IPG Health is bringing its Influencer ID service to Europe, extending an end-to-end influencer marketing solution that works with Health Care Professionals (HCP), patients, caregivers, and health advocates. The expansion makes the offering available to clients in the UK, Germany, France, and Spain, marking the first time IPG Health’s specialized creator services will operate across these markets, ensuring compliance with each country’s healthcare rules.

The expansion addresses a gap in how pharmaceutical and healthcare brands work with content creators. Most markets outside the United States prohibit direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs, limiting traditional marketing approaches. Meanwhile, an increasing number of healthcare professionals now actively use digital platforms to share knowledge, and patients increasingly turn to social media for health information, creating both opportunity and risk for brands facing misinformation and regulatory constraints.

“To my knowledge, we’re the only AOR (Agency of Record) offering end-to-end creator services for both HCP and patient creators,” says Annie Foster, Group Director of Social Media Creative at IPG Health. “AORs should lead creator work because no one knows the brands, the science, and the audiences better.”

Annie and Jörg Hempelmann, President of IPG Health EMEA (Europe, Middle East, and Africa) and APAC (Asia-Pacific), are integral to the European expansion of Influencer ID, a service that provides comprehensive influencer marketing from identification and vetting through content development, compliance review, and performance analytics.

How Influencer ID Solves Healthcare’s Marketing Challenge

The pharmaceutical industry faces a unique paradox when it comes to reaching patients. In most markets outside the United States, regulations prohibit companies from advertising prescription drugs directly to consumers. That means pharma brands can raise awareness about diseases, but can’t promote specific products, a fundamental challenge for traditional marketing approaches.

“If you communicate about a condition like psoriasis and show what’s possible, that awareness benefits every pharma brand in the space,” explains Jörg. “You can’t make it brand-specific, but Influencer ID lets us work with trusted creators to share accurate, compliant information.”

Patients and consumers tend to trust real people more than institutions or pharma companies. Influencers can make complex topics easier to understand and humanize. This trust gap is especially acute in sensitive health areas such as mental health, chronic illness, obesity, and fertility, where creators can encourage open dialogue more effectively than institutional messaging.

To help brands address this, IPG Health built Influencer ID, a full-service influencer marketing solution that combines compliance, creativity, and credible voices. Its capabilities span influencer identification and vetting (from mega to nano creators), value matching to align creators with brand purpose, engagement and contracting, detailed scientific briefings, content development and localization, regulatory and GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) compliance, and performance analytics.

“It could be physicians, nurses, PAs, anyone working in the field,” says Annie. “It could also be patients, caregivers, family members, or advocates, maybe someone who’s survived cancer and now champions cancer care.”

Underpinned by EPICC, IPG Health’s proprietary suite of tools, Influencer ID delivers gold-standard engagement strategies while connecting teams and expertise across the network’s global footprint.

One of the most complex aspects of healthcare influencer marketing is maintaining regulatory compliance without losing the creator’s authentic voice. Annie emphasizes the importance of guidance over scripting:

“If you hand creators a script, you strip away what makes them authentic. You want their voice telling the brand story, but with clear do’s and don’ts.”

To set creators up for success, the team provides medical-legal briefings tailored to each region’s framework, FDA (Food and Drug Administration) regulations in the U.S. and multiple regulatory systems across Europe. “If we don’t give them the information they need to get it right, we’re not doing our part,” Annie says.

All content goes through medical-legal review before publication, but long-term partnerships streamline the process. “When there’s a good match and the creator performs well, you want to keep working together,” Annie says. “They internalize the guardrails, making it easier to speak naturally, but still compliantly.”

“Being creative within regulations is an art form,” Jörg adds. “It’s impressive how our industry continues to produce strong, creative work within those boundaries.”

The European Expansion Strategy

The decision to expand Influencer ID into Europe reflects both market opportunity and changes in the influencer space. “Germany, Spain, the UK, and France are all in the top 10 pharma markets globally,” Jörg explains. “You have to play there, just given the size and scale.”

But market size alone doesn’t explain the timing. The influencer space itself has evolved. “Five or six years ago, if you’d told me doctors would become influencers, I’d have said never,” Jörg admits. “Now they are – many specialize in science and health communication.”

This shift reflects broader changes in how people seek health information and which voices they trust. “It used to be cooking, dancing, or fashion creators,” Jörg recalls. “Now we’re seeing patients as advocates and healthcare professionals building trust through their platforms.”

Annie notes that this shift has changed which influencers provide the most value to brands. “There’s far more value in partnering with niche creators who have deeply engaged communities than with celebrity influencers,” she says.

