Clever Hospitals Find Another Way to Snag New Patients

Last month, I wrote about a hospital system in Colorado that had discovered a way to cross market its more profitable emergency room services if a patient first came to its urgent care center. Pretty clever! Then recently I came across another health care marketing trick close to home and just as sly. As I sat on a New York subway one sizzler of a day, an ad for an ice cream cone grabbed my attention. Ice cream! Hot day! After a closer read, I realized the ad was not touting ice cream but the Center for Advanced Digestive Care, a part of New York Presbyterian, one of the city’s most prestigious hospitals and well known for its TV ads designed to cultivate brand recognition.
Digestive care? Why not? Health care advertising has long bombarded consumers – care for pimples, care for weak ankles, braces for crooked teeth and those gross “pouring on the pounds” warnings from the Department of Health about drinking too much soda. Still, marketing excellence in digestive care isn’t something that would catch the eye of most casual subway riders. The ice cream cone was an effective attention-grabber.
So was the message: “Are her tummy aches too much chocolate swirl or is it lactose intolerance?” Was New York Presbyterian borrowing a page from drug makers? Pharma advertisements are renowned for suggesting that you might have an undiagnosed or untreated disease and then offering remedies to cure it. Consider the ads for the top three most commonly p...

Source: Disruptive Women in Health Care - August 19, 2014 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: dw at disruptivewomen.net Tags: Uncategorized Source Type: blogs