
42group is a specialist healthcare marketing agency that uses content to create connections with your audiences. In this article, healthcare marketing experts at 42group explain what a specialist marketing agency for healthcare does and how it can help you grow online and offline with your core audiences.
Let’s start with the basics of defining what a healthcare marketing agency is. In our world, a healthcare marketing agency specialises in helping healthcare providers and organisations connect with their target audiences effectively. This could be patients, other healthcare providers, clinicians, commissioners, politicians and the general public. It could be all of these groups or just one.
The best healthcare marketing agencies combine in-depth industry knowledge with innovative marketing techniques used by commercial companies to help you build brand awareness, engage patients and clinicians and ultimately drive growth. This can be about raising your corporate profile, product or service marketing or campaign-based marketing.
While the UK has a socialised healthcare system, healthcare is clearly becoming more consumer-driven. As a result, the role of healthcare specialist marketing agencies has never been more critical.
If you’re searching for a healthcare marketing partner or simply want to know what a health marketing agency can do (and can’t do), you’re in the right place.
What does a healthcare marketing agency do?
So, what can a healthcare marketing agency do? Here is a list of the typical services offered by a healthcare marketing agency. The first thing you’ll notice is that this is a long list. You’ve got to weigh up where your agency’s strengths lie and what your audience and engagement priorities are.
But we can get to that. Here’s a fairly comprehensive list:
Strategic healthcare marketing services
- Market research: Analysing target audiences, competitors and industry trends. Includes interviews, social listening and analysis.
- Brand strategy: Defining brand positioning, messaging, and value propositions for organisations and brands.
- Marketing planning: Creating tailored marketing strategies and campaigns to achieve clearly defined objectives.
- Go-to-market strategy: Launching new products or services effectively with content and campaigns that reach your target audiences.
Creative healthcare marketing services
- Brand promotional materials: Lefelts, flyers, brochures, whitepapers, infographics and any other materials your organisation needs.
- Website design and development: Designing and maintaining great-looking, accessible and fantastically functional websites.
- Copywriting: Crafting compelling, persuasive, and SEO-friendly copy for all marketing materials.
- Content marketing: Developing blogs, articles, videos, and infographics to engage audiences. (This also comes under digital marketing, but we’re a creative content agency, so we’re leaving it here.)
Healthcare digital marketing
- Search engine optimisation (SEO): Improving website visibility in search engine results through a structured programme of on-site and off-site improvements.
- Pay-Per-Click advertising (PPC): Managing paid ads on platforms like Google Ads or Bing. (Mostly Google, if we’re honest.)
- Social media marketing: Creating and managing campaigns on platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and TikTok. (This is a specialist area and one where you’re likely to need to work with a social media specialist agency to get the best results.)
- Email marketing: Building and executing email campaigns to engage, inform and inspire your audiences.
- Affiliate marketing: Partnering with affiliates – including other brands, organisations and influencers – to promote services/products.
Public Relations (PR)
- Media Relations: Building relationships with journalists and securing media coverage for you and your organisation.
- Event promotion: Promoting launches, conferences, or other brand events.
- Press release writing: Drafting and distributing newsworthy updates.
Performance Marketing
- Analytics and reporting: Monitoring campaigns and providing data-driven insights to create a process of continual improvement.
- A/B testing: Testing variations of campaigns to find the most effective approach.
42group’s approach: Audience-first marketing, campaigns and creative
Can one agency deliver everything above? Probably not.
At 42group, we are a healthcare marketing agency that specialises in content creation, campaigns and creative that put the audience first. Snappy slogan and all that, but what does it mean?
In practice, that means developing a comprehensive view of your audience, mining data, undertaking interviews, social listening and doing a deep dive to develop a strategic brand position for your business.
And, as if by magic, that’s the next part of this guide.
Creating strategic brand positioning for healthcare providers
Marketing is more than promotion; it’s about brand positioning. That involves finding your unique voice, defining your offer and providing an insight into your personality. Whether you’re a start-up looking to scale, an established healthcare leader looking to launch a new product or an NHS organisation that wants to refresh its identity, everything begins and ends with your brand.
