1. 2014 Healthcare
Marketing Report
Trends Impacting the Healthcare Industry & What it
Means for Healthcare Marketers

2. 2
Healthcare as we know it is in the midst of unprecedented change. This
change is being driven by structural challenges facing life sciences
companies, the advent of the Affordable Care Act, the evolution of
personalized medicine, and advances in health IT, digital, social and
mobile technologies. What does it all mean for healthcare marketers?
Those of us in healthcare marketing are witnessing a
period of change that we believe is unprecedented in
US history. These changes are both fundamental and
structural. They impact how drugs, devices and
diagnostics are developed, how healthcare is
delivered, and how it will be priced and paid for. In
2014, the healthcare industry finds itself in the midst
of the perfect storm, where a number of key factors
are coming together to drive these changes. The
Affordable Care Act is changing the structure and
administration of our healthcare system.
Consolidation in the biopharmaceutical sector
continues to impact the life sciences job market. As
personalized medicine becomes more of a reality,
drug development, reimbursement, clinical decision-
making and even patient education will all need to
evolve. These changes are compounded by the
amazing growth of Big Data, healthcare IT and
mobile health technologies, which seem to change by
the month as new platforms and services enter the
market.
We believe these changes will ultimately be positive
and result in greater efficiencies, reduced costs, and
most importantly, better health outcomes for
patients. But for healthcare marketers, navigating
these changes can seem like skateboarding through a
tornado.
This report examines three key sectors of the
healthcare industry:
1) Pharmaceuticals and biotechnology;
2) Diagnostics and personalized medicine; and
3) Healthcare IT and analytics.
Our goal is to provide a snapshot of each sector as it
appears in 2014, and then to offer our perspective on
what we believe are the main challenges facing
healthcare marketers who are working in these areas.
Biopharmaceuticals: The Wild Ride Continues
Between 2000 and 2014, an estimated 350,000 jobs
have been lost in the US pharmaceutical industry.
According to Matt Herper, science and medicine
reporter at Forbes, a major reason for these job cuts
is the spate of mega-mergers in the industry
throughout that time frame.
In a 2012 survey of senior executives from the top 20
global pharmaceutical companies conducted by Roland
Berger Strategy Consultants, 73% of respondents said
that they believe the pharmaceutical industry is
experiencing a strategic crisis, one that requires
companies to fundamentally change their business
models in order to adapt and survive.

3. 3
Hybrid marketing skills—the ability to work across
traditional, digital, social, owned, earned, paid
and shared media—is the “new normal” for
healthcare marketing professionals.
Despite the major challenges facing the
pharmaceutical and biotechnology
industries in 2014, there are also major
opportunities in key areas where
innovative companies will continue to
thrive. In the US, the demographics of
an aging population—compounded by
the ongoing obesity epidemic—suggest
that cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular
disease and age-related neurological
diseases (e.g. Parkinson’s disease,
Alzheimer’s disease, other forms of
dementia) will continue to be areas of
significant unmet medical need.
Perhaps one of the biggest opportunities
for biopharmaceutical companies today
is in the development of targeted
therapies and personalized medicine,
which we discuss in greater detail
below.
Life science marketers are under
intense pressure to demonstrate clear
ROI for their activities to senior
management. Adding to this pressure is
the fact that the pharmaceutical
industry continues to be criticized in the
court of public opinion. Engaging with the
public and putting a human face on the
company is therefore mission critical.
The days when a pharma marketing
director could focus on just a few core
marketing disciplines, and rely on the
agency or his team to understand and
manage the vast array of other
disciplines, are over. Even compared to
two years ago, the communication
channels and tools available to marketers
in 2014 are vastly more sophisticated. In
fact, in a report published by Adobe in
September 2013 entitled Digital Distress:
What Keeps Marketers Up at Night?, 76
percent of the 1,000 marketing
executives interviewed expressed the
opinion that marketing has changed more
in the last two years than in the past 50.
The proliferation and ongoing evolution of
new digital and social media channels,
analytics, content strategy and inbound
marketing, combined with the widespread
utilization of technology platforms such

