Despite the somewhat cautious tone of many speakers, the CMOs delivering growth are doing so by demonstrating enterprisewide leadership. Three strong examples, very relevant for healthcare marketers, were from:

• Stephen Quinn, VP and CMO at Walmart, who talked about leading like your customer is your boss.

• Esther Lee, senior VP of brand marketing and advertising at AT&T who talked about leadership beyond the marketing department.

• And Jon Iwata, senior VP of marketing and communications at IBM who talked about leading by building corporate character.

Easy to relate these three examples back to the need for an expanded enterprisewide leadership role for the healthcare CMO…

• Customer as boss. Disruptive technologies (access to information, influencers, communities, grades, reviews, wait times…), new business models, alternative care options, etc, translate to an empowered customer, not a captive patient.

• Leadership beyond marketing. Consider how much brand value is enhanced or destroyed based on the customer experience, pre-during-post care, across the organization’s many access points. This evolves the role of marketing to impact brand-led culture, experience design and operationalization.

• Leading by building corporate character. What’s your bigger envisioned place in the world, beyond that of (obvious) community health provider. The “core energizing idea” that resonates with, inspires and aligns employees and customers. As CMO, help to create the platform that continuously works to move both customer and organization forward in more meaningful ways.

People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.

This is Simon Sinek’s simple, smart idea presented through his TED talk: How great leaders inspire action. He calls his idea the ‘golden circle.” And it explains why some leaders and companies are able to inspire while others are not. It’s a concept that can’t really be boiled down to it’s essentials any further. But its value is big.

All companies know what they do. Most can identify how they do it. But far fewer (like Virgin, Harley Davidson, Six Senses, Innocent, Lululemon – my examples) can really identify why they do it – articulating why they really do what they do.

And “why” reflects how people make decisions (within their limbic brain, which controls our feelings) supported with the information (the “hows and whats”) people need to know to make them.

Simon’s ideas can just as effectively be applied to brand-building. And in some cases, might effectively replace the vision and mission statements which tend to sit and collect dust on corporate shelves.

These include:

• shared purpose and objectives
• shared strategies
• shared risk
• collaborate and support each other
• responsive to each other
• invest appropriate resources
• negotiate and work in good faith
• measure results and seek continuous improvement

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• strong and compelling visions
• central energizing ideas
• brand-centric cultures
• ability to link businesses and stakeholders
• drive shareholder value

And this energy shines through in their marketing. To marketing that is far more meaningful beyond messaging alone. Marketing that in and of itself adds value to people’s lives and that at the same time unlocks the real differentiating value of their brand. To marketing with energizing differentiation.

Healthcare, given its importance in people’s lives, has a real opportunity to up its marketing game. But this begins with acknowledging that communities and prospective patients don’t really care about the narrow view of what you have to offer. But they care deeply about their broader view of what you can do for them.

So beyond marketing messaging, consider additional ways to deliver what your audiences really want. Being the focus of their interest – instead of the interruption (by focusing on your hospital, service lines, procedures or technologies) – you’re much more likely to succeed.

Change the frame and look through your customer’s lens:

• consider their vision rather than yours
• their desire for participation vs. your desire for attention
• their aspirations vs. your functional benefits
• their desire to engage by doing vs. your selling
• their desire for community vs. your focus on the transaction
• wrapped in the most individualized, differentiating and branded experience you can provide

Competitors can copy much of the functional things that reside within your hospital, but they can’t copy your organization’s unique brand energy. This is your most sustainable competitive advantage.

If you truly look at the world from your customer’s pov, you’ll be surprised at all the different creative ways you can provide them with information they can use, with knowledge not easily gained elsewhere, and opportunities exclusive to their relationship with you.

Every year, Ad Age comes out with their list of the worlds Top 100 marketers. I look forward to the day when a healthcare marketer makes it to this list!

Here is Susannah Fox’s (Pew Internet Project) presentation from the recent What Really Works Mobile Health conference at Stanford University. She discussed what people are really doing online – “how they are gathering, sharing and creating health information and what it means now that a majority of adults have on-the-go internet access.”

Some facts from her presentation:

• Six in ten US adults gather health info online
• 59% go online wirelessly, with a laptop, mobile device or tablet
• 48% of wireless users look online for information about doctors or other health professionals, compared with 31% of internet users who do not have mobile access

And two important (not yet mainstream but growing) trends:

• the “mobile difference” – give someone a smart phone and they become more social, likely to share and contribute
• the “diagnosis difference” – having a chronic disease significantly increases an internet user’s likelihood to say they both contribute and consume user-generated content related to health. Learning from each other, not just from institutions.

Does this ring true for you? How much have you personally connected with others, shared and contributed as it relates to health conditions?

Disney’s first specialty offering, brand-new health and wellness suites, will debut this fall at Disney’s Contemporary Resort. These suites will feature 100 percent cotton sheets, bamboo floors and non-allergenic wrapped mattresses, along with bathrooms that will include tea tree oils and rainwater showers for a relaxing, spa-like experience.

