Reshaping Marketing After COVID: What’s the New Normal?
// By Marlene Kurban //
Top health system marketing executives weigh in on how COVID forced organizations to adapt quickly. Communicators’ skills were essential in navigating the crisis, and marketing led the way, meeting the extraordinary demand for information. Were greater flexibility and agility unexpected byproducts of a challenging year? Will they propel health care organizations into a nimbler future?
The pandemic has demanded that health system marketing departments radically shift their priorities. The question is: Which COVID-era changes actually moved the industry forward and should remain? Which strategic initiatives have the greatest potential to help health systems recover from losses and accelerate growth — and what are the necessary skill sets needed to navigate the post-pandemic world?
Jim Blazar, executive vice president and chief strategy officer at Hackensack Meridian Health; Dalal Haldeman, PhD, chief executive officer at Haldeman Marketing, LLC; and Catherine Harrell, chief marketing officer at the Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady Health System, shared their perspectives about the road to recovery during the recent Strategic Health Care Marketing webinar, “After COVID-19: What’s Next for Marketing?” sponsored by Wellsource and moderated by David Marlowe, principal at Strategic Marketing Concepts.
Overnight Change of Focus
The panelists describe how marketing functions changed virtually overnight.
“In many organizations, communications became a priority, a 24/7 production house when the command centers opened,” Haldeman says.