The No Normal Show by BPD (BPD)

Quest for Sleep - https://shortyawards.com/15th/the-quest-for-sleep

Breast Health Check https://www.webershandwick.com/work/a-love-hate-relationship/

Is your marketing team ready for the AI revolution? We sat down with Paul Roetzer, Founder and CEO of the Marketing AI Institute, to discuss how CMOs and healthcare marketers can approach AI in 2025. Healthcare marketers are still experimenting with AI—but need to scale, quickly. Ready, set, AI.

• What overturning Roe v. Wade could mean for providers

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Rev Cycle Intelligence Article: 1 in 5 Hospital Execs Expect Revenue Declines of Over 30% in 2020

Key Takeaways

Transitional Messaging

• We're seeing a shift from safety messaging to communications about accessing care in a post-COVID-19 world.
• There's a lot of fear from clinicians and administrators to make up lost time from a revenue standpoint and get people the care they need.

Timeline for Transitional Messaging

• The next narrative health systems and providers should be conveying:
  • It's safe to come back to healthcare.
  • You should be getting the healthcare you need.
  • Here are the specific service lines that are open and available now.
• We're going to move forward with reassurance messaging in the current market and evaluate every 30 days so that we can continue to be agile in our communications.

Scenario Planning for a Resurgence  

• We're looking at multiple scenarios with our clients. We're asking:
  • What happens if cases spike in the summer?
  • What happens if cases drop?  
  • What happens during the flu season?
• In some cases, we're using the same overarching brand campaign construct focused on personal safety, staying indoors, and wearing masks.  

Positioning Messaging

• We're looking back and using successful past campaigns and putting the focus of the messaging on the community and off of us.
• We want to position our clients as leaders through a campaign that can not only be good for now but can also carry them through 2020 and 2021.

Channel Engagement

• Provide a Q&A or some mechanism for people to be able to come in and ask questions.
• Virtual care and telemedicine are going to play a big part in this as well. We want to make sure that we are connecting to audiences looking for care in that modality.

Transitional Messaging in Leadership

• Leadership has been remarkably on board and enthusiastic about connecting and becoming more trusted by consumers and patients in the community.

Tracking the Narrative

• We should focus on patient retention and getting the individuals whom we already know need care.
• As we step up as community leaders, this is an opportunity for patient acquisition.
• We're going to focus on how people are coming to visit the resources that we are providing. You should ask yourself:
  • What kind of questions are they asking?
  • What is the volume of questions we're getting through some of those channels?
• We are creating individualized URLs so that we can see from a digital standpoint what is working well with consumers. 

Takeaways

• Our new book, Joe Public 2030: Five Potent Predictions Reshaping How Consumers Engage Healthcare, is now available for pre-order.
• Joe Public 2030 is Chris Bevolo’s 7th book. His writing journey started when an industry publisher came to him to write a book on brand for health systems.
• To write the book, Chris assembled a team of Revivers – Team 2030 – to collect as much research as possible. The team identified trends across literature, which evolved into Joe Public 2030’s five predictions.
• These findings were supplemented by in-depth interviews with healthcare industry leaders across verticals, including health system CEOs, venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, researchers, and physicians. Interviewed thought leaders come from some of the top brands in healthcare, such as CVS, Geisinger, Intermountain Healthcare, Optum, Johns Hopkins University Medical Center, and Mayo Clinic.

Prediction #1: Copernican Consumer

• Enabled by sensors, AI, and other technology, consumers are becoming the center of their own health universe.
• Potential results could include a dramatic reduction in the need for primary care clinicians, an entirely new sector devoted to personal health management, and true precision medicine combined with health management.
• The Copernican Consumer prediction is more than just patient-centric care. Instead, the Copernican Consumer is a prediction that places consumers as the central force in their own health, with physicians, health management tools, and other health-related services “orbiting” around them. Consumers will rarely go anywhere to receive health support or care – it all will come to them.
• Another difference from today is the frequency of consumer health engagement. Consumers will be able to continually monitor their health using aggregate health data. Instead of seeing a primary care doctor once per year, consumers will be able to access all the data they need and will be empowered to make care decisions.
• More sensors are being developed to enable this trend but are not yet in a place where they are sophisticated enough to support a Copernican Consumer.

Prediction #2: Constricted Consumerism

• Consumers will become increasingly responsible for their own health and use of healthcare services. Yet, they will actually become less and less empowered in the choices they have for care, especially in higher-acuity, higher-cost situations.
• While many in the industry will continue to sing the praises of choice, the reality is that most consumers will have far fewer choices moving forward, often in ways they might never consider or see.
• The biggest spender of healthcare money in the United States is the federal government. Employers are the second biggest healthcare spenders as they support employee health plans. For this reason, the federal government and employers are the consumers with the most power to determine how and when consumers receive care.
• For example, PBMs don’t always work in favor of the consumer. Instead, they work to control costs for the payor. Similarly, 72% of ACA health plans are considered “narrow networks.”
• Health insurance companies are the driving force behind these restricted networks and benefit from them. For example, UnitedHealth just reported a 12% increase in revenue for 2021.
• This prediction, in some ways, conflicts with the Copernican Consumer prediction, which places consumers in control of their health.
• The tension between predictions comes from consumers’ current inability to interpret and take action on their health data. How do we ensure that experts guide consumers in understanding their health information?
• This new advisory role may allow industry players to monetize this service, which would significantly impact the market landscape.

Prediction #3: Funnel Wars

• Non-healthcare organizations such as Walmart, CVS, Walgreens, Amazon, and Apple are entering healthcare through low-acuity services like primary care and urgent care.
• Health systems may not currently perceive these organizations as a competitive threat because low-acuity services are less profitable.
• These new entrants pose a competitive threat because they control referrals to higher acuity services – which health systems need to survive.
• Moving forward, we could see the splitting of the health system model, with some systems moving even further to the larger, more comprehensive “health” organizations, others retracting into solely acute-care destinations – the “giant ICU on a hill” – and others somewhere in the middle.
• How does the aging population fit into this? What will health systems’ role be in the future?

Prediction #4: Rise of Health Sects

• Challenges to and skepticism of the mainstream medical field have exploded in the past two years because of the pandemic and political tribalism in the United States. Taken to its potential, this trend could result in multiple “health sects” that coalesce around people’s political affiliations and worldviews.
• These sects will not only follow the medical thinking that best fits their worldview, but may also create their own reality through alternative research, diagnosis, treatment approaches, and models for care delivery.
• Health systems, built to serve entire communities, will find it increasingly difficult to deliver care due to splintering care ideologies. Health systems have a duty to provide science-backed medical care yet face resistance from those who don’t believe in mainstream medical practices.
• A significant factor in The Rise of Health Sects is the loss of trust of health experts. Some medical schools train students to build a thought leadership presence online to combat this loss of trust in the healthcare system and disseminate mainstream medical thought.

Prediction #5: Disparity Dystopia

• The pandemic shone an ugly light on the disparities that have plagued the U.S. healthcare system for decades, and unfortunately, that health gap is more likely than not to expand.
• This shift will be compounded by the mental health crisis, which disproportionately affects systemically disadvantaged populations and groups outside traditional healthcare access channels.
• While those entities that might address these disparities increasingly struggle financially, others lack the incentives to focus on the growing issue.
• The CommonWealth released a report that found that healthcare is better for white people in nearly every state. At the same time, we see a growing list of trendy startups looking to disrupt primary care, with many companies focusing on healthy, relatively well-off patients.
• Looking at the availability of PPE, ventilators, COVID-19 tests throughout the pandemic, you can see that populations with higher incomes are favored in resource distribution.
• According to Rand Corporation, the bottom fifth of low-income households are spending nearly 34% of their income on healthcare.

Who are you, what is your brand promise? 

• Mount Sinai Health System is different from many academic medical centers because the school was born out of the health system.  
• Their primary commitments – a defined brand, commitment to growth, organizational excellence – all roll up to facilitating a quality patient experience where the customer journey matches the expectations set by the brand promise.  
• Brand encompasses more than advertising – it should serve as the "soul" or DNA of an organization, driving each function with purpose.  
• Mount Sinai committed to an organization-wide rollout to define its brand position, including a series of workshops, one-on-one interviews, coordination with HR, testing, and iteration.  
• Definitions are critical to the success of brand positioning because not everyone has the same baseline understanding of marketing. Teams must define core concepts like positioning, brand, and logo. 

Organizational feng shui: Centralizing the marketing function 

• Value-based care, digital health innovation, and consolidation have created a significant debate on centralizing the marketing function in health systems.
• Mount Sinai saw an opportunity to drive organization-wide efficiencies by centralizing its marketing function. However, to execute, they needed to stay aligned with business goals and develop a scalable strategy while maintaining chair relationships. 
• The Mount Sinai team needed to demonstrate that decisions made in silos result in disconnect from a larger mission and a loss of efficacy. For instance, some facilities were bidding on the same keywords in their SEM programs, ultimately driving up costs for everyone.   

The real digital front door 

• Most health systems' real digital front door is google, as 80% of customers start online – even if they've already received a diagnosis and referral. Health systems need to show up with content that meets these research needs. 
• Once you've assisted the research process, you need to make the decision easy for them with convenient access to your services. Patients with diagnoses will likely be emotional, and a challenging provider selection process makes for a stressful experience.  
• Each diagnosis is unique, meaning patient research needs per diagnosis are also unique. To accommodate patients, we must build numerous decision-making pathways based on diagnosis without overwhelming the patient. 
• Technology is valuable because it offers a virtual experience. It's valuable because it's convenient. Don't over-invest in technology that doesn't serve the goal of a convenient patient experience.  

Three articles to read:

• Ageism in healthcare: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2024/03/07/1236371376/bias-ageism-older-adults-geriatrics
• Amy Webb's 2024 Emerging Tech Trend Report @ SXSW: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uLSDbh6M_U
• President Biden Takes New Steps to Lower Prescription Drug and Health Care Costs, Expand Access to Health Care, and Protect Consumers: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/03/06/fact-sheet-president-biden-takes-new-steps-to-lower-prescription-drug-and-health-care-costs-expand-access-to-health-care-and-protect-consumers/

Takeaways

What is ethnography, and why is it valuable? 

• Surveys and focus groups can result in a “contaminated” interpretation of the truth in which the context of the survey or focus group influences participants’ responses.
• One of the best ways to learn about your audiences is to observe their words, emotions, and actions in the context of their daily lives – this is called ethnography.
• Living and following your audience’s lifestyle offers a more accurate picture of what they’re thinking and doing, as it reveals unconscious actions and interpretations.
• For example, if you are evaluating product placement in grocery stores, observing someone shop in the context of their daily lives – every item they look at, reach for, or put back – may reveal more than the participant is aware of.

When to use, when not to use 

• Ethnography should be performed at the onset of a project because it allows us to understand human motivations and behavior that can then guide analytics and strategy.
• Ethnographic research offers rich opportunities for health system marketers to understand their patient populations because so much of health happens every day.
• For instance, a chronic condition can affect a patient’s everyday life – what they can and can’t do and the decisions they make. Understanding these lifestyle challenges allows health system marketers to cater to them.
• Ethnography is not a good approach for tactical tasks such as A/B testing creative or messaging because it can overcomplicate more minor decisions, making them more cumbersome.

If you like people watching, you’re halfway there 

• Don’t talk too much, and let the action unfold in front of you. Try to make your footprint in the research as minimal as possible.
• Much of the time, ethnographic research means going into someone’s house, which is very personal. This is a privilege, so marketers need to do everything they can to make subjects feel comfortable.
• Interviewing populations without conditions can be as powerful as interviewing those with conditions because it offers a more holistic community perspective.
• For example, ReviveHealth and Community Health Innovations (CHI) partnered to perform ethnographic research on diabetes in Monterey County, CA. We spoke to 10 families around the county with similar education levels without screening for diabetes.
• Interviewing independent of diagnosis revealed patients suffering from diabetes without a diagnosis. It also gave us an understanding of the community dynamics diabetics live in.

What do a fictional death, a DOJ investigation, and Kendrick Lamar have in common? In this episode of the No Normal Show, Desirée, Stephanie, and Chris connect the dots between pop culture, marketing, and the ever-evolving world of healthcare. They revisit Kendrick Lamar's Super Bowl performance—and what it all says about the game of strategy. Plus, they unpack the messy brilliance of White Lotus Season 3 and debate whether Duolingo’s owl met a just end. But it’s not all fun and games—big questions arise as they dig into the DOJ’s investigation into UnitedHealthcare’s Medicare billing and the ethical gray areas of media buying. In a world where truth is up for grabs, how can healthcare brands build trust? Tune in to find out.

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As healthcare costs rise and institutions face increased scrutiny, a new battle is emerging. Will governmental policy and public skepticism reshape the industry? How will funding cuts impact hospitals and research? In this episode, we unpack the shifting landscape and what it means for the future of healthcare.

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Takeaways

Getting a feel for HLTH 2021

• Revive's Gale Pryor and Brennan Mason joined our team on The No Normal Show to share their takeaways from this year's HLTH conference in Boston, Massachusetts.
• The purpose of the event is to bring everyone in the health ecosystem to reimagine healthcare delivery. Brennan and Gale found that the ecosystem has more players than ever.
• A good mix of organizations attended, including Amazon, AARP, Fidelity, AHA, IBM Watson, Maven, Philips, ResMed, Teladoc, Verizon, Vertex, CVS, Walmart, Zoom, Optum, Oak, Cigna, Aetna, Humana, and the Blues+.
• HLTH orchestrated an indoor event of 6000+ attendees while ensuring that everyone in attendance was vaccinated or had tested negative within the last 72 hours of the conference. They made COVID-19 testing accessible in the lobby.

 The reinvention of primary care 

• Primary care is attracting heated discussions because many of the core themes in healthcare transformation are coming together in primary care.
• Amazon Care is expanding its virtual and hybrid primary care service beyond its employees, offering other employers a covered benefit in selected cities.
• UnitedHealth is rolling out a virtual-first primary care product, NavigateNow, to select employers with self-funded plans in nine markets, expanding to 25 markets by the end of 2022.
• Primary care is a strangely heated space. This year, Rushika Fernadopulle of Iora Health clashed with serial entrepreneur Adrian Aoun of Forward about tech-based primary care. Adrian equated the entrance of pharmacy retailers to "wanting an iPhone and being sold a Motorola."
• Our hosts found that Adrian came across as disconnected from the reality of primary care and that retailers like Walgreens, CVS, and Walmart have advantages like a massive physical presence, logistical network, longitudinal understanding of consumers, and high net promoter scores.

