MCLEAN, Va., Oct. 13, 2020 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Binary Fountain, the leading online reputation and customer experience management platform for enterprises, healthcare organizations and small and medium-sized businesses, today released the findings of its "2020 Healthcare Consumer Insight & Digital Engagement Survey."
Now in its fourth consecutive year, Binary Fountain's annual survey aims to understand how patients search, evaluate and share their experiences with healthcare providers and brands. It analyzes consumer preferences for finding doctors, booking appointments, sharing experiences online, and communicating with healthcare organizations. The survey also includes key insights across four years of data and breaks down current consumer trends by demographic, including age and gender.
The 2020 survey results show that patients increasingly rely on online ratings and review sites to make informed healthcare decisions, and that local listing information is becoming key to the digital patient experience.
According to this year's survey results:
41% of patients use ratings and review sites to find a doctor – more than twice as much as in 2017. The average consumer reads nine reviews before choosing a doctor.
53% of consumers use hospital/clinic websites to look for physicians. Google is the most-used third-party directory for finding doctors (34%), followed by Healthgrades (24%). More than 20% of consumers are now using voice search to search for care.
Google and Facebook remain the most popular platforms for sharing healthcare experiences, but healthcare review and rating sites like WebMD and CareDash have gained popularity with a 78% increase and 2,150% increase respectively since 2018.
More than half of consumers say they primarily book appointments over the phone. But the share of consumers using third-party sites to book appointments has increased 69% since 2017.
The survey also asked consumers about how they evaluate, review and rate the care they receive. For the fourth consecutive year, the top three factors that matter most to patients when rating or evaluating a provider were "friendly and caring attitude," "thoroughness of the examination," and "ability to answer questions."
"The evidence grows clearer every year. Reviews, listings, and online reputation are key drivers in a data-driven, consumer-centric healthcare industry," said Aaron Clifford, senior vice president of marketing at Binary Fountain. "Patients have – by necessity in 2020 – become vigilant in using ratings and reviews to research their healthcare providers and facilities. We need to engage patients throughout the digital customer experience, giving them the right information at the right time, to earn their trust and their business."
For more findings from the 2020 "Healthcare Consumer Insight & Digital Engagement" survey:
Download the e-book here.
Download the infographic here.
Methodology
Sponsored by Binary Fountain, the "Healthcare Consumer Insight & Digital Engagement" survey was conducted by OnePoll, a marketing research company specializing in online quantitative research and polling, between Sept. 16-17, 2020. Feedback was obtained from more than 1,000 U.S. adults who have visited a doctor in the last year.
About Binary Fountain
Binary Fountain provides the leading customer experience and online reputation management platform for enterprises, healthcare organizations and small and medium-sized businesses. Anchored in its Natural Language Processing (NLP) technology, the cloud-based platform mines customer and employee feedback from surveys, online ratings and review sites, social media and other data sources to equip organizations with actionable insights needed to improve brand loyalty, increase engagement, attract new customers and drive sustainable bottom-line results. On a mission to help companies grow their business and create better customer experiences, Binary Fountain serves various industries including healthcare, hospitality, retail, automotive and financial services. For more information, visit http://www.binaryfountain.com.
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SOURCE Binary Fountain
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