Stages of Behavioral Change + CRM: A Winning Strategy for Healthcare Marketers

// By Melanie Graham //

You don’t need to be an industry expert to know that today’s healthcare structure is experiencing tremendous change. Organizations are grappling with new technology as well as adjusting to reimbursement models that involve taking on more risk for patients’ health and well-being.

These changes affect healthcare operations and administration, and they also trickle down to marketing departments. Healthcare marketers, who may have previously focused on patient volume, find themselves shifting some of their attention to population health and patient wellness.

Susan Dubuque, principal and co-founder of ndp

“It’s no longer only about getting patients to come to your hospital for their surgery, it’s about how organizations can partner with patients and the community to help engage them in healthier behaviors,” says Susan Dubuque, principal and co-founder of ndp, a marketing and advertising agency that specializes in healthcare and service industries.

Dubuque, who has a background as both a mental health specialist and a marketer, approaches healthcare marketing from a unique angle — through Stages of Change. This model, originally conceptualized by James Prochaska, PhD, can give marketers the ability to better understand and engage their target market.

Dubuque shared these concepts in a Strategic Health Care Marketing webinar with ndp marketing analytics lead James Colvin, who explained how the Stages of Change model can be applied through a customer relationship management (CRM) platform; Katie Mardigian, transplant outreach coordinator at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) Health’s Hume-Lee Transplant Center shared how VCU combined the power of CRM and Stages of Behavioral Change to successfully market its transplantation program. Dubuque and Mardigian shared recent results of the program during their presentation “Marketing’s Role in Behavior Change” at HMPS in Salt Lake City in May.

Here, we’ll see how the Stages of Change model mirrors the marketing funnel, how to craft consumer messaging that corresponds to each stage, and how a CRM platform helped VCU target and track patient activity at all points along the journey.

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