The Healthtech Marketing Show

Most healthtech thought leadership isn't leadership. It's participation with a byline. That's what healthtech marketing leaders are saying about themselves.
This month we ran two candid peer sessions on thought leadership in the Healthtech Marketing Network, and this solo episode is my report on what came out of them. When we asked senior marketing leaders where their programs sit on Adrianna Hosford's three levels of thought leadership, almost everyone said level two. A few said zero. Not one person claimed level three, even though industry surveys say 97% of practitioners believe their programs deliver measurable impact.
I walk through six themes from those conversations. Why evidence alone is not a point of view. Why the bar for bold is lower in healthcare than you think. Why your best thought leader might be a director, a clinician, or a KOL rather than your CEO. How AI went from a bad author to your most important reader. Why the stage is the source and everything else is the echo. And why the attribution ceiling is starting to crack. Along the way I bring in insights from past guests Adrianna Hosford, Paul Wicks, and John Lynn, and I close with five takeaways and one exercise you can try this week.
If you've ever wondered whether your thought leadership actually sets you apart or just adds to the noise, this episode will help you find out.
Key Topics Covered:
"(00:00)" Introduction
"(03:10)" Adrianna Hosford's three levels of thought leadership
"(06:00)" The level two trap: free education for your whole category
"(07:00)" Evidence is not a point of view
"(08:45)" Two CEOs who paired proof with a real opinion
"(10:10)" Regulatory constraints and healthcare's lower bar of controversy
"(12:25)" KOLs as third-party endorsement
"(13:25)" Building thought leadership for buying committees
"(15:05)" AI as author: why it produces the generic average
"(17:00)" AI as audience: what LLMs weigh when deciding who gets cited
"(18:10)" John Lynn's counterpoint on branded content and AI citations
"(19:25)" Why conferences and live events came out on top
"(20:15)" Why the room was skeptical of LinkedIn despite the ROI data
"(21:20)" Podcasting as the bridge between the live moment and the long tail
"(22:30)" Can thought leadership be tied to pipeline?
"(25:25)" Five key takeaways
"(27:05)" One thing to try this week
"(27:25)" Closing thoughts
Previous Episodes Mentioned:
Is Sponsored Media as Trusted as Earned Media?
The Thought Leadership Gap in Healthtech
How to Build Pipeline With Podcasts
How Peer-Reviewed Evidence Drives AI Discoverability
Resources Mentioned:
Thought Leadership in Practice: The 2026 Report
The ROI of Thought Leadership: Calculating the Value that Sets Organizations Apart
If you are interested in discussing this or any other topic, let's have a chat.  Reach out to me directly to schedule a no-obligation discussion. This isn't a sales call, but rather an opportunity to talk through your questions and challenges.
Follow me on LinkedIn.
Subscribe to The Healthtech Marketing Show on Spotify or watch us on YouTube for more insights into marketing, AI, ABM, buyer journeys, and beyond!
Find all of our episodes on the Health Podcast Library.
Thank you to our presenting sponsor, HealthcareNOW, 24/7 expert shows, interviews, and podcasts, powering healthcare leaders with innovation, policy, and strategy insights.

How do you know whether your healthtech company needs a classic demand gen campaign or a full ABM program? 
In this episode, I'm joined by my colleague Paul Vandre, Account Director and Digital Marketing Specialist at Health Launchpad. Paul has two decades of experience in digital marketing, spending more than five years building paid media strategy for about 30 Health Launchpad clients.
Paul starts by diagnosing the right approach. He uses two rules of thumb: a deal size of around $50K, and who you're selling to. Then he looks at why health systems usually settle on a shortlist long before anyone books a demo. According to 6sense, the first vendor a buyer calls wins 84% of the time, so paid media's real job is getting you into the consideration set early. Paul also explains which signals to track at each stage of the buyer journey, and how to show your leadership team that marketing is influencing revenue when you can't attribute every deal.
On the demand gen side, Paul gets into why LinkedIn isn't always the answer, especially for clinician audiences. Paul explains how Meta, programmatic, Google, direct mail, and niche trade outlets fit into a real multi-channel mix. He also covers why campaigns tend to hit their stride around month three. If your paid media isn't delivering what you expected, this episode will help you work out whether the problem is your channels, your message, or both.
Key Topics Covered
"(00:00)" Introduction
"(04:00)" How to tell whether a company needs demand gen or ABM
"(06:00)" Two rules of thumb: the $50K deal size line and who you sell to
"(07:00)" How health systems buy and how paid media supports ABM
"(10:00)" The 6sense stat: the first vendor called wins 84% of the time
"(11:00)" What digital advertising is for
"(13:00)" The signals to track at each buyer stage
"(14:00)" Showing leadership the value of influence
"(19:00)" Reaching clinicians when LinkedIn doesn't work
"(21:00)" What to expect in the first three months of a paid demand gen campaign
"(23:00)" Programmatic advertising explained
"(26:00)" Content and offers that work at each stage of the funnel
"(28:00)" Paul's biggest lesson
"(30:00)" The first thing to check when paid media isn't working
"(32:00)" My five key takeaways from the conversation
If you are interested in discussing this or any other topic, let's have a chat.  Reach out to me directly to schedule a no-obligation discussion. This isn't a sales call, but rather an opportunity to talk through your questions and challenges.
Follow me on LinkedIn.
Subscribe to The Healthtech Marketing Show on Spotify or watch us on YouTube for more insights into marketing, AI, ABM, buyer journeys, and beyond!
Find all of our episodes on the Health Podcast Library.
Thank you to our presenting sponsor, HealthcareNOW, 24/7 expert shows, interviews, and podcasts, powering healthcare leaders with innovation, policy, and strategy insights.