Here are some ways a healthcare marketing provider can support you with strategic brand positioning for your organisation, product, service or campaign. We’ve even added some examples to bring our
- Building a unique brand identity: Effective brand positioning starts with creating a distinct identity that resonates with your target audience. Even organisations under the NHS banner have some freedom to create campaigns that use commercial techniques and push the world’s most trusted brand into new and exciting places. Branding must be built on an understanding of your target audience. Healthcare marketing agencies can conduct market research to identify unique value propositions and connect and communicate with your core audience.. For example, the NHS “Stay Well This Winter” campaign successfully positioned the service as a trustworthy source for seasonal healthcare advice, encouraging early flu vaccinations and self-care. If you haven’t seen it, you can learn more here.
- Establishing trust through storytelling: We navigate the world through stories and storytelling is a powerful tool to humanise healthcare brands and connect with patients at an emotional level. Agencies like 42group create campaigns featuring real patient experiences that can build trust in your brand. For instance, Bupa UK’s “This is health” campaign highlighted personal health journeys, providing an insight into person-centred care provided by the organisation.
- Crafting a consistent brand message: Consistency is key to building recognition and trust with any audience – but especially with patients. At 42group, we help our clients develop comprehensive brand guidelines that ensure uniform messaging across all channels. These start with a message framework and become more sophisticated and involved, providing guidelines (or guardrails) that your organisation can operate. There’s no stronger brand in the UK – and potentially across the western world – than the NHS. Check out how the brand is presented across all digital channels, including the UK NHS homepage.
- Adapting to local healthcare markets: Healthcare marketing agencies tailor strategies to meet the needs of local demographics, populations, stakeholders and politicians. This is vital if you’re working internationally, of course, but there can be significant differences within a country like the UK or even between urban and suburban populations. You want an example? Spire Healthcare’s regional campaigns emphasise their private hospital’s proximity and specialised services, which appeal directly to local patients.
- Establishing partnerships for credibility: Collaborating with trusted organisations can be hugely positive for any healthcare brand. Healthcare marketing agencies can play a role in facilitating relationships and partnerships with charities, professional bodies and (in the 21st century) influencers. A really positive and effective example is Macmillan Cancer Support’s partnership with Boots. Together, they’re able to provide in-store cancer support services that enhance credibility and reach and boost visibility and donations for Macmillan.
Marketing isn’t a set of activities or a content or social media plan, it’s a comprehensive range of activities combined to deliver a strategic goal. Strategy is the start, middle, and end of any successful marketing campaign.
Your healthcare marketing agency partner shouldn’t start by providing answers or outlining actions, but by asking questions. At 42group, we begin every journey with a deep dive into you and your organisation to learn what defines and differentiates you. Together, we explore what you want to achieve and why. This naturally leads us into the process of identifying and defining your audiences before we begin to define the tactics we’d use to reach them.
Helping you to drive engagement with digital marketing
Digital marketing is a huge part of the marketing mix, and it’s arguably where 42group adds the most value. We’re a content-first marketing agency that uses the power of digital content to establish connections with your core audiences. Here is how digital marketing can help you to drive engagement, increase awareness and succeed in an increasingly complex and competitive environment.
- Search engine optimisation (SEO) for healthcare: Healthcare marketing agencies like 42group can help to optimise websites to rank higher in search engine results, ensuring that patients can easily find relevant services. This involves a mixture of analysis (understanding the issues) with your site from an audience perspective and an algorithmic one. What signs is your site sending to Google, and are they the right ones? Through a mixture of on-site and off-site improvements, we can help improve the ranging of your website for the keywords that matter to your audience. For example, BMI Healthcare invested in SEO to increase visibility for private treatments, leading to a significant boost in inquiries. Read about BMI Healthcare.
- Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising campaigns: PPC campaigns provide instant visibility for your website by placing it at the top of search results. This is paid-for reach that you can turn on or off when you need it. It’s not a replacement for organic SEO but an additional tool and tactic to boost your visibility. An excellent example is the Priory Group’s use of PPC ads to promote mental health services, driving substantial traffic to their website. Explore Priory’s services.