Digital health, of course 

• Digital health has always been the focus of HLTH, but this year was less about an incoming digital revolution and more about the ways different players collaborate and integrate solutions.
• Walmart Health put it well: It's not just about going digital; it's about having different mechanisms for different consumer preferences.
• Hybrid care was widely recognized as a critical element in appealing to consumer preferences and building trust.
• Much of the conversation was focused on chronic care management and wellness, with Noom, Thirty Madison, Big Health, and Everly Health all present. The goal of digital tools in this space is to become a reimbursed benefit.
• If healthcare delivery wants to transform healthcare delivery, organizations need to take the lead. To lead healthcare delivery, organizations need to change their business model from a pipeline to a platform where all players can connect to your health system.

Plans + employers + digital health 

• As employers take a more proactive role in workforce health, plans seem to be reinventing care delivery using digital health and the workplace to do it. As Divya Paliwal, Chief Clinical Transformation Officer of Horizon BCBS said, "How can we use these dollars better than shelling out to a hospital ED or ICU?"
• The drivers of the growth in digital health are plans and employers. And employers are moving away from PPO, and high deductible plans to incent healthy behaviors – the key focus of digital health tools.
• In a world of remote work, benefit offerings become even more important. When features of physical workspace become irrelevant, benefits are essential in recruiting and retention.
• Employers are certainly stepping up to improve access to health solutions through employee benefits, but this only intensifies the division between the "haves" and "have nots" by excluding small businesses and the unemployed.

Resources in Today's Episode

• Misinformation Statement: Kati Everett, Chief Communications Officer at Novant Health
• Article: Cue the debunking: Two California doctors go viral with dubious COVID test conclusions 
• Article: Trump's New Favorite COVID Doctor Believes in Alien DNA, Demon Sperm, and Hydroxychloroquine
• Article: An Elite Group Of Scientists Tried To Warn Trump Against Lockdowns In March

Key Takeaways 

The Situation – Rogue docs 

• First, let's define
  • We're not talking about physicians publicizing PPE shortages.
  • We're not talking about the ED doctor suing for unreasonably lowering safety standards after being fired.
  • Those are more on the labor side of issues management.
• A "rogue doctor" hits two kinds of extreme:
  • They are someone who has an extreme or fringe health view.
  • And they are someone who uses an extreme level of communication — such as press conferences on the steps of the Capitol.
  • Rouge doctors discredit the seriousness of COVID-19, talking about kids not being susceptible to it, disregarding masks, etc.
• This is a risk because these doctors carry your health system name and are stating things that are potential liabilities, and it puts your name on misinformation.

Public Examples

• The original rogue doctors – two urgent care doctors went viral in April with video on Facebook claiming pandemic is a political hoax and overblown. They received 4.3 million views on YouTube, and Elon Musk tweeted, "Docs make good points."
• The Houston doctor who said hydroxychloroquine is a cure and that you don't need masks from the steps of Capitol.
• A leading scientist from one of the top AMCs in the country rallied a group of peers to convince President Trump back in the spring that coronavirus was overblown, not enough of a threat, and to not lock down the U.S. — with no credible data.
• Other examples we're seeing:
  • Rogue doctors are showing up at school board meetings advocating for reopening with fringe claims.
  • Rogue doctors are holding press conferences, sometimes from a hospital's property.
  • Rogue doctors are on TV, social media, etc.

Addressing Rogue Doctors from a Communications Perspective

• Do it in a way that you're not taking on the physician, but the data and science — use a credible clinician like a Chief Medical Officer, infectious disease expert, or Chief Nursing Officer to deliver the message, not a CEO or communications member.
• There's a continued obligation for systems to be the arbiters of truth — clinicians have had incredibly high trust scores during COVID-19.
  • When public safety is involved, health systems have an obligation to use this trust clout to counter growing conversations related to misinformation or false viewpoints.
  • Speaking out also doesn't just have to be just when physicians are going rogue, it can be related to conversations happening within your communities about how schools should go back, mask wearing, etc.

Legal Options

• Depending on the situation, rogue doctors represent, at best, a headache for system leaders, and at worst, a real risk to their brand reputation.
  • We spoke with Dan Higgins, partner at Dentons, the world's largest law firm, to identify what options systems might have to address physicians that exacerbate the spread of misinformation.
• Except for when a health system directly employs physicians, there are limited recourse options, given physicians' rights to share their medical opinion with patients and the public.
  • However, if there is significant conversation surrounding a physician, a health system can counter a negative message with one of its own.
  • Point to the facts and science in these situations, ideally leveraging the Chief Medical Officer for a doctor-to-doctor comparison to the public.
  • If the affiliated physician uses a logo or the health system's platform without permission, the health system can ask for the physician to retract its statement.
• When an employed physician is involved, there are additional steps a health system can weigh.
  • Health systems should consider proactively drafting a high-level policy focused on patient precautions for staying safe and well.
  • The system can note that it wants to guide the strategy for the organization's COVID-19 communications, and that while they respect the first amendment and the physician/patient relationship, no one except those authorized by the health system should speak on behalf of the health system in relation to COVID-19.
  • This restricts physicians from any use of the health system's logo without consent. If there is any violation of this policy, the health system has the option to take employment action.

Leaders Have a Voice and Have a Responsibility

• With all of this said, health systems are needed and expected to be the voice of truth — continuing to focus on the facts — even if that lands them in hot water with policymakers and community members.
• Given their position, health systems have a societal obligation to correct any misinformation that may be spreading in their communities.
• Beware of the shaming and guilt language in your communications. Consumers are looking for us to be a stable, objective resource of facts and truth.

Takeaways

Featuring a special guest

• This week, The No Normal Show features Content Strategist and fellow Reviver, Tiera Carlock, as she reviews her research findings on Hispanic and Latino consumers and Black consumers.
• At Revive, Tiera jumps in on all things content strategy, social strategy, and writing. Her years of healthcare experience have made her a champion for some of the unsung heroes in healthcare, like nurse-midwives and nurse practitioners.

Understanding Hispanic and Latino consumers

• Tiera started her research by looking into Hispanic and Latino communities – who are they, what do they like, how do they navigate their home lives, and how do they navigate their work lives?
• From these questions, Tiera found that Hispanics and Latinos are a young, multicultural, and family-oriented people, representing one in six people in the United States.
• This group is not a race, as they are a diverse group of people who can track their origins from one of 20 Latin American countries and Spain.
• Tiera’s findings suggest that Hispanics and Latinos value close relationships and shared cultural experiences and tend to live in larger households that offer those shared experiences. Family takes up a lot of time for these consumers, limiting opportunities to engage in external communities.
• It is common to find undocumented immigrants, citizens, grandparents, and children living in the same household. This unique living experience creates linguistic and cultural barriers as they navigate American systems and shapes how they see themselves as part of the American fabric.
• Hispanic and Latin American people often identify as two hundred percenters – 100% Latino and 100% American – with a strong desire to preserve their cultural roots while also integrating into American society.
• Tiera cites an article about an Afro Cuban woman whose parents never taught her Spanish to simplify her assimilation experience. This woman feels it was a missed opportunity to maintain a connection with her history and culture.
• Household makeup can impact healthcare decisions for Hispanic and Latino people. For example, undocumented parents cannot engage with American institutions like Medicare out of fear of revealing their undocumented status. This fear can also limit their children’s access to healthcare.
• Hispanic and Latino people commonly prefer to take a self-sufficient approach to healthcare while avoiding traditional healthcare settings.
• While this group has a general mistrust of medical professionals, they are more likely to engage with a doctor in a doctor’s office than in a retail center or via telehealth.

Understanding Black consumers

• From HeLa Cell research to the Tuskegee Experiment and beyond, the Black community has a centuries-long history of medical maltreatment and racism in the United States.
• In response to this maltreatment, Black individuals have learned to distrust healthcare institutions and are more likely to turn to internal groups and communities where they feel the safest and the most respected.
• While Black Americans have been routinely neglected and taken advantage of by the U.S. healthcare system, many want to be proven wrong in their distrust.
• Black consumers receive 26% less funding from healthcare initiatives than white, non-Hispanic people but spend 19% more on hospital services and 13% more on emergency services than white, non-Hispanic people.
• These statistics speak to the limited availability of primary and lower-acuity care for Black Americans, forcing Black Americans to become dependent on costly higher-acuity services.
• Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) is not just important from a humanitarian perspective; it’s also crucial from a business perspective as Black Americans have tremendous spending power and influence on widespread consumer behavior, yet it’s common for organizations to treat DEI as a charitable endeavor.
• Brands in the healthcare space that correct this lens to encompass social responsibility and business opportunity will be the brands that lead the way in health.

In this episode, Desirée Duncan is joined by Yvette Conyers, Associate Dean of Equity Diversity, and Inclusion at the University of Maryland School of Nursing, and Chelsea Rice, Associate Vice President of Engagement at BPD to discuss the critical themes of health equity and the power of storytelling in nursing. We learn about Yvette's personal journey in nursing, the importance of understanding social determinants of health, and how storytelling can foster deeper connections and understanding in healthcare.

Key Takeaways

Travel Industry Lessons After 9/11

• Security changes were made behind the scenes and gradually travel resumed.
• It wasn’t until after the financial crisis of 2008 that the airline industry started to recover.
• A couple of lessons we learned from this:
  • We’re going to see substantial financial impacts across the healthcare industry.
  • We could see the healthcare industry restructuring as small health systems start to merge with large systems.
  • We have to challenge our pre-COVID-19 thinking and be nimble moving forward.
• We’re working with United on a program called Clean+ to help build traveler’s confidence in flying again.

COVID-19 Response 

• We first saw patients with COVID-19 in Abu Dhabi, so we initiated our incident command structure that includes all of our locations around the world.
  • We started planning in early January by looking at clinical processes and surge capacities as well as gathering stockpiles of PPE.
  • Then, the focus was setting up drive-through testing, building surge capacity, and finally, recovery and reopening.
• Now we’re looking at trying to get back to our pre-COVID-19 numbers while being prepared for flare-ups.
• Our digital platforms have had a significant impact on reaching patients and communities all over the world.
  • Since March 13, we’ve done 8,000 social media posts.
  • Our website has had 120 million sessions so far this year.
  • We’re sending a million emails a week.

Recovery Mode 

• In response to the resistance for people to return for routine care:
  • We've downsized our outpatient spaces to allow for social distancing.
  • We're running at 75% capacity but making it up through virtual visits.
  • We're doing thermal screenings and continuing to enforce mask-wearing.
  • We're encouraging our clinical departments to extend hours and provide virtual options to ensure maximum flexibility.
• We have also created predictive models, which are looking good 30 days from now.

Virtual Care 

• The physician community and health systems around the country and world have undoubtedly adjusted to virtual visits.
  • It’s only going to get better and smoother as technology advances.
• We’re looking forward to remote monitoring tools that can send reliable data to physicians and integrate with health records.
• If we do it right, we should be the big winners in virtual health.
  • Consumers will want to come to Cleveland Clinic for virtual health and not a third party, one-off visit.

What No One is Talking About (But Should)

• Elevating your internal communications.
  • We’ve learned that through COVID-19, our internal communications were a guide throughout this process.
  • Our caregivers have opened 3.3 million of our internal emails since March.
    • We have an 83% open rate with emails from our CEO.
  • We've created 25 videos with messages from our CEO.
• Regulatory areas that need to be addressed.
  • Our supply chains are predominantly outside the United States.
    • The swabs we needed for COVID-19 testing were made in Italy at the height of the COVID-19.
    • Our masks and gowns come primarily from China.

Acute Home Healthcare

• One of our goals as a health system is to reduce the length of the patient’s stay.
  • Infection rates are lower when we can get people home, so we are very focused on that.
• We have a home health division at Cleveland Clinic, and it's an integrated part of the care that our institutes provide.
  • We do it for chronic diseases, especially working with EMS teams that go to people’s homes to try and keep chronic disease patients out of the hospital.

Reimbursements for Virtual Visits 

• From a regulatory perspective, it needs to be one of our highest priorities.
  • We're going to continue to see virtual visits move forward now that we have had such a huge trial period for them.
• Those discussions take place on a state-by-state and insurer-by-insurer basis except for Medicare, but I think you have to give CMS and the government credit that they opened that up very quickly.

Takeaways

How to make the media your ally, not your enemy

• Take a transparent, partner-first approach to media, leveraging their networks to get standardized information to the public.   
• Baystate Health invites the media to virtual briefings in which the health system answers media questions in the order of the RSVP list. This approach reduces the number of duplicative inquiries, standardizes messaging, and builds trust.  

Managing misplaced blame for vaccination challenges

• Some states are more conservative in their vaccine rollout, which can cause confusion – especially for those who live close to state borders and hear mixed messaging. 
• With close to three vaccines on the market, the public expects a new level of consumer choice that isn't necessarily accessible.  
• Consumers often get conflicting messages from different authorities. When setting your system's response plans, pick a lane and stick with it. For instance, Baystate health has aligned with the state Department of Health and CDC. 

Planning for brand evolution in 2021

• Health systems have earned a lot of public trust during the pandemic, but vaccination variables may threaten this goodwill. Branding after COVID-19 may need to involve reputation repair.  
• Healthcare will have to keep COVID-19 messaging much longer than other industries, but it's not clear for how long. We expect the next big focus to be managing challenges related to delayed preventative care.  
• We can use this period of uncertainty to update and refine our current marketing assets. For instance, health system marketers can focus on improving SEO, physician profiles, and landing pages. 

Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• CNN article: Florida and Georgia facing scrutiny for their COVID-19 data reporting
• Vox article: Georgia’s COVID-19 cases aren’t declining as quickly as initial data suggested they were
• Kateto survey: The State of the Nation: A 50-State COVID-19 Survey
• Primary Care Collaborative survey: Primary Care & COVID-19: Week 8 Survey
• Subscribe to our bi-weekly COVID-19 communication insight reports

Key Takeaways

COVID-19's Impact on Primary Care

• 70 percent of practices have reported a 50 percent drop in inpatient visits, and only half of those visits are reimbursable.  
• One-third of primary care clinicians believe COVID-19 is going to affect the independence of primary care practices across the country.
• According to Epic Health Resources, there has been an 86 to 95 percent decrease in cancer screening during this time.
• Many patients have put off care, which is going to increase acute care over time.

What Should Marketers Be Doing to Support Primary Care Clinics?

• Continue to push for patients to come in for annual exams.
• Make sure your hospital has a digital experience enabled.
• Increase self-screening and make sure they have easy access to virtual visits if they find something abnormal.

Learn more about the Value Attack

Key Articles and Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode:

ReviveHealth's Consumer Report on COVID-19

75% of Americans lack access to or have never used telehealth

Takeaways

• The word "turkey" is a broadway term that describes a show with a lot of previews but later underperforms based on quality. Historically this had to do with increased tourism around the holiday period, making it lucrative to have more shows at the end of the year.
• Our team applies the term "turkey" to marketing in this episode, reviewing this year's most significant marketing flops. We asked our agency for their opinions, and the following campaigns were submitted.

