Introduction
The impact of social media on communication and business increases as the use of related platforms becomes a daily necessity for billions of people worldwide. Furthermore, the COVID-19 pandemic forced even such conservative industries as safety and healthcare to include and improve digitalized practices in their marketing and educational strategies (Schillinger et al., 2020). Hospitals, medication brands, and service providers had to develop approaches to reach their leads and customers via the most popular platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn. Social media is a helpful tool for healthcare marketing because of the large scope of potential clients representing diverse age, racial, and cultural groups (Suarez-Lledo & Alvarez-Galvez, 2021). For instance, promoting contraceptives via Facebook is efficient because the target audience, young women, is reachable through this platform. This paper aims to discuss how social media platforms are used as a tool for healthcare marketing, enabling related businesses to digitalize their communication with customers.
Healthcare Marketing
People became more aware and conscious of their health conditions after the COVID-19 pandemic and the developing trends of active life. Healthcare marketing is the operations initiated to reach certain audience groups to communicate and sell them products or services they potentially need (Çağlıyor et al., 2022). Traditional approaches, such as media campaigns, sponsorships, promotions, and recommendations from the industry’s professionals, are now competing with social media tools, such as target advertisement, product placement, and online discussions (Schillinger et al., 2020). Moreover, various healthcare marketing agencies are established nationwide to assist organizations in developing effective campaigns. Most of them utilize social media as an essential tool to gather data about audiences and reach them directly or via promotions and influencers.
How Social Media Influences Healthcare Marketing
Social media is a useful tool for healthcare marketing because the campaigns developed on online platforms are more straightforward and require fewer recourses for launching. The digitalized advertisement also can be tracked and updated more efficiently as clients’ interactions with the promotion are registered precisely. Social media also influences healthcare marketing because active lifestyle, longevity, and wellness are valued in most communities and displayed by popular bloggers as role model. However, private data protection regulations disrupt operations because information about individuals’ health conditions cannot be disclosed (Suarez-Lledo & Alvarez-Galvez, 2021). For example, Instagram or Facebook is not useful for promoting novel tools for diabetes treatment because there is no option to identify audiences with the disease. Offering them to clients via posters and recommendations in related hospital departments or pharmacies is more appropriate.
Healthcare Marketing Trends
Healthcare marketing changes toward prioritizing social media as a tool to reach potential consumers because of the platforms’ communicational and selling tactics. Additionally, such trends as telehealth and remote diagnosis help providers and hospitals integrate digital tools into their operations (Purcarea, 2019). The popularization of a healthy lifestyle in social media is also essential to improve online marketing strategies for related industries. Indeed, influencers who promote wellness products, legal medication, and services increase the interest in the segment and expand the target consumer base.
Conclusion
Today’s healthcare marketing uses social media to reach broader audiences and communicate with consumers more efficiently. Platforms allow producers to directly contact potential clients and conveniently provide them with the information necessary to sell a product. The influence of such strategies on healthcare marketing is significant because it determines the effectiveness of communication and competes with traditional promotions. Social media trends of healthy lifestyle promotion also assist related organizations and brands in integrating their offers into campaigns on Instagram, Facebook, and other platforms.
References
Çağlıyor, S., Tosun, P., & Uray, N. (2022). Communicating value in healthcare marketing from a social media perspective. In New Perspectives in Operations Research and Management Science (pp. 143-170). Springer, Cham. Web.
Purcarea, E. V. L. (2019). The impact of marketing strategies in healthcare systems. Journal of Medicine and Life, 12(2), 93. Web.
Schillinger, D., Chittamuru, D., & Ramírez, A. S. (2020). From “infodemics” to health promotion: A novel framework for the role of social media in public health. American Journal of Public Health, 110(9), 1393-1396. Web.
Suarez-Lledo, V., & Alvarez-Galvez, J. (2021). Prevalence of health misinformation on social media: Systematic review. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 23(1), e17187. Web.