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76 percent of marketers
think that marketing has
changed more in the
past two years than in
the past 50.
--Adobe
as Hubspot, Marketo, Salesforce and Oracle’s
WebCenter Content systems, have contributed to
most of those changes.
Healthcare marketing professionals at pharmaceutical
and biotechnology companies need to stay current
with the evolution that is taking place in content
marketing, inbound marketing and social media.
Despite regulatory constraints, smart life sciences
companies continue to find ways to engage with their
publics through most of these channels. And we’re
willing to bet that these changes won’t slow down
anytime soon. In a relentlessly uncertain industry,
embracing new tools and the powerful analytics they
offer, learning new skills, and demonstrating their
value to corporate leadership will make savvy
healthcare marketers stand out from their peers.
Diagnostics and Personalized Medicine Continue to
Expand
Although personalized medicine is still in its infancy in
2014, few can take issue with the potential of
diagnostics and personalized medicine technologies to
reduce waste and improve patient outcomes. The
Institute of Medicine (IOM) estimates that the US
healthcare system wastes approximately $765 billion
per year. Of that number, according to the IOM,
approximately $210 billion a year is wasted on
unnecessary services.
Diagnostics and personalized medicine technologies
can help improve clinical decision-making and
decrease the amount of unnecessary or ineffective
treatments and services that are charged to Medicare,
Medicaid, government and private healthcare plans,
thereby improving efficiencies, reducing waste and
ultimately lowering the cost of healthcare.
Personalized medicine is here to stay, and it will
continue to grow in importance as a critical part of
healthcare delivery.
Reimbursement is increasingly being linked to the
utilization of diagnostics in an effort to improve
treatment outcomes and efficiencies. At the same
time, advances in digital and social media
technologies are leading to increased patient demand
for diagnostic tests. As noted in a McKinsey &
Company report on personalized medicine, “while
there are many factors that will spur the growth of
personalized diagnostics in therapy selection, the
most significant are payors mandating Dx to ensure
proper use of therapeutics, advances in our
understanding of the heterogeneity of disease and
safety signals, improvements in the underlying
technology and quality of Dx testing, and physicians’
need for more information. Additionally, the
increasingly informed and active consumer and the
advances in digital and information technology will
drive growth.”
Healthcare IT and Big Data: Clouds and Lots of
Sunshine in the Forecast
The cloud has changed healthcare forever. Healthcare
IT is now one of the fastest growing industries in the
United States. The Affordable Care Act has
contributed to this growth by mandating that
electronic medical records (EMR) systems be in place
in all medical practices by 2014, with penalties for
those who have not adopted an EMR system starting in
2015.
Driven largely by the explosive growth in cloud and
mobile health technologies, healthcare IT is projected
to grow at a rate of almost 10% CAGR annually
between now and 2018. The expansion of the cloud
has ushered in the era of Big Data, which is exerting
an enormous impact on the healthcare industry. Big
Data is driving clinical decision-making and best
practices in population health sciences, public policy,
health outcomes research, drug development and
personalized medicine. In an annual survey of mobile
health technology trends, the Healthcare Information
and Management Systems Society (HIMMS) reports that
the number of organizations offering mobile apps to
patients and consumers increased by 13% in the past
year alone. The same survey found that 88% of those
working within the healthcare industry were
employed by organizations that either had a mobile
technology plan in place or were in the process of
developing one.
Having a proliferation of Big Data is one thing.
Interpreting it, analyzing it and turning it into
actionable information is another. Healthcare
analytics providers are an essential part of what's
driving the growth in healthcare IT. As concerns over
the high costs and inefficiencies of healthcare persist,
providers of healthcare analytics software, services
and related technologies will find attentive

