Scott MacStravic, Ph.D.
In terms of commercial product and service strategies, the “new consumerism” means that consumers are better informed about their options, more demanding, less loyal, and generally a tougher sell. Progressive firms are investing in improving customer buying experiences, employing permission marketing, advising and educating consumers as much as persuading them. They are becoming “consumer-centric” not in the sense of just focusing on retaining and “developing” consumer customers, but also in seeking to understand and empower them to gain greater benefit from transactions and relationships.
In health care, this kind of consumerism is also increasing, but there is an entirely different kind being touted at the same kind. It reflects the belief (or perhaps merely the hope) among employers and insurers that shifting more of the responsibilities for making health and health care choices and sharing the costs of such decisions will end up reducing consumers’ use of and spending on care. Of course, since this is clearly aimed at benefiting payers first and foremost, it is difficult to accept that it is truly “consumer-centric.”
The misleading label of “consumer-driven/directed health plans” (CDHPs) means mostly that consumers are expected to pay a far greater share of the costs of such care, not that they are taking over the running of health care organizations and systems.
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