I’ve found that I’m answering more and more questions about relationship marketing in pharma, so I wanted to provide my perspective. Most pharma companies have some ongoing relationship marketing program typically in the form of a newsletter or other regular email or direct mail-based program. But there’s a lot more to relationship marketing than the occasional email especially when it comes to digital.

Relationship marketing is exactly what is sounds like. It’s marketing that involves an ongoing relationship between customer and company. “Relationship” is of course the key word, but often times, it’s really just a one-way communication:company to consumer. That’s going to have to change.  A few trends in pharma and healthcare are going to make this happen whether we like it or not. Understanding these trends is going to be critical if your relationship marketing program is going to bring value to customers or be piled in with the rest of the spam out there.

Here are six emerging trends that every pharma and healthcare company needs to consider not just in regards to their relationship marketing programs, but in all their marketing efforts.

• Healthcare Information 24/7 —  The information that consumers will have access to and will use to make decisions will continue to increase in volume and availability.
• Consumers As “Physicians” — With the staggering increase in bloggers, user-generated media (such as YouTube), and social networking, end users are creating and controlling more and more of the content available online.
• Internet = Trusted Source — All other forms of media already fall behind the Internet as a source for healthcare information for most Americans.
• It’s Their Data, Not Yours — In the future, consumers will have more control of their healthcare records and history.
• Healthy Social Networking — Because of the sheer number of people utilizing the Internet, it is possible to find people who share the same experiences as you.
• Constant Contact, Constant Care — Some technologies to monitor patients’ health, now in early development, which still are largely cumbersome and not embraced by the public, will become more widespread.

If you want more information on each of these trends, then you can download my full white paper on this topic: The Future of Healthcare Relationship Marketing  (1583 downloads)

You can download more publications and presentations on the “Pubs and Presos” page.

If you want to be informed of any new white papers I publish, just fill out the form below. Your information will only be used for this purpose and will never be shared under any circumstance. (Note: this form will not work in email clients or within Feedburner. Please click through to the post to fill it out.)

Possibly related posts (auto-generated):

1. Emerging Media in Healthcare and Pharma White Paper
2. No, Pharma’s Digital Future Isn’t All Social Media
3. The 7 Biggest Mistakes in Digital Relationship Marketing