The could be a variety of possibilities for marketing in healthcare. A lot depends on the person or entity who sets a goal, the purpose of the goal and the expected results. The authors of specialist marketing books divide the mentioned above goals into two categories.

The first one presents transaction orientation. This theory claims that the purpose of marketing is to generate sales and, more importantly, profit. All actions taken are therefore aimed at obtaining orders, selling products and services. Marketer’s attention is not focused much on other aspects, because they are either irrelevant or secondary.

The second theory presents a completely different approach, which is based on building a relationship with the client (the patient) which will be satisfactory for both parties. In this case, the marketing specialist places a huge emphasis on the satisfaction of the consumer of the product or service, which is important as it provides him with the corresponding positive emotions. Not only will a satisfied patient gladly come back to consult a doctor, he will also recommend this doctor to others. A person seeking medical care more willingly trusts his good friend than an advertisement in the local newspaper, where the employees of the clinic can write themselves everything they think a man would like, which obviously reduces the credibility of this information.

The most important task of marketing of health services is to meet the needs of patients, which mainly include three categories of needs: saving lives, improving health and maintaining life. It should be noted that the above-mentioned needs find their key place in Maslov’s theory, which placed health at the level of security needs. Those needs belong the lower level, and more precisely on the second level (from the most basic), above the physiological necessities, which are the most basic human needs. If a person does not have the needs of a lower order satisfied, he or she does not even think about satisfying the needs of a higher order, e.g. affiliation.

It’s also worth mentioning that while defining the tasks and goals of marketing, a scheme developing the “SMART” principle may be helpful (S – specific; M – measurable; A – achievable; R – realistic; T – timed).

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