healthcare.con
I have been ‘doing’ billable healthcare digital for 14 years. In the beginning there were video presentations, online Q&A sessions and clinical summary downloads; more recently, a wealth of Flash-enabled tools. To date it’s been pretty easy to repurpose content or repackage it as a digital thing and sell it as exactly that - a thing, a tactical item, a separate channel for delivering traditional content. “A better mousetrap” as Ian would say.
The digital gold rush has produced an interesting response in the healthcare agency world. First, we have learned to bolt Shockwave Flash capability onto an existing production function. We expanded our in-house capability to do this, or outsourced to those talented Shockwave Flash savvy freelancers/e-lancers available locally or globally.
The second reaction is more radical. Agencies have been set up to focus purely on the digital channel, merging a healthcare marketing background with the ability to talk to internal and external audiences entirely through online means.
We’re responding to the rise of what we know as web 2.0 (every evolution must be named!). The success of brands such as Google, Facebook, eBay, YouTube have forced the agency world to find ways of incorporating the Web 2.0 experience into our healthcare approach. It appears no longer acceptable to consider “digital” as remote from the strategic process, interactive paper that crops up when useful. We must use its real advantages: to assist brands not only with functional delivery, but emotional answers and even a service offer.
It strikes me that an uptake of “real digital” in healthcare, and the correct use of its communication opportunities, calls for agencies to evolve and not necessarily clients. For years I sat with numerous agencies and moaned about the slow adoption of digital in healthcare. Over time I started to see how the digital evolution meant an entirely new strategic process. Forget the production bolt-ons, our work now is a total re-think from the earliest stages of brand planning. That’s when we will see brand values such as ‘community building’ being agreed on and more importantly, delivered.
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