Healthcare is entering a new era in which the consumer is in control and holding organizations to new, higher standards when it comes to the patient experience–and several factors are influencing this shift.
For one, the pandemic accelerated both digital adoption and the demand for swift, personalized, frictionless, convenient, and anticipatory experiences, such as one-click shopping and tailored loyalty programs. While retailers have long offered these kinds of experiences, now consumers expect them from brands across industries.
At the same time, patients are no longer simply comparing their doctor’s office to the competing practice down the road—instead, they’re comparing their providers to every other business they interact with.
And to add to the list, category disruptors like Amazon and CVS Health are gaining traction within the healthcare industry by applying the customer experience best practices they’ve used in retail environments to disrupt and win within the healthcare space.
To evolve and meet the demands of this new reality, legacy healthcare providers must take a page from the retail playbook—not to commoditize care, but to make it more accessible, navigable, and human.
Lessons from Retail for Legacy Providers
Trust is built across every interaction
While the healthcare industry has traditionally focused on improving interactions between the patient and providers, the global community for patient experience professionals, the Beryl Institute, defines the patient experience as the sum of all touchpoints across the continuum of care.
If trust between a patient and a health system is a bridge, every interaction—whether that’s when scheduling an appointment with a contact center agent, when paying a bill, or when receiving a post-visit survey—has the potential to add to that bridge or completely erode that trust and cause the bridge to collapse.
Strengthening this bridge needs to become a bigger priority for healthcare organizations because when issues arise and trust diminishes, consumers are then driven to seek alternatives, making patient experience a differentiator alongside clinical outcomes and cost. After all, patients report better improved health outcomes when they have higher trust in their healthcare provider.
The end-to-end experience should be as frictionless as it is in retail
Patients want to be able to easily find providers and schedule appointments online based on their preferences for location and more. They want omnichannel (e.g., in-person, virtual, chat, app-based) access to care and a seamless handoff between different providers.
Additionally, patients want transparency when it comes to billing, similar to how they know exactly what to expect when they’re shopping for an item with a retailer. While companies like Amazon are delivering the same kinds of experiences they serve up in retail as they expand into pharmacy and virtual care settings, too often, legacy providers fail to meet these expectations.
That’s also why other disruptors, such as CVS Health, are getting ahead, as these organizations are seamlessly embedding healthcare into consumers’ daily routines. By enabling consumers to pick up their prescriptions, get vaccines, receive health screenings, have lab work done, or be seen by a nurse practitioner or physician assistant for common illnesses or injuries right when they’re running errands, healthcare becomes more accessible and simplified.
Disruptors are also gaining a competitive advantage because they’re not comparing themselves to other healthcare systems. Instead, they’re following the most successful brands across industries and focusing on understanding and meeting the needs of the consumer. Really getting to know the communities they’re trying to serve helps healthcare leaders deliver experiences that meet expectations, strengthen relationships, drive trust, and fuel better health outcomes.
Personalization doesn’t have to be complex to be effective
Legacy healthcare providers can level the playing field with emerging disruptors by driving personalized experiences. For example, healthcare organizations can start with the basics, such as asking patients about their language preferences and then using that language in educational materials, emails, and SMS updates before, during, and after appointments.
They can take things a step further by asking patients about what they’d like to learn about and what their health goals are, then use these insights to personalize future visits, communications, and overall care delivery. For next-level personalization, they could even offer a comfort menu for patients to choose items, such as a warm blanket or a portable charger, to make their visit more enjoyable.
Enterprise healthcare systems already have a wealth of consumer insights—it’s time to act on them
Every time a customer reaches out to the contact center, each interaction offers clues about their interests and needs. By using AI-powered text analytics and speech analytics, organizations can instantly analyze these conversations at scale, gaining a better understanding of consumer preferences (and ideas for how to best meet them) without having to directly ask patients.
Beyond gathering and analyzing insights, teams need alerts set up so that appropriate individuals can take action on relevant feedback in real time.
When patients feel heard and that an organization is taking action on their feedback, that adds bricks to the metaphorical bridge of trust.
While many providers gather patient feedback, many fail to quickly act on that feedback. What’s more? Only a small percent—most of them being some of the industry disruptors—complete the critical step of telling patients what they’re doing to action on their feedback altogether. However, this final step is what supercharges patient trust and not completing it could be a critical oversight.
Legacy Providers Are at a Crossroads—Now Is the Time to Act
While newer incumbents from the retail sector enter the healthcare industry, traditional health systems do have an advantage: established trust, credibility, and deep ties with patients.
At the same time, legacy health systems face other obstacles—such as the scale of their operations, industry regulations, and potentially outdated infrastructure—that make it harder, but not impossible, to deliver the modernized experiences patients expect.
The organizations that rise to the challenge and integrate care into the rhythms of consumers’ daily lives today through experiences that draw inspiration from retail and are seamless, tailored, and trustworthy will be tomorrow’s leaders.
Those that fail to adapt risk being left behind. This is no longer a choice, but a necessity.
Amber Maraccini
Amber Maraccini is VP and Head of Healthcare & Life Sciences at Medallia.