Notable mentions

• Balenciaga released sweatpants that had boxers sewn into the inside that made them look like sagging pants. The United States' history of police shooting black men with saggy pants brings to question the ethics of the wealthy capitalizing on this style.
• That's why we need to take more time to research the history of the products we develop. So much time goes into product development already; this additional step would be a drop in the bucket comparatively.
• From a more lighthearted perspective, the oatly SuperBowl ad polarized audiences – some loved it, and some hated it.
• Bud light has been chasing the seltzer craze and now has taken it a step or two too far with eggnog flavored seltzer.

The not-so-fresh turkey

• Subway has lost popularity amongst consumers and released a new campaign to increase sales. The "Eat Fresh, Refresh" campaign boasted a refreshed menu but offered little information on the changes and availability of new products across locations.
• The issue is that the definition of fresh has changed over the past ten years. Their current menu – which has the same ingredients as before – no longer meets modern standards for freshness. They have, however, reported increased sales which could be attributed to the campaign or a pandemic rebound.

The tweet you can't take back

• On International Women's Day, Burger King UK announced a program to address gender disparities in the restaurant industry by building a scholarship program for female employees. The idea itself was great, but the execution was not thoughtful (and cringeworthy).
• They announced the scholarship by tweeting "women belong in the kitchen," providing context only in the tweet's thread, which obscured critical context for the tweet.
• Our team expressed that Burger King UK should have chosen a different platform than Twitter to offer audiences more immediate context for the jarring statement.
• To avoid this sort of mishap, marketers need to present campaigns to stakeholders in the same way their audience will experience the campaign. For example, a conference room audience may experience concepts differently if presented in a pitch deck.

 The algorithm gone wrong

• Chris helped his dad sell his townhome this summer using Zillow's Offer tool. The tool gives an estimate for how much the house was worth pending inspection. Zillow purchased the home for the Zestimate price, but the listing price had been cut by close to $50,000 a few months later.
• Chris' experience is symptomatic of Zillow's inaccurate Zestimate tool. The business made a significant bet on the power of its data and the ability of an algorithm to predict which homes are worth buying and flipping to sell for profit.
• Zillow, after significant losses over the past few years, ended this house-buying initiative.
• The future is AI and algorithm-driven, but the technology isn't where it needs to be quite yet. Placing that much money on an algorithm is very risky given the lacking maturity of current technology.

Key Takeaways

Brand Management at Procter & Gamble

• One of the core truths at Procter and Gamble (P&G) is that the consumer is boss.
• The brand manager’s responsibility is to fully understand the consumer’s needs and how they make decisions.
• With this knowledge and role, they were the leaders within the organization.

Winning the Moments of Truth

• Zero Moment of Truth: refers to the moment when a consumer is in the discovery and awareness stage and is looking to learn more about a product or service (Ex: In healthcare, this could be a consumer looking up online reviews for doctors or hospital).
• First Moment of Truth: when a consumer is first confronted with the product or service (Ex: Someone visiting a specialist for the first time).
• Second Moment of Truth: refers to when the consumer experiences a product or service they’ve purchased. (Ex: What was the experience like after their doctor’s visit or surgical procedure and did they want to spread the word to their friends).

Brand Management in Healthcare

• The role of the brand manager is important, but as many know, this role in hospitals is not seen in the same light as companies like P&G.
• The place marketers can bring extreme value to the health system is their understanding and knowledge of the consumer to ensure the systems wins the zero moment of truth.

The Future of Marketing Structure

• The most significant opportunity for marketers is to start shifting their structure to be about programs rather than function – this allows for a much more collaborative approach to tackling problems than our current siloed efforts.

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Inside the Coronavirus Battle at Our Lady of the Lake: The Fight of Their Lives

Key TakeAways

Our Lady of the Lake Created a Highly Effective News Story by Showcasing the Rawness of COVID-19 in Their Hospital.

• Our Lady of the Lake was leading the charge in getting the word out about how to protect yourself amid the coronavirus by having their Chief Medical Officer always available for local media coverage.
• Internally they weighed the pros and cons of whether or not they should allow a behind the scenes look at their hospital. After several discussions, they felt it was essential to continue to be transparent with their team and the public about the current state of COVID-19.
• It was crucial to make sure patient privacy was respected while also allowing journalistic freedom to capture the real story.
• They provided PPE education to the reporter and photographer the night before to set clear expectations.
• The journalist arrived at 7 am and entered the COVID-19 unit at 7:30 am. They wrapped up at 2 pm.
• The journalist was allowed free rein to talk to anyone as long as it didn’t affect patient care.
• They also knew who was going to be in the unit at that time and were able to educate the staff to be prepared to answer any questions.
• Typically, we look at rawness as bad, but Our Lady of the Lake opted to acknowledge that rawness is okay and even helpful to the community in this current situation. 

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Modern Healthcare: Nearly a third of Americans have put off healthcare during COVID-19
• Every COVID-19 Commercial is Exactly the Same

Key Takeaways

The Role of a Brand:  

• We use brands to help navigate our decisions, and the brands we trust promise us a specific level of quality.
  • During this COVID-19 crisis, brands represent normality and will be beneficial in transitioning the patient's perception of healthcare to a new normal.
  • Health systems are putting out similar messages because there is a sense of duty to provide clear and informative public announcements.
  • Trying to establish a brand revolving around "self" comes off as tone-deaf and connotates bragging at an inappropriate time.
    • Brands that step up and take responsibility during this time will be leaders in the industry after the crisis settles.  

Brand Shift in a New Normal:

• Health systems have the option to adopt a health-oriented brand vs. a care-oriented brand.
• The need for post health system brands to motivate their audience through personality branding will be more crucial than ever before.

A quick COVID-19 pulse check

• Health systems are seeing an uptick in admissions — many of which can be attributed to the Delta variant, with higher concentration in the southern states.
• We live in a strange world where fact is not always fact, and perspectives on health reflect political orientation, not proper understanding.
• For example, Associated Press published an article that said 100 vaccinated people in Massachusetts died of COVID-19. That's only 0.002% of the population, but AP is a known news authority. We have a responsibility to represent facts accurately without sensational language.

Decisions, they get easier when you get buy-in up front
 

• It's common for health system marketers to launch a campaign or initiative — only to receive negative internal feedback after the fact. This delayed pushback can derail campaigns and waste marketing resources. 
   
• A marketing governance program can help reduce this strain on health system marketing departments by getting buy-in from clearly defined decision-making roles.
   
• Penn State Health has a marketing governance charter outlining the decisions the Council needs to help manage, including a cohesive brand strategy, annual priorities amongst service lines and geographies, change management, budgets, organizational alignment on marketing priorities, and ROI measurement.
   

Health system marketing governance in practice

• Individual hospitals leaders were being held accountable for disparate PNLs, resulting in unnecessary competition between system units. Penn State is unifying marketing system-wide through Tuckman's Stages of Group Development. 
   
• Marketers should ask, "Where do we really need to grow the organization's volume and support brand?" For example, opening a new facility requires marketing support. That had to be a priority.
   
• Penn State Health acquired Holy Spirit Medical Center, which means acquiring all the practices that previously competed. Penn State Health had to figure out a way to distribute marketing resources so that practices weren't competing while also communicating why certain practices received more help. It's not just about who's loudest. 
   
• Penn State Health had a change of neurosurgery leadership who wanted to make changes to the strategic plan. The Marketing Governance Council procedure required this leader to request a change through the hospital president, who then would choose whether or not to open the discussion with the Council.

One heck of a 20 months 

• UCHealth has always tried to show diligence in learning about patients and empathizing with their experiences, but COVID-19 accelerated that understanding as public health conversations became more frequent and urgent. 
• When COVID-19 struck in March 2020, they had to reset priorities overnight because people were now looking to health systems for information.  
• UCHealth’s marketing team essentially turned into a communications team, with 70% of their marketing staff focused on supporting COVID-19-related communications.  
• UCHealth started to gain deeper insights into public stressors and pain points because patients were having more conversations about health. 

From listening comes understanding  

• COVID-19 highlighted health inequities because these disparities showed up in ICU admission and ventilator usage volumes.
• UCHealth started to realize they’d never mapped out the entire patient experience from a cultural perspective. So, rather than looking at disparities exclusively from a care interaction perspective, the team started to look at disparities as a continuum.  
• The impact on certain populations is much higher than it is on others. Take, for example, downward trends in life expectancy. White Americans’ life expectancy average dropped a little over one year since COVID-19, but Black Americans’ average dropped almost three years.  

Social media becomes a crucial learning channel

• Social media has always been part of UCHealth’s marketing strategy, but since COVID-19, it’s been the dominant channel of focus for the team. 
• UCHealth makes concentrated efforts to make sure the patients’ perspective is represented before the system’s perspective. This focus on the patient has dramatically increased engagement, offering UCHealth more direct patient communications to learn from.  

Shifts in public expectations and local legislation 

• Provider reputations have been a rollercoaster over the past few years. First, price transparency laws put providers in the hot seat. Then, when COVID-19 struck, providers became celebrated heroes. Now, providers are back to scrutiny from the public, media, and legislators. 
• Colorado is in the process of passing legislation that would rely heavily on health systems to bring healthcare costs down.
• The public is missing the “whole picture” when it comes to care delivery value. Health systems need to communicate their value to the community wholistically – beyond the itemized bills.  
• For example, health systems shouldn’t be faulted or penalized for seeking commercially insured patients to make up for the millions in losses resulting from unpaid medical bills.  

Resources

• Wendell Potter's book and New York Times Best Seller, Deadly Spin.
• Joe Public 2030 LinkedIn Group
• Joe Public 2030 Book

How can we overcome the backlash against DEI initiatives and truly address health equity? Hint, communications plays a vital role. Guests Vanessa Nazario, Chapter President of the South Florida Chapter of the National Association Latino Healthcare Executives, and VP of Communications, Nicole Terry joins our host Desiree Duncan, VP of Health Equity & Inclusion to delve into the crucial themes of health equity, the influence of social determinants on patient outcomes, and culturally competent care being a must for every organization. Don’t miss this compelling conversation on how healthcare marketers, communicators, and c-suite level executives can create more inclusive and equitable healthcare system for all and grow their market share.

Marketing’s Role Amid COVID-19

• When COVID-19 first hit, the first thing we did was focus on the safety of our staff and community.
  • All of our messaging both internal and external informed people of safety measures to take, the seriousness of the virus, etc.
• Once the cases started to go down the first time, we were one of the first areas to reopen.
  • Our message changed to “it’s safe to come back to the hospital” and “Don’t delay your needed care.”
  • We also pushed for virtual visits.
• Today, it’s a combination of the two messages as numbers have gone up again.
  • The message is, “Be safe, but don’t delay your needed care.”
• Truly, it’s a lot of trial and error.
  • We recognized that we would fail throughout this, but we must fail fast and keep moving forward.
• While the situation is horrible, these times have caused us to scrap everything and start new.
  • This time has allowed us the opportunity to show leadership our effort’s connection to direct revenue.
  • It’s a clean slate to test marketing efforts and show why marketing is important for not only times like this, but in all times.
  • Hospital leaders are now turning to marketing to help fill volumes and revenue.
  • This is our chance to show people what we can do.

Leveraging Data and Tools

• We’ve leveraged Salesforce capabilities like other leading brands in other industries I’ve worked in, which is not typical to a health system or hospital.
  • We’ve created lead lists for physicians, implemented lead scoring, and leveraged email, in-person visits, and local executives across different campuses.
• We have a weekly survey that goes out to patients to get real-time and location-relevant patient sentiment about how the public feels about returning to the hospital.
  • They use this data not only to adjust messaging, but to show their physicians so that they can be aware of how to approach each visit in a way that matches the consumer sentiment.

Proving Value

• The Piedmont marketing team has leaned into the idea and have proven we are a revenue-generating function, not a cost center or service partner.
  • Now more than ever, if you aren’t showing that you drive volumes and revenue, you will only ever be viewed as a cost center.
• In all other places I’ve worked (i.e. Southwest), marketing is seen as revenue drivers.
  • In hospitals and health systems, marketing typically looks like a cost center that spits out bio cards and newsletters.
  • But in reality, that’s not why we exist. I’m showing our executives what marketing is doing to bring in money.
  • It’s rewriting the story of our role. It should be tied to the numbers, not the bio cards (which we’ll still get done, but it’s not what we are known for).

Tying Efforts to Dollars

• Because COVID-19 caused a complete stop on all of our prior marketing efforts, we were given a blank slate to tie our efforts to dollars.
  • We have nothing else out in the market. So when we send an email, and there’s a drastic jump in volume behavior, we can tie it straight to that.
  • We’re in a unique time where we did nothing else that day other than that email, so we know it is what caused the jump in appointments.
• And if you can prove it multiple times, there’s less questioning beyond that and, therefore, more ability to do more without question moving forward.
• We also share data all the time — so leadership knows what works, but also what doesn’t work.

Maintaining Focus

• Right now, we have to be solely focused on things that bring in volume and revenue.
  • We cut 170+ sponsorship deals due to COVID-19. But not one person complained about it. They understood.
• We have to be good stewards of our patient’s money.

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• ReviveHealth Consumer Survey Report

Key Takeaways from Today's Episode:

• Cost
  • Hospitals and health systems prior to COVID-19 have been lumped into the cost villains associated with pharma and insurance companies. Post COVID-19, public perception will be more positive and will value the worth of healthcare institutions.
  • Before COVID-19, hospitals and health systems had to defend the costs of running their operations. Post COVID-19, the question has now changed to why aren’t we supporting them more?
• Changing cliche branding
  • COVID-19 has brought forward the critical role of hospitals and where they stand in regards to convenience healthcare such as CVS and Walgreens.
  • Before COVID-19 we were trying to differentiate hospitals from their competitors outside of the care they provide through their doctors and nurses. Now, showing the heroism of doctors and front-line still staff has the potential to be a major player in healthcare marketing in the next few months and years. It’s possible that people have the same sentiment for healthcare workers as they did after 9/11 for firemen and the police force.

Q&A:

Question: As health leaders are highly trusted...How well have the health system leaders done in stepping up to speak and lead in communities?  Do any names come to mind?  I've seen Tina Freese Decker from Spectrum Health in Michigan do this otherwise.....but none others.  Missed opportunity?

Answer: Yes, there has definitely been a missed opportunity in regards to branding, and getting us through this in general. There is a leadership vacuum associated with this crisis. People are really craving leadership and there should be at least one healthcare leader, if not more, in every market.

Resources from today's episode

• Health workers, stuck in the snow, administer coronavirus vaccine to stranded drivers 
• Washington state hospital apologizes for prioritizing top donors for COVID-19 vaccine 
• Framing What We Do with a Noun or a Verb: Are we “___ing”? 
   

