On the issue of segmenting the healthcare market. Medical services market and characteristics of individual segments Segmentation of the medical services market by main competitors

The market consists of many types of consumers, goods, and needs. The consumer market is formed by buyers who differ from each other in various parameters (place of residence, gender, age, income level, education, lifestyle, social class, etc.).

It is difficult to find consumers with the same reaction to the product or service offered. Marketers must understand and anticipate what influences patient behavior. Patients behave differently when receiving different health care services, so it is important to understand how they make decisions. For example, before deciding which dental clinic to go to, people look through many newsletters, listen to information on radio and television, and only then choose the one that is most suitable.

When purchasing even the same product (service), patients are rarely guided by the same motives, although this particular product may be intended for different groups of consumers. In marketing terminology, these

groups of consumers are called market segments, and the process of identifying them is called market segmentation.

Market segmentation is one of the most important marketing features that ensures the success of a medical institution. This is done in order to best meet the needs and requirements of patients and thereby ensure the sustainable functioning and profitability of the medical institution.

A market segment is a specially selected part, some

or a group of patients, medical services or medical,

having common characteristics,

The segmentation is based on the following criteria:

1. Quantitative parameters of the segment - the volume of medical services that can be provided; number of potential patients; the territory in which they live, etc.

2. Availability of the segment for medical i.e. availability of carts

the ability to obtain a sufficient number of channels for promoting medical services, to identify the power of these channels and their ability to ensure the sale of the entire volume of services and medical goods - i.e. determine whether the medical institution is ready to promote its products on the market or whether something needs to be changed in its work.

3. Segment importance - determining how realistically a particular group of patients can be considered as a market segment and whether it is worth focusing your activities on it.

4. Profitability - using this criterion, they determine how profitable it will be for a medical institution to operate on the basis of a selected market segment (return on invested capital, increase in the institution’s profit, etc.)

5. Compatibility of the segment with the market of its main competitors - determines to what extent the promotion of this service will affect the interests of competitors; otherwise, the medical institution may incur additional costs.

6. Security of the selected segment of the medical services market from competitors - it is determined who can become a potential competitor, what are its strengths and weaknesses, whether the medical institution has competitive advantages and what they are.

Only after receiving answers to all these questions can you decide whether this segment is suitable or not for a medical institution, whether it is worth continuing to study consumer demand for the services provided, collecting information and investing additional funds.

Segmentation targets can include patients, healthcare services, and healthcare facilities. For example, patients can be grouped by geographic or demographic characteristics, income level, profession, etc., that is, by any of the significant characteristics. In accordance with this, the basic principles of segmentation of any consumer markets (including medical services markets) are:

Having determined what the medical services market is, it is necessary to carry out market segmentation, that is, consider the market depending on patient groups, medical services, and existing health care facilities.

Based on this analysis, it is possible to determine what medical services should be provided, in what quantities and what groups of patients need them.

A market segment is a specially selected part of the medical services market, any group of patients, medical services or medical institutions that have common characteristics.

Segmentation objects can be patients, medical services and healthcare facilities.

The experience of marketing activities shows that segmentation is one of the important tools that ensures the success of health care facilities.

The segmentation is based on the following criteria:

Quantitative parameters of the segment: the volume of medical services that can be provided, the number of potential patients, the territory in which they live.

Accessibility of the segment for health care facilities, that is, an understanding of the opportunity to receive medical services. The healthcare facility must determine whether it has a sufficient supply of medical services. The answers to these questions will provide information to the management of the healthcare facility about whether it is ready to promote its medical services to the market or whether it needs to change something in its work.

Segment materiality is a determination of how realistically a particular group of patients can be considered as a market segment. The head of the health care facility will have to find out whether the selected market segment is growing, stable or declining, and whether it is worth focusing its activities on it.

Profitability - using this criterion, determine how profitable it will be for a medical institution to work on the basis of the allocated market segment.

Compatibility of the segment with the market of its main competitors. If your competitors react sharply to the services offered, then the health care facility may incur additional costs.

