7 Creative Marketing Ideas for Healthcare Organizations

Whether you’re focused on patient acquisition or trying to grow your organization, your marketing strategy will be at the crux of your success. And with the growing competition in the healthcare industry, it has become increasingly important to employ creative marketing tactics that cut through the clutter and deepen relationships with your patient population.

Check out these seven creative ideas that can help you breathe life into your healthcare organization’s marketing efforts.

1. Wellness Challenge

Start a wellness challenge among your patients and encourage them to share their progress on social media, tagging your organization and using a branded hashtag. You can even incentivize patients to post by offering prizes such as gift cards to healthy restaurants, free trials at local gyms or fitness gear in exchange for consistent participation. A great example of a wellness challenge in action is the award-winning United Health Care campaign, “We Dare You.”

2. Waiting Room Experience

Patients waiting to be seen by a physician are a captive audience, perfectly positioned to pay attention to any news or brand messaging you want to get in front of them. Utilize waiting room televisions, bulletin boards and signage to cross promote services, tout your doctors’ expertise and share other organizational updates. The content will be a welcome distraction to patients who are waiting to be seen and they’re likely to be more attentive.

3. Blogger Relations Campaign

The blogger community has been steadily growing over the years. Bloggers have developed an excellent amount of clout with their readers — in fact research has shown that 81% of the online population trusts advice they get from bloggers. By partnering with strategic bloggers, you can work with them to share your messaging in unique ways with their trusting audience. Vitamin developed an impactful blogger relations campaign for Saint Agnes Healthcare to generate awareness during Breast Cancer Awareness Month. We employed a variety of health, parenting and lifestyle bloggers to talk to their followers about the importance of breast health and getting a mammogram. The award-winning campaign was incredibly successful in spreading the message and raising awareness of the hospital’s Comprehensive Breast Center.

4. Mobilize Staff

Your doctors, nurses and administrative staff are your best brand ambassadors. They are on the front lines with your patients and are your most valuable communications resource. Find unique ways to mobilize your staff to promote key messaging. For example, arm your staff with “Ask Me About” buttons that promote new programs or services. Make sure they have all of the information and talking points needed to speak confidently and accurately.

5. Community Activation

Community involvement is an important component of any healthcare organization. Your continued commitment to the wellbeing of the people who live and work around you will do more to build trust and credibility for your organization than any perfectly crafted ad or social media post ever could. Hosting events like wellness fairs or block parties will put a friendly face to your organization’s name and give you a casual opportunity to provide information on services that will make your community a healthier place to live. For example, the Columbia University Medical Center hosts a Summer Haven block party to encourage their neighbors, patients and medical staff to get outside and enjoy the first days of summer.

6. Develop Strategic Partnerships

Two heads are better than one! Anytime you have the opportunity to partner with a synergistic, likeminded organization — consider it. For example, if you’re trying to increase your presence in a medically underserved community, reach out to the neighborhood associations or community nonprofits to see if you can work together. Developing the right partnerships will give you direct access to a broader patient population, help you disseminate your messaging more effectively, alleviate your team of doing all of the work and align your organization with ones of value.

7. New Patient Forms

Every patient who walks through your door most likely has to fill out new patient forms before receiving care. These forms are an easy way to reach people who may tune out many of the other tactics you will use to try to reach them down the road. Consider promoting major services, events or programs in your new patient forms packet — this will ensure that new patients are educated about your organization at the first visit.

Feeling inspired and want to learn more about creative healthcare marketing solutions? Contact us to start the conversation.