Takeaways

Need for speed

• COVID-19 has accelerated change, requiring health systems and their marketers to find new ways to move faster. Safety protocols and legacy processes can make it challenging to adapt to change.  
• Health systems can apply some agile marketing principles such as prioritization and iteration to serve COVID-19 demands but should be calculated in each iteration. 
• Because the stakes are so high for healthcare communications, each iteration must carefully balance exactness and speed, as each iteration could potentially reverse public trust.

Setting expectations for responsive branding

• Faster change means our brands need to evolve faster to remain relevant and avoid sounding out of touch. Continually test messaging to see what’s working and what’s not.  
• Health systems should consider diversity equity and inclusion as a central pillar of every branding conversation. Incident-based branding efforts can translate as insensitive and self-serving.  

On the horizon for healthcare marketers 

• COVID-19 has increased public demand for quality communications, and consumers will likely maintain these expectations in a post-COVID-19 world.  
• Informative, relevant, actionable content marketing will be an essential function for health system marketing and communications, and consumer expectations for quality content will rise.  
• Marketers may play a more strategic role in health systems because of familiarity with new technology and the ability to bring data to the table.  
• We will have to continue to act as technology educators as virtual care becomes more embedded in today’s healthcare system. 

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• HealthLeaders Daily Briefing
• HealthLeaders Intelligence Report

Key TakeAways

Technology Advancements Coming Out of COVID-19

• Telemedicine is a high demand function due to COVID-19 and will be a huge factor moving forward. Health systems that have been reluctant to leverage telemedicine are now needing to overhaul their current systems if they are going to keep up with patient expectations and demand. 

Financial Backlogs for Hospitals

• Billers and administrative workers will have to deal with an unprecedented amount of backlogged elective surgeries, which has the potential for errors or for surprise billing to show up.
• Health system leaders need to focus on what's happening today, while also planning for the future after crisis mode.
• Consumerism is driving where the healthcare system is going, and it will be interesting to see how consumer behavior and opinion change towards a health system after this crisis is over.

Resources

• Amy Webb's 14th annual tech trends report

Takeaways

A little bit of everything

• Last week, we launched a new podcast format and outlined our changes and why we made them. Missed the episode? You can catch up here.
• The podcast team shared a good laugh over the latest marketing spoof to go viral featuring Emily Zugay, a graphic designer who laughably redesigns logos for big brands like McDonald's, Doritos, and the NFL.

That little health brand we like to call Apple

• Despite several roadblocks in Apple's initial entrance into the health industry, the tech giant continues to expand its presence with investments in health features and devices.
• Apple is reported to have cognitive decline and depression detection, insulin level detection, and walking steadiness detection features in development currently.
• Human bodies are becoming containers for data points monitored by devices. With these devices come enhanced insights and the ability for providers to treat more effectively. With so many health data points available, comes a new question of privacy – how comfortable will consumers be sharing this sort of data directly with providers?
• On the other hand, it's possible that these continual monitoring devices will remove the need for physician interaction altogether.
• Since the launch of its first health app seven years ago, Apple has a wealth of consumer health data already and will continue to build this database as it develops new health data-collection devices.
• If Apple is an immovable force in the health industry, where does it fit into the business plans of other health entities such as health systems? As a strategic question, systems must carefully consider where they compete, partner, and invest.
• While Apple's technology could make health systems' digital front door more accessible, a partnership would add a new level of dependency on Apple, giving Apple more control in the industry.

Step into the metaverse

• Metaverse is the concept of a future iteration of the internet, made up of persistent, shared, 3D virtual spaces linked into a perceived virtual universe.
• Facebook is investing heavily in "responsibly" building the metaverse. For those who know Facebook's reputation for living up to civic duty, you'll understand why this gave our team a chuckle.
• In 2003, the first promise of a metaverse came out with the platform, Second Life. Initially, the concept created plenty of buzz in the healthcare industry, showing promise of enhanced patient engagement. But the buzz was just that – hype that quickly faded.
• Now, the big name in the metaverse is Roblox, a gaming creation community with 43 million active users. Brands like Vans, Nike, and Gucci have pioneered experiences in Roblox, setting the standard for brand usage of the platform.
• But where does Roblox and the Metaverse fit into the world of health? That remains the burning question. With no clear pathway yet defined, health brands may have an opportunity but should experiment with caution.

I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on TV

• This segment is our question of the day segment for the show. Today's question: how do you gain approval from legal and compliance teams to engage influencers in your marketing initiatives?
• By nature, good legal and compliance officers will lead you to the safest path. But as we all know, the safest path isn't what will drive results amidst heightened competition.
• Since influencer marketing is relatively new to healthcare, health brand marketers may need to answer questions that may sound intuitive, such as: Are we paying people to be patients? Are we disclosing that we have influencers? Can we rely on influencers to protect our brand and speak to our brand as agreed upon?

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Washington Post: U.S. deaths soared in early weeks of pandemic, far exceeding number attributed to COVID-19

Key TakeAways

Our latest research revealed that people are avoiding hospitals:

• People are avoiding necessary Emergency Room visits in an effort to avoid hospitals altogether.
• There have been increasing numbers of deaths from strokes and heart attacks nationally but decreasing amounts of stroke and heart problem related ER visits.
• Will this prompt a national reassessment of the COVID-19 related death count? New York has reassessed the total death count, but will other states do the same?

What are the obstacles to patients that need healthcare but are not willing to go to the hospital?

• 9/10 people are afraid of returning to hospitals even if they were to need health services.
• Of people that are currently in need of health services, 5/10 of them are still fearful of going to a hospital.
• Patients do not see a difference in healthcare facilities; they are fearful of all of them whether or not COVID-19 treatment is being administered in a given facility.

People are using personal logic to assess the COVID-19 threat:

• It is going to be more difficult and take longer to get people back in hospitals, regardless of states opening back up.
• People are relying on the confirmed case and death counts to determine if hospitals are getting safer instead of listening to political officials or healthcare experts.
• On average, most patients anticipate it will be 3-6 months before COVID-19 settles down in their communities.
• Regardless of political affiliation, people are still relying on their own conclusions about safety instead of listening to political leaders.

People want to see the information for themselves; how do healthcare marketers assist in this?

• People want to know exact information about the protective measures that hospitals are taking to protect against the spread of COVID-19.
• Hospitals need to be explicitly clear about sanitation, protective gear, and where the COVID patients are being treated.
• No amount of information is “too much” for the consumer now.
• People want to hear from their hospital twice a week, which is a complete shift pre-COVID desired communication patterns.

Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• New York Times Article: I Was Supposed to Eat at a Restaurant. I Bailed.

Key TakeAways

A Macro Perspective

• Fear of infection is gradually declining, though two-thirds of Americans are still concerned about becoming ill or fear someone in their family will become infected.
• 83 percent of people believe that social distancing is effective in saving lives.
• Although unemployment numbers are high, there's still more optimism about the job market than the financial crisis of 2008.
• In Jarrett's findings, there are three types of public opinions:
  • Those who are ready to reopen.
  • Those who do not want to be the first to step back out but are ready to reopen.
  • Those who will not return to normal life until there is a vaccine.

Consuming Information

• In the first part of March, Republicans were apprehensive about precautions; by the middle of March and into April, the parties were mostly on the same page about precautionary measures. Now, we're seeing a sizable partisan gap again.
• People are choosing their own news, and it's impacting how they're processing the pandemic. There are significant differences between partisan parties about PPE, reopening, and the death count.
• Health systems have patients of every party and should consider understanding the psychology of what drives people.
• Healthcare providers are still considered the most trusted news source, but there is a disconnect between providers and communities.

Resources in Today's Episode:

• Mayo Clinic's Presentation Slides
• Five Long-Term Consumer Behavior Changes Due to COVID-19
   

Key Takeaways

Do We All Have an Equal Chance for Health? 

• How to Forecast the Future
• On an annual basis, Mayo Clinic looks for a collection of trends.
• Some trends are healthcare-related, and some are macro-related and are affecting every industry.
• They take the trends and predictions and determine how these impact their organization.

Five Forecasts for the Future

1. Accurate diagnosis, anytime, anywhere.
2. The patient will see you now – this means that we believe there will be a day when consumers will be much more in control of their health care, and providers will need to adapt to that.
3. Virtual visits will outpace physical interactions. Within two months of the pandemic, there were 2 billion virtual visits.
4. Today's reimbursement model becomes old school – Healthcare is one of the last industries to go through consumer transformation.
5. Research and education are game-changers.

Predictions from October 2019 into what 2030 Will Look Like 

• A massive increase in AI innovation.
• Cybersecurity from the standpoint of moving from attacks on individuals to attacks on hospitals and government entities.
• Big tech would not stay just in the realm of technology but will disrupt multiple different industries.
• Rise of consumerism – almost all consumers will feel a need to take control of their information.
• We're due for an economic downturn, and there will probably be two economic downturns over the next ten years.
• There will be job losses due to automation and technology implementations.
• Unaffordability is a big concern in healthcare.
• As they look at 2030, there will be a more significant increase in social division.

Resources

• United Airlines "Fly the friendly skies" campaign
• Delta Airlines personalization example

Takeaways

Why brands are like people 

• Brands are kind of like people – some you want to be around, some you don’t. Modern brands build positive connections with their audiences through thoughtful interactions.  
• Healthcare is inherently “human,” which gives healthcare brands an opportunity to build lasting connections with their communities. 

Lead with authenticity 

• Above all else, modern brands must be authentic. Align with your purpose and values and stick with those values in every action. 
• If there’s an opportunity to prove your authenticity, take it. Actions speak louder than words, and today’s distrustful consumer requires consistency of action to build trust. 
• Authenticity requires brands to communicate transparently, and it doesn’t have to be at the cost of creativity. You can have creative and honest conversations with your audience.  

Listening could be your competitive edge 

• You can't have an in-person conversation with everyone, but you can use technology to understand your audience and personalize their experience of your brand. 
• Listening to your audience opens the way for a two-way conversation, building brand relationships more effectively. 

Surprising consumers in creative ways 

• People are familiar with advertising, so we have to meet them in unexpected ways in unexpected places to capture their attention. Powerful creative can significantly impact a brand’s ability to engage its audiences. 

Gen X—the so-called “forgotten generation”—has officially entered the chat. In this episode of the No Normal Show, Desirée and Chris goes deep into why Gen X deserves more attention in healthcare marketing. Sandwiched between two larger, louder generations, they’ve been overlooked for years—but as they take on the role of both patient and caregiver, their influence on healthcare decisions is bigger than ever.

From their skeptical, independent nature to their deep distrust of inauthentic marketing, Gen Xers don’t buy into fluff. Let’s be clear—if your healthcare brand isn’t speaking to them in a real, no-BS way, you’re missing a massive opportunity.

We break down why this “forgotten middle child” should be at the center of healthcare strategy, how their unique experiences shape their expectations, and what health systems need to do to reach them before it’s too late.

Click to subscribe to our newsletter.

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Bain survey: The US Is Not Fully Prepared to Resume Elective Medical Care
• Alan Shoebridge article: The 80% Healthcare Economy
• Revive’s Latest Consumer Survey Report

Key TakeAways

Returning to Clinical Settings

• 56% of consumers have concerns over the cleanliness of hospitals and that they might contract Covid-19 from other patients.
• 76% of consumers surveyed are planning on altering how they seek care going forward.

Opportunities for Brands

• Health systems should be consistent in their messaging to consumers. It’s important to avoid self-promoting and focus on being empathetic.
• This is a once in a lifetime opportunity to reach consumers and retain their loyalty.
• It’s too early to market competitively. Health systems have gained an empathetic following that they should harness as long as possible.
• Any information about testing and how to receive it is still essential.
• Health systems need to continue to work as equals to make sure factual information gets to their communities efficiently.  

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• ReviveHealth Consumer Survey Report on COVID-19
• Public Opinions Strategy Report
• Bloomberg Article: Hospitals Tell Doctors They’ll Be Fired If They Speak Out About Lack of Gear

Key Takeaways from Today's Episode:

• When it comes to best practices for internal communications, start with empathy – acknowledge this is scary for people.
• It's essential to communicate in multiple ways. People aren't reading all the emails, so you also have to get to them in person, through video, etc.
• We need to guide nurses and front line staff to understand what they need to do to not take this virus home with them.
• If you don't have digital media monitoring set up to follow conversations, start now. Otherwise, you'll be caught by surprise.
• It's also not just about digital monitoring – talk to your employees. Find out how they are feeling, what they are hearing, and see where you can help.
• Find ways to ensure there are processes in place for two-way communication either through managers, emails, etc.

About Daily Briefing Live:

Daily Briefing Live is a 30-minute live video podcast focused on how health system marketers and communicators are managing the COVID-19 crisis.

Each day, we’ll feature the latest that we’re hearing from the industry and our clients, the most up-to-day recommendations and ideas, and provide a forum for attendees to ask questions. We’ll post a recording of the podcast each day for download, and then we will be back, every weekday at 12:00 CST, until this crisis passes.

To join the live video podcast each day, simply visit http://bit.ly/daily-briefing-live at 12:00PM CST. 

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Turbine Labs
• Nurses Share Coronavirus Stories Anonymously in an Online Document
• Brandon Edwards, CEO of ReviveHealth's Blog Post

Key Takeaways from Today's Episode:

• Communicating internally about increasing flex time and the reduction of physician compensation is becoming a likely possibility, and getting ahead of these rumors is essential for your organization.
• In a specific example, email open rates for internal communication with physicians was about 70%, but when they looked at all staff, it was closer to 25% open rate. It's critical to find channels that will ensure the hospital staff sees this content.
• Create a place that allows physicians to ask questions to leadership and get answers.
• Being ready to respond to attacks from unions quickly will be very necessary.  Where possible, back up your messages with facts and data.
• Health systems need to be thinking about how their staff and move beyond thank yous. The front line staff inside a health system will have secondary trauma after this pandemic and will need our help during and after this crisis.
• Marketing and communication leaders need to put a lot of effort, thought, and resources into creating an ongoing campaign that is all about supporting their front line staff.
• If your health system has a magazine that you send out to your community, it's essential to update this content to make it relevant to the COVID-19 crisis. Which this can be a challenge given magazine timeframes, but a 4-page magazine that's relevant to the crisis is way more effective than continuing to push an outdated 16-page magazine that promotes your knee replacement surgery.

Background to the Facebook Boycott

• Initially, Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook came across as noncommittal.
  • They have since committed to adding more context to problematic political posts, and has broadened its definition of hate speech.
• Sheryl Sandberg and Mark Zuckerberg met with the Anti-Defamation League, NAACP, and Color of Change.
  • The groups were disappointed with the outcome of the meeting — wanting more to be done.