Protection of the internal segment of the medical services market from competitors. It is determined who can become a potential competitor, what its strengths and weaknesses are, whether health care facilities have competitive advantages and what they are.

Thus, having received answers to all these questions, you can decide whether the segment is suitable for health care facilities or not,

4.7. Market segmentation by patient groups

geographic segmentation

demographic segmentation

psychological segmentation

4.8. Segmentation of the medical services market by main competitors.

Market segmentation by main competitors is the next step in developing a strategy for a health care facility's marketing program. Studying competitors, highlighting their strengths and weaknesses is extremely important for gaining a certain share of the medical services market.

This becomes especially relevant today when there are competing medical institutions.

The presence of competitors makes it possible to objectively evaluate your own activities, understand why patients turn to your competitors for services, outline ways for further development, and increase your competitiveness.

You start studying your competitors. Where should I start?

collecting information about them;

who are your competitors;

which healthcare facilities are your competitors;

what types of medical services they provide;

what prices they set for medical services;

what are the sources of funding;

what is the system for promoting medical services;

The assessment of competitiveness should be carried out in a comprehensive manner, identifying the strengths and weaknesses of both competitors and one’s own. Even when assessing the competitiveness of competitors, it is best to systematize it in the form of a table.

Having information about the strengths and weaknesses of competitors, you should, firstly, determine the distinctive features of competitors, and secondly, declare your own competitive advantages.

Competitive advantages are the unique, special features of a medical institution that distinguish it from others. When defining competitive advantages, it is important to focus on patients, their needs and be sure that these advantages are perceived by your patients. The main requirement is that your difference must be real, expressive, and significant.

What are the competitive advantages:

high reputation of health care facilities;

high quality of medical services provided;

focus on the patient, his needs and wishes;

sufficient material base (sustainable financial support, personnel, equipment).

A competition analysis will help determine the place of health care facilities in the medical services market and position the institution, that is, determine those actions that will ensure the institution’s competitiveness in the market. To choose a position in the market you need to know your competitors.

Main stages of position determination:

designation of the services that your institution will provide;

determining what will differentiate the services you offer (level of training of medical personnel, remuneration system, service methods, etc.)

conducting an analysis of competition in the medical services market and the position occupied by your institution.

A special medical care system was created for the leadership of the party and the country. With limited resources allocated to health care, a certain priority was given to workers and children. All this does not prevent us from asserting today that the availability of qualified medical care was ensured by the state regardless of the patient’s social status, his place of residence, etc.
The fundamental essence of the modern period of reform of the domestic healthcare system, along with others, is characterized by objective conditions under which a medical service becomes a commodity, and the relationship between producers and consumers of medical services (in particular, the doctor and the patient) essentially begins to be defined as marketing with the predominant role of the patient .

Classical civilized market relations, as is known, are subject to economic laws, are specific in management and are in conflict with administrative methods. In the field of market relations, medical care, as a unique type of production activity, is filled with economic characteristics. Before that, conditional groups of patients (patients of the same nosology, decreed contingents, persons from dispensary observation groups, etc.) begin to correlate with structures characteristic of the market. The field for implementing marketing relationships in medicine is becoming certain segments of the medical services market, the diversity of which in form and content reflects in healthcare, as in the social structure of society, one of the principles of democracy. At the same time, given the equality of needs, collectively referred to as medical, marketing relationships in healthcare give rise to fragmentation of the medical services market in accordance with certain, significantly different levels of needs for medical services. It is a wide range of medical needs, from individual to group, their effective and high-quality satisfaction, taking into account diversity and community, that determine the essence of healthcare marketing systems. In this sense, multistructure in health care systems, widespread privatization, as an extreme form of decentralization, form that integral environment without which classical market relations are impossible.