- Content marketing to educate and inform: You’re reading this (or we hope you are), which illustrates the importance of high-quality content and its role in building trust and establishing authority. Healthcare marketing agencies like 42group can create blogs, videos, and infographics to educate patients. A standout example is the NHS Inform website, which provides detailed and accessible health information, attracting millions of visitors monthly. Content isn’t a numbers game but about relevance. We can use content as a strategic tool, with each piece building a clear picture for your audience and the search engine algorithms about your product, service, or solution that helps to boost your brand online.
- Social media engagement: Having visibility and engagement across social media platforms is vital for brand building, connecting with patients and sharing updates. Healthcare marketing agencies can support you with post creation and help to manage profiles. Great Ormond Street Hospital’s active Instagram presence helps humanise their services and connect with families, as well as encouraging financial support.
- Email marketing for personalised outreach: It may be old-school technology, but email campaigns are hugely effective at enabling healthcare providers to maintain direct communication with patients, clinicians and other key stakeholders. For example, Bupa’s personalised email reminders for health check-ups have proven effective in improving appointment rates and patient engagement.
Digital marketing is a core part of the healthcare marketing mix and is where most organisations find delivers the greatest value. The key is to work with an expert healthcare marketing agency like 42group that understands the complex and shifting nature of healthcare, including the ethical and moral responsibilities of communicating about health.
Building trust: Ensuring navigating compliance and ethical marketing
Trust in information online is at an all-time low. Do you believe everything you read? We’re guessing the answer is no – and you’d be right. In every industry, fake claims, bogus sites and bad actors are destroying trust. So, how do you build it?
- Building trust through transparency: Transparent communication is vital in building patient confidence. Healthcare marketing agencies can help brands communicate openly about services, solutions, products and pricing. A good example is the open pricing policy promoted by Circle Health Group. Learn about Circle Health.
- Understand and respect patient privacy laws: It’s a tough environment to operate in and you need to get it right. Specialist healthcare agencies should ensure all campaigns comply with regulations like GDPR, safeguarding patient data. This builds trust and avoids legal complications. An example is Lloyds Pharmacy’s strict adherence to privacy standards in their online services. Discover more about Lloyds Pharmacy.
- Advertise ethically: Marketing in healthcare demands a high ethical standard to ensure transparency. Agencies develop campaigns that provide clear, truthful information. For example, NHS Blood and Transplant’s ethical campaigns encourage blood donations without sensationalism. View their campaigns.
- Educating patients responsibly Agencies focus on providing accurate and accessible information that add value to the reader or user. We love the “Be Clear on Cancer” campaigns educate patients on recognising early symptoms, driving earlier diagnoses. Learn about this campaign.
- Manage sensitive topics with style: Marketing sensitive health topics requires tact, empathy and insight. Agencies specialise in creating compassionate campaigns, like Marie Curie’s “Daffodil Appeal”, which raises funds for end-of-life care with sensitivity and impact. It’s a tough topic to deal with, but they do so with some style.
Selecting a suitable healthcare marketing agency
Healthcare marketing is a complex and challenging area to work in, with multiple stakeholders, audiences and priorities. The worlds of marketing, communications and engagement are constantly changing, too, which means you’ll need a partner who’s flexible, committed and capable of adapting.
We’ve come this far together, and by now, you should know that 42group is the ideal healthcare marketing agency partner for your project. We have 20 years’ of experience in healthcare marketing, content creation and digital development – skills we can use and apply to your projects.
Even if you don’t work with us, we recommend you spend time selecting a suitable healthcare marketing agency that can provide services and support tailored to the unique demands of the healthcare sector. Specialist healthcare marketing agencies will have the capabilities, capacity, expertise and confidence to help you create connections with your audiences.
Your healthcare marketing agency questions answered
What would an SEO-focused guide be without an FAQs section? We know we’ve not spoken with you, but here are some of the common healthcare marketing agency questions provided by the billionaires at Google.
