Marketing: applications in a military health care setting

Military health care leaders must recognize the importance of satisfied consumers. As part of this recognition, the focus of military medicine must change from a coercive-power to a reward-power system. This change highlights the need for business practices such as marketing. Encouraging military health care administrators to learn and understand the applications of the marketing variables will enhance demand management and health care delivery for beneficiaries. This paper describes some applications of marketing variables, informs the military health care administrator about the process of marketing, and describes the utility of marketing in the current paradigm shift in military health care delivery.