Marketing Controls and Campaign Effectiveness, Explained

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Marketing Controls and Campaign Effectiveness

Healthcare Organization and Management · Chapter 15: Healthcare Marketing: Strategy and the Marketing MixSection 15.3 · lesson 92 of 1059 min · free with a free account

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Earn 3 college credits for Healthcare Organization and ManagementRecommended for credit by NCCRS · Health 302 · self-paced · one payment, lifetime access
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In this lesson

Setting targets, reading the funnel, and calculating marketing returns honestly.

  • Apply the control cycle by setting expected results before a campaign begins
  • Match measures to awareness, inquiry, conversion, retention, and referral objectives
  • Calculate cost per inquiry, cost per acquisition, and return on marketing investment
  • Explain why attribution is difficult and what a marketing audit catches

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Transcript

Everything said in the video, section by section (1,115 words). Read along, or search it.

Opening Case

Did the Campaign Work

Colleen Lawson's spring campaign for Larkfield's joint pain seminars cost eighteen thousand dollars. The agency's report leads with two numbers. Reach beat its target, and recognition of the seminars tripled. Tom Brennan, the chief financial officer, asks one question. Did it work? Nobody can answer, because nobody wrote down beforehand what working would mean.

Control Cycle

Write the Expected Result First

Marketing control is the ordinary control cycle applied to marketing. Set a standard, measure performance, compare, and act on the difference. Marketing tends to fail at the very first step. Campaigns get commissioned with an intention, not a target, and an intention can't be missed. So the single most useful habit is simple: write down the expected result before the activity begins.

Matching Measures

Awareness, Inquiry, and Conversion Measures

Objectives aren't interchangeable, and each needs its own measures. Awareness aims to make a segment know the service exists. Measure recognition in that segment, not patient volume. Inquiry aims to produce contacts. Count inquiries, and cost per inquiry. Impressions delivered only measure the channel's activity. Conversion aims to turn contacts into completed visits. Measure the share of inquiries that book, and of bookings that show up. Rising inquiries can hide falling conversion.

More Objectives

Retention and Referral Measures

Retention aims to keep existing patients. Measure the share who return on schedule, and the lapse rate by segment. New patients won can mask a retention problem, for as long as the spending lasts. Referral aims to build the flow from other clinicians. Count active referring sources, not just total referrals, which can rise while the sources narrow. Notice what the misapplied measures share. They're easier to get. So pick the family that matches the objective, plus one measure a step beyond it.

Funnel Analysis

Where People Drop Out

So Colleen asks for the funnel instead of the headline. The target segment was thirty thousand adults. Nine thousand recognized the seminars afterward. That's thirty percent. Two hundred forty of them called or signed up online. Two forty out of nine thousand is about two point seven percent. Ninety-six booked a seat, forty percent of inquiries. And seventy-two attended, seventy-five percent of bookings. Proportionally, the biggest loss is between knowing and acting. The radio spot named the seminars, and never said how to sign up.

Cost Measures

Cost per Inquiry and per Acquisition

Now two cost measures. Cost per inquiry is total campaign cost divided by inquiries. Eighteen thousand over two forty is seventy-five dollars. Cost per acquisition is total cost divided by new patients who actually received the service. Eighteen thousand over seventy-two is two hundred fifty dollars. Neither number is a verdict on its own. Each becomes useful compared with another channel, or an earlier campaign, worked the same way.

Quick Check

Radio Spots' Cost per Acquisition

Quick check. Last fall, Larkfield ran radio spots alone for nine thousand dollars. They brought a hundred fifty inquiries, and thirty new patients attended. What was the cost per acquisition: sixty dollars, a hundred fifty, or three hundred? Pause, and decide. Three hundred dollars: nine thousand divided by the thirty patients who attended. Sixty dollars is tempting, but that's cost per inquiry. Against the seminars' two fifty, the radio spots cost more per patient, even though each inquiry was cheaper.

