Should You Sell Your Maternity Services Like a Resort?
For One Florida Hospital, It Was the Smart Way Out of a Marketing Conundrum.
Notable Health Care Advertising
// By Peter Hochstein //
For people trying to market the maternity services at Jackson Memorial Hospital, a huge institution in Miami, Florida, with more than 1,254 beds on its main campus alone, it must have felt like the best of times and the worst of times.
It was the best of times because the hospital, once teetering on the edge of financial failure, had regained its equilibrium under the leadership of a new president and CEO, Carlos Migoya, a charismatic local banker. In just a few years, he had brought the hospital from a $400 million deficit to a $50 million surplus.
It was also the best of times because, as quantitative market research made clear, the hospital had a powerful reputation for medical expertise, despite its former financial troubles. It was, and still is, a teaching hospital with a Level 1 trauma center.
Matthew I. Pinzur, Associate Vice President, Communications and Outreach at Jackson Memorial Hospital
But there was a catch. Perceptions were strong, says Matthew I. Pinzur, Associate Vice President, Communications and Outreach at the hospital, “that the facilities were outdated, not large, not up to modern standards.”
That negative perception was particularly relevant to maternity services. As Pinzur explains it, “When you’re talking about organ transplants, the quality of the room you’re staying in is not one of the top three concerns.” But with maternity, he says, most people think they’re going to have a routine experience.
“That makes the accommodations much more important on the front end when they’re deciding which hospital even to consider. So we felt it was valuable to marry the idea of the medical miracles we do here with the luxury that we can produce,” he says.