Quality of medical care, free access to methods and forms of treatment, natural opportunity and implementation of choice and access to any medical service provider, the possibility of legal and economic influence in case of dissatisfaction or poor-quality satisfaction of medical needs, the earnings of a medical worker related to the results of work and patient satisfaction, legal and economic security of both the consumer and the provider of medical services is not a complete list of positive characteristics inherent in healthcare marketing systems. At the same time, it is necessary to reveal and explore the negative components of the medical services market. In particular, the negative nature of marketing relationships in healthcare includes the weakening of preventive measures, rejection of medical services with a high share of the humanitarian mission of healthcare and a low degree of direct economic benefit, fears of discrimination against sick socially vulnerable groups in need of medical care, etc. Some contradictions of such problems are resolved remove using a methodological approach that considers such groups of patients, their medical needs and requirements as unique and specific market segments, determining their rightful place in the healthcare marketing system and finding forms and methods of meeting the needs and demands of clients of these segments.

Market segmentation is usually called the process of classifying consumers into groups with different needs and requirements, characteristics or behavior. Such a definition, although acceptable for the medical services market, is unlikely to fully reflect the specifics and differentiation of the provision of medical care.

It is known that for the consumer goods market, customer groups can be formed according to the following criteria: geographical, demographic, psychographic, behavioral.
To be economically useful, a market segment must have the following five characteristics.

1. It must be possible to measure it, i.e. information can be obtained on the fundamental parameters of the buyer.

2. The segment must be broad enough and/or profitable enough to be worth developing a specific marketing plan for.

3. Possibility of access. The enterprise must be able to effectively carry out its commercial efforts in the field of the selected segment.

4. The segments must be truly different, i.e. differ from one another in terms of established variables.

5. The enterprise must be able to carry out its plan.
Closely related to market segmentation is the essence marketing.

The strategy of undifferentiated marketing of health services is to minimize differences between market segments, by first taking into account the general characteristics of consumers of health services, and then their differences. A medical and preventive institution strives to obtain a license and present to the market such medical services (types of medical care) that will attract as many patients as possible and strives to create a unique image in the mind of the buyer of medical services. This strategy is used if it can achieve cost reduction, but the enterprise risks either falling into intense competition in a given segment or incurring significant economic costs. Conditionally undifferentiated marketing of medical services could include immunoprophylaxis, preventive examinations of the population, etc. In all likelihood, within the framework of undifferentiated marketing of medical services, with its negative economic risks for the manufacturer, the points of application of state guarantees should be determined, i.e. Essentially, the buyer of such medical services should be the state.

Differentiated marketing of medical services- development of various types of medical services and targeted medical action programs for each segment; Using variations in medical services and changing them, the medical institution (doctor) hopes to obtain higher revenue with optimal results and quality of medical care (QMC).

The dynamism of the strategy for providing medical services lies in the reasonable and timely combination differentiated and undifferentiated marketing of medical services. The ability to transfer a consumer of medical services from one segment to another determines the dynamism and area of market viability of a medical institution or medical practice, and the relative degree of accessibility of medical services is characterized by the specificity of the market segment.

A medical service, being a specific form of a product, essentially determines the specificity of segmentation of the medical services market.

Taking into account the relatively equivalent characteristics of consumers of medical services, market fragmentation can be carried out in two main directions:

· social needs,

· medical needs.

Fragmentation of the market according to the possibilities of demand for medical procedures is carried out in accordance with economic groups, which are characterized by the type of medical service, medical diagnostic group, cost of the procedure, solvency and personality of the patient.

The development of a possible classification of segmentation of the medical services market is presented according to the following parameters:

· by age and gender (men, women, children, adolescents, adults, the elderly);

· by type of medical care (outpatient, hospital, obstetric, dental, drug provision, etc.);

· by designated groups (healthy, sick, working in conditions associated with occupational hazards, military personnel, students, etc.)

· by nosological groups (as a special case - by clinical examination groups);

· by medical diagnostic groups;

· by groups of equal medical standard;

· by economic groups (level of well-being and solvency),

· by type of medical services.

It is impossible to appeal to all health care buyers at once, as they have diverse tastes and differ in purchasing style and income level. From here, the direction of specialized segments of the medical services market emerges. In addition, competitors may be well located in some submarkets. Therefore, a medical institution (medical practices) should be interested in identifying those submarkets that will be most attractive to them and compatible with its goals and resources. With the same medical needs, the needs, resources, geographic location, level of sanitary culture, purchasing attitude, and habits may be different. Any of these variables can be used as a basis for market segmentation. Ideally, a medical institution (subject of medical practice) prefers to be the only one in its niche; the narrower this niche, the fewer competitors there are. But at the same time, the likelihood of large and widespread sales of medical services is also narrowed.

