and wellness. Or, in the words of Kristin Hambelton, one of many CMOs who are bringing traditional marketing strategies to healthcare-oriented enterprises, call it the “Amazon Effect.” As Hambelton explains, “We want what we want, when we want it, and if we can’t get it from one place we’ll just keep looking until someone meets our needs.” New Choices, Increased Competition, Ubiquitous Information Pharmaceutical companies, medical device manufacturers, healthcare organizations, hospitals, clinics, insurers, and even individual providers are all facing a new reality: The empowered healthcare consumer. It’s a transformation driven in part by the proliferation of choices and the easy availability of product information and reviews—in other words, the “Amazon Effect.” But there are other powerful drivers as well. In the U.S., the Affordable Care Act has created a marketplace in which insurers are competing to attract tens of millions of new subscribers directly, rather than through employer-based plans. At the same time, consume...
Source: Mass Device - Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Tags: Blog Schawk Source Type: news