To Join or Not to Join 

What's the reach and impact of pausing Facebook in your marketing efforts? 

• Your media plan is essential to reach as many people as possible.
  • 70% of adults in the U.S. are Facebook users.
• When you start looking into making up for the incremental reach that's being lost by moving away from Facebook, you have to start looking to other larger media channels like print, TV, and radio, which have a high out-of-pocket cost.

What do you think brands or hospitals and health systems specifically need to consider if they're going to decide to join this boycott? 

• The number one consideration of your decision needs to be about the authenticity of your brand.
  • What are your values and practices? Those are the things that will persist beyond just this month and that you should be living by.

What are the risks of joining the boycott? Could hospitals and health systems make a change in the way Facebook operates? 

• The first thing you need to look at is the structure of their leadership.
  • It's unique versus what we would see from any other company.
  • The operation is entirely led by Mark Zuckerberg, he exercises complete voting control over the company, and shareholders can't remove him.
  • This complicates the entirety of the boycott campaign.
• Nearly a thousand total advertisers have joined this boycott.
  • Forty of those fall into their top 100 advertisers in terms of their yearly ad spend.
  • Even if all 100 of their top advertisers pulled out, it would only account for about 6% of Facebook's advertising spend.
  • As much as Facebook needs the advertisers, we as advertisers need Facebook a lot more.

What should we do to avoid being reactive in a situation like this? 

• Consumers and patients are looking for certainty and someone to trust.
  • The voice of hospitals and health systems is more critical than ever to keep that trust and have the ability to put out future messages.

What if you have joined or are planning to participate but are still trying to reach people and drive ROI? 

• This should be addressed on a campaign by campaign basis.
  • But if you are going to boycott, I would suggest taking the hit when it comes to losing the Facebook reach.
• Advertisers are using this boycott as a way to pressure Facebook into giving more control of the platform.
  • Traditionally, Facebook will not allow many things that would be acceptable with most other advertisers.
    • They don't allow third-party audits on their site, whereas typically, when you run a digital campaign, you can have a third-party source, and they can confirm that your ads are running as promised.

Corporate Activism 

• Corporations are being forced to take a stance on some issues.
  • Hospitals and health systems are going to be at the center of that for two reasons:
    • Many issues that we're talking about today are related to health.
    • Whether you view yourself as a leader or not, most health systems are one of the biggest employers in their region and to have top-line revenues is a big deal even if your margins are slim.

Preparing for the Roll-out of a Vaccine 

• There may need to be a process or an index that you can use to say what you know, what your decision making process was, and how you're going to help our most vulnerable.
  • It needs to be aligned with what you've decided as your company mission and point of view.
• We need to navigate this together with our clients and make sure that we have a united front.
• It's critical to think of your internal team's hearts and minds when creating your organization's point of view.

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Stat News Article: Health care worker suicides hint at COVID-19 mental health crisis to come
• USA Today Article: Coronavirus strains cash-strapped hospitals, could cause up to 100 to close within a year
• Becker's Hospital Review Article: 25 states resuming elective surgeries
• Morning Consult Report: American College of Emergency Physicians COVID-19

Key Takeaways

Addressing the fear of opening up again

• 1/3 of Americans have put off care due to the COVID-19 crisis.
• Patients are going to need multiple reassurances when hospitals open up their doors to minimize the patient's fears. They'll want to know:
  • What are you doing to sanitize?
  • What are you doing for infection control?
• Each health system should conduct local market testing to understand what resonates with the consumers in their community.

The financial reality post-COVID-19

• Health systems should continue to build relationships with Chambers of Commerce and other business-minded organizations at the local level.
• Members of these organizations are vital ambassadors for health systems because:
  • They can provide insight into the economic impact of a health system on a community.
  • They can offer help to employers and find out what they need from their health system.
  • They can talk to elected officials about securing funds for the future.
• Many hospitals and health systems will be vulnerable to acquisitions post-COVID-19.
  • If that's the case, communications and business leaders should begin preparing communications plans to make this challenging announcement.

Takeaways 

Offering Support to Employees Amid the Pandemic 

• The response to the workforce wellbeing amid COVID-19 involved creating a new initiative — leveraging existing resources at the very beginning of the pandemic and then adding some additional services later on. 
  • It was clear that employees needed support for their emotional needs, so in response, University Hospitals offered: 
    • A call center for on-demand support. 
    • A digital library containing helpful resources.
    • Free webinars and classes (Yoga, meditation, leadership/management). 
    • A Crisis Intervention Team.
    • "Lavender Rooms" with massage chairs to create a quiet, calming space to relax and reset.
    • Daily emails with important news and encouraging stories.

Accessing Resources 

• University Hospitals focused on offering support that was not connected to HR in order to provide a neutral space. 
  • It's important to be a role model in making sure there is a buy-in from the top leadership by using and talking about the services you offer.  
• Most of the resources are offered in an online portal, but not every University Hospitals employee has a company computer. 
  • So we also send daily emails short enough so that they can be printed and shared by supervisors or managers. 
  • This has been most effective when there is a change in shift for nurses as well as changes in cooking and cleaning crews.   

Breaking the Mental Health Stigma for Healthcare Workers 

• The focus for us is on prevention and building resilience. 
  • The goal is to let employees know that you genuinely care. 
• In terms of communication, we must tell the stories of how others are building resilience and how they face and conquer adversity.  

Tips for Wave Two of COVID-19

• It's important to validate your employee's fears and concerns before you ever offer solutions. 
  • The first step is to make sure that we listen to them.  

Communication Tools

• We use multiple modes of communication. 
  • The daily email is very short and very different from any other emails that people are receiving. 
  • We work hard to try to avoid additional files and any repetition. 
  • It's delivered early in the morning so it can be printed, posted, and shared. 
• We've also hosted town halls, webinars on zoom, and YouTube videos.    

Measuring the Effectiveness of Internal Communications  

• We track the open rates of our emails, attendance to our classes and webinars, and the usage of the call center and the Crisis Intervention Team. 
• We have different kinds of rewards/recognitions to boost morale and participation. 
  • In the weekly email, we highlight workers in our "hero interviews".
    • These are individuals that stand out and bring a great sense of team spirit. 
  • For our classes, employees get points for attending, which ultimately awards money.
    • There is a maximum amount of points per quarter.

Resources

• One Medical  increases bookings by 20% 
• Walmart increased the flu vaccination rate by 6.8% with SMS

Takeaways

• Chris Bevolo initiated our Halloween episode of The No Normal with a tribute to SNL superstar, David S. Pumpkins.
• In the spirit of Halloween, this episode centers on three scary trends facing marketers today, including climate change, political polarization, and you guessed it – Facebook.

Climate change as a public health crisis

• Until only recently, climate change hasn't been recognized as a public health crisis. With the rise of severe weather and natural disasters, brands are increasingly focusing on their role in addressing climate change.
• Climate change will drive more significant public health issues that health systems will have to figure out how to manage. For example, the winter storm in Texas last year made it difficult for patients to receive care and providers to deliver care.
• How to avoid a climate disaster by Bill Gates compares climate change deadliness to COVID-19 deadliness. By 2060, climate change could be as deadly as COVID-19 and, by the end of the century, five times as fatal as COVID-19.
• Hospitals and health systems are significant contributors to global warming because they produce massive amounts of carbon and will need to find ways to address their contribution to global warming.

The politicization of health

• The politicization of health isn't a new concept. During the 1918 Spanish Influenza outbreak, masks were a hot topic of political and social debate.
• COVID-19 accelerated the politicization of health. While health has always been a public issue, platforms like social media have increased the rate at which we share, consume, and react to information.
• Society calls for brands to become more actively involved in public health issues, which puts providers between a rock and a hard place.
• Health systems must stand up for medical truths, but doing so can alienate large parts of a community. As community-based organizations, hospitals and health systems cannot afford to alienate those who disagree with their principles and values.
• As the staffing crisis continues, health systems need to also think from an employee perspective so that they can retain talent. Perceived alignment with a political party could impact staffers' willingness to work for their current health system.

Facebook, enough said. 

• Chris deleted his Facebook account in 2018 because he didn't like how the company manages data. This process took "the better half of a day," demonstrating the depth of Facebook's information on its users.
• Facebook is how many marketers built their careers. What used to be seen as the "cute" side of marketing is now a significant driver in marketing strategy across industries.
• Recent news highlights the potential harm of social media on our society, including its adverse effects on mental health and inflammatory content. Reports show that Facebook has knowingly chosen to ignore these problems because solving them would negatively impact revenue.
• Our team's biggest concern about Facebook's recent scandals is that they chose not to take action. By not taking action, Facebook demonstrates value for the bottom line over the public good.
• Stephanie acknowledges that those in the social media space have known for a while that emotional content goes viral much more quickly than non-emotional content. With this in mind, it makes sense that inflammatory content goes viral more quickly and more frequently.
• Around 25% of digital marketing dollars are spent with Facebook today, which speaks to Facebook's monopoly on digital advertising. With Facebook baked into the digital advertising ecosystem, brands must ask themselves if they want to diversify their advertising channels.
• Chase identified whitelisting as the most shocking Facebook practice exposed by the Wall Street Journal, stating that this is hazardous because it lowers the standards for people with more influence, increasing the likelihood of spreading harm and misinformation.
• A few years ago, Facebook changed its algorithm to prioritize content that gets more engagement rather than content individual users express interest in. Since inflammatory content receives more engagement, the algorithm prioritizes it in users' feeds, quickly leading to "us" vs. "them" dynamics.
• Facebook renamed its holding company "Meta," reflecting its goals to build a metaverse beyond the Facebook platform.
• Stephanie follows a 70-20-10 model for financial investments in digital advertising, with 70% of your budget dedicated to what is proven to work, 20% for platforms that work fine, and 10% for experimentation.
• Experimentation is health systems' opportunity to diversify their media mix and to take ownership over their audiences by investing in building out their CRM and bolstering their email marketing efforts.

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Reuters Article: Large employers push back on U.S. healthcare mergers during coronavirus crisis
• New York Times Article: The Public Has Been Forgiving. But Hospitals Got Some Things Wrong.
• World Health Organization Article: More than 117 million children at risk of missing out on measles vaccines, as COVID-19 surges

Key TakeAways

Coming out of Memorial Weekend

• It's important to keep in mind that we've flattened the curve, but we're not out of the woods yet. Health systems and marketers need to reiterate to their community the importance of social distancing and personal hygiene.

How to Prepare for a Second Wave

• Health systems should do some research and polling to gauge if the public sentiment about their hospitals has gone up or down.
• Health systems need to evaluate what's been done in the past so they can prepare for the fall. They should ask:
  • How have we rolled out communications for past flu seasons?
  • What's the plan of action if we have to contend with the flu and COVID-19?
  • What does this all mean for testing capabilities?
  • How do we roll out communications and recommendations for the public?

M&A Activity

• A variety of large employers are pushing back against M&A activity due to fears relating to a lack of quality care and higher costs.
• Large systems might be predatory toward smaller systems that are in need of financial support.

The Impacts of Delayed Care

• One hundred million children are unable to receive the vaccines due to delayed care.
• We have to consider pediatric public health and its relation to vaccines and make sure we're communicating with parents.
• It's important to communicate with at-risk groups to make sure those children are receiving care.
• Marketers should consider the high number of unemployment figures we're seeing during this time and recognize that many of these children's parents had insurance tied to their occupation.

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Daily Briefing Live: March 19, 2020 with Samantha Pierce
• Modern Healthcare article: "Cigna claims data shows declines in hospitalizations for serious conditions"
• Vox article: "Coronavirus has created a crisis for primary care doctors and their patients"

Key TakeAways
Cigna Claims Data Report

• Hospitalization rates for atrial fibrillation decreased 35% over the two months
• Hospitalizations decreased 28% for epilepsy and seizures, 24% for gastrointestinal bleeds, and 22% for aortic aneurysms and dissections
• Admissions for acute appendicitis and acute coronary syndromes, which include heart attacks, dropped 13% and 11%, respectively

The Latest on Earned Media

• After Scripps' Chief Medical Officer went on television to assure the community that hospitals were safe, cardiologists noticed a 40% jump in work
• Fundamental pillar for earned media is to "think human"
  • Understand that everyone is going through their own experience, and the more we can be empathetic with consumers the more effective our stories will be
• If your story fits into two of the three areas below, it's a story worth pursuing:
  • Is it related to a strategic business initiative?
  • Do you have a story/solution that is making a tangible difference right now in the COVID-19 response?
  • Do you have something meaningful to share with your peers or that the mass audience can benefit from?

Being Proactive

• Explaining to consumers how you are planning on opening back up for surgical care, chronic care, and emergency care will provide trust to the community that everything is being put into place to keep people safe and healthy
• Health systems need to be prepared to navigate billing conversation as patients will start to receive bills for the care they received for COVID-19 treatment

Learn more from our recent blog Addressing health equity starts with trust

• Answering the health equity wake-up call
• The trust gap is growing, and systems need to build trust
• Redefining “community” and how systems show up in the community
• Marketing’s Role in Health Equity

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Today's Webinar PowerPoint Slides
• ReviveHealth's Consumer Report Part Three
• AHA/ACS Guidelines
• CMS Guidelines

Key TakeAways

Results from Our Third Consumer Survey:

• Many individuals will not come back to health systems immediately
• People have delayed their care due to fear of going to hospitals and catching the coronavirus from other patients
• According to our consumer survey, health systems should be thinking about promoting facility cleanliness because 56% have a lot of concern over a health system's cleanliness

Rapid Recovery Timeline

• Every market will be different due to multiple factors (Governor, hospital preparedness, larger v. smaller markets)
• Even if there isn't a 2nd wave of COVID-19, hospitals and health systems should be preparing for the flu in the fall and a possible resurgence of COVID-19 during the fall/winter.

First-mover advantage

• The 1st priority is protecting delayed or canceled surgeries.
• There's an opportunity to grow patient base through aggressive marketing.
• Protect and build market share
• Those who move first will be able to avoid forced financial restructuring
• First mover's will have a buffer against future COVID-19 disruption

Planning Assessment Areas

• Business Priorities
  • Service-line, profitability, prioritization by patient need, payor, status
• Operational Readiness
  • Facility-by-facility, equipment/supply status, staff readiness
• Market Assessment
  • Impact of COVID-19 on the community, consumer and brand sentiment
• Marketing Capability
  • Status of Staff, budget, available partners

Rapid Recovery Marketing Initiatives

• Consumer targeting
• Patient Retention
• Patient Acquisition
• Reputation Assessment & Action
• Staff Engagement
• Measurement & ROI

Q&A

• Question: Can you give some examples of what we'd say or do to stay in front of a patient
• Answer: Provide guidelines for how you're going to prioritize patients. Be proactive with telehealth (check-in with scheduled patients). Provide them with content to show that we value.
   