What does a healthcare marketing agency do?
Basically, healthcare marketing agencies help healthcare organisations improve their visibility, patient engagement and growth by implementing tailored and targeted marketing strategies. Healthcare marketing agencies offer a comprehensive range of services, but (because the full-service agency model is dead) they’re likely to specialise in specific areas like digital marketing, branding, SEO and content creation. Regardless of their focus, healthcare marketing agencies have industry-specific knowledge that enables them to meet the unique needs of healthcare providers. The good ones do, anyway.
Why should I hire a healthcare marketing agency?
Do you want to succeed and have the budget to back it up? While there are no guarantees in business and life, hiring a specialist healthcare marketing agency should give you access to experts who understand the complexities of the healthcare sector. They can navigate regulatory challenges, create effective patient-centred campaigns and use commercial marketing techniques to help you achieve your aims and objectives.
How can a healthcare marketing agency improve my online presence?
Not all healthcare marketing agencies offer digital services, so it’s not a blanket ‘yes’. But many healthcare marketing agencies – including 42group – use tools like search engine optimisation (SEO), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, and social media management to boost your online visibility. The results should play a part in improving your website’s visibility in SERPS.
What are the key services offered by a healthcare marketing agency?
We’ve provided a comprehensive list above, so circle back there if you want full details. But here are some of the standard services offered by healthcare marketing agencies:
- Search engine optimisation (SEO)
- Social media management
- Content creation (blogs, videos, infographics)
- Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising
- Branding and reputation management
- Patient engagement strategies
Can a healthcare marketing agency help with patient engagement?
Yes, patient engagement is a core focus for healthcare marketing agencies. Or it should be. A healthcare marketing partner can help design strategies to educate, inform and connect with patients. Ideally, this happens through professionally created – but highly personalised – content, communication, digital tools and products.
How do healthcare marketing agencies measure success?
As the client, you’re the ones who define what success looks like. Don’t let your marketing agency dictate what metrics you use. However, some of the typical ways to measure the impact of marketing projects include:
- Increased website traffic
- Higher patient conversion rates
- Improved search engine rankings
- Engagement rates on social media
- ROI from paid advertising campaigns
What makes a healthcare marketing agency different from a general marketing agency?
This is a good question. No marketing agency is going to turn down a healthcare client, but ask yourself, do they have the skills, experience and insights that you need to connect with your core audiences?
A healthcare marketing agency has industry-specific expertise and a deep understanding of healthcare regulations, patient behaviour and medical terminology. They’ll also understand how the health system works (in the UK, Europe, the US, or the rest of the world). This knowledge – earned through experience – enables healthcare marketers to create tailored strategies that resonate with both healthcare professionals and patients.
How much does it cost to hire a healthcare marketing agency?
Costs vary depending on the services provided and the agency’s experience. Expect to pay around £500 per day for a specialist healthcare agency.
Don’t be put off if this figure scares you. Agencies (including 42group) offer tiered pricing models, ranging from affordable options for small organisations and start-ups to comprehensive strategies for larger healthcare organisations.
Remember that you get what you pay for.
How do I choose the right healthcare marketing agency?
Too many contracts are decided on price, whereas we recommend judging on a more rounded set of criteria. Here are some factors to consider:
- Their experience in the healthcare industry
- Client testimonials and case studies
- The range of services they offer
- Their understanding of healthcare regulations
- Pricing and flexibility in customising packages
Even if an agency ticks all the boxes, consider how you relate to them personally. Do you like the idea of working with them and their team?
How long does it take to see results from a healthcare marketing agency?
Results vary based on the strategies you and your agency choose to use. In general, SEO and content marketing may take several months for you to see results. On the other hand, PPC and social media campaigns can yield quicker results. A comprehensive strategy often delivers the best outcomes, which is a short-term increase in visibility and sustainable long-term improvements in rankings and awareness.
Can healthcare marketing agencies support small practices and providers?
Absolutely. Many agencies provide customised solutions for smaller practices, focusing on budget-friendly strategies like local SEO, content marketing, and social media to maximise impact without overspending.