Pharmaceutical marketing
Pharma Ads Meet Tech. Overview of the Healthcare Marketing and Advertisement Software Ecosystem
New FDA Rules, a patient-centric approach, AI-powered data-driven decision solutions, and omnichannel marketing transform how healthcare brands connect with patients.
Pharma marketing is shifting toward a personalized, data-driven approach. HIPAA-compliant targeting allows marketers to use anonymized data responsibly, delivering tailored content without compromising patient privacy. Meanwhile, downstream outcome measurement tracks how campaigns impact patient behavior and health outcomes, clarifying ROI (Intelligent Relations). Real-world data (RWD) from health records and insurance claims further refine targeting, providing deep insights into patient journeys. These trends underscore an industry focused on meaningful patient connections within strict regulatory frameworks.
To keep up with these trends, sophisticated healthcare marketing software tools that enable precision, compliance, and personalization are the most important components of a successful strategy. The right software integrates AI, data insights, and cross-channel capabilities so marketers can navigate the ad landscape quickly and effectively.
Linear TV's staying power in pharma marketing
While CTV is growing in popularity — according to a Leichtman Research Group report, 87% of US TV households have at least one CTV device, at the same time, according to Pharmavoice, linear still captures 43% of pharma's ad spend and remains pharma's bread and butter. Why? Linear TV offers a scale and reach that no other medium can match, especially for an industry driven by broad awareness and extensive audience reach requirements. According to the Standard Media Index, In 2022, pharma companies invested $5.5 billion in linear TV product ads. A significant portion of this was tied to major cultural events, such as the Beijing Winter Olympics, where $165 million was spent on pharmaceutical ads alone.
For decades, traditional or linear TV has allowed life sciences companies to meet the industry recommendation of reaching at least 10% of their targetable population. The approach has worked well enough—casting a wide net ensured high visibility for brands in a way digital channels couldn't match at scale. However, as younger audiences move to digital, the dominance of linear TV is finally starting to wane. Even so, it still commands the lion's share of pharma budgets and delivers high reach, especially among older demographics who watch more linear TV than streaming.
The next logical step? It's time to apply the precision of data-driven programmatic targeting to linear TV. The capabilities that have redefined digital and connected TV advertising—hyper-focused segmentation, AI-powered insights, and real-time measurement—are precisely what linear TV needs to maximize its potential for pharmaceutical advertisers.
The shift: applying data precision to linear TV
The days of running linear campaigns based solely on surveys and last year’s statistics are over. Today, advertisers operate with data-informed precision, tailoring strategies based on real-time insights rather than outdated assumptions. However, there are still important distinctions between targeting on streaming platforms and traditional linear TV.
In CTV, targeting is as precise as spearfishing—highly focused, efficiently reaching exactly the intended type of viewer. Data-driven linear, in contrast, leverages digital targeting data to strategically position ads where they’re most likely to reach relevant audiences at scale. It’s like casting a well-informed net in the best waters, capturing many desired audiences while bringing in a broader mix.
This evolution could mean capturing more relevant audiences on linear TV, minimizing waste, and driving more measurable outcomes.
Demand-side platforms. How can DSP be applied in pharmaceutical advertising
Demand-side platform (DSP) is a software advertisers use to purchase digital ad space across multiple networks and platforms in an automated way. Here’s how DSPs can be explicitly applied in the context of pharma advertising:
HIPAA-Compliant Targeting. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) safeguards sensitive patient health information. It ensures patient data is used securely and privacy-protected while delivering relevant ads to the right audiences. DSP enables pharma brands to target specific patient demographics in a privacy-compliant way, ensuring that data used for audience targeting meets HIPAA and other regulatory standards as DPPs work mostly with anonymized data sources.
Audience segmentation for health conditions. DSPs allow advanced audience segmentation based on anonymized data about specific health conditions or behaviors. By partnering with healthcare data providers (like Crossix or DeepIntent, for example), DSPs can target audiences likely to be interested in a particular treatment or health condition, which is especially useful for reaching niche patient groups on CTV.
Frequency management and avoiding ad fatigue. DSPs help pharma marketers control ad frequency across multiple TV platforms, ensuring viewers aren’t overexposed to a particular ad. This is crucial for maintaining engagement without causing viewer fatigue.
Sequential messaging. DSPs enable sequential messaging, where ads are served in a specific order to guide viewers through a story or campaign journey. For pharma, this could mean starting with awareness messages about a condition, followed by ads about treatment options. This strategy helps build brand familiarity and provides viewers with relevant information in stages.
Downstream outcome measurement. DSPs can track KPIs unique to pharmaceutical brands, such as script or brand lift. They offer analytics on how effective the TV ad was in prompting actions like prescription fills and doctor visits, allowing pharmaceutical advertisers to measure the real-world impact of their campaigns and refine future strategies based on these insights.
Pharma audience data provider. How to choose?
Pharma audience data providers, or Data Management Platforms (DMPs), collect and analyze anonymized health data to help pharmaceutical advertisers reach specific patient and healthcare provider (HCP) segments with precision and privacy compliance. These providers aggregate data from sources like medical claims, electronic health records, and pharmacy transactions to create targetable segments based on conditions, treatment behaviors, and healthcare journeys. By offering insights into patient needs and HCP prescribing behaviors, they enable advertisers to craft relevant, impactful campaigns that meet strict privacy regulations like HIPAA. Integrated with DSPs and media platforms, these audience segments are used across channels, ensuring a seamless cross-channel approach. Marketers can select the tools and capabilities that best suit their campaign goals.
