At A Glance
Pharma marketers can support more informed health journeys when patient and HCP messaging is relevant, privacy-forward, and optimized against meaningful outcomes. In this Ask the Expert conversation, Experian and DeepIntent discuss how health marketers can coordinate education, CTV, activation workflows, and measurement without entering private clinical decisions.Privacy-forward pharma media supports more informed healthcare journeys
Effective pharma marketing depends on reaching patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals (HCPs) with useful information in appropriate, privacy-forward ways. The goal is to make relevant education easier to find, support more informed conversations, and help brands understand how media contributes across the health journey.
In this Ask the Expert session, Natalie Mancuso, SVP, Data Partnerships at DeepIntent, joins Sheila Wirick, who leads the health team at Experian, to discuss how to craft patient and HCP campaigns, privacy-safe activation workflows, connected TV (CTV), and measurement approaches built for pharma.
Why should your media plan start with understanding the patient and provider
The patient-and-provider journey should inform your media plan, as treatment decisions in pharma are increasingly informed, personal, and patient-driven. With more health information available than ever, patients are playing a more active role in understanding their options and participating in treatment conversations. As other industries become more customer-centric, pharma media planning needs to become more patient-centric.

“We’ve got patients who are more informed, more involved in their treatment decisions than ever. The accessibility of data and information and the ways we can consume it with just AI alone is so vast that if we’re not arming people with the right information in real time, we’re missing the boat.”
DeepIntentNatalie Mancuso, SVP, Data Partnerships
This means media should be aligned to where a patient or provider is in the decision journey and what they need at that moment. Early on, media may play an educational role by building awareness of a condition, symptom, or treatment category. Later, it may help support more specific questions, treatment consideration, access, affordability, or adherence.
The patient-provider conversation remains the key boundary. That exchange should stay private and clinically led. Media can play a valuable role before and after those moments by offering information that helps patients and providers feel more informed.
How can brands connect patient and HCP messaging responsibly?
It’s critical for agencies and brands to deliver relevant messaging to inform each stakeholder’s needs throughout the treatment journey, especially ahead of key clinical milestones. To execute this, brands must exercise privacy-forward activation, keeping patient and HCP identity, activation, and measurement paths separate, while using a common workflow layer to support the same brand goal.

Experian helps pharma marketers do this by acting as an independent, privacy-forward identity, data, and workflow layer. We bring together high-fidelity matching, governed onboarding, and non-clinical consumer context, so patient and HCP engagement can be activated more accurately across channels and connected to reporting.
The distinction is not only where each audience is reached. HCPs may be engaged in both professional and personal environments, but their needs are different from patients’. For example, an HCP may receive messaging about co-pay savings for eligible patients, while a patient may receive information about patient support programs. These are different messages for different audiences, but they ladder up to the same goal: informing both parties in a privacy-forward, relevant way.
Hear from Natalie Mancuso in our 2026 State of advertising report
In our 2026 State of advertising report, Natalie shares why identity serves as the connective infrastructure that links planning, activation, and measurement across connected TV (CTV), programmatic, commerce media, and walled garden environments.
What does privacy-forward activation look like in pharma?
Pharma brands often start with fragmented patient and HCP signals. Privacy-forward activation turns those inputs into usable audiences by first confirming that the data can be used, then translating identity in controlled environments that protect personally identifiable information through tokenization or other methodologies.

For DTC, that means building and matching audiences without relying on inferred health conditions from browsing behavior. For HCPs, it means connecting professional identity to verified sources in a way that supports activation and measurement. In a category shaped by HIPAA, state privacy laws, internal review, and consumer sensitivity, building privacy in from sourcing through activation is what makes responsible health media possible.
How can CTV play a more useful role in pharma?
CTV can play a more useful role in healthcare when it’s connected to a larger, privacy-forward plan and not treated as just an awareness channel.

