I’ve been working closely with small and growing healthcare brands in Africa for almost 8 years now!
Yes, that long.
Started as a regular volunteer, helping healthcare brands manage websites and write content, then started my own website in 2019 (this website), which began as a simple free WordPress blog.
Remember those free WordPress.com blogs?
Yes, I enjoyed them.
I learned the basics of Web management with those free WordPress blogs.
And ever since I’ve worked with various healthcare brands (small and growing ones), I’ve noticed common challenges they all face.
In this article, I will write about them and offer possible solutions (and how we’re trying to help).
I will focus on small and medium-sized healthcare brands, but some of the problems they face are the same ones even big, established healthcare brands still struggle with.
The Noise Problem: When Every Message Competes For Survival
In today’s African media space, health stories and content compete for attention with politics, pop culture, religion, and an endless scroll of entertainment content.
The result? Even the most important public health messages risk being drowned out before they’re heard.
Across Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, and South Africa, health brands are spending more but achieving less visibility.
The reason isn’t really a lack of creativity—it’s clutter.
The digital ecosystem has become a crowded marketplace of promises and opinions. And when health information sits side by side with misinformation, it becomes harder for audiences to trust anyone.
In this noise, credibility, consistency, and quality are the new currency—and that’s where the real battle lies.
How can you stand out in the noise, either as a growing healthcare brand or an established one?
- Credibility: This element always surfaces when discussing healthcare media and communication issues worldwide. Healthcare is private, enclosed and personal. So, any media brand that genuinely wants to do health media business must show the people it cares by pursuing the highest standards of credibility.
- Consistency: Being consistent as a health brand indicates seriousness. It shows your brand is dedicated to what it represents and is willing to show up every day! It’s consistent with its voice, quality and media presence.
- Quality: The quality of what you produce or create is a direct reflection of the value you place on your brand. It doesn’t really have to be perfect. Besides, quality isn’t entirely about perfection or even aesthetics; it’s first about the authenticity of what you’re presenting to the public as healthcare content. Perfection and aesthetitism are only there to amplify authenticity.
Low Trust In Health Information
If the COVID-19 pandemic taught us anything, it’s that trust can’t be bought with media spend.
Many Africans still carry deep scepticism about official or institutional health messages.
Social media amplified this mistrust—turning half-truths and conspiracy theories into viral content.
For healthcare brands, this is a major hurdle. A campaign about vaccines or digital health can easily be dismissed if audiences perceive it as propaganda, even though it’s important and can actually save lives and improve health.
How to rise above it:
- Lead with transparency: Be honest about limitations and uncertainties.
- Humanise your message: Replace corporate jargon with real human stories.
- Build local credibility: Partner with trusted community voices and professionals, not just influencers.
Trust is no longer a byproduct of visibility—it’s the outcome of consistent authenticity.
Limited Health Journalism Capacity
Many African media houses lack dedicated health desks or trained health reporters and journalists. This creates a gap in how complex health issues—from genomics to telemedicine—are reported and understood.
Healthcare brands often find themselves having to “educate the media” before a story can even be told. And when journalists lack depth, the message risks distortion or oversimplification.
How to fix it:
Forward-thinking brands now treat media engagement as capacity-building.
They host workshops, share data access, and create simplified press resources that help journalists report accurately. And more innovative healthcare brands go so far as to have healthcare professionals join editorial teams and even train and educate them to become healthcare journalists or reporters.
The smartest brands aren’t just seeking coverage—they’re investing in literacy across the media ecosystem.
Poor Content Distribution Infrastructure
Even the best content can die quietly if it doesn’t reach its audience. Africa’s fragmented digital infrastructure means a brand can have massive online engagement in Lagos or Nairobi, yet remain invisible in rural communities just 100 kilometres away.
Internet access, language diversity, and cultural nuances make one-size-fits-all campaigns ineffective.
Smart move: adopt a blended media strategy—where podcasts, radio talk shows, WhatsApp broadcasts, and short-form social clips complement traditional media.
In Africa, distribution is as much about cultural fluency as it is about bandwidth.
Investing in the right media channel can make a big difference in how messages affect people.
Different regions respond to various media channels. Some are more in tune with radio, while others are with newspapers, handbills, or social media.
Inconsistent Content Strategies
Most healthcare brands in Africa have inconsistent content strategies. Instead of a well-structured content cocktail, they throw in a scattered mix of content here and there. There’s no intention or consistency.
Weak Marketing
Healthcare marketing is difficult. It’s a hard job. And if you’re not doing it right, you won’t see any reasonable results. People are already distracted by loads of content junk on social media. To capture their attention and make them see your healthcare brand, product, or service, you must put in extra work.
Broken Social Media Management
Some years back, big corporate organisations looked down on social media. They didn’t take it seriously. To them, it was just child’s play. But today, social media is the biggest marketing channel on the planet.
If your company or organisation isn’t on social media, it’s operating on an outdated system and will soon go extinct.
Most healthcare brands in Africa have broken social media presence. It’s inconsistent and lacks the soul of their brand.