If you skipped every healthtech conference this year, this episode is your catch-up call.
My guest is Colin Hung, Editor-in-Chief at Swaay.Health and Healthcare IT Today, who is on pace to attend 50 conferences in 2026, roughly one a week, which means he sees more vendor pitches and more buyer conversations than almost anyone else in this industry. I asked him what has actually changed on the show floor this year, and his answer should worry anyone still pitching a five-year ROI story.
Colin walks me through why buyers have no patience for long payback periods. The standard or many, is three to six months. And, why AI has quietly moved from a standalone purchase to something baked into every backend system you already own. That shift is making it harder than ever for vendors to stand out.
We get into the one unglamorous AI use case that is actually winning deals right now (hint: it involves faxes), why security transparency and AI governance are becoming the next competitive edge, and what he thinks marketers need to stop saying if they want their message to break through the noise.
We close with his predictions for 2027, including a call on patient experience investment that you may not want to hear, and his take on what you are missing every single time you decide to stay home instead of showing up.
Key Topics Covered
“(00:00)” – Introduction
“(06:00)” – The economy takes center stage in conversations
“(08:00)” – Budget cuts, paused projects, and stripped down requirements
“(09:00)” – Buyers now demand proof of value in three to six months
“(10:00)” – Operational efficiency becomes the new buzzword
“(12:00)” – A maturing conversation around generative versus agentic AI
“(17:00)” – Fax triage and other unglamorous, high impact AI deployments
“(19:00)” – The gap between what vendors promote and what buyers want
“(23:00)” – Security transparency and AI governance are becoming competitive advantages
“(24:00)” – The standout technology of the year
“(26:00)” – Predictions for 2027
“(29:00)” – What healthtech marketers miss by skipping conferences entirely
“(30:00)” – What's next for Swaay.Health
If you are interested in discussing this or any other topic, let's have a chat.  Reach out to me directly to schedule a no-obligation discussion. This isn't a sales call, but rather an opportunity to talk through your questions and challenges.
Follow me on LinkedIn.
Subscribe to The Healthtech Marketing Show on Spotify or watch us on YouTube for more insights into marketing, AI, ABM, buyer journeys, and beyond!
Find all of our episodes on the Health Podcast Library.
Thank you to our presenting sponsor, HealthcareNOW, 24/7 expert shows, interviews, and podcasts, powering healthcare leaders with innovation, policy, and strategy insights.