DeepIntent connects CTV and digital exposure data using identity signals, such as National Provider Identifiers (NPIs), hashed email addresses, IP addresses, device IDs, and household signals, where permitted and reviewed. That identity layer helps support sequencing and suppression across streaming, endemic, mobile, and digital settings.
In practice, CTV can introduce targeted education or broad brand awareness, and later touchpoints can provide sequential information in the right channels. Instead of repeating the same message, brands can make pivots based on engagement and context.

“For us, it starts with identity and not panels. When we’re resolving CTV and digital exposures to the same person, we’re leveraging signals so that every touchpoint across streaming, endemic, and mobile is recognized as the same individual, not model lookalikes.”
DeepIntentNatalie Mancuso, SVP, Data Partnerships
For pharma, campaign performance should not be measured by reach alone. A stronger approach looks at whether sequenced engagement contributes to meaningful downstream signals, including:
- Prescription activity
- Provider engagement
- Referral patterns
- Patient compliance
- Adherence signals, where measurement is permitted
Why should messaging and reporting change in pharma?
Pharma campaigns are journeys with changing information needs. Reporting should guide the campaign optimization.

“If I’m launching into a market with a new class of drug, I’m asking what education needs to be put into the market – from both an HCP and a consumer standpoint – to build awareness?”
DeepIntentNatalie Mancuso, SVP, Data Partnerships
Clicks and website visits still have a place, but they can’t tell the full pharma story. DeepIntent processes data in real time, giving brands an up-to-date read on how media connects to campaign engagement. Campaign signals can help teams optimize audience logic, creative, channel mix, or sequencing during a live campaign.
Heading Test for Media & Text Block
Content Test for Media &Text Block
Heading Test for Media & Text Block
Content Test for Media &Text Block
Heading Test for Media & Text Block
Content Test for Media &Text Block
Explore how privacy-safe pharma activation can make an impact
Experian brings marketing data and identity expertise for health marketing and DeepIntent adds pharma-specific activation experience. Together, we help brands connect patient and HCP strategies responsibly, with privacy built in from the start.

