Health Companies Blog Hero

Health Companies Show How to Build Trust

Industry Specific Insights06 Apr, 2022

Trust and Health Organizations

Companies with an excellent Reputation Score are three times more likely to be trusted in a crisis, according to RepTrak data. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, health companies stepped up to help their patients, employees, and the public.

Efforts included leading vaccination stations, prioritizing essential procedures, and working with government leaders to encourage vaccinations. As a result, many health entities saw an overall increase in trust and Reputation Scores.

As we move past the pandemic, sustaining these new levels of trust is top of mind among seven health organization clients who took part in a conversation RepTrak convened recently.

Building Blocks of Trust

The conversation kicked off by exploring ways organizations are building trust equity. Participants discussed:

  • The idea of credibility and the importance of following through by delivering on your promise

  • Combating persistent stereotypes of patient care. Participants discussed the challenge of balancing care while meeting patients' and insurer expectations

  • Demonstrating how you are protecting patients' health when that might mean questioning their provider

Authenticity as a health organization is critical participants agreed. Sometimes, health entities can preserve patient trust by taking the role of a proactive advocate, sometimes even questioning the healthcare provider, and communicating the role as a protector of patient health.  

Specific Tactics That Are Building Trust

Participants shared particular ways they are connecting with their communities in ways that build trust:

  • Opinion Leaders, Ambassadors, and Influencers – Several participants discussed strategies that involve using third-party advocates to build credibility and shared how those result in reputation score gains.

  • Innovation and Focus on Society – Companies are deploying technology to connect two critical reputation concepts: demonstrating innovation and citizenship to expand and evaluate the user experience. Storytelling around how climate change is a public health crisis and showcasing efforts to protect vulnerable populations in local communities.

  • Media and Social Media – The media conversation took a look at a few different parts of the equation:

    • Organizations are confidently deploying clinicians and medical experts to the media frontline to validate their value proposition

    • Likewise, sharing granular proof points are critical elements in communicating credibility

  • Messaging – Many are refreshing their messaging in light of the changes from the past few years.

    • In doing so, entities are recognizing two key concepts to be: Simple and Holistic

    • They are refining messaging to be more present and relevant, adding words that connote immediacy, such as "here and now"

    • They are incorporating into key messages attributes that speak specifically to trust, such as "being a trustworthy company"

    • And they are shifting the messaging value proposition to emphasize "health" versus "healthcare"

Final Thoughts

While each health entity covers different regions and serves different audiences, all participants agreed that strengthening trust in the future means that "Saying what you do and doing what you say" must be lived through every moment. 

Thought bubbles that the group may like to explore in future Rep-Connects are:

  • How to sustain continued stable to high reputation scores

  • Relationship between media and tone and reputation

  • How to grow reputation in a post-COVID world


Related Blog Post stories