Transactions between healthcare providers and consumers are not one-time events between a single buyer and a single seller. Consumers now have multiple options to choose from for every service, and the stakes are much higher than they are for purchasing items for the home, according to Deloitte’s 2016 Consumer Priorities in Health Care Survey.
To achieve effective customer engagement, you’ll need to acquire solid information about what your clients want to enable you to deliver personalized healthcare experiences.
Putting Patient Needs First
A recent study by Accenture shows strategies for customer engagement need to include easy access to records and healthcare education for patients, even those who aren’t digitally savvy. To reach a majority of consumers, as a healthcare provider you’ll need to review how you connect with patients, and whether the methods you’re currently using are resonating with your customers.
By putting consumer needs ahead of your company’s need for easier methods of outreach, you’ll be able to offer the type of experience your patients want.
What Consumers Want
Making consumer needs a priority doesn’t mean discarding technology developments, however; it just means you need to have a greater focus on the ways people connect with your company, and whether these methods work for a critical mass.
The Deloitte study identified data patterns showing the primary factors that genuinely mattered to healthcare consumers. They were as follows:
- Personalized interactions with doctors, hospitals and other providers
- Having a range of affordable options to choose from for care
- Convenient access to healthcare providers
- Being digitally connected to providers
Currently, many providers are succeeding with #4 but doing less well with numbers 1 through 3, indicating that perhaps we’re looking in the wrong place in our efforts to relate to healthcare consumers.
Getting It Right
Having said all that, there’s irrefutable evidence from McKinsey that tech-enabled consumers are re-ordering the healthcare landscape and moving toward creating their own health management “eco-systems.”
These changes indicate a substantial amount of healthcare spending that could be up for grabs by providers who get the formula right. Various studies show technology could make it possible to provide primary care much less expensively, and while this will benefit mainly the patients, providers should enjoy some benefits.
Getting your fair share of this pie will depend on you being a healthcare provider who conquers the mysteries of customer engagement and succeeds in being an integral part of each consumer’s digital eco-system.
For more insights on creating successful healthcare marketing campaigns, call Wax Custom Communications at 305.350.5700 or visit waxcom.com.
