This is part 2 of a five-part series exploring how Helix sharpens and accelerates the full marketing lifecycle.
Healthcare marketing plans are often built on assumptions. Agencies know roughly who they're targeting, have a general sense of the geography, and make educated calls on channel mix based on what's worked before. Budgets get allocated, and everyone moves forward, hoping the fundamentals are right.
Helix replaces that guesswork with data-driven answers to three questions that should anchor every campaign plan: Who are your target customers? Where are they? And how do you actually reach them?
Know Who Your Audience Is
HCP audiences aren't monolithic. A cardiologist in a large academic medical center and an NP at a rural community clinic may both be relevant targets for the same brand. But they engage with information differently, use technology differently, and respond to different messaging.
Helix surfaces demographic insights on each provider in your target audience, giving agencies and brands a clearer picture of the people behind the prescription data. Are your targets tech-native or late adopters? Primarily MDs, or a mix with a significant number of NPs and PAs? These answers shape creative strategy, channel selection, and how sophisticated (or simple) your digital touchpoints need to be. Planning with audience clarity upfront means less guessing and less course-correcting mid-flight.
Know Where to Concentrate Effort
Geography matters in pharma marketing, but not always in the ways teams assume. Budget decisions that look right at the national level can mask real disparities at the regional or zip-code level.
Helix helps uncover two types of geographic signals that are particularly valuable for planning. First, coverage gaps: markets where your drug doesn't have strong penetration and where increased spend could move the needle. Second, incidence concentration, or areas where your target indication is diagnosed at above-average rates. These aren't always the same places, and knowing the difference is critical. Spending heavily in markets where incidence is low, or underinvesting where a condition clusters, means leaving opportunity on the table. Helix makes that geographic layer visible before a single dollar is committed.
Know How to Reach Your Audience
Knowing who your HCPs are and where they practice only goes so far. Effective planning also requires understanding where those specific providers are actually spending their attention.
Helix provides channel affinity data derived from DeepIntent's media intelligence, showing which channels your target HCPs are most frequently found on. If your audience over-indexes on CTV, that should inform budget allocation toward that channel. If display engagement is lower than expected, that's worth knowing before the media plan is finalized. This affinity data turns channel selection from a best-practice exercise into a brand-specific decision grounded in real-life behavior.
From Strategy to Execution, Before the Clock Starts
Campaign strategy has traditionally been a combination of experience, instinct, and broad-market data. Helix adds a layer that was previously missing: brand-specific, audience-specific intelligence that's ready to use before a campaign is in market.
By answering who, where, and how at the planning stage, agencies can walk into client conversations with a sharper point of view. In turn, brands can move faster with more confidence that the foundation is right.
Ready to see what Helix can surface for your next campaign? Learn more here.
