Building Reputed Brands through Smart Technologies: A Quantitative Analysis of the Best Hospitals in the United Kingdom

Abstract

Smart technologies such as artificial intelligence and big data have transformed hospitals from a medical, management and communication perspective. This paper aims to analyze how the best hospitals in the United Kingdom manage these technologies to build a reputed brand. To do that, we conducted a literature review about smart technologies and online branding processes in hospitals. Then, we defined 34 indicators to evaluate how the 140 best hospitals in the United Kingdom managed smart technologies for branding purposes. Our results proved that most of them focused their branding efforts on patients (4.98 criteria out of 11 applicable), rather than journalists (3.01/11) or public authorities (2.16/6). We concluded that hospitals should implement an integrated marketing communication approach, use smart technologies to establish new organizational processes with stakeholders, and develop digital transformation plans to efficiently manage this process.