Jörg points to evidence supporting the business case: “We now have proof that influencer marketing delivers long-term ROI (Return on Investment) and growth. It’s not just a theory anymore, there are measurable results.”

While the core Influencer ID approach transfers from the United States to Europe, successful execution requires deep local adaptation. Europe’s regulatory structure is fragmented, with different rules governing healthcare communications in each country. “We have to localize by market,” Jörg explains. “The UK has its Advertising Standard Authorities and NHS regulations. In Germany, we follow the Heilmittelwerbegesetz, which governs what we can say to consumers and patients.”

Cultural differences add another layer of complexity. “In the UK, influencers often focus on patient rights and empowerment,” Jörg notes. “In Germany, credibility comes from science-based voices or associations.”

These nuances require local expertise working in close coordination with global leadership. “My team and Annie’s team speak weekly,” Jörg says. “Our U.S. team has done incredible work, and we can learn from that while adapting locally. Annie supports us in making it relevant for each market.”

This collaborative structure reflects IPG Health’s broader operational philosophy. “Annie approves the approach, but local teams own execution,” Jörg clarifies. “We trust each country’s team to know what works for their audience.”

Inside IPG Health’s Competitive Edge

IPG Health’s competitive advantage lies in its combination of global scale with deep healthcare expertise at every location. Jörg emphasizes that unlike some networks, where global presence is more symbolic, every IPG Health office represents true healthcare knowledge. “Many agencies count dots on a map,” he explains. “At IPG Health, every dot is an agency of healthcare experts who understand data, studies, and regulations.”

This expertise extends to the company’s interconnectivity across regions. “We often have people from France, Germany, China, Japan, and Singapore working on the same brand,” Jörg says. “Our ability to connect global experts seamlessly is a huge differentiator.”

Annie brings a unique perspective to this structure. After 14 years at JUICE Pharma Worldwide and seven at Meta as Creative Strategy Lead for Health and Beauty, she bridges pharma expertise with social platform knowledge. “My goal at IPG Health is the same as it was at Meta, help clients make the most effective ads for the platform,” Annie says. “IPG Health already has a strong social reputation; I just want to raise that even higher.”

She describes modern advertising as inherently interdisciplinary. “If you’re not combining creativity, data, and technology, you’re not doing advertising right in 2025,” she says. “Technology changes fast, but creativity is timeless, it just needs to evolve with the tools.”

Measuring Success

Success metrics for Influencer ID campaigns vary based on client goals. “Objectives could be awareness, consideration, or conversion, though conversion in pharma looks different,” Annie explains. “It might mean downloading a doctor discussion guide or asking your doctor about something, which is hard to measure.”

Upper-funnel metrics might include brand lift, awareness, and recall. “We look at things like brand lift studies, video views, and click-through rates,” Annie says. “The KPIs depend on the project’s goals, which also shape the creative approach.”

For the European expansion, Jörg emphasizes building a portfolio of strong case studies. “We want to win clients and prove this works,” he says. “If we can set the trend and lead the market, that becomes our competitive edge.”

Annie underscores why case studies matter in pharma: “Pharma wants innovation, but proven innovation. Strong case studies are the best way to show it works.”

Jörg agrees. “Our industry wants to innovate, but rarely wants to go first,” he says. “Once one company succeeds, others follow. That’s why case studies are so critical.”

The Future of Healthcare Marketing

As IPG Health expands Influencer ID across Europe, the team is already preparing for the next frontier in digital health marketing: AI-driven search and content discoverability. “We’ll see a big shift toward generative engine optimization – GEO – which is like SEO for AI-driven search,” Annie explains.

This shift is already shaping 2026 planning. “Two clients have already said GEO is what they want to tackle next year,” Jörg says. “Google search is fading; AI engines like ChatGPT are becoming the new way people find information.”

For healthcare marketing, ensuring accuracy in AI-generated summaries is critical. “Our goal is to make sure AI surfaces accurate content,” Jörg emphasizes. “That’s my biggest focus for 2026, keeping health information reliable and trustworthy.”

Annie adds, “So many people don’t go beyond the AI summary anymore.”

When asked what she’d change about how health brands approach social and influencer work, Annie doesn’t hesitate. “Let go of misplaced aesthetic standards,” she says. “You’re not making TV, you’re making social. It has its own visual grammar and language, and we need to embrace that.”

Jörg agrees. “Exactly. It’s not just another touch point. It’s something entirely different.”

This philosophy extends to how IPG Health approaches Influencer ID and its mission to help healthcare brands connect genuinely with patients and professionals. As the company brings its influencer marketing capabilities to Europe’s diverse markets, it aims to leverage its unique position to combat misinformation while respecting both creator voice and medical accuracy. 

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