MedCity Influencers

A sneak peek at the state of health care content marketing

Editor’s note: This post was originally published before the 2012 Content Marketing World Health Summit. As anyone in the  health care marketing industry  will tell you, content marketing in that space is a bit behind the times. The lag is due to a combination of factors, including legal and ethics issues, culture, history, and plain […]

By Joe Pulizzi on August 07, 2013 5:21 pm

Editor’s note: This post was originally published before the 2012 Content Marketing World Health Summit.

As anyone in the  health care marketing industry  will tell you, content marketing in that space is a bit behind the times. The lag is due to a combination of factors, including legal and ethics issues, culture, history, and plain old fear.

Now I would never proclaim to be an expert in health care  content marketing , but I’ve been around enough to know that everyone is talking about innovation in the health space, including the function of marketing. I believe if we are going to see true innovation in health care marketing, storytelling and authentic sharing are key.

So, just to get the ball rolling, here is a sneak peek at some of our research findings that we’ll formally release to the public at the event.

  • Health care companies outsource content marketing at a higher rate than other industries: Compared to all other industries in the study, health care brands outsource some portion of content marketing at approximately a 40 percent higher clip (63 percent, compared with an average of 45 percent).
  • Health care companies struggle with content marketing effectiveness: Just 28 percent of respondents feel that their content marketing is successful in solving their overall marketing objectives.
  • Health care companies use social media less often: Of the top 10 social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.), health care companies show substantially decreased usage — except for one: YouTube (video). Also, the total number of platforms used is lower than that of other industries — 4.5 channels leveraged versus 3.6 for health care companies).

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