Diagnostic industry is rapidly adopting digital marketing to tap the expanding healthcare services market in the country and deliver better services to consumers thereby improving quality of care.
According to Deloitte, the Indian healthcare market, which is worth $100 billion, is likely to grow at a 23% CAGR to reach $280 billion by 2020. Digital marketing offers lot of promise for the diagnostic industry across the value chain and for each stakeholder which include doctors, hospitals, pathologists, labs and most importantly the end consumers. It opens new vistas of engagement, access to quality services, ease of consumption, enhanced experience and much better health management. It will really help the ecosystem become more consumer centric and thus more efficient and structured, said Piyush Kumar, chief marketing officer, Metropolis Healthcare, a leading diagnostic chain.
Across the entire value chain of diagnostic process, digital is playing a pivotal role and is getting adopted at a rapid pace to deliver better services, enhanced experience, create awareness, share knowledge on both the platforms B2B and B2C. In fact on the B2E side, the adoption has been much faster, said Kumar.
With the onset of the modern day digital medium, tech-savvy customers have information at their fingertips with easy access to peer groups and expert forums for quick reviews and information about diseases and illnesses. Their decision to seek service from a specific healthcare facility is no longer impulsive rather; it is driven by extensive research on internet. Consumers especially younger ones are turning to online resources to self-diagnose and treat – which is making content even more important.
Taking serious note of this, major diagnostic players like Metropolis Healthcare, Dr Lal PathLabs, SRL Diagnostics etc have adopted digital marketing to engage the audience. They are reaching to all stakeholders like doctors, labs, hospitals, pathologists and consumers.
Digital marketing helps improve quality of care for patients. It is also opening the doors to new technologies and the way people interact and access data. Now all your health records can be digitized which can be analyzed basis historic data and predictive modelling. Availability of test parameters data trends can really help a patient keep track of inner health and take corrective actions in time. Senior patients can book a home visit through an app to avail blood test at home services. They can even pay through wallets and cards while at home.
Awareness on ailments, diseases, symptoms etc has been enhanced due to availability of interesting data formats and high speed connectivity. It is now much easier to educate, share, consult and inform the patients. At Metropolis, we are in consistent touch with our consumers through social and multiple channels while we do over 30 million tests every year, said chief marketing officer.
Shedding light on future of digital marketing technologies in Indian healthcare industry particularly diagnostic industry, he said “Lots of new technologies will enter this space across all platforms. IoT, chatbots, artificial intelligence, predictive analytics and more while technologies like wearables, eHR, telediagnostics, digital pathology are already creating an impact.”
Refuting a report that digital channels are overshadowing traditional marketing, he stated “This is not correct. In fact it is adding another dimension to traditional marketing by making it more effective, personalized and measurable. New age channels are great places to start conversations with consumers and to engage them for better awareness about their inner health.”