By Michael McNamara, Managing Director, McKinney Health
In advertising, we often talk about "categories" as if they are separate rooms in a house. There is the Tech room, the Food & Beverage room, and the somewhat formal Health room. But for consumers today, those walls have been knocked down. The same person who spends the morning buying diapers for their baby is the same person picking up a pizza for a quick dinner, and the same person scrolling an app like Noom for the new weight-loss medication. They don’t stop being themselves or change their expectations just because they’ve moved from a retail store to a doctor’s office. They are one person navigating a continuous negotiation of limited resources, shaped by what you have, what changes around you, and who you’re trying to be.
At McKinney, we live at the intersection of health and life. Health decisions don’t happen in a vacuum. They happen in doctor's office and dining rooms, on social media and in shopping aisles.
The Retailization of Health
We are witnessing a massive “retailization of health” that goes far beyond the current buzz surrounding weight-loss medications. The retailization of health is the shift from patients following instructions to consumers making choices, bringing the behaviors, expectations, and decision-making patterns of retail into healthcare. Consumers now expect health solutions to be as accessible, easy to understand, and engaging as a smartphone upgrade or a new pair of sneakers.
This is not just about where people buy medicine; it is about a mindset shift. The consumer is no longer a passive recipient of medical advice. They are an active "health shopper." They are looking for brands that earn the right to be in their life by proving they understand their daily realities.
Meeting the Patient on the Feed
One of the clearest examples of this shift is the explosive role of social media in the health journey. Health is now a mainstream conversation on TikTok, not a niched topic. We can no longer wait for a person to walk into a clinic to start a conversation. Today, the conversation is already happening on TikTok, Instagram, and Reddit. Unfortunately, like everything else on social media, this means there is an abundance of misinformation. Brands can be the truth in advertising. For a brand to be successful, it must show up in these spaces with credibility & authenticity in an engaging way. It is about moving from being an interruption in their feed to becoming a valuable part of their community.
The New Front Door: The LLM
Beyond social media, we are seeing a radical change in how people seek initial health advice. Instead of starting with a search engine or a phone call to a doctor’s office, consumers are increasingly utilizing Large Language Models (LLMs) for immediate answers. Whether it is ChatGPT and Perplexity in the U.S. or the recently unveiled KMed.ai from Naver in Korea, these tools are becoming the new "first opinion." Recent studies indicate that roughly 1 in 3 Americans are already using an LLM like ChatGPT to seek medical info, self-diagnose, or prep for a doctor's visit. This represents a massive opportunity for brands to provide clear and empathetic guidance at the very moment a question arises, right where the consumer is already living their digital life. Our brands need to show up in the model’s answers, not just Google results, which means designing for usefulness, not persuasion, for questions not keywords.
Driving Unfair Attention in a Crowded World
This is where the retail and tech heritage of an agency becomes a superpower. By bringing the world-class creative and social-first thinking of consumer marketing into the health space, we can drive Unfair Attention. We stop being an intrusive communicator of Pharma-speak, making noise in someone's day, and start being a culturally relevant partner. By focusing on the full picture, including the fears, routines, and cultural context of the person, we build brands and experiences that actually connect.
Our Approach at Cheil and McKinney
As part of Cheil, we believe this human-centered approach is the most effective way to navigate the global healthcare landscape. Whether in Seoul, London, or New York, the modern "health shopper" is looking for simplicity and empathy. By combining our network’s deep roots in technology and retail with McKinney’s focus on the lived experience, we can create health-related work that feels essential to a person’s daily life. It is an approach that moves beyond traditional advertising, helping us build brands that truly resonate in a world where health and life are finally one and the same.