1. Introduction
Periodically, no matter the discipline, new fields of research
emerge. Marketing is no different. A marketing journal's calling should
be to foster newfields of research, as theymayprove to be influential in
the long run (Stremersch & Lehmann, 2007, 2008). Research fields can
be defined by their topic (for example, customer relationship management—
e.g., Gupta & Zeithaml, 2006), method (for example, marketing
dynamics—e.g., Leeflang et al., 2009), or application area (for example,
high tech marketing — e.g., John, Weiss, & Dutta, 1999). Health and
Marketing is starting to gain firm ground as a new research field
defined by its application area.
The number of papers on Health and Marketing submitted to
marketing journals has been increasing rapidly over the last five years.
Mainstream marketing conferences feature special sessions on health
marketing. The increasing expertise on Health and Marketing among
faculty, combined with high societal demand, has induced schools to
offer healthcare marketing classes to students, dual affiliations across
economics, psychology, or business, and medicine to faculty, and new
Health and Marketing chairs to faculty.
Common concerns in the establishment of a new research field
include the following questions. First, is the field relevant? Second,
does the field present us with new questions that require new
knowledge development? Third, does the field yield knowledge that
can be generalized? These questions and the rise of research on Health
and Marketing motivated the International Journal of Research in
Marketing and the Marketing Science Institute to assemble a special
issue on the topic. This special issue aims to stimulate more research
in this area, relieve some of the tension between reviewers and
authors that characterizes the birth of any new research field, and
induce young scholars to consider it as an area in which they might
want to specialize.
Building upon the papers published in this special issue, Iwill position
the field ofHealth andMarketing, provide examples of questions that can
be addressed, and cite data opportunities. I will then address common
concerns other scholars express over Health and Marketing research.
2. Health and marketing: scope, research questions and data
2.1. Scope of the field
Given that this research field is defined by its application, its scope
can be best understood from the perspective of the healthcare value
chain (Stremersch & Van Dyck, 2008, adapted from Burns, 2005). The
healthcare value chain (Fig. 1) consists of a healthcare delivery chain
(from right to left) and a healthcare payment chain (from left to right).
The healthcare delivery starts with therapy producers, who are commonly
referred to as the life sciences industry (Stremersch & Van Dyck,
2008).
At its core, the life sciences industry is composed of the pharmaceutical,
biotechnology, and (therapeutic) medical devices industries. At its
boundaries are the food (e.g., nutraceuticals), high tech (e.g., medical
imaging) and cosmetics industries (e.g., cosmeceuticals). Product intermediaries
are typically referred to as the “channel” in marketing literature.
Care providers are central in the healthcare value chain.
The care provided in the chain is paid for by employers, government,
and/or consumers (who, if afflicted with a disease, are referred to as
patients by the medical profession). Often, there is co-payment by several
of these actors, where each pays a certain share. Especially in systems
where the government is not themainpayer, there is a substantialfinancial
intermediary industry composed of HMO's and insurance companies.
The scope of the Health and Marketing field can now be bounded
as any phenomenon contained in the marketing domain, at any position
in the healthcare value chain.
2.2. Research questions
The papers in this special issue provide some great examples of
questions across this domain, most of which have strong public policy
implications (Table 1). Half of the papers address issues on the producer
side of the healthcare value chain. Kremer, Bijmolt, Leeflang, and
Wieringa (2008) find that effectiveness of promotional expenditures by
pharmaceutical firms are modest in size and show high heterogeneity
across studies. They explain that part of this heterogeneity is driven by
the promotional instrument, the disease category studied, and the
study's design, such as the variables included and corrections for
endogeneity. Gonzalez, Sismeiro, Dutta and Stern (2008) study generic
entry upon patent expiration, which is a theme idiosyncratic to the life
sciences industry. They examine the diffusion of generics and showhow
competition ina drug category, beyond themolecule that goes generic, is
affected by such generic entry.
Intern. J. of Research in Marketing 25 (2008) 229–233
☆ This editorial benefitted from the comments of Nuno Camacho, Josh Eliashberg,
Sonya Grier, Amir Heiman, Eelco Kappe, Peter Leeflang, Don Lehmann, Vikas Mittal,
Eitan