Where marketing fits on the patient's path

Where the brand promise meets the handoff

Marketing's real job in the patient experience is translation. Marketing doesn’t run fulfillment, customer support, or billing, but it influences the words, tone, and materials that internal teams and patients rely on. Done well, translation is how a brand promise survives the handoffs and protects patient trust.

I wrote recently about a specialty pharmacy that lost my family's trust and a clinical specialist who earned it back. For almost two weeks, the only answer I got was that someone would be in touch soon. That was one disrupted moment. This is about the whole path, and where marketing fits in.

Marketing is underused on the patient’s path. It’s rarely asked to help design it and is usually brought in after the fact to promote a service, a product launch, or a digital platform. As a patient, a mother, and a 20-year healthcare marketer, I know how much a clear path matters, and I believe marketing deserves a clear seat at the table where it gets designed, bringing audience insight, brand consistency, and clear communication.

This is also where branding makes a big impact. To a patient, a brand is a promise of clarity and safety when they’re worried. To the teams behind it, it’s the standard they’re expected to deliver. Translation is what turns what an organization says into what a patient actually experiences.

Here's what the gap looks like. A patient is told her results will be in the portal, but nobody showed her how to log in. When she calls the imaging network's support line, the representative has no guidance and says to look online.

Now picture a patient starting a specialty therapy. The pharmacy benefit manager (PBM) sends a dense letter about prior authorization, the pharmacy calls about shipping, and a telehealth nurse calls to schedule injection training. That’s three organizations she didn’t choose, each assuming someone else is explaining the whole thing. She experiences them as one, and the failure isn’t in any single message. It’s in the handoffs, and every brand involved gets judged for it.¹

That’s where marketing can help. Service still earns or loses trust in the room, on the phone, or in the portal, and a clear message can’t fix a frustrating interaction. What marketing can do is build the enablement tools and playbooks that make those moments easier to get right: the talking points that a support representative leans on when a portal goes down, the way a PBM explains a prior authorization denial.

Depending on structure, some of this work may sit with Communications, Patient Experience, Patient Education, or Operations, and marketing works best alongside these teams.

To close these gaps, marketing can focus on three things.

First, keep it simple

Patients are often anxious, overwhelmed, or in pain when they deal with a healthcare company, and complex communication fails when mental load is high. A patient who doesn't understand his onboarding instructions may struggle to follow through with care. Marketing's job here isn't persuasion. Again, it's translation: making it make sense with simple, clear steps for patients, and the same simple tools for the teams who support them.²

Next, focus on the peak moments

Not every step carries the same weight. A shipping confirmation might matter less than the wait between a scan and its results, a first telehealth visit, or a call about paying for a prescription. Organizations that treat every touchpoint the same end up giving extra care to none. Deciding which moments matter most is a marketing skill. Earning trust at these peaks is what turns an unfamiliar name into a brand patients rely on.

Finally, follow the real path, not the ideal one

Many organizations design around a flawless, linear journey. Real paths are messy. Patients move between imaging networks, specialty pharmacies, PBMs, telehealth visits, and portals, often without knowing who owns the next step.

Start by interviewing real patients and walking the patient path yourself. We know calls are recorded, but does anyone listen to them? Someone should note the confusion and hesitation, and act on it. Without that, what the organization promises and what the patient experiences pull apart.

That gap builds frustration and costs trust, and trust is what keeps patients. In provider settings, Accenture’s 2026 patient experience survey found that 91 percent of patients who completely trust their provider say they’ll definitely stay. Forty-three percent don’t have that complete trust, which may make them more likely to look elsewhere.³

Patients rarely walk away because of one issue. They leave because enough small moments made them feel like an afterthought.

Throughout, the standard stays the same: consistent, accurate, understandable, and empathetic communication. When marketing is at the table and works in partnership with delivery teams, the path feels coordinated. When it doesn't, it feels chaotic, and patients notice.

If your organization treats patient experience as someone else's department, I'd push back. Whether you lead marketing for an imaging network, a PBM, a telehealth platform, a specialty pharmacy, or a patient engagement tool, your team has a real role here.

What does branding mean in healthcare?

A brand is a promise. For patients, it’s clarity, consistency, and safety. For organizations, it’s the standard that aligns service, operations, and administrative teams. Marketing makes sure patients feel that promise at every handoff.