The more attractive a niche segment of the medical services market is, the more it meets the following characteristics:

A. purchasers of health care services (patients) have complex and specific health care needs;

B. they are willing to pay a high price to receive medical care of absolute quality, i.e. when medical procedures are absolutely adapted to their obvious and hidden needs;

B. the provider of medical services has high, constantly improving professional and social competence;

D. the acquisition of this competence allows one to bypass competitors, hence “the ability of a medical worker to learn is becoming an increasingly important quality, even more important than practical experience, which quickly becomes outdated” (O.P. Shchepin).

There is no single method for segmenting the medical services market. It is necessary to test segmentation options based on different variables, one or more at a time, to find the most useful approach to considering the structure of such a market. Thus, the restructuring of the healthcare industry, taking into account its emerging marketing functions, in our opinion, should be carried out in accordance with the segments of the medical services market.

Apparently, state guarantees in protecting the health of citizens should cover those market segments that, for a manufacturer of medical services counting on profitability, are associated with the unattractiveness of the sector.

Thus, healthcare marketing systems, based on objective economic laws with many determinants, are characterized by certain market segments. Segmentation of the medical services market makes it possible to provide medical care (satisfy specific demand) both taking into account the individuality of the patient and taking into account the mass consumption of medical services.

5. General characteristics of the Russian medical services market.

The transition to market relations in Russia has placed the issue of pricing in all areas of the national economy in one of the first places. When talking about the price of a product in the healthcare system, we mean the price of a medical service that is fully endowed with commercial properties. Through the market mechanism, buyers and sellers interact to determine the price and quantity of goods produced. Consequently, demand, supply and price are the main elements of economic relations in the market.

The key concept expressing the essence of market relations is competition. The pricing policy is developed in accordance with the market structure. Depending on the relationship between the number of producers and the number of consumers, the following types of competitive structures are distinguished:

Perfect competition market;

Oligopoly;

Monopoly;

Monopolistic competition.

The medical services market has the following characteristics:

The number of sellers is limited, there is a restriction on entry into the market;

Heterogeneity of medical services, its individuality, uniqueness;

Imperfect awareness of buyers about the services market;

Impossibility or difficulty of comparing price and quality;

The presence of a large number of public or private non-profit organizations;

In most cases, the sale of goods requires a competent intermediary, who pays for a significant part of the medical service.

Thus, the medical services market for the most part can be classified in structure as a market of monopolistic competition and monopoly.

Budgetary healthcare is an example of a monopsony in the medical services market, when the level of prices at which medical services are purchased is determined not by the real costs of service providers, which no one considers, but by the solvency of the state and its ideas about the value of such a good as the health of citizens.

Thus, one can be convinced that the peculiarity of the Russian medical services market is that it is a strong fusion of monopoly and monopsony, when almost all medical workers and medical institutions are subordinate to the Ministry of Health. At the same time, the state, being a monopolist, also dictates clearly unfavorable conditions for financing the structures subordinate to it, without even ensuring that their real costs are covered. The patient in such a system is alone and absolutely powerless. Therefore, the goal of the health care reform is to demonopolize the system of providing medical services, to gradually transform the Russian medical services market, first into a “seller’s market,” when sellers have greater market power (dictating their terms to the buyer, imposing goods (services) and prices on them), and then into “buyer’s market”, when the central figure determining the position of medical services and their prices will be the consumer-patient.

On the way to this, one of the primary tasks is to determine the legal and economic status of medical institutions and ensure their financing, based, at a minimum, on the real costs of producing medical services provided to the population. Financing at the level of real costs will ensure the financial sustainability of the country’s medical institutions, allowing them to move from solving problems of survival to problems of improving the quality of medical services.

