A recent article by Healthcare Dive reports that nearly 90% of companies pay employees to participate in wellness programs. This is a good thing. Yet when it comes to ensuring their own brand protection health, most health brands and providers ignore their own advice.
Consider these legal health marketing scenarios:
Trademarks. For every new health brand name or slogan that is adopted, chances are that most have not been properly cleared by a trademark attorney. This is despite the fact that services rendered under the new trademark will in all likelihood earn millions of dollars of revenue for a provider and have six figure marketing budgets. So how valuable is a healthcare name? Certainly more than the few thousand dollars it will cost to properly search, clear, and apply to register the newly adopted trademark.
Copyright. Marketing agencies produce millions of dollars in digital and print collateral for healthcare systems and providers annually. Yet for many health brand owners, there is no legal compliance process in place to make sure that all creative materials comply with U.S. copyright laws and do not infringe the rights of third-parties. And few have any system in place to catalog and protect all proprietary copyrightable subject matter and marketing materials on behalf of healthcare clients.
Social media. The use of social media to promote patient testimonials and population health initiatives is increasing. With this growing trend is a heightened legal risk to health providers. The social media marketing and promotional efforts of health providers must adhere to HIPAA Marketing Compliance and privacy rules as well as other federal laws applicable to truthful marketing and advertising.
As healthcare marketers continue to increase their spending on advertising, the associated legal risks of such activities continue to rise. This is why it is vital for both healthcare providers and agencies to implement proactive legal wellness programs to prevent damage to their valuable brands and goodwill.