Mastering the Martech Stack for Healthcare's Digital Front Door
With the evolution of martech and healthtech, the healthcare marketing industry has no shortage of technology available, so why does it often seem like it’s lagging behind in delivering digital experiences?
Part of the problem may be your technology stack or “techstack.” Simply put, a techstack is the group of software platforms an organization uses to deliver a digital experience. Think?about all the marketing technology examples that touch your consumer along the way of their digital journey.?
The Digital Front Door is an omnichannel healthcare consumer strategy that uses technology to deliver better experiences for patients. It represents all the ways that medical providers interact digitally with patients outside the point of care. The concept of omnichannel engagement is gaining momentum in healthcare for the same reason it has taken hold everywhere else — the patient journey increasingly emulates that of a retail journey.?
Martech Software Stack and the Digital Front Door
In only a few years, the marketing technology landscape has expanded from a few dozen separate tools to hundreds of solutions, many of which work together. As Scott Brinker, creator of the “Martec 5000” explains in the 2020 update, “1 in 5 of the solutions on this year’s martech landscape weren’t there last year.”
Unfortunately, the rapid proliferation of new technology has not been accompanied by a rapid growth in healthcare marketing budgets and staff. While the available software has?grown by more than 5,233%?since 2011, healthcare marketing teams have grown by only 150% in that same period, according to Geonetric, which publishes an annual report of?Healthcare Marketing Trends.
The proliferation of technology to enable the healthcare consumer creates both a challenge and opportunity. The challenge is more software comes with an increased risk of making an inefficient spend. But on the other hand, the opportunity is that connecting those healthtech solutions effectively can guide the consumer along the journey. Understanding your marketing stack addresses both the challenge and opportunity. Leading healthcare systems are taking a closer look at the technology stack to see where they can fill gaps and eliminate redundancy.?
The consumer journey remains complicated, touching many stakeholders within an organization. Strategy, marketing, digital, IT and clinical teams must examine how each technology fits together to make the customer journey better — here’s how they can do so.?
Step 1: Create an Ideal Consumer Journey Map
Ask yourself the following questions:
Plot each step on a grid in the order it occurs. A journey map helps you detail every step of the journey, touchpoints where they may encounter your brand, and the wants and needs of the consumer along the way. For example, how important is Facebook or your Google Business Profile listing? Which customer journey touchpoints are most important for your brand to encourage that consumer to learn more about you? Google listings are a particularly influential jumping-off point for people to learn more about providers when searching for care.
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Step 2: Identify Gaps and Overlaps
Audit existing healthcare technology to see which tools your team is using to support customers along the journey. Then, assess where in the journey might be disjointed or unsupported by technology. Consider if there are any areas where your team has multiple tools that perform the same function.?
Answering these questions will help you identify cost savings, break down data silos, and identify where your marketing, clinical, revenue cycle and customer service functions might collaborate more effectively to maximize value.
It’s not uncommon to learn that various departments are using different technologies to accomplish the same task. This is a huge waste of budget, not to mention the staff resources required to maintain duplicate platforms. For example, let’s say an organization found out they were paying for nine different survey tools in use across the various departments. Even more concerning, some of the tools being used by departments were not HIPAA-compliant, which is a risk to the organization. By standardizing to a single, compliant survey platform, a company can save more than $500,000 a year.
Step 3: Challenge Your Vendor Partners
The process of optimizing your technology stack can be daunting. Don’t do this alone! Reach out to your technology partners. Most technology companies have teams of industry experts you can tap for best practices, along with marketing technology examples and healthtech examples your team should implement into your software stack. Describe your challenges to your technology partners and ask for their recommendations for how to solve problems. Some questions to ask your vendors:
Step 4: Define and Measure Success?
Determine what an optimal experience looks like for a patient. Then set key performance metrics that will support this experience. Some metrics to aim for might be 25% of all primary care appointments will be booked online, urgent care locations will have at least a 4.5 average star rating on Google, and 30% of ambulatory invoices will be paid online and within 15 days.
Final Thought: Focus Your Efforts
As the line between sales/marketing and patient/consumer experience blurs, healthcare providers are finding that there are too many data sources existing in disconnected silos. Examining your technology stack is the first step to unifying data to support a great experience. But you won't be able to do it all at once.
Embrace the concepts of agile by making iterative changes over time. with each small change, don't be afraid to fail and try something else. optimizing the Digital Front Door and building the techstack that supports it is a marathon, not a sprint.
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3 年Great post, Annie! I think part of the challenge for healthcare is the clinical care side of the house will always get "first dibs" from a technology and resource perspective. But more organizations are learning the need to also invest in Martech. As you pointed out, the customer journey in healthcare has evolved, so it's becoming more and more critical to invest in technology (and staff) that can meet them where they are in that journey.