Creating a Patient Buyer Journey Map for Post COVID-19, Five Key Elements

 

Image by Free-Photos from Pixabay

It is an understatement to say that the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has fundamentally changed the way patients search for and receive medical care. With many more care options for convenient and accessible medical care, driven by the digitization of healthcare delivery, patients will never go back to the way it was. 

Patients realize their need for hospital services revolves around specific services such as emergency care, intensive care, complex acute medical conditions, PICU, or NICU. With the awareness and experience of alternatives for care, patients are more in control of the medical care buying journey with their physician.

While a patient buying journey map pre-pandemic was a useful tool in understanding key decision points in patient choice, now is the time to start anew and create a new journey map. Though we are still in the darkest and deepest winter of the pandemic, it will come to an end.  The updated patient buyer's journey will provide new clues and ways of engaging, messaging, communicating, and marketing. The impact in growth and revenue will be significant, driving the hospital forward in a direction that is more patient-focused and responsive to needs.

Patient Buyer Journey

In the current pandemic environment, marketing campaigns, such as messaging that we care more about, have the best facilities, the best technology, or multiple locations are meaningless today.  How hospitals communicate overall with some variations on features across the continuum of care may differ, but still, at its most basic level, are substantiallyidentical. 

Image by Andrew Martin from Pixabay

Of course, brand reputation can be a powerful influencer, but some providers struggle when they don't have a considerable brand reputation or more than basic patient understanding. I propose for your consideration, that pre-pandemic buyer journey maps are most likely irrelevant in a post-pandemic world.

What is the change that is required?

The requirement is to move from an overreliance on features and benefits marketing to organizational patient-focused culture and strategy. The marketing operation becomes highly integrated internally, and shifts to inbound marketing. Marketing's job is now to provide the right content, at the right time, in the proper healthcare context during the patient's buying journey.

Influencing the patient's journey is about highly effective content with context for engagement.

When hospital leadership understands the buying processes, then marketing becomes far more useful. Marketing moves from putting the heads in the beds or focused on brand awareness and image in the hopes that the patient chooses the hospital, to a defined process that produces growth and puts heads in the appropriate setting be that inpatient, outpatient, or community-based centers.

Next steps

Creating a patient journey map takes time and resources. Let me be clear that this is some heavy lifting if done correctly. No shortcuts are allowed.

Key Elements

There are many ways to map, and a search on the IoT will provide one with all the templates necessary. But at a minimum, the following information is essential to the process and understanding from multiple sources. Keep a singular focus on the patient stages of Awareness, Consideration, and Decision. Each step will have one or more pieces of the informational puzzle for the patient map. 

1.       Identify the initial touchpoints, places, influencers, and moments that lead to first contact. 

2.       Learn what journey process steps are the patient takes and conversations they engage in finding solutions. 

3.       Map the flow of the process steps and experiences leading up to purchase. 

4.       Determine the engagement content that drops at the appropriate patient journey stage, influencing the patient's decision to select, purchase, and consume. 

5.       Then identify and map the ongoing experience and reactions to the purchase.

After all, if you want to survive, thrive, and grow in the post SARS-CoV-2 pandemic healthcare environment, then you must understand the patient's buyers' journey like you have never done before.

Image by Gerd Altmann form Pixabay

Michael is a healthcare business, marketing, communications strategist, and thought leader. As an internationally followed healthcare strategy blogger, his blog, Healthcare Marketing Matters, is read in 52 countries and is listed on the 100 Top Healthcare Marketing Blogs & Websites ranked at No. 3 on the list by Feedspot.com. Michael is a Life Fellow, American College of Healthcare Executives. An influencer in healthcare marketing strategy, communications, digital marketing, and social media, Michael is in the top 10 percent of social media experts nationwide. For inquiries regarding strategic consulting engagements, you can email me at michael@themichaeljgroup.com. 

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The opinions expressed are my own.