No Stupid Questions: Influencer Marketing for Healthcare Teams

A 90-minute strategy session for your team. Bring every question you have about working with creators and patient influencers, from the smartest to the ones you’re embarrassed to ask, and I’ll walk you through how it really works.

Most healthcare brands go into influencer marketing guessing.

They guess at what creators charge. They guess at what patients will trust. They send the same templated pitch to 200 people and wonder why nobody answers. Then legal shuts it down, or the campaign launches and the comments go sideways.

I’ve worked on both sides of this. For six years I was senior director of influencer marketing at a pharmaceutical marketing agency, where I cast real patients in pharma campaigns. I’m also a patient creator with a community of more than 180,000 people. Brands pitch me constantly, so I know what lands, what doesn’t, and why.

This session gives your team that knowledge before you spend your budget.

We’ll cover the whole landscape.

• The culture: How creators and patient influencers think, what they value, and why the relationship matters more than the contract.
• The opportunity: Where influencer marketing fits for your category, and where it doesn’t.
• The landscape: Who’s out there, which platforms matter for your audience, and what’s working for healthcare brands right now.
• Payment: What creators charge, what drives the price, what usage rights are, and how to budget realistically.
• Engagement: How to find, approach, and build relationships with creators so they want to work with you.
• Promotion: Organic and paid amplification, review cycles, and getting content through approval without losing what made it work.

What this session is, and what it isn’t

This session is an education in the patient influencer industry and where your category fits in it, whether you’re in pharma, biotech, direct-to-consumer healthcare, pharmacy, digital health, medical devices, or another part of the healthcare world.

It is not an audit or analysis of your business. I won’t be reviewing your marketing plan, your brand, your product, or your past campaigns in 90 minutes. That work takes more time, and it’s what ongoing consulting is for (see below).

Bring the smart questions. Bring the stupid ones too.

Here’s what teams usually ask once they’re comfortable:

• “Do we have to pay patients? Isn’t that weird?”
• “What’s the difference between an influencer and a UGC creator?”
• “How many followers does someone need to be worth it?”
• “Why didn’t anyone respond to our outreach?”
• “Can we tell them what to say?”
• “What happens if someone posts something negative about us?”
• “Is $500 a lot or an insult?”

Nobody gets judged for asking. The questions people hold back are usually the ones that lead to expensive mistakes.

How it works

1. Book your session. Tell me a little about your company, your category, and where you are with influencer marketing, even if the answer is “nowhere.”
2. Bring your team. Marketing, brand, communications, leadership, legal: anyone who will touch this work should be there.
3. Ask everything. We spend 90 minutes on your team’s questions, and I’ll explain how the patient influencer world works for companies in your category.
4. Leave with clarity. You’ll understand the landscape, what creator partnerships cost, what to avoid, and what questions to answer next.

Investment: $1,500 for a 90-minute session with your team.

If you want to go further, we can build the plan together.

For some teams, one session is enough. They leave knowing what they need to do.

Others want help putting it into action. I work with healthcare companies on an ongoing basis to build influencer and patient engagement strategies: looking closely at your business, identifying the right creators, structuring partnerships, running patient insight groups, and keeping the work going after launch.

Every engagement starts with this exploration session. It’s how we both find out what you need.

Learn about ongoing consulting →

Who you’ll be talking to

I’m Ilana Jacqueline, a patient advocate, consultant, and the Penguin Random House author of Surviving and Thriving with an Invisible Chronic Illness and Medical Gaslighting. I’ve spent more than 15 years in patient advocacy and healthcare marketing, including roles at Global Genes, WEGO Health, and Health Union, and six years leading influencer marketing at a pharmaceutical agency.

I work with pharma companies, biotechs, startups, agencies, and advocacy organizations that want patients to trust them, not just tolerate them.

Your team has questions. Let’s answer them.