A large academic medical center was interviewing candidates for the position of

Question

A large academic medical center was interviewing candidates for the position of marketing director. One interviewee was a vice president of marketing for a large consumer food product firm. During the interview, the interviewee was asked what skills he had for the position. He responded, “I’ve sold products all my life and have been successful. Marketing a food product is no different than marketing a hotel, airline, or hospital.”

(a)   Is this view naïve? Why or why not?

(b)   How is health care marketing similar to marketing other products or services?

(c)   How is it different?

Explanation / Answer

(a) The view presented is not naive. Basic of marketing is the same for any product. It is know your customer well and address his needs or demands in the best possible manner. So, marketing any product requires similar approach. To arrive at a marketing strategy, the procedure followed is same. After knowing the cutomer,product well the marketing strategy is framed based on that

(b) Before marketing any product, you should know your customer well and how your product addresses his needs. Once these are established you need to decide on other things like what promotional activities you use, what message will you communicate,etc. This is similar for all products and services

(c) Marketing strategies depend on type of the product in terms of involvement. Let us compare health care with Food. In health care service or product is a high involvement one. Health care deals with elimination of pain and problems. On the other hand, food is a low involvement product. It is a basic need.In health care marketing you want customers to trust you. In food products marketing you can ask customers to give a try which you cannot with health care. Switching costs are very low for food products. For health care , switching costs are huge.

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