Privacy-First Audience Targeting: Real Results From 4 Healthcare Leaders

Healthcare marketers are often blocked from using data to build or activate audiences on ad platforms. That restriction creates a massive blind spot. Marketers can't exclude existing patients from acquisition campaigns, can't retarget incomplete signups, and can't build lookalike audiences from patients who have already walked through their doors or members who have already signed up for their health plans.

But four healthcare organizations just proved there's a better way. They're using Freshpaint Audiences to unlock sophisticated targeting capabilities while maintaining full privacy compliance. The results? ROI improvements of 75%, campaign deployment in 30 minutes, and enterprise-scale management of 100,000+ prospects.

Here's how they did it.

A Large Regional Payer: Enterprise Scale, Zero Compromise

The Win: 10% CPC improvement in just one week

This regional payer is proving that privacy-first audiences can meet compliance requirements and drive real performance. In just a week of running Freshpaint Audiences, they cut Cost Per Click (CPC) by 10% while also improving Cost Per Mille (CPM).

And they’re doing it at enterprise scale. With 100,000 prospects imported and dozens of custom segments live across Meta and Google, they’re running sophisticated A/B tests during their critical open enrollment period.

This isn’t a workaround or a compromise. It’s healthcare marketing operating with the same sophistication as any other industry, but with the privacy guardrails that HIPAA demands.

A Global Fertility Clinic Network: Speed That Changes Everything

The Win: 30 minutes from import to live campaigns in Meta

A Global Fertility Clinic Network demonstrates what happens when compliance barriers disappear. Within 30 minutes of connecting Freshpaint Audiences, they imported their entire customer list and deployed it as an exclusion audience in Meta. That's right. Just 30 minutes to redirect ad spend from existing patients to future ones.

Google’s policy limitations were holding this network back, but after deploying Audiences, the network launched Meta as a new channel. Meta delivered immediate value via exclusion lists. Every dollar saved from targeting existing patients is a dollar that can acquire new ones. When you're under pressure to do more with less, that kind of efficiency is transformative.

An Innovative Healthtech Startup: Turning Dead Leads Into Revenue

The Win: 75% ROI improvement from a single audience segment

This company had a problem every marketer knows: 60,000 email addresses from users who started but never completed signup. Traditional thinking says those leads are dead. Audiences proved otherwise.

By importing those 60,000 emails into Freshpaint Audiences and retargeting them on Meta, they generated a 75% ROI lift compared to other awareness channels. That's not just an incremental improvement. It’s a step change in performance. And with phone number support coming, their reach will double to 120,000 potential patients.

This is what happens when you stop letting privacy restrictions dictate your marketing strategy and start using tools built specifically for healthcare's unique requirements.

A Virtual Care Clinic: Building Compliance Into Growth From Day One

The Win: Consent-first architecture enabling confident scaling

One virtual care clinic’s journey showcases a different kind of win: the confidence that comes from getting compliance right from the start. Their legal team decided they needed a consent management solution before launching campaigns, and the marketing team treated it as foundation-building rather than a barrier.

With that foundation in place, they’re now tracking consented events, have 14,000 users in their first segment, and are preparing to launch retargeting campaigns. They didn’t have to retrofit compliance after the fact or pause campaigns for a privacy audit. They built it in from day one, and now they can scale without looking over their shoulder.

This proves that Freshpaint works across the full spectrum of compliance needs and can meet teams wherever they are.

Proof That the Privacy-First Marketing Works

These aren't edge cases or lucky breaks. These organizations represent various segments of healthcare, ranging from large insurers to specialized fertility clinics and digital health startups. Yet they all faced the same challenge: how to run sophisticated marketing campaigns without violating an ever-growing patchwork of privacy laws.

The answer isn’t to accept limitations. It’s to find tools built for healthcare’s unique requirements. Tools that understand the difference between a website visitor and a patient. Tools that can handle PHI safely while still enabling the targeting capabilities modern marketing demands.

Each of these organizations made a choice. They decided compliance wasn’t a roadblock but a solvable problem. They chose tools that let marketing and compliance work together instead of against each other.

The results speak for themselves:

• Campaigns live in 30 minutes instead of weeks
• ROI improvements of 75% on previously dead channels
• Enterprise-scale audience management with full compliance
• Consent-first architecture that enables, not restricts

The Cost of Waiting on Audience Capabilities

Every day you operate without proper audience capabilities is a day you’re leaving money on the table. You’re targeting existing patients with acquisition campaigns. You’re missing retargeting opportunities. You’re unable to build lookalike audiences based on quality data.

The organizations featured here faced the same constraints you do. The difference? They found a solution that turns privacy regulations from a barrier into just another operational requirement — one that doesn’t have to limit your marketing sophistication.

The takeaway is clear: compliance doesn’t have to mean compromise, and the marketers who act on that insight are already pulling ahead.