When considering the market for medical services, it is necessary to pay attention to the factors that determine the supply and demand of medical services, the main one of which is price. In this case, prices can be divided into the following three groups:

1. group – high prices (first price) for a service reflect its uniqueness, technological patent protection, lack of demand (demand market) at the initial stage;

2. group – low prices (breakthrough or penetration price) for the service, reflecting the simplicity of the technical and technological solution, low costs, high and stable demand, strong financial position of the company;

3. group - experimental prices (when there is no similar product on the market), reflect the novelty of the functional purpose, the lack of data on the emergence of a sales market and prices.

Also important is the interaction of the medical services market with the market of labor and material resources. On the one hand, demand in the resource market is a derivative of the demand for medical services, on the other hand, the price level, and in general, the situation in the resource market determines the potential opportunities and boundaries for the development of medical institutions.

Different medical services cannot be needed simultaneously by all patients, and therefore health care facilities and individual specialists focus on serving certain parts (or segments) of the market, in other words, target consumers. A market segment consists of consumers who respond similarly to the same set of consumer marketing stimuli. Accordingly, dividing the market into similar parts is called segmentation.

There are many segmentation techniques used in marketing. One of them is the construction of a typology of consumers.

Consumer typology is the process of dividing the studied set of objects into fairly homogeneous and stable groups of consumers in time and space with a characteristic type of consumer behavior for each of them. For example, depending on how consumers of medical services react to changes in prices for medical services/goods, they can be divided into 5 types (segments).

1st group:economical patients(pensioners, students, low-income people). Patients in this group are highly price sensitive. Demand for services decreases when their price is high (more than 50% of the Russian population).

2nd group:prestigious patients(part of the entrepreneurs, intelligentsia). For this group, prestige and quality of service are important. They are insensitive to prices (20% of potential customers).

3rd group:ethical patients(people belonging economically to any of the two previous groups). For such patients, certain ethical qualities of medical services are important (belonging to the country of origin, social group) (20% of potential patients).

4th group: “innovators”- focus on everything new (methods of diagnosis, treatment). The quality of service is associated with the age of the doctor. They give preference to young doctors.

5th group: “conservatives”- in contrast to the previous group, they prefer old, proven methods of treatment. In their opinion, doctors with more experience are more reliable.

Segmentation is carried out according to the following main criteria:

1) geographical (republic, region, region, city, district, village).

2) demographic (gender, age, family size).

3) psychographic (based on social class, lifestyle or personal characteristics).

4) behavioral (based on the behavioral characteristics of consumers of medical services). Consumers are divided into groups depending on their knowledge, relationships, and the nature of their reaction to the service.

Public healthcare market;

Patient Market;

Market of Ideas;

Pharmaceutical industry market;

Medical equipment market;

Physical culture market;

Medical education system market;

Medical services market;

Health insurance market.

3.1. Segmentation of the medical services market

In healthcare systems built on the Soviet model, the volume and level of medical care, despite all the declarations of equality and social justice, were distinguished by a high degree of privilege. A special medical care system was created for the leadership of the party and the country. With limited resources allocated to health care, some priority was given to workers and children. All this does not prevent us from asserting today that the availability of qualified medical care was ensured by the state regardless of the patient’s social status, his place of residence, etc.

The field for implementing marketing relationships in medicine are certain segments of the medical services market, the diversity of which in form and content reflects one of the principles of democracy in healthcare, as in the social structure of society.

At the same time, given the equality of needs, collectively referred to as medical, marketing relationships in healthcare give rise to fragmentation of the medical services market in accordance with certain, significantly different levels of needs for medical services. It is a wide range of medical needs, from individual to group, their effective and high-quality satisfaction, taking into account diversity and community, that determine the essence of healthcare marketing systems. In this sense, multistructure in health care systems, widespread privatization, as an extreme form of decentralization, form that integral environment without which classical market relations are impossible.

The essence of differentiated and undifferentiated marketing is closely related to market segmentation.

Differentiated marketing of medical services - development of various types of medical services and targeted medical action programs for each segment; Using variations in medical services and changing them, the medical institution (doctor) hopes to obtain higher revenue with optimal results and quality of medical care (QMC).