• Question: I think this reluctance/fear to engage might mean that our time to convert from initial outreach to actual patients/customers takes much longer than we're used to. How do we ensure that our leaders understand that and fund marketing efforts accordingly? What might have needed three months of funding in the past might require 6 to 12 months of funding.
• Answer: The planning process should show the value of this marketing initiative and should be prioritized.
   
• Question: What do you recommend as low hanging fruit - i.e., data to look at to inform rapid recovery? There is a lot of internal data in our organization, from delayed procedures to referral network patterns to virtual visit data. Any thoughts on the first steps to take?
• Answer: Personalized messaging will help retain patients we already have. We already have all of their information, so we should take advantage of the ability to talk to them on a personal level.

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Axios article: Spine and joint procedures have taken a dive during the pandemic 

Key TakeAways

The Providence St. Joseph Covid-19 Approach

• Responding to the media and internal audiences was incredibly important because the news was swinging between two extremes.
• Providence was able to get their unbiased perspective out into the communities that they serve, which allowed their consumers to have the best information from those battling the crisis.  
• Providence had 1400+ COVID-19 patients in the last two months and have had to delay 110,000 surgeries due to the shutdown.
• They created an internal dashboard that lets their providers and healthcare workers know where they stand with PPE and testing to provide transparency. They are in the green in almost all metrics, but want workers to know the policies they have in place if they ever go in the yellow or red.
• It was vital for Providence to launch the 100 million mask campaign so that they had enough PPE for their front-line workers.  
  • It took on a life of its own in when Mukilteo (a Washington furniture factory), Nordstrom, Alaska Airlines, and others stepped in to make sure their hospitals had enough PPE.  
  • Eventually, AHA adopted the campaign and allowed it to go nationally to ensure hospitals across the country had enough PPE. 

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Apple and Google Partner on COVID-19 Contact Tracing Technology
• University of Washing Partners with Microsoft on Contact-Tracing App

Key TakeAways

Contact Tracing Technology

• Multiple tech companies are joining forces on contact tracing technologies by creating apps that will use blue tooth technology to trace contact with people who have tested positive for Coronavirus.
  • Apple and Google
  • Microsoft and University of Washington have partnered up to create a contact tracing app that helps public health agencies identify who has come in contacts with someone that had COVID-19
• Contact tracing will be very important until we have a vaccine in place and will provide physical and technical opportunities.
  • Furloughed employees can be trained on how to become a contact tracer
• Communicating to the community to opt into contact tracing apps to help flatten the curve will have to be done thoughtfully as a health system.
  • It’s important to talk about privacy and to approach the topic carefully to come up with the right messages to educate the community so they can understand the technology and privacy issues

Next Step for Health Systems and Hospitals 

• Currently, we’re helping clients revise the crisis playbooks they had in place before COVID-19. We want to measure how well we responded, keep what worked, and figure out what needs to be enhanced so we can rapidly and effectively respond if there is a second wave.
• Prepare your crisis playbook:
  • How did your team respond to supply chain management and operations?
  • Were you able to do media training with executives quickly?
  • How interchangeable is your marketing and communications staff?
  • Does your staff know their roles during a crisis?

Preparing Communications for Reopening Institutions 

• Consumers and employees who weren’t on the front line might be fearful of returning to hospitals, so it’s important to rebuild trust by providing communication internally and externally regarding how we’re going to keep people safe.
  • Will there be a limit on the number of people allowed in an elevator?
  • How many people will be allowed in the employee break room?
  • How are we going to operate our cafeteria and food services for patients and visitors?
• The logistics will be challenging to navigate, so it’s important from a communications and marketing perspective to work hand and hand with your operations staff as soon as possible.
• It will be important to use the individuals who have been on the front lines to help share and train employees who are just now coming back to work.

Mergers and Acquisitions 

• M&A’s are going to be a big topic due to the financial strain health systems have faced during the COVID-19 crisis.
• Some health systems have delayed M&A activity after COVID-19 hit, but they are now ramping back up and are preparing for potential announcements.
• A few health systems have publicly paused previously announced M&A activity.
• Some health systems that have stronger financial pockets are using this opportunity to expand their M&A activity. A few things to consider when expanding during this time:
  • It cannot reduce the health systems ability to address current COVID-19 issues
  • Expansion should be announced once systems start returning to normal
  • If you are the acquiring health system, it’s important to understand that decisions to furlough or cut employee pay are a reputation risk

Today's Episode

• Axios/Ipsos Survey
• Public Opinion Strategies Survey
• The Harris Poll
• Fierce Healthcare Article
• New York Times Opinion Article

Key Takeaways 

Misinformation

• The No Normal is rife with conditions that make truth, transparency, and combatting misinformation challenging.
• An inconsistent response to COVID, disagreement about testing, changing case and death data, uncertain information on therapeutics, and a rush to develop a vaccine all present cracks in the truth and accuracy.
  • As a result, we data such as only 31% of people trusting COVID-19 information coming from the government.
  • More importantly, we have a whole populace that has to work really hard to figure out what is true and trustworthy as they try to live through this period of time.
• There is some sort of silver lining in this, and it's where hospital and health system marketers come in.
  • While trust in government and institutions has dropped, confidence and trust in hospitals and healthcare providers has increased.
  • 76% of Americans surveyed by Public Opinion Strategies hold a favorable view of hospitals.
  • 9/10 people said doctors and nurses were trustworthy resources of information, according to a recent Harris poll.
  • "The organizations that Americans trust most are those who are in the trenches delivering, which is why you see doctors and nurses as number one," Rob Jekielek, Managing Director with The Harris Poll, told Fierce Healthcare.
• That puts hospital and health system marketers in a unique position — one that comes with significant responsibility.
• From our own research, we've seen that consumers trust and have confidence in local healthcare.
  • Some hospitals and health systems are shying away from that trust.
• This trusted position hospitals/health systems are in comes with considerable responsibility, but it's such an important time to seize.
• The spread of misinformation across social channels is especially rapid.
  • Hospitals and health systems can use their digital channels and social platforms as megaphones for truth and accuracy
• The misinformation volume is only going to get louder over the next several months with new hotspots, therapeutic and vaccine claims (and opposition), and the scoring of political points in the run-up to the election.

Resources

• Why investors are pouring billions into primary care
• Joe Public 2030 LinkedIn Group
• Joe Public 2030 Book

Takeaways

To fellow bookworms

• As of this recording, Joe Public 2030 is officially available for pre-order. Backed by more than 250 resource citations and input from 22 industry experts, including health system CEOs, venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, and physicians, Joe Public 2030, makes five game-changing predictions about the future of health engagement. 
• What are our predictions, and how will your organization be impacted? Order your copy of Joe Public 2030 for a deep dive into the potential future of consumer health engagement.
• A bookworm and avid learner, Stephanie Wierwille finished 95 books in 2021. Her recommendation for other bookworms looking to read more? Carry multiple formats of books at all times – you’d be surprised at how often you can pull out a book or plug in your earbuds in a day.

New & noteworthy

Here comes 23andMe

• DNA testing company 23andMe took its first drug to clinical trial, using clinical insights derived from saliva test DNA results from consumers.
• This news, coupled with 23andMe’s recent acquisition of telehealth platform, Lemonaid Health, indicates the newly-public company’s intentions to grow beyond DNA testing and into personalized medicine.

That no good, very bad word: COVID-19

• Just when we thought we were out of the hot water, COVID-19 surges have forced hospitals to postpone elective surgeries … again.
• For hospitals and health systems, pausing elective surgeries means pausing critical revenue streams while patients’ untreated symptoms often worsen.
• Hospitalizations due to COVID-19 seem to be plateauing in major metropolitan markets.

The advertising market, party of three

• Alphabet, Meta, and Amazon are projected to account for 50% of the $1 trillion ad market by 2025, including non-digital advertising.
• If you’re a small business, you’re probably running digital ads, which means that your reliance on these three companies is greater than that of a big brand.

ICYMI: Advocate Aurora at J.P. Morgan Health Care Conference

• In addition to being a non-profit hospital system, Advocate Aurora is moving to become a health-related company and gave a rundown of its latest moves to do so.
• This year, the system will continue to invest in “become[ing] more evolved in healthcare beyond just hospitals and doctors,” Advocate Aurora CEO Jim Skogsbergh said.
• Advocate Aurora detailed how it is buying stakes in innovative consumer health tools. This investment includes a 20% stake in the telenutrition business FoodSmart and the complete acquisition of the home care and wellness company Senior Helpers. The system also bought a 17% stake in the digital and analytics platform Xealth.

The latest trends in telehealth

Virtual care on the decline

• Virtual care, which boomed during 2020, has reportedly experienced a significant decline in consumer usage in 2021.
• It would be interesting to know if this decline results from lower demand for virtual care or lower supply. Do consumers no longer want virtual care, or are their health systems not supplying it?
• Some data shows that no shows were significantly higher with telehealth which could de-incentivize providers to offer virtual care services.
• Telehealth was primed for its big moment but ultimately disappointed many because the industry failed to integrate it into the patient experience.

When consumers prefer telehealth

• A month ago, eMarketer released a US Telehealth Trends 2022 report, which found that the number one reason people use virtual is to avoid contracting a disease.
• While adoption is low, it could be possible that the market hasn’t reached the tipping point where telehealth will prevail yet. If you look to other industries, it took time for consumers to become comfortable with a digital experience, so perhaps healthcare is no different.
• Health systems need to prepare themselves for when consumers are ready to embrace telehealth because those leading the charge will end up on top.

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Modern Healthcare article: California hospitals ask governor for $1 billion in immediate aid
• Bain article: The U.S. is not fully prepared to resume elective medical care
• Modern Healthcare article: U.S. faces 'truly daunting' challenges on needed COVID tests:
• ‘Plandemic’ article

Key TakeAways

Observations About Patient Acquisition

• Consumers are trusting their local health experts to provide guidance during this time, and are thinking about their health more than ever.
• 6/10 people are willing to switch providers, according to our latest research, even if they already had a planned surgery before the COVID-19 shutdown.

3 Primary Levers to Pull for Patient Acquisition

1. Direct response
   • Before proactively marketing a service line, the organization must be ready for those seeking care by maximizing reactive tactics.
   • Example tactics include:
     • Always-on search
     • Website content (particularly on service line pages)
     • Call center capabilities
     • ORM
     • Find-a-Physician tool
2. Physician referrals
   • The quickest and most powerful way to impact volumes is by understanding and improving physician referral patterns.
   • What does your outreach program look like?
   • What can you do to make your referral process as easy as possible?
   • Provide educational messages so referring doctors know they’re sending patients to a safe place.
   • Don't forget physician-to-physician communication.
3. Demand generation – How can you be top of mind?
   • Once direct response and physician referral tactics are in place, systems can generate demand for service line volume through targeted personalized marketing, promotional campaigns, and content marketing programs.
   • Example demand generation tactics include:
     • Personalized marketing campaigns
     • Promotional campaigns
     • Content marketing
   • The luxury of building relationships isn’t available during this time. We’re advocating that health systems think about unifying their service line campaigns for efficiency. 

Six key themes from SXSW:

1. The pace of innovation is accelerating
2. Storytelling matters more now, than ever
3. Patients are still profiles, not people—and that must change
4. Physicians are experiencing a dethroning
5. Be fearless. Be bold.
6. Generative AI is here to stay.

Takeaways

CES took place during the recording of this episode. The No Normal team reviewed the health trends and technologies featured at the event. 

A health perspective on the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2022 

• Health had a more prominent presence at this year's CES than in previous years. For the first time, a healthcare executive took the main stage.
• Abbot CEO Robert Ford delivered a keynote presentation on human-powered health, talking about topics such as at-home testing, biome-based medical nutrition, and wearable sensors.
• This spotlight on health at a consumer goods conference is interesting because it demonstrates the blurring of lines between healthcare, retail, and the consumer world.
• Whereas medical devices used to be associated with healthcare alone, brands commonly feature these technologies at major consumer electronics events.

Health technologies that made a splash at CES

• Senglad Smart Health Monitoring Light: The WiFi- and Bluetooth-connected Lightbulbs track consumers' heart rate and sleeping patterns throughout the household. This technology is an alternative to on-body sensors.
• Withings Body Scan Smart Scale: Withings' scale goes beyond standard measurements, offering users insights into body composition per body part. It also makes ECG measurements for atrial fibrillation, vascular health, and changes in nerve activity — all of which users can send to doctors directly from the scale.
• Sleep Number 360 Smart Bed: Sleep number debuted changes to its 360 Smart Bed. The bed, which already detects movement and makes adjustments automatically, could detect illnesses and disorders like insomnia, sleep apnea, or cardiac events in the future.
• Toto Wellness Toilet: Toilet retailers have presented at CES for the past few years. This year, Toto launched its Wellness Toilet, which scans the user and "key outputs" to determine the individual's level of wellness.
• Mind-controlled earbuds: These earbuds use a neural interface to control music and answer calls by detecting users' neural or facial movement activity.
• With all of these advancements, the health industry still has a long way to go. In fact, 70% of U.S. hospitals still rely on fax machines to communicate patient records.

Personalization meets privacy

• Consumer preference for personalization has been a hot topic for a while, but what's interesting now is how the trend increasingly clashes with consumer privacy concerns.
• According to Forrester, 72% of consumers only engage with marketing messages tailored to their interest, but 86% are concerned about data privacy. How do we meet both needs when they work against each other?
• In this new world of consumer health sensors and a growing amount of consumer health data, privacy concerns will likely become an even larger topic of discussion.
• This weight on privacy is also evidenced by the whopping 96%  of users who deny applications access to cross-tracking on Apple devices.
• Enforcers are also cracking down on data privacy. In fact, France recently fined Google and Facebook millions of dollars for failure to obtain proper consent for data tracking.
• Which organizations do consumers trust the most with their data? Around 50% of respondents identified Amazon as the most trusted data steward, above Apple, Google, and even banks.
• We explore the personalization of healthcare — what we call the Copernican Consumer — and its relation to privacy preferences in our upcoming book, Joe Public 2030.

Splintered societies

• Our book, Joe Public 2030, also predicts The Rise of Health Sects, splintering societies based on political affiliation related to health.
• This phenomenon is commonly referred to as political tribalism. However, tribalism may not be the correct term as the language implies ancestry, race, or culture.
• In-group and out-group dynamics dramatically shape individual value systems and political views. When individuals belong to a group, they will look to those they trust — their group — for signals on how to think.
• The way someone thinks or acts on a health issue is highly correlated with their political affiliation. We've seen that with masking and vaccination, and other health-related issues.
• In 2022 this trend will continue, which will have implications for brand strategy, creative, and business in general.
• Historically brands have focused on speaking to "universal truths." In this new age of splintered societies, we can no longer group our audiences as we have in the past, just based on age or demographics. We need to go beyond traditional consumer segmentation and lean into the power of group influence. As marketers, we need to reevaluate how we partner with trusted entities across different groups.

Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• Beckers Hospital Review Article: How COVID-19 is changing hospitals' marketing strategies
• Washington Post Article: No Deaths and an Army of Hospital Workers Ready to Fight: A Rural Town’s Prescription For a Nation Weighing What’s Next
• Harvard Business Review Article: How One Health System Is Transforming in Response to COVID-19

Key Takeaways

Geisinger's Marketing Messaging 

• The communications function has pivoted just as the organization has pivoted to reopen.
• Pennsylvania has created a color-coded reopening system.
• One of the hurdles is safety, so we're trying to reinforce that message while supporting operations and clinical teams, and ensuring that we're getting people back appropriately.

Keeping People Informed and Ensuring Operations Continue 

• We pivoted as we shut down non-emergent procedures and closed down many clinics.
  • We provided a prevention message about COVID-19.
  • We were ready as a department to support efforts with marketing materials.

Distributing Internal and External Communications 

• Many of our surrounding households have a Geisinger employee in them, so we have to be very thoughtful about our internal communications from that perspective and think through the community impact of every decision.

Pivoting into a Crisis with New Branding  

• Our new brand message explains why we do what we do, which is what I believe is the essence of a good brand.
  • We did some hard work in 2019 and finished around the holidays.
  • We launched it around our core essence that we're not just about health care; we're about total health.

Brand Evolution in a Post-COVID-19 Environment 

• As a health system in a rural area, we can't postpone needed care — even in a pandemic.
• Some things were postponed that were not life-threatening in March that became life-threatening in May.
• As we move into a potential second surge, we need to be clear about what care our communities still have access to.

Geisinger Moving Forward 

• We saw increased interest in internal communication utilization, so we're going to try to figure out a way to keep that traffic level up through our intranet, push communications, and email.
• We did some experimentation with multicultural marketing because we have pockets of predominately Spanish speaking communities that were not receiving communications.
  • We were seeing them show up in the ED without much information, so we created an infrastructure to support those communities moving forward.
• Utilizing virtual meetings can promote our organizations either from a paid or an earned media perspective.

Resources in Today's Episode:

• WHO infodemic management 50 actions tracker
• Johns Hopkins COVID-19 profiling by country
• The online competition between pro and anti-vaccination views

Key Takeaways

The Infordemic Landscape

• An infodemic is the widespread sharing of misinformation (false information spread accidentally) and disinformation (false information spread with an agenda) that makes COVID-19 interventions challenging.
• There is too much information on COVID-19, making it difficult for the general public to discern between factual and non-factual information.
• Frequent shifts in recommendations made by trusted leaders continue to damage the public’s trust in the information they receive.

Four tips for combatting misinformation

1. Get to know your audience by conducting surveys, performing social media analyses, and continue to refine how you listen to your audience based on your findings.
2. Distill science and research into a more understandable format to make information more approachable.
3. Build resilience to misinformation by educating the public on misinformation, how it spreads, and why it’s important to report.
4. Engage with local communities by working with religious leaders, employers, unions, chambers of commerce, and other trusted local groups to amplify good health information.

How social media affects the infodemic

• Social media can accelerate misinformation, therefore we must standardize how to respond to misinformation by analyzing how it is shared, how it jumps channels, and how interactions vary across channels.
• Around 67% of people identify providers as a trusted source of information while only 11% report social media as a trusted source.

Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

Kaiser Family Foundation Article: Opportunities and Barriers for Telemedicine in the U.S. During the COVID-19 Emergency and Beyond

Brookings Article: Removing Regulatory Barriers to Telehealth Before and After COVID-19

U.S. News Article: The Coronavirus Pandemic and the Transformation of Telehealth

Credit Suisse Study: Telehealth Industry: Beyond the Pandemic

Key Takeaways

Telehealth - what should we call it?

• We see telehealth, telemedicine, and virtual medicine used in the majority of industry dialogue right now.
• It can be confusing when organizations define it in different ways.
  • The World Health Organization
    • Telemedicine services are administered by physicians only.
    • Telehealth is a little broader, so its services are administered by a variety of different care providers.
  • The U.S. federal government
    • Telehealth is a broad swath of remote healthcare services, not even entirely clinical.
    • Telemedicine is specific to the remote delivery of clinical care.

The utilization of telehealth.

• Several barriers have prevented the adoption of telemedicine.
  • While many employers report offering telehealth to employees, a large number of consumers are unaware that they have access to it.
  • How many providers can be compensated for telehealth versus in-person visits?
• There have been several restrictions temporarily lifted during COVID-19.
  • Federal
    • Waived HIPAA requirements.
    • Waived out-of-state licensing.
  • State by state
    • Loosened privacy laws.
    • Waived out-of-state licensing requirements.
    • Expanded Medicare programs.

The implications for health systems and hospitals.

• I would expect that states will more permanently wave a lot of in-state licensure requirements.
• What will not continue after COVID-19 is the use of non-HIPAA compliant technologies.
• The service and payment area are still undetermined about what will stay and what will cease after the temporary lifts have concluded.
• A patient is going to be looking at multiple options for how they want to receive care virtually.
  • As health system marketers look to prioritize their own telehealth services, they must approach communication with even more rigor, targeting tactics, and educational messaging than their health plan counterparts.

The impact of consumer perception on telemedicine adoption.

• Consumers are still afraid to go back into hospital settings.
  • They've become comfortable with telehealth, so demand is likely going to continue.

Let's talk all things Super Bowl! In this episode, Desiree and Stephanie are joined by Mindy Adams, Chief Creative Officer at BPD, as we break down Super Bowl LIX. We explore ads that stood out, the cultural significance of Kendrick Lamar’s halftime performance, how healthcare brands are showing up (or missing the mark) in major media moments, the impact of AI in advertising, and the power of storytelling in shaping public perception.

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Setting the stage  

• Healthcare is way behind in the consumer space. Fortunately, we have other industries to learn from when merging online and in-person experiences.
• Chris DuFresne, Vice President of Experience and Marketing Operations, draws from his experience at e-commerce giants Target and Macy's for inspiration at Allina Health.
• Dufresne acknowledges that health systems aren't just businesses but states that they need to bolster their businesses to support our missions. To do so, we must redefine patients as "consumers" because patients represent just the person receiving care when other stakeholders – consumers – are involved.

Transferring retail knowledge to healthcare 

• Our industry was built for the provider, forcing patients to navigate a complex ecosystem. How do we deconstruct this physician-centric model in a way that puts the consumer first?
• Chris DuFresne challenged health systems to use consumer-centric industries as benchmarks. For example, health systems can ask themselves, "How do we make patient scheduling as simple as OpenTable?"
• Part of becoming consumer-centric in healthcare is honoring various consumer preferences and needs without overwhelming consumers with options. For example, some people may want to call in to schedule an appointment, while others may like to schedule online. The art is making each option convenient and personable even if utilizing call centers.

When does a connected experience matter most? 

• The consumer is ok with asynchronous virtual care for minor ailments like sinus infections that are somewhat isolated.
• Patients requiring both digital and onsite experiences offer opportunities for health systems to prove their value to patients through connected experiences.
• For instance, a digital encounter may require labs. How can a health system get these labs without leaving and redoing the whole visit again? How should that visit be billed, and which services are covered by insurance? How does the consumer know that the price of a virtual visit matches the value they receive?

Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

CNN Article: US should have a 'couple hundred million' doses of a Covid-19 vaccine by the start of 2021, Fauci says

The Atlantic Article: We Don’t Even Have a COVID-19 Vaccine, and Yet the Conspiracies Are Here

Advisory Board Feature with ReviveHealth: Q&A: The right (and wrong) ways to talk with patients who are frightened to seek care

Key Takeaways

Takeaways from Rapid Recovery in Health Systems

• Patient engagement and personalized messaging have been a significant focus.
• There has been a lack of critical patient communications included in the reopening plans of many health systems. This is often due to limitations regarding consumer targeting. Limitations we’ve seen:
• Recent adoptions to CRM
• Lack of a sophisticated CRM
• Limited ability to work around automated marketing
• Learning the consumer in this new climate is crucial to patient retention.
• Consumers are wanting detailed information explaining how hospitals are going to keep them safe when they show up to their appointments.
• Consumers’ frequency of hearing about COVID-19 has shown to be an essential factor in our research.

Messaging Matters – Our Recommendations  

• We need to keep in mind who is delivering our messages.
• Physicians are our biggest advocates, so we need to support them by keeping them informed by not leaving them off our communication plan.
• Cross-functional alignment with health systems and marketers is crucial so that marketers can adequately adjust how we are marketing and how we are communicating with patients.

Forcing Function for Systems

• COVID-19 provided a silver lining highlighting the need for tools that have been on the health systems marketer’s wish list for many years.
• There’s been a significant increase in telehealth adoption, which is more convenient, less expensive, and overall provides better clinical care.  
• The rise of martech capabilities and tools
• Improving personalized marketing and consumer targeting  
• Smarter service line prioritization  

We had an amazing time at last month's Joe Public Retreat digging into healthcare marketing's most pressing issues with CMOs across the nation. We're bringing you all the hot takes, right here! In this episode, Chris Bevolo returns to the show as a permanent host and chats with Stephanie about the three-day event in Charleston, SC. We explore the pressures CMOs face and the urgent need for a shift in their roles to address market dynamics and stakeholder engagement. From Paul Keckley’s insights on economic pressures to Dr. Marcus Collins’ bold vision for branding as community-building, and Paul Roetzer’s groundbreaking takes on AI in healthcare marketing—we’re covering it all. Tune in!

Want to read more about Rome is Burning? Click the link here: Rome is Burning

Resources

• Media Platform Personality Archetypes
• Amazon and Houston Methodist's partnership
• TikTok Advertising

Takeaways

We introduced the new format for The No Normal Show this week. The show changes include: 

• ReviveHealth is now Revive, and to that end, the show will no longer focus solely on hospital and health system marketers and communicators, but marketers, branders, and communicators who are engaging consumers around health.
• The show will no longer be grounded in COVID-19 discussion but will explore new avenues of conversation, focusing on trends shaping the future.
• We will start to talk about marketing beyond healthcare and how to transfer that knowledge to the business of health.
• We are transitioning from a guest interview format to a consistent group of hosts including, Chris Bevolo, Stephanie Wierwille, and Chase Cleckner.
• The podcast will no longer be recorded live on Thursdays. However, we will still post the recording by 11 a.m. (CST) on our site and your favorite podcast listening platforms every Friday.

TikTok may be worth the hype 

• TikTok user activity overtook that of long-standing leader YouTube, with the average user spending 25 hours on the app in June 2021.
• Why is TikTok growing so rapidly? Carefully considered UX factors such as the endless scroll and full-screen experience increase engagement.
• Endless scroll, a common feature across social media platforms, appeals to the human desire for closure. With no concrete end, the user is never fully satisfied, increasing the likelihood of long sessions on the platform.
• Full-screen engagement, which TikTok pioneered, takes up the entirety of the screen, minimizing distractions that could lead the user away from the platform. A recent study showed that this full-screen experience resulted in 280 times more engagement than non-full-screen content.
• Marketers in the health space are slowly dipping their toes in the water to see if TikTok could be a valuable advertising and content marketing platform for their organization.

The time and place for health brands on TikTok 

• Several brands like Cleveland Clinic and Mucinex are already on TikTok and experiencing success. Other brands work through clinicians and other influencers.
• If your team has the resources and capacity to create custom content for TikTok, then yes, TikTok can be a great place to build your brand presence.
• Suppose you don’t have resources at your disposal specifically for TikTok. In that case, influencer content may serve you better because content that is made for other platforms will likely not resonate with TikTok's audiences.
• To be successful on TikTok, brands must be willing to experiment with non-serious tonality, integrating humor and surprise into their content.
• As health brands, we need to use potentially addictive platforms like TikTok in a way that encourages health rather than detracting from it. For example, marketers channel the addictive power of social media platforms by creating content that improves health – like Headspace, Pelaton, or Noom.

Is Amazon flying under the radar in the healthcare industry? 

• While Haven, Amazon’s joint venture with J.P. Morgan and Berkshire Hathaway, disbanded, Amazon’s success in the health space is progressing quickly.
• Houston Methodist and Amazon Web Services (AWS) have been working together for the last year to create a listening platform that is used in the exam rooms and operating rooms. The touchless technology voices steps for clinicians to complete, which can be marked as completed verbally. The technology inputs information directly into the EHR.
• Our upcoming book, Joe Public 2030, will take a deeper look into the next decade in our industry and where Amazon fits into the mix.

Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode

• ReviveHealth Article: The Era of "No Normal"
• ReviveHealth White Paper: Five Core Issues for Providers Post-COVID-19

Key Takeaways

The "No Normal" 

• We don’t know what normal looks like.
  • There will undoubtedly be profound changes in our society.
  • We’re still in the midst of this, and it will take months or even years for the healthcare industry to feel like things are starting to normalize.
• To recover from the financial strain, we have to learn to live and thrive through this uncertainty.
  • That’s why we created this podcast.

Five Principles for Success

• Make no assumptions.
  • We can’t assume what we did in the past will work moving forward.
  • Market research has a short shelf life (2-4 weeks).
  • We’ve seen considerable shifts in just three months of surveying for clients.
• We’re living in a fluid environment.
  • The industry will continue to change as we navigate through multiple waves of COVID-19, the seasonal flu, and the economic unrest we’re experiencing.
  • We’re going to experience a fluid environment from now into 2021 or possibly even 2022.
  • The market has essentially been on a sugar high, but now we are looking at even more layoffs in July when the CARES Act runs out.
• We have to be in a mindset of constant learning.
  • Our decision-making process needs to be faster and feedback loops need to tighten.
    • We have to be agile enough to learn through the waves of COVID-19.
  • Let’s make decisions and adjust our course as we go.
    • The old way of research and committees will leave you behind.
• There will be massive ripples – this isn’t just about COVID-19.
  • We must be ready for the significant changes COVID-19 will bring on.
  • There's been ten years of societal and digital advances in just a few months.
• We have to be comfortable in chaos.
  • There’s an opportunity in this chaos to restructure the healthcare system around the consumer instead of the physician.

Five Issues for Providers in COVID-19 (download the full report here.) 

1. Maintaining a safe environment.
2. Virtual care.
3. Working capital solutions.
4. The idea of physician-hospital integration.
5. Reexamining scale.

Think of your favorite book. Is it your favorite because the synopsis on the back cover was really good, or is it your favorite because of the storyline and the interplay of characters? We'll admit — we kind of set you up for that one, but hear us out: sometimes (not all the time) to get the full value of content, you just have to experience the entire thing. This is one of those times. 

