Thinking Outside the Box: The Shift to Out-of-Industry Health System Marketing Executives

In today’s increasingly consumer-driven healthcare landscape, marketing leaders are being called to do more than just promote services—they are expected to shape strategy, drive digital engagement, and build lasting patient relationships. As traditional approaches struggle to keep pace, a growing number of healthcare providers are looking outside the industry for fresh thinking. Over the past few years, one trend has emerged: appointing chief marketing officers (CMOs) from sectors like retail, technology, and finance.

These out-of-industry leaders bring bold, consumer-centric strategies that challenge legacy norms and inject innovation into healthcare marketing. To explore this unconventional but promising shift, we spoke with executives who have successfully made the transition. Their stories reveal key insights into the value of an outsider’s perspective, the challenges of adapting to healthcare’s complexity, and the foundational priorities that marketing teams must embrace to lead in a rapidly evolving environment.

 

I recommend healthcare organizations look outside of the industry. You need to hire for capabilities and leadership – successful leaders can learn about the industry.”

Paul Matsen
Cleveland Clinic CMO

 

Why look beyond healthcare?

Best in class marketing leaders are customer-centric, tech-enabled growth drivers. Hiring CMOs from outside the healthcare industry brings fresh perspectives that challenge long-standing, often outdated norms. Historically , healthcare organizations have struggled to fully leverage internal and external marketing campaigns and technologies. Much of this stems from a long-held skepticism about whether healthcare should be “marketed” at all, leading to a tendency to deprioritize marketing as a strategic function. Marketing has traditionally been seen as an art, rather than an additive science—with brand building taking a back seat to service-line promotion, and innovation stalling due to risk aversion and regulatory complexity. In contrast, out-of-industry leaders are accustomed to fast-moving environments, intense competition for customer attention, and the proactive use of data to inform real-time decision-making.

This outsider lens empowers these marketing leaders to challenge the status quo in meaningful ways. Several executives we interviewed shared that their initial observations—such as missed opportunities in digital personalization or lack of cohesive brand identity—were initially met with resistance. However, their consistent push for consumer-first thinking ultimately gained traction. These leaders helped health systems reframe patients as active participants in a continuous care journey, rather than recipients of transactional services. By applying strategies from industries more thought of as more consumer-focused (e.g. retail, travel), these CMOs are not only elevating the role of marketing but also helping reshape how healthcare organizations think about life-time customer value , engagement, and long-term growth.

 

In healthcare, the C-suite typically lacks a depth of understanding the space of marketing, addressing it as an art versus a science.”

Mark Bohen
Mass General Brigham CMO

 

 

Many healthcare leaders struggle to understand what they want the role of marketing to be. The bottom line is that in healthcare marketing, we are not aiming to sell hospital visits – we aim to provide information that our patients can use while on their healing journeys.”

Paul Matsen
Cleveland Clinic CMO

 

A steep learning curve proves challenging

While CMOs from outside the healthcare sector bring fresh thinking and proven consumer strategies, the transition into this highly specialized industry comes with a steep learning curve. One of the most immediate challenges is reframing the patient as a customer—without undermining the mission-driven culture of clinical care. Several executives emphasized the delicate balance required: shifting mindsets to embrace consumer-centric marketing while honoring the deep sense of purpose held by physicians and caregivers.

 

In healthcare marketing, you must be able to change the mindset from patient to consumer in a way that does not devalue the mission of what the physicians and caregivers do – it’s incredibly difficult.”

Riham El-Lakeny
Former BJC Healthcare CMO

 

This challenge is compounded by healthcare’s inherent risk-averse nature and a persistent tendency to undervalue marketing at the executive level. In an environment where failure is rarely an option, efforts to introduce experimentation, particularly around digital transformation and new marketing techniques, are often met with resistance. Obstacles arise as innovation demands a willingness to test, iterate, and learn.

Leaders highlighted the difficulty of fostering this mindset, especially among senior operational stakeholders. At the same time, many organizations continue to question the value of marketing altogether, assuming brand awareness in local communities is sufficient. This skepticism frequently leads to underinvestment and a limited view of marketing’s potential.

Out-of-industry CMOs are often tasked with reshaping that narrative — positioning marketing not as a support function, but as a strategic growth driver that enhances patient trust and delivers measurable impact. As a result, they found that the key to securing senior-level buy-in lies in framing marketing efforts as low-risk, data-driven experiments that align with the organization’s broader mission while enabling long-term growth.