Examples of DMPs
DeepIntent is a healthcare advertising platform that enables marketers to plan, activate, measure, and optimize campaigns targeting healthcare professionals (HCPs) and direct-to-consumer (DTC) audiences.
- Capabilities:
- Access to clinically precise audience segments based on comprehensive healthcare datasets.
- Integration with connected TV (CTV) viewership data to enhance targeting.
- Ability to reach over 75% of addressable CTV households with curated inventory from major programmers.
- Provides daily reporting on HCP audience performance, allowing for real-time adjustments.
Veeva Crossix specializes in targeted TV advertising for health brands, combining traditional and digital targeting precision.
- Capabilities:
- Engage health audiences through cable and satellite with data-driven linear TV buys.
- Reduce media waste by activating campaigns with smaller budgets while still reaching relevant audiences.
- Utilize audience segments that are compliant with industry regulations.
Effectv, part of Comcast Advertising, offers a suite of data-driven advertising solutions tailored for the healthcare sector.
- Capabilities:
- Leverages first-party Comcast data combined with trusted third-party data to segment audiences effectively.
- Provides multiscreen delivery options across linear TV, streaming, and video on demand.
- Offers detailed reporting metrics to assess campaign performance and ROI.
Choozle provides digital advertising solutions specifically designed for the healthcare industry, focusing on data-driven strategies.
- Capabilities:
- Allows advertisers to create custom audience segments based on health-related criteria.
- Manages customer data while ensuring compliance with regulations like HIPAA.
- Optimizes targeting for patient and consumer groups using comprehensive datasets.
Pharma-specific measurement providers. What value do they bring?
Pharma-specific measurement providers deliver essential insights that go beyond standard ad metrics, focusing on outcomes critical to healthcare. These providers assess the direct impact of campaigns on prescription lift, patient engagement, and healthcare provider (HCP) awareness, offering pharma brands a clear view of how effectively their messaging drives treatment adoption and education. These platforms provide a long-term perspective on campaign success by tracking downstream outcomes like follow-up visits and treatment adherence. Integrated with real-world data (RWD) from sources such as electronic health records and insurance claims, they connect ad exposure to actual health outcomes, creating a comprehensive picture of effectiveness. Additionally, pharma-specific measurement providers operate within HIPAA and privacy standards, ensuring that all data handling complies with regulatory requirements.
Examples of pharma-specific measurement providers
They offer insights into market access, patient outcomes, and promotional effectiveness, helping pharma companies optimize their marketing strategies.
Their solutions include measuring TV ad effectiveness and understanding audience engagement, which is crucial for compliance and optimizing marketing spend.
Their products include customer relationship management (CRM) solutions that help pharma companies track interactions with healthcare providers and measure the impact of marketing efforts.
They offer healthcare-specific measurement tools that assess brand performance, advertising effectiveness, and consumer behavior in the pharmaceutical sector.
Supply-Side Platforms. Why do marketers need SSP?
Supply-side platforms (SSPs) play a vital role in pharma marketing by enabling streamlined, programmatic ad placement across HCP-focused digital channels, including medical journals, educational sites, and association platforms.
SSPs offer robust ad inventory management, allowing pharma brands to manage and distribute ads efficiently across multiple outlets. They also provide analytics on user behavior and engagement through real-time data insights, helping marketers understand which channels resonate most with healthcare professionals. SSPs’ programmatic capabilities and machine learning optimize ad performance, ensuring ads reach the right audience segments—HCPs or patients—at the right moment with minimal waste.
CTV Networks. Where to advertise?
Connected TV (CTV) networks and apps are becoming increasingly important for pharmaceutical marketers as they seek to effectively engage healthcare professionals (HCPs) and patients.
Platforms such as Hulu, Roku, Peacock, and Paramount+ offer programmatic ad inventory that allows pharma brands to deliver ads based on demographic, behavioral, and health-related data insights, all within HIPAA-compliant frameworks. CTV networks also support cross-channel alignment, allowing pharma marketers to extend audience targeting capabilities across linear TV and digital, maximizing reach to relevant patients and healthcare providers (HCPs).
To choose the right CTV network for a pharma ad, prioritize HIPAA-compliant platforms that offer robust targeting, cross-channel integration, audience-aligned reach, flexible ad formats, and detailed analytics to ensure effective and measurable campaign results.
Data-driven approach for pharma marketing. How does Simulmedia do this
Simulmedia's platform empowers pharma marketers to make linear TV campaigns as targeted and efficient as digital. It starts with integrating TV viewing data, allowing the platform to directly apply the same audience segments used in digital campaigns to linear TV. This cross-channel alignment means pharma brands can reach patients and healthcare providers on a broad scale with precision traditionally reserved for digital channels.
Using AI-driven audience forecasting, Simulmedia analyzes viewership patterns to predict where specific patient populations will be watching. This approach enables pharma brands to deliver relevant messages to target audiences based on anonymized health insights, meeting the right people at the right time.
By bridging the gap between traditional linear TV and connected TV (CTV), Simulmedia creates a seamless experience that extends digital targeting capabilities across both platforms. While linear TV doesn’t offer real-time insights, Simulmedia’s use of ACR data delivers early results, and its quick post-log processing enables more agile in-campaign adjustments. This adaptability brings a new level of responsiveness to linear TV, enhancing its impact in ways once only possible with digital.