Overview
Healthcare Direct Advertising is a process of communication that seeks to promote a product, service, or brand. And it is often seen that 10% – 20% of the annual budget of a company is for marketing only. Where most of the companies are totally free for utilizing any means of marketing, pharmaceutical companies face a hindrance while doing the same. In most countries, pharmaceutical companies are not allowed to advertise most of the medical products on TV, radio, and other means of media.
Direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) is a form of promotion that aims to market prescription pharmaceutical products to the end patient rather than health care professionals. Direct to consumer pharmaceutical advertising can appear in a variety of media, including magazines, newspapers, social media, TV and radio. DTCA can have a variety of purposes – for instance, to convince customers that a company’s pharmaceutical products are the best, inform consumers about uses for established products or announce new products. It hinges on advertising products directly to consumers, bypassing third parties.
What are the benefits of Direct to Consumer Advertising?
Direct-to-consumer advertising (DTCA) is generally the tactic used by pharmaceutical companies to market prescription drugs to the public. DTCA has caused some controversy but yet, on the other hand, DTCA has tremendous benefits, such as helping people become more informed about diseases and their cures. Some of the detailed benefits of DTCA may be as follows:
- Patient Awareness – Ads for prescription drugs help develop a consumer base that is more informed about certain diseases or disorders and how medication may help. DTCA triggers a reminder in people who already have a condition that the person needs to take their medication, which helps people stick to their drug schedule.
- Increase in Preventive Care – Direct to Consumer Advertisements benefit the healthcare system as a whole by motivating people to go to their doctor with health concerns and get preventative treatment rather than waiting until they need a lengthy hospital stay or possibly even surgery.
- Positive Response – a recent study found that the public has responded most positively to the increase in prescription drug advertisements. In 2004, a study was conducted and it was found that only 19% of respondents believed that DTCA had a negative impact on health care. 14% of people in the same study went to the doctor specifically because of DCTA ads and 5 percent felt that they had more say in their health care decisions. DTCA ads were especially helpful in getting low-income families to seek medical care. Low-income individuals and families are typically the hardest demographic to reach for any public awareness campaign.
- Physician’s Feedback – most physicians feel that patients ask better and more logical questions and have a better understanding of treatments for their condition after seeing DTCA ads. In addition, patients are often quite adept at recognizing conditions. According to a 2004 survey, 88% of the people ended up having the condition they came to the doctor for.
Advertising in Pharmaceutical Industry
Healthcare marketing today should be all about the patient. Pharmaceutical, Diagnostics, HealthCare Brands that embrace the power of digital innovation and a customer-first business model will succeed in building more effective interactions, deeper loyalty, and lasting brand preference. Despite the squeeze of cost-control, regulatory restrictions, and global competition, the marketing world of pharma will adapt going forward to focus on the user, not the drugs.
Traditional healthcare marketing strategies in this industry have revolved around vigorous product marketing of the prescription drugs that the decision-makers think will make money. Commercial success is attributed to aggressive digital marketing and promotional activity—usually targeted to the physician
The health care system is responding to the evolving trend toward integrated health management by implementing a multi-disciplinary approach to health care. Pharmaceutical companies are responding with personalized and improved offerings that have been fine-tuned to address patients’ specific needs throughout the health care value chain
Health care technology is the key to enabling a patient-centric approach. This approach could perhaps be achieved using predictive analytics tools, powered by artificial intelligence and machine learning to help determine which patients are at the highest risk of hospital readmission.
Regardless of which technologies are used and how they are levered, those pharmaceutical companies who insert themselves into this value chain in a meaningful way with patients, providers, and payers, will build value, trust, and loyalty with their constituents. In doing so, they’ll be miles ahead of the pharmaceutical companies who cling to in-person physician visits and sales sampling that worked in the past.
Investing in emerging technologies isn’t without risk. For pharma firms in particular, regulatory considerations do not come without risk. Still, for those firms that embrace the power of technologies and put the customer first, the opportunity is endless.
How ERemedium can help Pharmaceutical Companies?
ERemedium is India’s largest health literacy platform and leading Healthcare Digital Marketing Agency with a presence in over 3,000 centers and impacting 10 million patients monthly.
ERemedium works closely with over 10,000 Doctors to better engage and communicate with patients by creating patient education Animation. Here are the ways through which we can help you to run a successful marketing campaign digitally by the production of patient education animation targeted towards Patients as well as Doctors. We specialise in airing Direct to Consumer Advertisements since our media are placed in well discoverable places like Waiting Areas, Doctors Chamber and our own Social Media Platforms.
Our other Effective Media are as follows:
MEDIO: Medio uses OPD Waiting Area TV to increase patient satisfaction, ease waiting time, and promote health literacy at the moment of greatest impact. The Healthcare digital Marketing team also uses it to promote services, facilities, and latest updates to ensure patients feel a connection to your practice. Medio runs patient information animation and empowers patients with healthy lifestyle animations, like nutrition and exercise, condition-specific animations, and much more while they are waiting to meet the Doctor. Content is approved by top medical associations and personalised to Doctor’s Speciality and Care Setting.
For more information: https://eremedium.in/medio/
MEDCOMM: Touch Screen Signage embedded with 3D Gesture Driven patient information videos personalized to Speciality and Care setting. Doctors can now communicate over 1,000 Conditions, Procedures, and Treatment Options with Patients in an unprecedented way. Medcomm enables Quality Consultation in less time by use of copyrighted content library consisting of 3D Anatomy, Gesture driven patient information Animations. A centralised Knowledge base of Latest Research, Clinical Tools, Medical Information at fingertips. Medcomm is also capable of running promotions which ultimately helps in the digital marketing of pharmaceutical companies.
For more information: https://eremedium.in/medcomm/
CONTENT STUDIO: Our content studio team is one of the best digital healthcare marketing consultants and creative agencies in India. Our healthcare marketing experts collaborate with Doctors, Hospitals, and Healthcare Brands with expertise in Communication strategy, Program Design, Program Execution, KOL engagement. We tell stories leveraging media formats ranging from animation production, animations & infographics that connect healthcare brands, doctors, patients, and caregivers. In a span of just 2 years, Eremedium Content Studio has emerged as the leading Patient Education Animation production company in India with deep expertise in the production of Patient Information Animations and Patient Information Videos for Hospitals, Clinics, and Leading Healthcare Brands.
Our healthcare marketing samples are available at https://eremedium.in/studio