Watch the full video with our experts to hear Sheila Wirick and Natalie Mancuso discuss patient and HCP messaging, CTV, privacy-safe activation, and outcome measurement for pharma brands.
About our experts
Natalie Mancuso
SVP, Data Partnerships, DeepIntent
Natalie Mancuso is SVP, Data Partnerships at DeepIntent and a leader in health-focused AdTech and DSP strategy. With over 20 years of experience growing billion-dollar healthcare brands, she turns complex data into scalable, performance-driven solutions that keep marketers ahead of industry change.
Sheila Wirick
Director of Health Sales, Experian
Sheila Wirick is the Director of Health Sales at Experian with more than 20 years of experience in data and analytics. As Director of Health Sales at Experian Marketing Services, she collaborates with healthcare, pharmaceutical, and nonprofit organizations to apply data and insights that enhance customer retention, brand awareness, and acquisition. She is committed to helping organizations use data to deliver measurable results and meaningful impact.
FAQs
A pharma audience is activation-ready when patient or HCP inputs can be translated into usable audiences with the right accuracy, controls, interoperability, and destination readiness. For patient engagement, that may include privacy-safe cohort construction, caregiver logic, non-clinical enrichment and appropriate exclusion rules. For HCP engagement, it may include governed identity inputs such as NPI, specialty, practice location, professional address and other verified attributes where appropriate.
Pharma brands can sequence messages responsibly by giving each channel a clear role and using audience logic to maintain continuity. CTV and out-of-home can support awareness, social can reinforce the message, search can capture active research and point-of-care or rep-triggered channels can support decision moments. The workflow should preserve separation between patient and HCP identity strategies.
Pharma marketers should measure whether media connects to outcomes such as audience quality, prescription activity, qualified HCP engagement, verified delivery, referral patterns, therapy starts or adherence signals where permitted. These outcomes often depend on partner-enabled workflows, clean rooms, and aggregated outputs rather than direct end-to-end tracking.
Experian acts as an independent privacy-first identity, data, and workflow layer for pharma marketers. We help brands bring together identity, high-fidelity matching, governed onboarding, non-clinical consumer context, and partner interoperability so patient and HCP engagement can be activated more accurately across channels and connected more cleanly to partner-enabled measurement.
Latest posts
The Simmons Multi-Media Engagement Study is a unique syndicated research program that measures – across multiple dimensions – the relationship between media vehicles and their audiences. This strategic tool provides measures of the cognitive and emotional engagement consumers have with major media properties, which includes broadcast, cable, and syndicated television, major magazines, and Internet sites. The Fall 2009 release of the Simmons Multi-Media Engagement Study utilizes a patented behavioral integration model to map the engagement levels of nearly 800 media vehicle users back to the respondents in the Experian Simmons National Consumer Study, allowing the analysis of media engagement to be filtered by consumer behaviors including users of over 8,000 brands in over 460 product categories. The following slides will demonstrate some powerful examples leveraging the Spring 2009 MME study. Among all U.S. adults, Consumer Reports magazine is the most Trustworthy media vehicle. In fact, 6 of the top 10 Trustworthy media vehicles are print magazines. The other top vehicles include 3 websites and 1 cable television network. When broken down by gender, there are 4 vehicles that remain consistent across the gender breaks, although their rank orders do change. Among media properties that index at 110 or higher for new car intenders*, we can determine which are best for communicating a message of trust. Below are the top vehicles ranked by the percent of new car intenders saying “I trust this to tell the truth.” When ranking print magazines by Ad Attention/Receptivity – the dimension that measures how likely consumers are to notice and pay attention to ads as well as buy advertised products – we find that the top of the list is dominated by niche publications, whose audiences are focused and whose ads are typically targeted. In a similar vein, those magazines that focus on a mass-market audience tend to have the lowest Ad Attention/Receptivity scores. Looking at the statement, “I get valuable information from the ads in this magazine,” we can see some interesting differences between consumers by region. For instance, while American Baby is tops in 3 of the 4 census regions, it is fourth in the Midwest. Smart Money magazine makes the list only in the Northeast and House Beautiful only in the West. Likewise, Family Handyman appears in both the Midwest and South, but not in the Northeast or West. Among print magazines that index at 110 or higher for readers planning to retire in the next year, we can determine which magazines would be ideal for placing ads promoting plans and hobbies for their future free time. The following magazines rank top for future retirees who say “This magazine has ads for things I care about.” The Personal Time Out dimension helps identify vehicles that people like to relax with and to spend their free time using. While there are similarities across users of all ages, these top websites for each age group show that younger users prefer social media and entertainment-oriented sites, while more mature users lean towards lifestyle sites when they just want to kick back. Of the Facebook.com users who say, “I like to kick back and wind down with Facebook.com,” we can look at what retailers they are most likely to shop compared to other online adults. Facebook.com users who like to kick back and wind down on the site are 172% more likely to shop at Express and 130% more likely to shop at Victoria’s Secret or Banana Republic. Should these retailers advertise on Facebook, they could benefit by including messages of escape and time-out. When it comes to word of mouth, synergy is a powerful tool. While 69% of all viewers of The Oprah Winfrey Show say, “This program gives me something to talk about,” this number increases to 81% among those viewers who either read O, The Oprah Magazine or visit Oprah.com. Incredibly, when looking at Oprah viewers who visit her website and also read her magazine, fully 96% say The Oprah Winfrey Show gives them something to talk about, an increase of 39% over all program viewers.