In addition, guests will also be able to indulge in seasonal and organic fresh foods at the concierge lounge, or enjoy a yoga session or a relaxing spa treatment at the resort’s newly renovated wellness studio. Finally, guests will also have the option of having cardio fitness equipment brought right to their rooms.

Disney’s core brand idea (or DNA, mantra, essence…) is family fun entertainment. More than a slogan, these three words should serve as a touchstone for business and brand decision-making. So, is integrating health into the Disney experience consonant with this brand idea? Share your thoughts.

This is how Chip Wilson, founder of international retail phenomenon lululemon, describes his first store, which he opened in 1998 in Vancouver BC. He goes on to say that “unfortunately for this concept, the store became so busy that it was impossible to help the customer in this way in addition to selling the product.”

There’s a great lesson to take away here about lululemon, which underscores their success: while their business might be selling yoga-related apparel, the business of their brand is about enlightening, creating community and enriching people’s lives. Here are just a few reinforcements:

1. Their mission is creating components for people to live a longer, healthier, more fun life.

2. Their “public-facing” manifesto, which is just as much about their customers as it is about them.

3. Yoga serving as the vehicle to create community, happiness, energy and change. Every week, lululemon stores and showrooms push their products aside, unroll yoga mats and turn their spaces into instant yoga studios. Classes are complimentary and lead by instructors from local community studios.

4. Helping employees and their customer community with goal setting, which is a big part of lululemon culture. Every employee is encouraged to set personal, health and career goals and is given goal setting training. They provide this framework (below) and this downloadable worksheet on their site.

I really like what lululemon stands for. Obviously, so do many others given their dramatic growth. It’s a high-energy brand with a strong point-of-view, that creates interest and excitement, is experiential, participatory and responsive and provides life-enriching value in ways that others do not.

What’s your pov?

You can do things instead of saying things. Empower people rather than control them. Engage them in dialogue instead of delivering a monologue. Create a community rather than focus on transactions.

Easy enough to say this, but you still need inspiration and fresh insights to make it happen. And there are many places to look.

Here are seven “ignition starters” (beyond the obvious one of Customer Insights) to help you see things differently and create new value for your customers and your organization:

1. Market Insights
2. Purchase & Experience Insights
3. Usage & Experience Insights
4. Brand Idea Insights
5. Cultural Insights
6. Future Insights
7. Outside Category/Role Model Insights

Are there others to add to this list?

Thus begins the story of three guys who quit their day jobs in 1998 to make smoothies. Who today, zealously lead an innocent brand continuing to deliver interest, excitement and more relevancy to people’s lives by getting natural, healthy food and drink to as many people as possible.

Look beyond the cover of the innocent story and you see what makes them so special:

It begins with their name. innocent reflects the fact that their drinks are always completely pure, fresh and unadulterated. It’s simple, full of honest and healthy meaning and easy to remember.

Standing for something. Simple, strong, meaningful. And the basis for every single decision the company makes, and doesn’t make. Starting with a purpose of “make food good.” A long term vision of becoming “the earth’s favourite little food company. One core principle around which they base all their decisions “create a business we can be proud of”, supported by five simple values: “be natural, entrepreneurial, responsible, commercial, generous.”

Relevant brand story. Distinctive, real, light-hearted and highly meaningful. Brilliantly, meticulously and seamlessly delivered across all aspects of the business (both inside and outside).

Exceptional, coherent customer experience. From cow vans, to playful packages, to fruitstock music festival to the big knit to raise money to Help the Aged, among other things, innocent delivers a distinctive, powerful and true customer experience.

Passionate Leadership. innocent leaders embrace the brand, in fact “are the brand”, and work zealously to deliver what it promises through their own behavior.

Cult-Like Culture. The people at innocent go to great lengths to protect the DNA of their brand. Unique rites and rituals reflect this. As do employee hiring practices and rewards, separated (in a uniquely innocent way), into two pots: the important stuff and the nice stuff.

Staffing. With marketing people who are really into their products. innocent isn’t a job for these people, it’s a lifestyle.

Importantly, the glue that holds consumers, company, brand and products together is that innocent reflects a healthier, happier, fun lifestyle. It’s a point-of-view that continually opens up opportunities for the company to play more of an important role in customers lives. And ultimately, for both innocent and customers to grow stronger together.

Not being able to distinguish where your health brand creative stops and the media begins.

The smart brand just kicked off a new campaign developed by BBDO Berlin revolving around travelling together in a car, which is designed just for couples, trying something new and being unique.

The tagline of smart’s advertising push, which was launched across multiply media, is ‘smart fortwo—A big idea for…’ which mirrors the light-hearted and adventurous nature of the brand.

The important takeaway about this campaign, exemplary of the local posting above, is that creative and media tend to be seamless. It’s hard to tell where the creative stops and the media begins.

Consider that the most innovative and compelling ideas to drive business forward might actually be the result of a 50%/50% partnership between creative and media teams. Where they’re working collaboratively from the start to bring to life strategy and tactics.