Regulatory And Ethical Minefields
Healthcare brands face strict advertising and data rules. A misstep—like overstating a claim or mishandling patient information—can lead to reputational damage or even legal consequences.
This is especially true for startups in digital health and pharma marketing, where the line between information and promotion can blur quickly.
The way forward:
- Embed ethics and compliance from day one.
- Ensure content teams understand patient data protection laws.
- Work closely with regulators and associations to align messaging with public health priorities.
A compliant story may move more slowly, but it lasts longer. Strict regulations and ethical frameworks are part of the limiting factors in healthcare media.
Compared to other media where strict laws don’t govern advertising and content creation, there are limits on the kinds of language, promises, and expectations.
The use of media and communication language in healthcare media is different and used cautiously. And this is where most healthcare brands in Africa are having challenges. They don’t know how to navigate the maze of healthcare media advertising language and culture, so they don’t even try and end up in trouble with regulatory bodies.
Weak Brand Identity And Message Consistency
Many health startups and brands across Africa struggle with defining who they are and what they stand for.
Without a clear brand voice, they end up sounding like everyone else—or worse, like their funders.
Consistency builds memory.
When every post or campaign tells a slightly different story, the audience forgets the brand entirely.
Lazy Brand Management
Brand management goes beyond the logo and colours. It’s more about ensuring the soul of your brand is found in every piece of communication, from internal communications to social media and major web communications. Brand management ensures creative uniformity.
Strengthen Your Website Presence
Your website is your digital office. Social media leads to this office. It’s where everything about your company should live. People might not be able to visit your company’s physical location, but when they visit your website, they should be able to learn what your company is all about.
Unprofessional Designs
Design didn’t used to be a big deal some years ago. But today, the quality of your designs says a lot about your company or brand. Most healthcare brands in Africa don’t have a solid design culture, which all really boils down to a lack of brand management.
The solution:
Build clarity around your purpose, tone, and promise.
Utilise storytelling frameworks that align your brand with your audience’s aspirations—not just products or features.
Brands that sound human, clear, and mission-driven stand out faster in a noisy field.
Build a strong brand strategy, or, if you don’t have one, hire a brand manager.
This is not an exhaustive list; however, if you could provide a complete list, you would see that the challenges mentioned here are all interwoven in some way. Surprisingly, even big brands face these challenges.
Media Management For Healthcare Brands In Africa Is Difficult
The giant healthcare brands can afford to splurge cash to power their media endeavours.
They can employ skilled and brilliant professionals to handle all their media needs, but the smaller guys don’t have the resources the bigger folks have, and this lack puts them in a position where they are constantly struggling to keep their media engines running, from web management/maintenance to marketing, branding, social media management, you name it.
It isn’t easy when you look closely.
There was a time when volunteers were on the ground to handle most media tasks for healthcare brands and NGOs in Africa.
But that era is gradually fading away, as most volunteers now don’t have the skills to produce quality work.
Another notable issue is that most healthcare brands in Africa identify as NGOs and are primarily powered by young volunteers, often students and enthusiasts.
But powering a brand on volunteer power will never be enough.
You need to put professionals at key points to ensure smooth running, and this is where growing healthcare brands in Africa find it particularly difficult.
They may have fantastic visions!
A dedicated and ambitious founding team!
But they will never grow into their full potential if their media engines run on low power.
How Can We Help?
Over the years, as I worked very closely with healthcare brands, I have also been building a community/network of creators—from web managers/developers to writers, brand managers, graphic designers, and product designers. And so far, we’ve helped a few brands, but we are taking it to a different level!
When I started my own personal projects, I also encountered the same problem faced by these small and medium-sized healthcare brands.
How was I able to thrive?
Well, I made a lot of mistakes, learned from them, and learned many things quickly, which allowed me to do many things at once.
I wore many hats!
Did everything, but gradually I began to attract other talents who joined me.
You shouldn’t build in isolation.
To attract like minds, you must be ready and willing to share what you are building with others. There will be people out there who would gladly join you.
However, you don’t have to wear many hats like I did. Wearing too many hats has its downsides, and not having enough time to focus on core needs is the biggest one.
You need to focus on what matters, and that’s why we’ve built a small community of creators and experts to help you.
We will work closely with you to gradually build media structures to support your ideas.
The process is easy.
Fill out this form to get started, or if you’d like to send us an open email about how we can work together, feel free to do so here(mediabusiness@carecityonline.com).
The Path Forward: From Communication To Connection
Africa’s healthcare communication challenge is also its greatest opportunity. The continent’s media landscape is young, creative, and evolving fast—and so are its audiences.
The brands that will win are not the loudest, but the clearest. They will simplify complex science without diluting truth, localise global conversations, and use storytelling to rebuild public trust.
Health communication in Africa is no longer just about awareness—it’s about connection.
And those who learn to connect—ethically, consistently, and creatively— will not only earn attention but also lead the next chapter of Africa’s health transformation, and we’re here to build this future with you.
