B. Wrenn et al., DIFFERENCES IN PERCEPTIONS OF HOSPITAL MARKETING ORIENTATION BETWEEN ADMINISTRATORS AND MARKETING OFFICERS, Hospital & health services administration, 39(3), 1994, pp. 341-358
Hospital administrators have been struggling for more than a decade to
determine the role and proper position for marketing and marketers wi
thin their organizations. Results of a study now confirm the expected-
administrators and their chief marketing officers do not see the same
marketing actions being conducted for their hospitals. The consequence
of such perceptual differences in marketing orientation for the role
of marketers within the hospital are significant and are discussed in
this article. Of particular importance is the finding that the marketi
ng behaviors of the organization as identified by line managers correl
ate strongly with both revenues (r = .64 for inpatient revenue) and oc
cupancy levels (r = .44). Additionally, it was found that as little as
a 10 percent improvement in a hospital's marketing orientation is ass
ociated with a $25 million increase in total net patient revenues and
an 8 percentage point increase in occupancy rate.