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audiences, especially if they can be said to
offer a solution.
For marketers at these organizations, the key
challenge is establishing thought leadership.
In 2014, healthcare IT is an increasingly
crowded market, with major insurance
providers, EMR companies, healthcare
analytics consultancies, mobile health
providers and others all vying for share of
voice. Those that can demonstrate
leadership, innovation and the ability to
address some of the very real challenges
facing the US healthcare system will be those
that differentiate themselves from the rest.
Conclusion
While the issues and trends discussed in this
report have been developing for the past few
years, what is really interesting about 2014
and beyond is the degree of convergence
taking place between the biopharmaceutical
industry, diagnostics, and the burgeoning
fields of personalized medicine and
healthcare IT.
Pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies
are embracing targeted therapies and
companion diagnostics. Purveyors of
personalized medicine and diagnostics are
making major advances as Big Data becomes
more pervasive, and the benefits of Big Data
can be translated into product development,
clinical decision-making and disease
management. Digital, cloud and mobile
health technologies are helping to
revolutionize product research and
development, while facilitating integration within
and between healthcare systems and physicians
practices, a development that may enable improved
patient outcomes, more efficient care delivery and
reduced waste due to unnecessary treatments and
procedures.
In sum, healthcare marketers in 2014 are witnessing
a time of transformational change, both within the
industry and in the broader marketing profession.
Healthcare marketing professionals, and the
strategic business partners they work with, must be
able to adapt to new industry models, understand
the transformative impact of new technologies, pivot
when required, and learn the new skills necessary to
do their jobs effectively. Those who can will find
both new opportunities and success.
The Institute of Medicine
(IOM) estimates that the
US healthcare system
wastes approximately
$765 billion per year.
--Adobe

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Sources:
1. ChemJobber Blog: 11/7/13. 2013 not shaping up to be a
great year for pharma. Challenger reports 19,507 jobs
lost. http://chemjobber.blogspot.com/2013/11/2013-
not-shaping-up-to-be-great-year.html. Last accessed
3/25/14.
2. Forbes: 4/13/11. A decade in drug industry layoffs.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/matthewherper/2011/04
/13/a-decade-in-drug-industry-layoffs/. Last accessed
3/25/14.
3. Roland Berger Strategy Consultants: 12/2012. Pharma’s
fight for profitability.
http://www.rolandberger.ru/media/pdf/Roland_Berger
_Pharmaceutical_Industry_20130113.pdf. Last accessed
3/25/14.
4. Adobe: 9/2013. Digital distress: What keeps marketers
up at night?
http://wwwimages.adobe.com/www.adobe.com/conte
nt/dam/Adobe/en/solutions/digital-
marketing/pdfs/adobe-digital-distress-survey.pdf. Last
accessed 3/25/14.
5. Institute of Medicine: 2/24/11. US healthcare costs –
where is the money going?
http://resources.iom.edu/widgets/vsrt/healthcare-
waste.html. Last accessed 3/25/14.
6. McKinsey & Company: 2013. Personalized Medicine: the
path forward.
http://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/dotcom
/client_service/Pharma%20and%20Medical%20Products/
PMP%20NEW/PDFs/McKinsey%20on%20Personalized%20M
edicine%20March%202013.ashx. Last accessed 3/25/14.
7. Forerun Systems: 3/14/13. Guide to the 2015 electronic
medical records mandate.
http://www.forerunsystems.com/news/bid/271083/Gui
de-to-the-2015-Electronic-Medical-Records-Mandate.
Last accessed 3/25/14.
8. FierceHealthIT: 2/18/14. Cloud technology to propel
growth in healthcare IT market.
http://www.fiercehealthit.com/story/cloud-
technology-propel-growth-healthcare-it-market/2014-
02-18. Last accessed 3/25/14.
9. HiMSS Analytics: 2/24/14. 3rd
annual HiMSS Analytics
mobile survey.
http://apps.himss.org/content/files/FINALThirdAnnual
MobileTechnologySurvey.pdf. Last accessed 3/25/14.

7. For more information, contact:
David Avitabile
JFK Communications, Inc.
davitabile@jfkhealth.com
+1(609) 456-0822 ext. 101
jfkhealth.com
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