Health Marketing: What It Is and What It Isn’t

Michael StellefsonDoctoral Student

Department of Health and KinesiologyTexas A&M University

Business Mindsets

Product Mindset- a wealth of products are offered due to the very high demand for those products.

Sales Mindset- supply outgrows demand, so you have to begin “selling” your products through persuasion and advertising.

Marketing Mindset- instead of just producing products and then trying to “sell” them to consumers, first determine what customers want before even producing the product.

Traditional Marketing Defined

Marketing- satisfying producer and consumer wants and needs through exchange processes (Kotler, 1979)

The bottom line of all private sector marketing is the production of sales

To achieve sales objectives, private sector marketers engage in activities that are designed to change beliefs, attitudes, and values Their reasoning for doing this is that they expect

such changes to lead to increased sales

Marketing and Exchange

Type of Marketing

Price Is exchanged for…

Benefit

Traditional Money → New Car

Health Travel time to doctors → Cancer

Screening

Marketing Principles

Achieving the “sale” is the desired outcome A market not only has a need, but also has

the ability, willingness, and authority to address the need.

Marketing involves developing and managing a product that will satisfy target market needs

Organization Centered “Marketing”

The organizations offering is seen as inherently desirable.

Lack of organizational success is attributed to customer ignorance, absence of motivation, or both

A minor role is afforded to customer research Marketing is defined primarily as promotion One ‘best’ marketing strategy is typically employed in

approaching the entire market Competition from competing forces tends to be

ignored

Consumer Centered Marketing

Focuses on behavior as the “bottom line” of much of what it does.

Rely heavily on research. Has a bias toward segmentation. Defines competition broadly. Uses strategies using all elements of the “marketing

mix” not just “communication”

Selling vs. Marketing

Selling – concentrating on producer’s needs Marketing – concentrates on the needs of

the public

Advertising Advertising- to make known or to give notice about

a product, service or program To tell about or praise publicly as through newspaper,

flyers, radio, TV, etc., so as to make people want to buy something

DO NOT EQUATE MARKETING WITH ADVERTISING

Those who equate marketing with advertising believe that the goal of marketing is to get the word out about behavior change or change attitudes about particular behaviors without determining whether each of these “objectives” will lead to the desired behavior change (goal)

Non-Profit Marketing

Includes marketing activities conducted by individuals and organizations to achieve some social goal other than ordinary business goals of profit, market share, or return on investment.

Social Marketing Adaptation of commercial marketing

technologies to programs designed to influence the voluntary behavior of priority audiences to improve their personal welfare and that of the society of which they are a part

Health Marketing Involves creating, communicating, and delivering health information &

interventions using customer-centered and science-based strategies to deliver health interventions (CDC, 2005)

Draws from marketing, communication and health promotion National Center for Health Marketing (CDC) http://

www.cdc.gov/healthmarketing/

Health Marketing and Exchange

Target Market

Item #1 Item #2 Outcome Value

Elderly Time → Read health info in paper

Favorable

Elderly Time → Read health info online

Not favorable

Kids Time → Read health info in paper

Not favorable

Kids Time → Read health info online

Favorable

Health Marketing vs. Health Communication Too many confuse health marketing with

health communication. While marketers communicate information,

marketing is not simply education dissemination.

Many health communication programs are largely educational In taking a marketing perspective, education is

only useful if it leads to the desired behavior change (Andreasen, 1995).

Marketing has a Behavioral Bottom Line

Those without a “behavioral bottom line” are more inclined to evaluate program success in non-behavioral terms such as the number of messages distributed, beliefs changed, or sessions held (Process evaluation measures)

Health communication tends to measure success by what can be measured, rather than tackle the harder problem of figuring out what should be measured and then attempting to do so (Andreasen, 1995)

Next time…

Integrating marketing activities and consumer behavior theory into marketing agendas