If you've ever wondered why splitting your brand budget from your demand gen budget always seems to end with brand getting cut first, this episode is for you. I sat down with Drew Neisser, founder of CMO Huddles, a peer community built exclusively for B2B CMOs with over 800 members, to dig into what's actually changed for CMOs in the AI era, and what hasn't.
We talk about why AI is turning competent content into a commodity, and why that actually makes human judgment, humor, and original thinking more valuable, not less. Drew makes the case for the return of the big idea, and explains why treating brand and demand gen as separate budgets sets marketing and sales up to work against each other.
If you're worried about CMO tenure or wondering whether the job is even still worth pursuing, Drew shares brand new data from a study he ran with Findem on how long CMOs actually last at public, venture backed, and private equity backed companies, and why the gap is bigger than you'd think.
We also get into what a CMO should do in their first 90 days at a new company, why peer communities like CMO Huddles matter more than ever, and why knowing your customer better than anyone else in the room is still the strongest superpower a CMO has.
Key Topics Covered
"(00:00)" - Introduction
"(00:04)" - Why CMO Huddles is built
"(00:06)" - What's changed and what hasn't for CMOs in the AI era
"(00:09)" - Why the pressure on marketers keeps rising
"(00:13)" - Why splitting brand and demand gen backfires
"(00:19)" - The rise of unified GTM teams and who should lead them
"(00:21)" - Is the CMO role disappearing?
"(00:23)" - The buyer journey in healthtech
"(00:25)" - Agent sprawl: a new kind of MarTech debt
"(00:28)" - Inside Reputracker
"(00:31)" - New CMO tenure data from the Findem study
"(00:36)" - The Quick Wins Playbook for a CMO's first 90 days
"(00:39)" - Why marketers should join a peer community
"(00:42)" - How CMO Huddles supports CMOs in transition
"(00:44)" - Why AI fluency is now a make or break interview question
"(00:45)" - Talking to customers: the real CMO superpower
"(00:48)" - Adam's five key takeaways from the conversation
If you are interested in discussing this or any other topic, let's have a chat.  Reach out to me directly to schedule a no-obligation discussion. This isn't a sales call, but rather an opportunity to talk through your questions and challenges.
Follow me on LinkedIn.
Subscribe to The Healthtech Marketing Show on Spotify or watch us on YouTube for more insights into marketing, AI, ABM, buyer journeys, and beyond!
Find all of our episodes on the Health Podcast Library.
Thank you to our presenting sponsor, HealthcareNOW, 24/7 expert shows, interviews, and podcasts, powering healthcare leaders with innovation, policy, and strategy insights.

Another special episode from the vault. Instead of me hosting, you'll hear my colleague Mark Erwich, Chief Strategy Officer at Health Launchpad, and me as guests on the Sway Health Podcast, in conversation with Colin Hung. We recorded this about a year ago, but if anything, the topic feels more relevant today than it did then.
We get into the real mechanics of the healthcare buyer journey. Sales cycles are running past a year. Buying groups keep growing. And there's a stat that still stops people in their tracks: most buyers say they end up choosing the first company they call, which means their minds are largely made up before they ever pick up the phone. AI is only making this harder, since it gives buyers even more ways to research before they talk to a vendor at all.
If you've ever felt like deals appear out of nowhere, or wondered why your lead volume doesn't translate into pipeline, this conversation will explain why, and what to do differently. Mark and I walk through account-based thinking, how to read buying signals, why thought leadership matters most in the part of the journey you can't see, and what we tell clients to actually change first. We also talk about why healthcare is a genuinely different B2B market than the one most marketing advice is written for, and why leveraging your own customer network may be the most underused asset you have.
If pipeline growth is a constant conversation on your team, this episode is worth the listen.
Key Topics Covered
"(00:00)" – Introduction
"(05:00)" – The biggest pipeline struggle marketers report
"(08:00)" – Reframing the marketer's job
"(09:00)" – Why the old MQL-to-sales handoff model is breaking down
"(10:00)" – Shifting from lead-level tracking to account-level signal tracking
"(11:00)" – Why pipeline ownership belongs to the whole company, not just sales
"(13:00)" – What ABM thinking actually means: accounts, buying groups, and signals
"(16:00)" – Why healthcare is a finite, nameable market, unlike most B2B categories
"(18:00)" – Balancing ABM with broader brand awareness
"(19:00)" – What NOT to stop doing
"(20:00)" – Why "(outbound is dead)" and similar absolutes are wrong
"(22:00)" – Why most B2B marketing advice doesn't translate directly to healthcare
"(23:00)" – Examples of companies further along their ABM journey
"(24:00)" – The operational ripple effects of shifting to ABM
"(25:00)" – Sales and marketing alignment in practice
"(27:00)" – Practical ways to activate customer advocacy without relying on formal case studies
"(32:00)" – Recap and key takeaways for revenue teams
If you are interested in discussing this or any other topic, let's have a chat.  Reach out to me directly to schedule a no-obligation discussion. This isn't a sales call, but rather an opportunity to talk through your questions and challenges.
Follow me on LinkedIn.
Subscribe to The Healthtech Marketing Show on Spotify or watch us on YouTube for more insights into marketing, AI, ABM, buyer journeys, and beyond!
Find all of our episodes on the Health Podcast Library.
Thank you to our presenting sponsor, HealthcareNOW, 24/7 expert shows, interviews, and podcasts, powering healthcare leaders with innovation, policy, and strategy insights.