The dynamism of the strategy for providing medical services lies in a reasonable and timely combination of differentiated and undifferentiated marketing of medical services. The ability to transfer a consumer of medical services from one segment to another determines the dynamism and area of market viability of a medical institution or medical practice, and the relative degree of accessibility of medical services is characterized by the specificity of the market segment.

A medical service, being a specific form of a product, essentially determines the specificity of segmentation of the medical services market.

Taking into account the relatively equivalent characteristics of consumers of medical services, market fragmentation can be carried out in two main directions:

social needs,

medical needs,

The development of a possible classification of segmentation of the medical services market is presented according to the following parameters:

by age and gender (men, women, children, adolescents, adults, the elderly);

by type of medical care (outpatient, hospital, obstetric, dental, drug provision, etc.);

by decreed groups (healthy, sick, working in conditions associated with occupational hazards, military personnel, students, etc.)

by nosological groups (as a special case - by clinical examination groups);

by medical diagnostic groups;

by groups of equal medical standard;

by economic groups (level of well-being and solvency),

by type of medical services.

health care purchasers (patients) have complex and specific health care needs;

they are willing to pay a high price to receive medical care of absolute quality, i.e. when medical procedures are absolutely adapted to their obvious and hidden needs;

the provider of medical services has high, constantly improving professional and social competence;

acquiring this competence allows you to get ahead of competitors, hence “the ability of a medical worker to learn is becoming an increasingly important quality, even more important than practical experience, which quickly becomes outdated” (O.P. Shchepin).

3.2. Segmentation of the tourism services market

The tourism industry is an entire inter-industry complex, and the market for tourism services and goods has a complex structure and economic indicators unique to it.

Segmentation of tourism services by geographic parameters involves dividing demand into various geographical units depending on:

from the country of permanent residence of the tourist - for domestic, inbound and outbound tourism;

from the geographical purpose of the tourist trip - by parts of the world, countries, regions, cantons, cities.

Socio-demographic criteria (tourist characteristics)

Tourist profession.
Profession of the head of the family.
The size of the settlement where tourists permanently reside.
Number of family members accompanying the tourist
Family type.
Nationality.
Religious Beliefs.
The presence or absence of personal vehicles for the family.
Family income.
Income per family member.

Psychological and behavioral criteria (characteristics of tourist behavior)

Motive for the trip.

Type of tourist (psychological portrait).

Seasonality.

Organization of the trip.

Travel form.

Vehicles used.

Accommodation facilities used.

Remoteness of the tour destination.

Duration of the trip.

Sources of funding for the trip.

Consultants and intermediaries in making decisions about travel.

Let us give examples of segmenting demand according to some of the above criteria. Based on age, they distinguish, for example, youth tourism and “senior” tourism; The demand for tourist services from the age groups “from 30 to 45 years” and “from 45 to 55 years”, etc. has its own characteristics. Women's tourism and professional specialized tourism (for example, tours for bank employees, agricultural workers, and various industries) are becoming increasingly important. Depending on the type of family, demand is divided into family tourism with and without children, tourism for singles, tourism for families of 5 or more people, etc. Separate segments form religious, ethnic tourism, expensive exclusive and cheap tourist trips.

In psychological and behavioral segmentation, consumers of tourism services and goods are divided into groups based on lifestyle characteristics and goals regarding the organization of their free time, personality characteristics, as well as behavioral characteristics and stereotypes regarding the consumption of a tourism product.

Depending on the motivation of a tourist trip, the following main segments of tourism demand are distinguished: recreational, cultural, communication, sports, and business tourism. Many of them are divided into smaller sub-segments, for example, in recreational tourism these are vacation tourism and tourism for the purpose of treatment; There are many subspecies in sports tourism. It is often difficult to draw a clear line between individual segments based on motivation: business tourism can be combined with educational tourism, sports tourism with recreational tourism. The increasing complexity of tourism needs leads to the emergence of not only completely new segments in tourism demand, but also a significant number of mixed forms of tourism.