Healthcare Marketing’s Super Bowl Moment Is Just the Start

Healthcare marketing is taking centre stage. The Super Bowl, advertising’s biggest event, saw Pfizer, Novartis, and Hims & Hers push healthcare into the mainstream with bold, creative storytelling.

Pfizer’s campaign, set to LL Cool J’s ‘Mama Said Knock You Out’, brought the fight against cancer to a mass audience with a dream-sequence ad featuring a paediatric cancer patient boxing, reinforcing its mission for eight cancer breakthroughs by 2030. Novartis’ debut Super Bowl spot tackled breast cancer awareness head-on. While Hims & Hers sparked controversy by marketing telehealth weight-loss treatments to millions of viewers. The three spots placed healthcare marketing firmly in the global marketing spotlight.

This spotlight and the recognition that comes hand in hand with it matters. Yet when it comes to the healthcare marketing industry the truth remains that the growing creative power of the sector is still overlooked. Stereotypes that healthcare is an industry that is too heavily regulated for creativity to really thrive abound.

According to our Truth About Talent: Healthcare Marketing report 59% of healthcare leaders feel the advertising industry undervalues creativity in healthcare marketing. The research is based on in-depth interviews with leaders from some of the world’s most innovative healthcare agencies, including VML Health, 21Grams, Publicis Health, Ogilvy Health, and TBWA\WorldHealth. It revealed that while the healthcare marketing industry is driving forward a new wave of progressive creativity, the broader advertising industry is still playing catch up. Yet as the Super Bowl underlines the creativity of the healthcare marketing industry should already be centre stage.

Healthcare marketing’s creative momentum

Our research revealed significant opportunities for talent in the sector, driven by momentum in creative innovation. Healthcare marketing’s stand out success at the Super Bowl was not a one-off marketing moment, but a reflection of the creative resilience of the sector buoyed by stable budgets.

According to Market Data Forecast the global healthcare advertising market was worth $42.28bn in 2024 and is expected to reach $67.87bn by 2033. This increased investment was evident in the growing number of healthcare brands advertising in the Super Bowl.

Novartis' debut Super Bowl spot ‘Your Attention Please’, a hard-hitting breast cancer awareness advert, was a standout creative moment for the brand. The provocative and punchy spot focused on breast health, how common breast cancer is among American women and how they can get screened to take proactive care of their bodies.

While the controversial Hims & Hers ‘Sick of the System’ spot, which promoted the Telehealth companies GLP-1 products, underlined the new ethical questions which come hand in hand with the continued scientific advances in weight loss drugs. New creative opportunities will come hand in hand with challenging new questions.

Yet our research shows the healthcare marketing industry is stepping up to the challenge. Many leaders underlined that the biggest opportunity for talent in the healthcare marketing industry is to be in the driving seat of genuine creative firsts. Underlying those career-defining Super Bowl marketing moments is an ongoing industry-wide  movement to bring genuine and sustained creative innovation to the sector.

From dogs detecting cancer, to a reality TV show to demystify rare diseases, to social storytelling on platforms from TikTok to Reddit. A new era of creative storytelling is afoot. Brands such as Pfizer and Novartis are taking the lead in a more patient-centric and brand-first approach to communication.

At the same time mainstream consumer brands are increasingly recognising the truth that increasingly consumers expect every brand to consider health. According to research from VML, 81% of people think brands should be making an effort to improve people’s mental health. A state of play which makes every brand a healthcare brand.

Brands are already stepping up to this challenge. Nurofen is continuing its ground breaking campaign to drive health equity and close the gender pain gap. While Heineken has successfully taken aim at toxic productivity and overwork with its ‘Work Responsibly’ campaign in Singapore and Malaysia.

The stereotypes surrounding healthcare marketing are out of date. The creative momentum of healthcare marketing is increasingly impossible to ignore. The ability to make genuine creative firsts and make work that makes a meaningful difference to people’s lives is a magnet for talent. The spotlight of the Super Bowl may be over, but shining a light on the opportunity for talent in the healthcare industry is vital. The opportunity to create genuine firsts, work at the intersection of creativity and purpose, and drive real cultural change has never been greater.