 

In my role, I would say that I am 60% plumber and 40% marketer. As a marketer, data—clean data—is everything.”

Alexandra Morehouse
Former Banner Health CMO

 

With these data-driven initiatives, healthcare marketing must navigate a unique dual mandate: delivering highly targeted, ROI-driven campaigns while also functioning as a trusted source of information. Healthcare marketing is more than selling a product — it is about providing their patients with relevant, credible content when they need it most. One executive described building a content-driven marketing model, centered on health education, robust digital resources, and segmented patient outreach. Their approach combined informative brand-building with sophisticated digital tactics to engage both local and national audiences. This balance between mission-driven communication and data-backed performance reflects the complex, evolving expectations placed on marketing leaders in today’s healthcare landscape.

 

The key to marketing transformation is in the data analytics. In marketing, you are tasked with telling a story, and the story I tell is backed by this data. This is a critical component to being a successful marketer.”

Mark Bohen
Mass General Brigham CMO

 

Healthcare marketing’s future priorities

Looking ahead, healthcare marketing teams must fully embrace their role as strategic drivers of growth, not just communicators. Modern go-to-market leaders drive growth via customer centricity, future-focused digital enablement, and data-driven decision making. Leaders that can leverage technology to unlock the power and potential of the customer will be vital to achieving and sustaining growth for visionary health systems.

A key priority within health systems is investing in the right technology and talent to support a modern, data-driven marketing function. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platforms are becoming essential—not only for managing patient touchpoints, but for enabling personalized, timely, and relevant outreach across the care journey. Combined with omnichannel engagement strategies, CRM tools allow marketers to meet patients where they are, (online, in-person, mobile) delivering consistent and tailored experiences.

At the heart of this transformation is data. From understanding patient behavior to optimizing campaign performance and proving ROI, data is the foundation for smart, responsive marketing. Forward-looking teams have integrated their marketing teams into enterprise planning, clinical collaboration, and organizational strategy, building robust analytics capabilities to guide their decision-making. Teams that embrace these strategic changes and move away from outdated marketing tactics will be best positioned to continue building trust, strengthening brand loyalty, and supporting long-term growth in a competitive, consumer-driven landscape.

How healthcare organizations can position marketing officers for success

The evolving demands of the healthcare landscape are forcing organizations to reimagine how they engage with patients, build brand equity, and drive strategic growth. One of the most promising shifts in this transformation is the rise of out-of-industry CMOs. So, for healthcare organizations looking to stand out amongst the crowd, consider the following ways you can empower your marketing teams

• Out-of-industry CMOs bring the bold, consumer-centric thinking that healthcare needs: Coming from sectors like consumer, retail, tech, and finance, these marketing leaders’ experience with competitive markets, digital engagement, and data analytics positions them to inject much-needed innovation into healthcare marketing – helping health systems move beyond legacy tactics and elevate the patient experience.
  
  
• Success depends on strong internal support, cultural adaptation, and a willingness to rethink how healthcare communicates: These leaders must earn credibility with clinical stakeholders, learn to navigate healthcare’s regulatory and mission-driven environment, and foster a culture of experimentation in organizations that have historically deprioritized marketing.
  
  
• The future belongs to marketing teams that embrace data, digital, and cross-functional collaboration: As marketing evolves from a service-line support function to a strategic business driver, organizations must invest in CRM infrastructure, omnichannel engagement, and analytics capabilities. Marketing leaders who can bridge consumer expectations with healthcare delivery through personalized outreach, mission-aligned storytelling, and measurable outcomes will be instrumental in shaping the next era of healthcare growth.

Bold leadership, adaptive strategy, and a data-powered foundation will define the next generation of healthcare marketing—and organizations willing to challenge the status quo will lead the way.

Authors

Kate Scott is a senior member of Russell Reynolds Associates’ Healthcare Services practice. She is based in Boston.

Evan Sharp is a senior member of the Russell Reynolds Associates’ Consumer practice. He is based in Chicago. 

Amanda Callahan leads Russell Associates’ Customer Activation and Growth Knowledge team. She is based in Chicago. 

Tiffany Yam is a member of Russell Reynolds Associates’ Healthcare Knowledge team. She is based in New York.