African Americans represent 11% of the U.S. adult population and, as a group, constitute the nation’s largest racial minority market. African Americans are also more optimistic about their financial situation than the general population, and with good reason. According to the Selig Center for Economic Growth, African American buying power reached $913 billion in 2008, up from $590 billion in 2000. By 2013, African American buying power will reach an astonishing $1.2 trillion, meaning that almost nine cents out of every dollar spent in the United States will come from African American consumers. In celebration of Black History Month, Experian Simmons examines the attitudes, behaviors and media consumption of our country’s African American consumers using data from Simmons DataStreamSM, the Simmons National Consumer Study, New Media Study, Multi-Media Engagement Study and Experian MicromarketerG3 as well as findings from our friends at Experian Hitwise. When it comes to attitudes towards personal financial outlook, African Americans are more likely than the average American adult to say that in the next 12 months they will be better off financially. As of December 28th, 2009, 36% of African Americans said they would be better off financially in the next 12 months, compared with 31% of all adults who felt the same. African Americans are trend setters. Below are the top indexing statements on apparel, auto, food and social interaction among African American adults compared to the total adult population. Index relative to total adult population in parentheses. House Beautiful magazine is a great publication for reaching African Americans who respond to print ads. Readers of House Beautiful, for instance, are 37% more likely to be African American and House Beautiful scores 83% higher than the average magazine among African American readers who say they are likely to buy product or services advertised in the magazine. Where in the United States is the best place to find African American consumers with household incomes of $100,000 or more? Hinesville-Fort Stewart, Georgia is tops followed by Fresno and Stockton, California. African American consumers are more likely than the average online adult to use a wide range of emerging technologies and media. For instance, online African American consumers are 20% more likely than average to watch movies online, 19% more likely to listen to Internet radio and 18% more likely to use social tags or bookmarks. Below are the top sites ranked by the percentage of visits coming from the top African American Mosaic lifestyle segments. The list is dominated by social networking sites.
Coffee drinkers in America Coffee plays such an integral part of every day life in America that it may be safe to say that coffee helps the United States go round. In fact, fully 60% of all U.S. households use either whole or ground coffee beans at home. Experian Simmons extensively reviewed the American coffee drinker for this report which features detailed insights into the coffee-drinking American. In addition, we compare the patrons of Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks, the leading players in the battle for brew. Coffee in the Home The average U.S. household that uses whole or ground coffee consumes 4.2 cups per day. In total that’s about 280.5 million cups of coffee consumed at home by Americans each day or about 102 billion cups per year. Among households that use coffee, 89% stock regular coffee and 46% stock decaf.* Among households that use coffee, 84% use pre-ground coffee and 26% use whole bean coffee at least some of the time.* Instant Flavored Coffee Over a quarter of households (27%) stock instant coffee. Sixteen percent of households use instant flavored coffee. The most commonly used flavors among instant flavored coffee drinkers are: Older Americans More Likely to Drink Coffee Fifty-seven percent of adults ages 18-24 live in households that use coffee, but 25 to 34 year olds are the least likely to stock coffee in their cupboards with only 54% reporting they use whole or ground bean coffee at home. Coffee Use Increases with Household Income Seventy percent of Americans who report annual household incomes of $150,000+ drink coffee compared with 54% of those with household income less than $25,000. Dunkin’ Donuts Vs. Starbucks Dunkin’ Donuts 11% of American adults go to DD Between 9.15.08 and 9.15.09 the share of DD customers who go there 6+ times a month is up 11%* DD consumers are 41% more likely than the average adult to be registered Independents and 9% less likely to be registered Republicans Starbucks 13% of American adults go to Starbucks Between 9.15.08 and 9.15.09 the share of Starbucks customers who go there 6+ times a month is down 22% Starbucks consumers are 11% more likely to be registered Independents and 11% more likely to be registered Republicans Coffee Drinkers Are Coffee Drinkers A majority of coffee-drinking Americans are loyal to their franchise. However, there are a considerable number of Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks consumers who jump between coffee houses. How Often Americans Order Their Coffee The majority of both Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks customers visit each chain between one and five times in a typical month. Learn more about Simmons consumer research and studies.