But, of course, we're not going to leave you hanging if you're not convinced. Here are a few of the questions posed by our audience and answers they received from ReviveHealth's CEO, Brandon Edwards, and EVP, Chris Bevolo.  

Audience Questions 

When are ReviveHealth’s clients planning to get back to their jobs as marketers and communicators to support the organization’s business priorities?

• Unpopular opinion: While the dust may be settling, we are undoubtedly still in the No Normal and will be for a long time. For example, new variants in Michigan have caused hospitals to delay surgeries again to deal with an influx of hospitalizations.
• Even as businesses start to reopen, we have to remember that the world has been changed for good.
• We must accept these changes and re-establish our identity in this changed world. Who are you? How is your health system different? Who are you competing with?”

What would you have *hoped* hospitals would have done in the COVID era to progress, but maybe they missed the opportunity on?  

• It would be remiss to ignore the limitations and significant lack of funding health systems faced during the pandemic.
• If adequate resources had been available, we would have hoped health systems would have dispersed care sooner rather than requiring patients to navigate complex medical campuses. 

Our organization believes that physician acquisition and partnerships is the key to financial growth. Our ad budget has been slashed in half this year ... how can we show our value with our hands tied by a limited budget?

• Many health systems spend their growth budget on acquisitions rather than looking internally to their marketing teams.  Communicating the value of your team may be challenging, but it is possible. 
• Marketing and advertising are often (and mistakenly) used interchangeably. As marketers, we know that "marketing" is much more than that. Communicate that marketing means setting price strategies, developing messaging for target markets, filling your funnel, and keeping it full. 

As for the rest, you'll just have to listen to the episode for that. (:

Takeaways

In this episode, Chris, Stephanie, and Chase each reviewed one health brand, discussing why the brand is notable in today's landscape.

Cityblock: Better care, rooted in communities

• Chase chose to discuss Cityblock, an emerging primary care organization for low-income communities.
• The pandemic highlighted and exacerbated health inequities, spotlighting the growing need to make quality healthcare accessible to low-income populations. In fact, The Commonwealth Fund found that in nearly every state, healthcare is better for white people.
• While we see more organizations getting into primary care for the commercially insured, Cityblock is making care more accessible for Medicare-insured populations.
• Cityblock is unique because they meet people where they're at – existing schools, churches, and community centers.
• Cityblock hires a lot of its medical care team members from the communities they serve. This helps the primary care innovator build trust and understanding with the communities it serves.
• Cityblock recently announced their Series D round of funding, bringing total funding to $900 million.

Hims & Hers: A modern approach to health and wellness

• Hims & Hers is a company that encompasses prescription medicine, primary care, supplements, and CPG products.
• The company is built to provide better care to consumers with stigmatized conditions, such as those related to sexual health, mental health, and beauty.
• The company uniquely brings together prescription, beauty, and home health using a telemedicine platform and retail distribution networks.
• The company's valuation at IPO was about $1.6 billion, which is on par with what we've seen with OneMedical, showing gradual revenue growth over time.
• A lot of companies have tried to disrupt the pharmacy business, but many have failed because of cemented power dynamics and complex inner workings.
• Hims & Hers is breaking into this arena by making medicine less intimidating through beautiful design and branding. The No Normal team posits that consumers may find it less scary to receive a prescription in a beautiful bottle than a regular sick package.

Apple: Think different

• Chris chose Apple to focus on as a health brand because most people don't consider apple a health brand, despite Tim Cook's bold belief that Apple's legacy will be in health.
• From fall detection features to EMR integrations, Apple's progression into healthcare has been steadily marked by high-tech devices, including wearables like Apple Watch and AirPods.
• Walking steadiness is a particularly notable feature because it is a new clinical metric that can be credited to a "non-healthcare" brand. We use quotes here for a reason. Apple, whether you believe it or not, is one of the fastest-growing health brands out there.
• Apple may have faltered a time or two as it entered the healthcare arena, but these stumbles are merely learning opportunities that the giant will use to inform future efforts.
• Apple was the first company to reach $1 trillion after 42 years of business. It took only two more years to get to be valued at $2 trillion. They are known for design and innovation and have enough capital to invest in healthcare. If you connect the dots, the reality is clear: Apple is ready to take on health care ... whether systems are ready or not.

Resources in Today's Episode

• Your Consumers are Afraid a blog by Sasha Boghosian
• Alan Shoebridge LinkedIn Group Therapy Post

Key Takeaways 

Group Therapy while Living in a Pressure Cooker: 
Ways of coping with the evolving work demands and the circumstances of today’s world 

• Acknowledging that we are all just human
  • How do we take a step back and do our jobs to support the organizations we work for while also acknowledging how these circumstances are impacting us as individuals?
• Evolving work pressures and the impact of stress
  • This is a new situation for all of us – the personal aspects but also professional. Whenever there is a rapid and dramatic change to what we do, it will bring a lot of challenges with it, that alone is disruptive for people within “normal” circumstances
  • These changes have resulted in staff redeployments and changing how we think about doing our work along with the ongoing need to adapt
    • Significant shifts in the nature of roles that are typically focused on in-person relationships/events. If digital wasn’t IT before all of this, then it is now
  • We are being asked to do more with less. All while trying to reframe these challenges into an opportunity
    • We want to show up and deliver given all of the massive challenges that the world is facing, but on top of all of that pressure we are also dealing with our lives outside of the “office”
• How can we manage and support our team and co-workers?
  • Openness about how we are doing and speaking to it regularly – not carrying those feelings around silently is huge right now. Creating a space to have open conversations about how you are doing with friends and family
  • Creating these spaces is a crucial part of a leader’s work – we can’t get through these challenges without an engaged workforce
    • This is an ultra-marathon, and we are only halfway in. There is much further to go, and we have to care for one another to get there — play the long game here
  • Team Support Ideas:
    • Intentionally set up a time to hear how employees are doing from a human to human point of view
    • Weekly conversations that have nothing to do with work — getting the team to build personal connections has bonded them in ways that we have never seen before
    • Look to see what resources psychology departments are offering
    • Schedule a 30-minute mindful meditation block on everyone’s calendar
    • Schedule regular town hall meetings to discuss timely topics
    • Providing personal time off or leave hours that are COVID specific
    • Instituted a no lay off policy to help settle anxieties
    • Ensure that your team has the resources they need to be successful — do not assume everyone is playing on the same level
      • Example: stable internet access or children at home

A case for boldness 

• Health system marketing comes with many stakeholders, opinions, and expectations, making it challenging to deliver imaginative and bold campaigns. 
• Despite these challenges, marketers must continue to push on ideas that don't just "check the boxes" but truly influence behavior in a way that improves public health. 

The campaign that pushed the envelope 

• During the pandemic, health systems and hospitals across the country promoted COVID-19 vaccination within their communities. A literal life or death situation, VCU health knew they would need something more than a safe, traditional campaign. 
• To increase vaccine uptake in Virginia, VCU Health honed in on Virginian pride and the unique stories that make the people of Virginia. 
• Younger populations in Virginia were vaccinating at lower rates than other populations, so VCU Health's messaging needed to address these people directly rather than using broad messaging. From this direction, a provocative direction was born: This Sh*t Matters. 

Clearing the "buy-in" hurdle

• To bring this bold idea to life, the VCU Health marketing team needed to build a strong case for the campaign and why the provocative approach was necessary to drive impact. 
• The team bolstered their argument by testing the work in-market, collecting feedback from legislators, and collaborating with clinical experts. 
• Cynthia credits VCU Hea position as a challenger brand and the system's forward-thinking leadership for getting this game-changing idea across the finish line. 

Bolder campaign, bolder results 

• The campaign plan originally included three to four stories from Virginians. After a short stint in the market, however, more and more people came to VCU health to share their stories. The result: 15+ stories told by community members who knew their audience's context. The campaign also received coverage from several local news stations. 

Key Resources Mentioned in Today's Episode:

• ReviveHealth Consumer Survey Report

Key Takeaways from Today's Episode:

• How has LA differed from other areas in their response to Covid-19?
  • LA was an earlier adopter for the Safer at home executive order and had time to prepare first responders
  • We’ve realized how financially devastating this is and are working on solutions to get back to  without putting ourselves at risk.
• Communication Strategies from UCLA during COVID-19
  • Daily huddles with executive leadership
  • We built a website for external and internal communications as well as provided a chat bot that will soon offer a bilingual feature.
  • We’ve provided a risk assessment on the website
• Team LA
  • We wanted to remind people we can work together without having to physically be together.
  • We’re using mostly social media with a few PSA’s
    • Collective Resolve
  • Behavior enforcement (physical distancing, face masks, Safer at home)
  • Empathy Pillar (Acknowledge that this is hard but we can get through it)
  • Gratitude for staff has received many impressions and has been popular with the community
    • #TeamLA 170,000 impressions

Q&A:

• Question: How do you leverage the community goodwill that we’re gaining as hospitals and health systems in our communities moving forward into the post-COVID era? Financially, we’re going to need help.
• Answer: We should keep reinforcing the importance of health and continue to support hospitals and health systems.

About Daily Briefing Live:

Daily Briefing Live is a 30-minute live video podcast focused on how health system marketers and communicators are managing the COVID-19 crisis.

Each day, we’ll feature the latest that we’re hearing from the industry and our clients, the most up-to-day recommendations and ideas, and provide a forum for attendees to ask questions. We’ll post a recording of the podcast each day for download, and then we will be back, every weekday at 12:00 CST, until this crisis passes.

To join the live video podcast each day, simply visit http://bit.ly/daily-briefing-live at 12:00PM CST. 

Articles to check out: 
TikTok ban set for September arguments
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tiktok-ban-challenge-september-arguments/

Population shifts, risk factors may triple U.S. cardiovascular disease costs by 2050
https://newsroom.heart.org/news/population-shifts-risk-factors-may-triple-u-s-cardiovascular-disease-costs-by-2050

Salesforce State of Marketing (PDF)
 

Resources 

• CEO of UPS in NY times 
• Lego makes strides in sustainability 

Takeaways

Two sides of the same coin: Purpose & brand experience 

• Health systems need to approach branding differently than they have in the past to compete with powerful consumer brands establishing footholds in healthcare. One of the ways systems can embark on a new path is by rethinking "purpose.'
• Most health systems and hospitals assume they have purpose down pat – after all, they save lives every day. But there can be more to purpose.
• FutureBrand looks at the balance of purpose and brand experience. To them, purpose means nothing if it is not substantiated through a brand experience – regardless of audience.

Redefining brand purpose 

• What brand purpose is: A promise lived in every action or engagement – it has many hands, many stories, and is felt by all of your customers and employees. It is the tangible and enduring mark a brand leaves on the world, how it lives in the world, and makes it better than it found it.
• What brand purpose isn't: A compulsory mission statement on your website, a promise you make 1-2 times a year in a campaign or activation, or the words that are referred to now and again in company town halls and stakeholder presentations.

What it means to be a sustainable brand 

• COVID-19 and climate concerns have up-leveled what sustainability means today.
• Sustainability is no longer taking siloed actions for the good of the planet; instead, it's a full-court press to improve the well-being of the planet, the lives of people who live on it.
• Brand purpose goes beyond consumer experience
• The difference between a high-performing brand and a low-performing brand depends on the brand's ability to balance purpose and experience.
• The P&G brand does this well by actively living up to its corporate promise of "Touching lives, improving lives."
• A brand-led approach lessens the need to react to heightened public expectations.
  
   

From highlight reels to headlines, culture is shifting—and healthcare marketing needs to keep up. In this episode we get into why the moment is overtaking the message. We unpack the Meta tell-all Careless People, dissect the rapid-fire chaos of tech and policy updates (hello, Policy ICU), and explore how fan fiction, fantasy leagues, and even SNL are reshaping engagement in real time. Plus, we break down what it all means for brands trying to show up authentically in the age of short attention spans and hot takes. Ready to rethink your media mix? Tune in now.

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Key Resources

• HANYS Report on Report Cards
• Jackson Health System Care Quote
• Jackson Health System Quality Data Platform

Key Takeaways

Jackson Health's Transparency Philosophy

• When there is clarity about what public institutions are doing, it allows them to create buy-in and build alliances within the organization.
• With Jackson Health System being a public hospital, they've embraced the idea of transparency and have made it a part of their DNA as an organization.
   

How to Address Transparency

• Rather than relying on other sources or reviews, Jackson Health has leveraged public data and display it for all to see on their Quality Data Program site.
• Being a transparent organization means that you share your health systems' performance, even in areas you are not performing as high as competitors or the national average.
• This public data is being leveraged to motivate internal teams to improve on the quality of care where needed.
• Pricing transparency with health systems can be complicated. Still, Jackson Health has created a way to offer free quotes for upcoming surgeries based on your specific insurance coverage to give you an out-the-door price for your procedure.
• It's been a very successful program and is a great lead source for the organization. 
   

COVID-19's Impact on Transparency

• Given that COVID-19 has forced hospitals to move incredibly quickly, in some organizations, it has created situations where hospitals and payors find themselves disconnected, especially on the payment and coverage side for COVID-19.

The Future of Transparency

• We will not be going back to where we were nine months ago, especially as it pertains to virtual care.
• Even as payors are pulling back reimbursement for virtual visits, consumers have tasted the convenience, and some are keen on never going back to what it was.

Takeaways

A wide geographic footprint doesn’t come without its challenges 

• Spanning 29 states, LifePoint Health needed to keep a constant pulse on the state initiatives affecting each of its markets. This required a clear and constant line of communication with the compliance team.  
• The marketing and communications team’s greatest challenge was tracking and responding to changes across markets. For instance, South Carolina was the first of their markets to have a COVID-19 case, and therefore needed different communications than other markets at the time.  
• LifePoint was able to take learnings from each of its markets to iterate and refine marketing efforts.  

Getting standardization and localization to work in harmony 

• Local market leaders and corporate LifePoint Health strategists worked in tandem to produce effective results across state lines. 
• Focus on service line marketing vs. branding depends on the competitive nature of the market. In more isolated markets with less competition, branding is less of a priority, but in highly competitive markets, branding takes the stage. 

Earning that coveted “seat at the table” 

• COVID-19 has highlighted the importance of marketing and communications teams in achieving health system objectives. Now, it’s up to us to demonstrate our strategic worth by supporting organizational initiatives. 
• Maintaining marketing’s position as a strategic partner calls for targeted hiring initiatives, alignment on strategic plans for the market, and executive buy-in. 
• When communicating with executives, make sure you’re speaking to the value points they care about. For instance, CFOs and CEOs will likely care more about the bottom line and ROI, whereas CNOs may care more about clinical quality.