Return on Investment

One Assumption Moves the Return

Return on marketing investment compares what the campaign earned with what it cost: return minus cost, divided by cost. Say each new joint patient brings four hundred dollars in net contribution. Seventy-two times four hundred is twenty-eight thousand eight hundred. Minus eighteen thousand, over eighteen thousand: sixty percent. But some of those patients would have come anyway. If a third would have, only forty-eight count. Forty-eight times four hundred is nineteen thousand two hundred. Now the return is about seven percent. One assumption moved it from sixty.

Stated Assumptions

A Return Without Assumptions Is a Presentation

In health care, the top line of that formula is genuinely hard. Net revenue varies by payer, some volume displaces other work, and some benefit is mission, with no revenue at all. A return figure quoted without its assumptions isn't a measurement. It's a presentation. State the assumptions, and show how much the answer moves.

Attribution

Assigning Results to Causes

Underneath all of this sits attribution: assigning a result to a cause. In health care, it's especially hard. A woman hears the radio spot in March, talks with a neighbor in June, and comes in August after her doctor refers her. Crediting the March spot is a choice, not an observation. Two partial answers. Ask how people heard of you, but treat the answer with caution. That field is often filled in fast, from a poor list, so check its completeness and accuracy first. Stronger: compare timing in an area or segment that saw the campaign with one that didn't. That works only when the activity can be contained.

Levels of Control

Annual Plan, Efficiency, and Strategic Control

Control runs at different levels. Annual plan control asks whether this year's marketing objectives are being met, checked at set intervals. Efficiency control asks whether money is spent well: comparing channels, testing for the same result at lower cost. It runs continuously. Kotler's texts add profitability control, by service and segment. Strategic control asks whether Larkfield is pursuing the right markets at all. Its tool is the marketing audit, described by Philip Kotler and colleagues in nineteen seventy-seven. An audit is a comprehensive, systematic, independent and periodic review of the whole marketing function. It's the only control that catches a strategy executed efficiently in the wrong direction.

Claims to Resist

Three Unsupported Success Claims

Three claims to resist. One: volume rose after the campaign, so the campaign caused it, with no comparison, and season or referral patterns never ruled out. Two: we reached a lot of people, so we delivered value. That confuses the activity with its effect. Three: the campaign succeeded, judged by measures chosen after the results came in. Pick measures afterward, and something will almost always have moved.

Quick Check

What a Beaten Inquiry Target Supports

Quick check. A report on Larkfield's flu clinic campaign says it drew four hundred inquiries, against a target of two hundred fifty set in advance. Which claim does that data support? It raised patient volume, it beat its inquiry target, or it paid for itself? Pause, and decide. Only that it beat its inquiry target. The target was set beforehand, so that claim is fair. Raised volume is tempting, but inquiries aren't visits. Without bookings and attendance, the funnel's later stages are unknown, and so is any return.

Resolution

Less Flattering Reports by Design

Back to Colleen's report for Tom. The money is spent, so she spends nothing more on reach. She fixes the sign-up step in the material she already has, and for next spring, she writes the expected rate at every funnel stage before launch. Her future reports will look less flattering. That's the point.

Key Takeaways

Targets Before Campaigns

To recap. Write the expected result before the campaign starts. Match each measure to its objective, plus one step beyond. A funnel shows where people drop out. Cost per acquisition counts patients served, not inquiries. And a return figure means little without its assumptions.

About Healthcare Organization and Management at UPI Study

Healthcare Organization and Management (Health 302) is a self-paced online course of 105 video lessons in 18 chapters, from health systems and the law to ethics, leadership, teams, strategy, informatics, finance, quality, human resources, marketing and evidence-based practice. It carries a NCCRS credit recommendation for 3 semester credits.

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Why students take Healthcare Organization and Management with UPI Study

How hospitals and clinics are runHealthcare Organization and Management covers how care organizations are led and run: health law and ethics, leadership and teams, strategic planning, health informatics, budgets, quality improvement, staffing and marketing. It is a core course in healthcare administration and health management degrees.
Credit at a fraction of the priceThe same 3 credits can cost $750 or more at a US college. Here it is one payment, self-paced, with lifetime access.
Finish your degree soonerTransfer credits reduce the courses you still owe, so you can graduate earlier or lighten a heavy semester.
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Study on your own scheduleNo start dates, no deadlines. Watch the lessons, practice, and take the final when you are ready.
130,000+students helped with college creditsACE and NCCRS have over 2,100 cooperating colleges that will consider accepting credits; the final decision is with the universities.

