Happy Holidays from the Digital Health Coalition! In recognition of the coming new year, we circulated a set of questions to DHC Health Scholars and DHC Advisory Board Members, giving them a chance to share their own end-of-year musing with our readers. We hope these insights from the industry’s best and brightest will inspire you to start 2019 with a fresh energy!

We asked…

What tech/healthcare/marketing/advertising trend that can’t be ignored in 2019, and why?

They said…

Privacy is a tech/healthcare/marketing/advertising trend that can’t be ignored in 2019, because customers are quickly losing trust in all companies that collect, store, manage and use personal data for diagnosis and treatment, risk stratification, financial transactions, and omnichannel tracking and marketing.
— Joe Shields, President and Founder, Health Accelerators

Machine Learning (ML) is a technology trend that can’t be ignored in 2019, because Artificial Intelligence tools have reached a point where they are more powerful and accessible than ever. Machine Learning in 2019 will come out of the niche technology space and begin to become a standardized way to uncover powerful insights in even smaller datasets. Combined with traditional market research tools, ML will enhance our approach to solving some of the most interesting problems in healthcare.
— Lori Grant, President, Klick Health

Data is a trend that can’t be ignored in 2019. Focus on patient engagement and ongoing data handling topics will continue to be front and center of topics for the industry. As patient engagement continues to increase in importance the ability to develop strategies and supporting tactics to effectively reach patients across all digital channels. This also requires expert knowledge in data management as more patient data is collected and utilized having a clear data management approach in the US and globally is critical. Most data exists in silos today and marrying these data silos, cleansing and ensuring data integrity is foundational. The consequences are significant – particularly from a EU perspective, but longer term in order to have the ability to develop targeted marketing programs.
— Jim LeFevere, Director, Global Marketing Services, Roche Diabetes Care

AI is a trend I can’t ignore in 2019 because every vendor and writer is going to be hyping it. Just like every innovation, there are some truly amazing capabilities AI can open up. Focusing on the essentials – who is your customer? what are their needs? how can brands engage with them? are questions that can help keep the hype in perspective.
— Fred Bennett, Patient Engagement & Strategy, Intercept Pharmaceuticals

Healthcare consumerism is a trend that can’t be ignored in 2019. Consumers are bearing an increasingly larger share of healthcare expenses. Consequently, they are increasingly looking to play a more active role in healthcare decision making and be partners in care with their healthcare professional. This desire to be more engaged in healthcare decision making requires timely access to personalized, relevant health information and proactive communication between office visits. For example, in a recent survey 60 percent of patients said that they expect providers to text them or participate in online chats between appointments. And 57% said they expected providers to send automated text, voice or email reminders to urge them to take actions such as scheduling appointments or taking medications. Consumers are ultimately going to expect the same personalized, “Amazon-like” experience in healthcare that they can get in virtually every other aspect of their lives.
— Mike Collette, Founder and CEO, PatientPoint

Artificial Intelligence is a tech/healthcare trend I can’t ignore in 2019, for many reason but as a start, the technology provided via automation, chatbots, virtual assistants, etc can provide deeper patient insights, leading to improved healthcare and more personalized engagement, which ultimately should lead to better patient outcomes.
— Deb Nevins, Sr. Associate Director, HCP Integration and Engagement Lead, Jardiance Brand Team, Boehringer-Ingelheim

Voice is a technology trend that can’t be ignored in 2019, because healthcare is already proving to be a leading vertical for voice applications and we’re only at the tipping point of where things are going.
— Lori Grant, President, Klick Health

We asked…

What do you believe will dramatically influence the face of pharma and/or healthcare in the next 5 – 10 years?

They said…

I believe pricing pressure will dramatically influence the face of pharma and/or healthcare in the next 5 – 10 years, fundamentally changing the cost structure and business models of big pharma, forcing sweeping changes in how companies discover, test and market medicines and medical devices.
— Joe Shields, President and Founder, Health Accelerators

I believe the ability to move with urgency and quickly scale is critical (from a marketing perspective). Maintaining Fundamentals: The ability to scale resources quickly, develop impactful patient engagement programs and utilizing new technology to target patient populations are table stakes. The velocity of work has increased significantly in recent years and the pressure to be agile, urgent and also thoughtful and calculated in your approach to developing and delivering marketing programs has never been greater. It’s critical to be sure to not lose sight of the fundamentals in marketing and be focused on having a suite of partners and tools already in place in order to scale quickly. Or in other words, ensuring you are “digging your well before you are thirsty.” This is really linked to the idea that the notion of campaign planning is antiquated and you really need to be prepared with the ability to spin up programs very quickly within days and weeks versus months.
— Jim LeFevere, Director, Global Marketing Services, Roche Diabetes Care

I believe AMAZON Health will dramatically influence the face of pharma and/or healthcare in the next 5 – 10 years.
— Deb Nevins, Sr. Associate Director, HCP Integration and Engagement Lead, Jardiance Brand Team, Boehringer-Ingelheim

The explosion of data – linking real world outcomes against cost – will continue to radically transform the business of pharma and health interventions in general. What is the long term value of a treatment for a 10 year old child to eliminate traditional (and costly) supportive care? We’ll have hard data at scale to make those decisions. The flip side is we must make tough decisions when we allocate significant investments towards a patient at the end of their natural life – and where the therapeutic and treatment interventions may offer little to no benefit in terms of length and quality of life. We say value-based pricing exists today – but not anything close to how data will truly enable value-based pricing in pharma and health in the next decade.

Another area that will transform pharma will be the use of data to optimize the patient engagement and customer experience with physician customers. While pharma companies have been content to maintain an “arms length” relationship with their customers (often for legal reasons) the push by all other parts of the health system to invest in deep customer experience platforms and solutions will force pharma to come along – eventually. When brands make decisions based on customer experience, traditional segmentation based on historical activity becomes part of a much larger and holistic picture of customer value (and brand success).
— Mark Bard, Co-Founder, Digital Health Coalition

ADDITIONAL INSIGHTS FROM DHC PARTNERS

The Health and Tech Trends That Will Shape Pharma Marketing in 2019

Via Intouch Solutions | Website →

Intouch’s annual trends report – this is the fourth – highlights the healthcare and tech trends that will shape the year ahead. This POV focuses on the 7 trends to keep an eye on, including: Healthcare reform and pricing pressures, Understanding the human inside the customer (patient or HCP), Telehealth and other more personalized types of care delivery, Gene therapy, Voice technology and personal assistants, Data privacy and security, and AI inside. Read more →

Health-Condition Influencers Reveal Social Media Strategies

Via Healthline | Website →

Influencers have been impacting the health and wellness marketplace for years, but only recently are we beginning to see pharma brands catch on to this trend. Healthline’s 2018 “Health & Wellness Influencer Survey” questioned health influencers across all social media channels to understand how they work, what they value, and what they’re planning for 2019. Read about the valuable insights from the survey here →

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