Building a Strong Healthcare Brand in Five Steps

Branding is about much more than a nice logo. Done well, it can encapsulate your vision and send a clear, targeted message.  

Think of the vigorous and vibrant approach of Red Bull, or Apple’s minimalist and sophisticated image with products to match.  

Without clear messaging, it’s very difficult to connect with potential clients and get them to buy into your vision, let alone your products. A strong and meaningful brand is therefore essential to growth.  

This is especially true in healthcare, where credibility is key. Creating a confident but professional brand is essential to establishing yourself as a trustworthy player in the market.  

If they’re not aware of your brand and your values aren’t clear, healthcare stakeholders are unlikely to take the leap of engaging with you. Branding really can be make or break.  

So here are my five steps to building a strong brand:  

Find Your Niche 

Everybody needs a niche. In the rapidly growing, fast-moving tornado of new ideas, yours needs to stand out to be noticed, or it will be blown away.  

A novel idea will not have to compete as hard for attention as something that’s been done before. If the press and potential stakeholders can see why you’re different to others from the off, they’re much more likely to pay attention to you and what you have to say.   

Look the Part 

While the visual aspects are only one element of your brand, it’s important that they encapsulate and represent your core messages and position within a market.  

This may sound obvious, but an unclear website or fluorescent pink logo may be enough to create a bad first impression. 

For healthcare brands, simple is often better. Use neutral colours like white, blue and green for a professional look, augmenting your credibility and building trust with stakeholders. 

Remember that your brand visuals are what showcases your values and messages to your audience and the wider world. Make sure that they look the part.  

Make Waves 

Now you’ve got stakeholders’ attention, it’s time to make waves. 

No, I don’t mean going surfing, I mean making news and building your brand recognition. 

Start by establishing what messages you want deliver; are you trying to sell a specific product, promote your sustainable credentials, or lay the foundations of your wider vision?  

Once you know what you want to say, go out and say it.  

There are lots of ways to do this, including newsjacking (providing expert commentary on existing news stories), newsworthy press releases, and longer, more insightful thought leadership pieces.  

However, without targeting these at your intended audience, your efforts may be futile.  

Target Your Audience 

Perhaps the most important of all the stages, targeting your audience is crucial to success.  

You can have a strong brand and a pithy message, but if it’s being sent in the wrong direction, it will have little impact. Just like scoring a goal from the halfway line, only to realise that you’ve booted the ball into the back of your own net, it won’t be great for your future prospects.  

Make sure you know who you want your message to speak to. Is it clinicians? Patients? Investors? Target your work accordingly.  

For example, if you want to attract new investors, focus on your financial achievements. If it’s clinicians, pivot your message towards the ease of using your product or service.  

This will mean your message resonates more with your intended audience. 

Patience 

None of this is easy. There are no quick fixes.  

Building a brand takes a lot of time and effort, there’s no denying it. It’s a gradual process of marginal gains and, slowly but surely, gaining the recognition that you’ve been seeking.  

It’s especially hard to juggle alongside the other demands of running a business, particularly as communications and branding don’t have direct financial returns like other areas such as sales.  

However, this doesn’t mean branding isn’t important. Like I said at the start, no branding, no credibility.  

One solution is to bring in a professional agency with the knowledge and skills to build your brand. While you’re focussing on other areas of the business, they can sharpen your communications and open doors to publicity which would be impossible to achieve without sector specific contacts and expertise.  

After all, building a brand is too important to get wrong.