Influence of branding in medical tourism (With special reference to India)

The aim of this research is to analyze the influence of branding in medical tourism in India. Medical tourism refers to the movement of consumers to a country providing services for diagnosis, specialized treatment which is ‘cost effective’. Building strong brand needs careful planning, long term commitment that commands intense consumer loyalty and translates into consumer willingness to pay. People develop general impression that brands and branding is a part of manufactured products only. But today, most of the marketable products are services, which are clear from the contribution of service sector in GDP from many of the developing countries of the world, including India. The conventional marketing focuses mainly on 4Ps concept as the marketing mix and recommends promotional activities suitable to products to create brand name and brand awareness in the market. Since, we need to look at marketing from a different perspective; the conventional marketing mix has to undergo remarkable changes which are clear from the marketing activities undertaken by the service sector providers in India now. All leading hospitals and healthcare providers use integrated marketing on modern lines to differentiate their product through health care tourism. The major supportive factors are the escalation of medical treatment in US, Europe, development of global transportation and communication network, availability of most modern facilities in India through reputed hospital chains, availability of expert doctors and staff, opening up of the Indian market to global integration etc. This opportunity is effectively used to tap the potential globally by reputed hospitals like Escorts, Wockdhart, Apollo etc by developing a strong brand name in the global marketing scenario. So an integrative study is made on how these brands are promoting their brand names, what strategy is adopted by them to create the brand name and brand awareness, how they compete in international market place with brand synergy etc. So healthcare, which is treated as a service oriented product gradually, gets converted into a marketable commodity by creating brand preferences through generic strategy of differentiation recommended by Michael E. Porter. In India, healthcare providers can differentiate their service from service providers in other countries through the differentiation mechanism of health care tourism, as India which has got unparallel competitive strength as compared to other countries of the world.