Health Union Unveils New DTC Media & Marketing Solutions for 2025

Offering Pharmaceutical Advertisers Innovative, Exclusive Opportunities to Engage Patients Actively Involved in Managing Chronic Health Conditions

PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 15, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Health Union, the recognized leader in condition-specific online health communities and patient engagement, is excited to announce a suite of innovative direct-to-consumer marketing product enhancements for 2025. Building on emerging market trends, Health Union's latest innovations will capitalize on the company's industry-leading network of real patient leaders, unparalleled content capabilities across 45+ community websites, and differentiated first-party data to drive improved audience quality, efficiencies, and conversions for pharmaceutical advertising partners. Expanded influencer marketing solutions, new exclusivity opportunities, and content integrations that focus on diverse and underrepresented voices in health provide life science brands with a unique opportunity to align their messaging with patients actively seeking support, validation, and information in the moments that matter most, while driving measurable results against their KPIs.

Health Union's transformative solutions and new product enhancements for 2025 include:

Elevating Diverse Voices:  Health Union is proud to launch Distinctly Me, an initiative designed to help advertisers reach and activate diverse and underrepresented consumer health audiences through culturally relevant messaging and patient influencer partnerships. This comprehensive editorial content sponsorship package on Health Union's communities highlights the unique experiences of different cultures as they manage chronic conditions - offering tips, information, and authentic advice to help underrepresented patients advocate for themselves. Sponsorship for this offering includes 100% share of voice for contextual ad placements alongside tailored resources addressing the challenges faced by diverse patients, discussions of health inequities, and tools for combating health disparities. 

Additionally, by integrating stories from real, diverse patient leaders into the experience and promoting content via influencer social posts, the program engages multicultural audiences who are actively seeking support on a deeper level - building trust and relevancy for advertisers while also inspiring patient action. Health Union has proven that influencers who candidly discuss their diverse backgrounds can drive engagement rates 12 times higher than Facebook benchmarks, illustrating the demand for authentic representation in social health discussions. Sponsoring this comprehensive package enables brands to showcase their commitment to elevating underrepresented voices and combating health inequities, while also driving increased engagement and high value actions among key audience segments.

Custom Influencer Marketing Program Engagements:  Health Union's Pharmaceutical Grade Influencer Marketing (PGIM) solution is recognized industry-wide for providing best-in-class, fully branded or unbranded patient influencer marketing services. With a full-service approach that maximizes impact for brands by leveraging the authenticity of inspiring patient leaders, PGIM has driven up to 5X more engagement than typical social programs, as well as high value onsite actions (such as video views, patient support program sign-ups, and survey completions) that significantly exceed advertiser benchmarks. By partnering with Health Union to achieve influencer marketing goals, advertising partners receive an unparalleled end-to-end service that includes patient influencer recruitment and training, creative services, legal and regulatory process management and pharmacovigilance, social media campaign planning and delivery, data-driven reach to Health Union's first-party condition audiences, and performance analysis.  In order to support FTC and FDA compliance for patient influencer activities, Health Union launched a Patient Leader Certification Program, in partnership with the Society of Participatory Medicine, to educate patient leaders about responsible social media marketing and advocacy.  For 2025, Health Union is now enhancing the reach and diversity of its industry-leading PGIM solutions by expanding capabilities across TikTok, with new creative guidelines to authentically engage TikTok audiences.  

Influencer Audience Segments for Programmatic Activation:  Also new for 2025, Health Union has launched patient influencer-based audience segments that can be activated programmatically across any channel. By analyzing the first-party onsite behaviors and actions of Health Union's Social Health Network of 100K+ patient leaders and creating "influencer personas," the company now builds condition-specific, modeled audience segments that are more likely to influence the behavior of others. These segments amplify advertiser messaging among key content curators and patient leaders actively providing tips and recommending resources to loyal follower audiences, driving the conversation for brand partners among patients whose voices have the largest reach and impact.

Patient Influencer Video Roundtables:  In this first-to-market custom video series, Unconditionally, a diverse group of patient influencers get real about life with chronic illness.  Featuring a panel of 1-3 real patient leaders, these video roundtables feature real, raw conversations that explore both the challenges and moments of hope associated with living with complex conditions. The 3-part series is moderated by a sympathetic and charismatic leading health advocate, creating an authentic connection with viewers, and empowering them to talk to their doctors about treatment more productively. Unconditionally will not only cover the emotional impact of condition management, but also includes discussions covering lower-funnel topics such as questions to ask your doctor about treatment, how to know when it is time to switch medication, and advocating for yourself to avoid medical gaslighting. By exclusively sponsoring this series for a community, advertisers can align their message with a powerful, connective experience for highly engaged patients who are actively looking for solutions, improving audience quality and encouraging patient actions while blocking direct competitors from adjacencies to these impactful discussions. 

Expanded Advertiser Exclusivity Opportunities:  For the first time, Health Union is unlocking expanded Advertiser Exclusivity opportunities across their condition-specific online communities. By securing exclusive advertising rights within a community, brands can ensure they reach patients at critical moments in their health journeys—when they are considering treatment options, experiencing new symptoms, or feeling alone and frustrated – and block their competition from accessing these highly engaged patient audiences on Health Union's on-site ecosystem.  Exclusive community sponsorship showcases a brand's commitment to meet people where they are, supporting patient journeys with valuable information, validation, and connection to others. This unique opportunity allows advertisers to increase awareness, differentiate their value and activate patient demand effectively, ensuring their brand is front-and-center for patients in need of connection and information.

These enhancements represent a significant step forward in Health Union's proven approach to foster meaningful engagement among real patients and provide smarter, more effective solutions for pharmaceutical advertisers.  "Helping people live better with challenging, chronic conditions continues to be the focal point at Health Union. With our new product innovations for 2025, brand partners have the opportunity to reach and activate patients with information on treatment solutions and disease management when it matters most," said Scott Schappell, chief revenue officer of Health Union. "Our DTC media products and services have a strong history of generating impactful returns for our client's investments, and we are confident these enhancements will drive even better quality, efficiency, and conversion results for our partners, while also positively impacting patient outcomes." 

To learn more about how Health Union's new innovations can drive improved outcomes for both patients and brands, visit https://health-union.com/human-side-of-data.

About Health Union
Health Union is the proven industry leader in condition-specific, online health community and patient engagement. The company reaches millions of people through the largest network of online health communities (e.g., Migraine.com, MultipleSclerosis.net, LungCancer.net) and health leaders – addressing virtually every condition and providing patients and caregivers with the information, connection, and support they need to live better with challenging health conditions. For more than a decade, Health Union has been transforming the way pharmaceutical and healthcare brands engage with people, enabling transparent, innovative opportunities to gain insight and empower action through advertising, marketing research, and clinical trial solutions for the healthcare industry.

SOURCE Health Union