Where the credit goes

Universities that work with NCCRS

Healthcare Organization and Management carries a NCCRS credit recommendation. These universities work with NCCRS; some are UPI Study's signed partners. ACE and NCCRS have over 2,100 cooperating colleges that will consider accepting credits; the final decision is with the universities.

Thomas Edison State UniversityThomas Edison State UniversitySigned partnerUniversity of the PeopleUniversity of the PeopleSigned partnerCharter Oak State CollegeCharter Oak State CollegeSigned partnerStrayer UniversityStrayer UniversitySigned partnerColumbia Southern UniversityColumbia Southern UniversitySigned partnerIndiana TechIndiana TechSigned partnerPenn StatePenn StateWorks with NCCRSSouthern New Hampshire UniversitySouthern New Hampshire UniversityWorks with NCCRSSUNYSUNYWorks with NCCRS +many more cooperating universitiesFind my college →

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FAQ

Questions students ask us

About Marketing Controls and Campaign Effectiveness

What is cost per acquisition in healthcare marketing?
Cost per acquisition is the total campaign cost divided by the number of new patients who actually received the service. For example, an $18,000 campaign that brought 72 attendees has a cost per acquisition of $250. It differs from cost per inquiry, which divides cost by contacts, and either figure is most useful when compared with another channel or an earlier campaign calculated the same way.
How do you calculate return on marketing investment?
Return on marketing investment equals return minus cost, divided by cost. If 72 new patients each bring $400 in net contribution after an $18,000 campaign, the return is 60 percent. But if a third of them would have come anyway, only 48 count, and the return falls to about 7 percent. A return figure is meaningful only when its assumptions are stated.
What is a marketing funnel analysis?
A funnel analysis tracks how many people move through each stage, from awareness to inquiry, booking, and attendance, so you can see where they drop out. For example, a campaign might achieve strong recognition but turn only a small share of aware people into inquiries, pointing to a missing sign-up instruction. Rising inquiries can also hide falling conversion further down the funnel.
What is a marketing audit?
A marketing audit is a comprehensive, systematic, independent, and periodic review of the whole marketing function, described by Philip Kotler and colleagues in 1977. It is the tool of strategic control, which asks whether an organization is pursuing the right markets at all. Unlike annual plan or efficiency control, it can catch a strategy that is executed efficiently but heading in the wrong direction.

About the Healthcare Organization and Management course

How many college credits is Healthcare Organization and Management?
Healthcare Organization and Management (Health 302) carries a NCCRS credit recommendation for 3 semester credits. ACE and NCCRS have over 2,100 cooperating colleges that will consider accepting credits; the final decision is with the universities.
How much does Healthcare Organization and Management cost and what is included?
$250, paid once, with lifetime access: all 105 video lessons, a practice quiz after each, the graded work and final exam, and an official transcript when you finish. Students who want several courses choose UPI Study PRO instead.
Which universities accept UPI Study credits?
UPI Study has signed partner agreements with universities such as Thomas Edison State University, University of the People and Charter Oak State College, and works with universities such as Penn State, SNHU and SUNY. ACE and NCCRS have over 2,100 cooperating colleges that will consider accepting credits; the final decision is with the universities. Use "Find my college" on this page to check yours.
How long does Healthcare Organization and Management take?
It is self-paced with no deadlines. The 105 lessons total about 17 hours of video; most students add reading and practice time and finish in a few weeks to a few months, on their own schedule.
How are the exams done?
Quizzes and assignments are online in the course. The final exam is taken online with proctoring; a person on the UPI Study team checks assignments, usually within two days.
How do my credits reach my college?
When the course shows 100% complete, request the official transcript from your dashboard. It is sent to the college you name, and you can send it to more than one. Check your college first with "Find my college" on this page, or ask Athena.

Ready for the full course? Earn 3 credits in Healthcare Organization and Management.

105 video lessons, a quiz after each one, and the graded work that earns the credit. Recommended for credit by NCCRS.

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