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GBMC HealthCare is a private, not-for-profit corporation that owns and operates Greater Baltimore Medical Center (GBMC), a regional community hospital in Towson, Maryland, two miles north of Baltimore City. GBMC is located on a beautiful suburban campus where it handles more than 26,700 inpatient cases and approximately 60,000 emergency room visits annually. Since its founding in Towson in 1965, GBMC's accomplishments have validated the vision of its founders to combine the best of community and university-level medicine.

Planit and GBMC identified Primary Care Physicians that operate on the hospital's main Towson campus (as well as in satellite locations across the region) as a key component for feeding the “funnel” of the hospital’s various service lines. The more new patients get engaged in a healthcare relationship with GBMC-affiliated Primary Care doctors, the more they are referred to GBMC specialists and ancillary services. GBMC challenged Planit to go beyond the typical look of hospital advertising—a field cluttered with ads featuring images of doctors and hospital buildings—in order to raise awareness of physician offices throughout Baltimore County and increase new patient volumes.

After a thorough analysis of the variety of channels through which to implement this campaign, Planit chose a highly trackable, multi-channel approach to include radio, print, online, and direct mail—each with their own striking concepts and visuals that were very different from the usual hospital advertising. Radio and broad-reaching print vehicles supported awareness initiatives, while targeted print vehicles, direct mail, search engine marketing, and banner ads reinforced the direct-response component of the campaign, driving consumers directly to a variety of ways in which they could make an appointment with one of several GBMC Primary Care Physicians accepting new patients. Even more, Planit’s detailed, targeted approach brought strategic insight, media tactics, and creative prowess together to create the opportunity to drive traffic to Russian-speaking physicians with ads (translated into Russian) specifically targeting patients who would prefer a Russian-speaking physician.

Using targeted media over an eight-week period, campaign results showed a substantial increase in new patients for the main GBMC Primary Care Physician offices in Baltimore County. Online brand awareness increased by 39% and site traffic increased by 400% over the length of the campaign. Besides garnering a comment from a GBMC board member that it was “the most exciting marketing work that GBMC has done in 25 years,” the campaign introduced over 1,000 new patients into the “funnel” of GBMC’s healthcare system. A single direct-mail drop alone resulted in over 500 inquiries. GBMC immediately initiated plans for a follow-up campaign with Planit. Not bad for our first engagement.

Silver ADDY Award - Consumer or Trade Publication