#FutureReadyHealthcare
2 Jun 2025
As data privacy moves to the forefront of healthcare engagement, consent and preference management has become a strategic priority for life sciences organizations. It’s no longer just about compliance—it’s often the first real interaction with HCPs and patients. When handled well, it builds trust, demonstrates respect for individual preferences, and lays the foundation for ethical, effective engagement.
This whitepaper provides practical guidance for life sciences leaders looking to mature their consent operations. It explores why consent management matters beyond regulation, highlights the challenges unique to the industry, and presents proven solutions—from deploying robust systems to building a skilled consent operations team. It also shares best practices around data consistency, multichannel consent capture, and preference management.
Ultimately, the goal is to help organizations turn consent from a compliance checkbox into a competitive advantage grounded in transparency and trust
Device-Based vs. Person-Based Consent
Broadly, consent can be categorized into two main types: device-based consent and person-based consent, each serving distinct purposes but both essential for building trust and ensuring compliance.
Device-Based Consent
Governs data collection for analytics, personalization, and advertising Typically implemented through cookie banners or pop-ups during anonymous website interactions.
Person-Based Consent
Governs how personal data is collected and used, especially in life sciences.Involves identifiable individuals, ensuring transparency and regulatory compliance.
Within life sciences, person-based consent is crucial, and it can be categorized into three key types, each contributing to a more robust, compliant, and trust-based approach to data management.
Marketing Consent
Marketing consent refers to the permission obtained from HCPs to receive targeted marketing communications aligned with their preferences and professional interests.
Example
I consent to receive updates on educational events, product information, and data insights relevant to my practice.
CRM Consent
This involves authorization to collect and maintain personal information within Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems. It ensures that HCPs are informed about how their data is stored and used.
Example
I consent to the collection and use of my personal data within your CRM system for ongoing engagement and record-keeping.
HCP Profiling Consent
Profiling consent allows life sciences organizations to analyze an HCP’s interaction history—such as content consumption across emails and websites—to personalize future engagements and improve relevance.
Example
I consent to the creation of a profile based on my activity (e.g., the content I interact with on your website and emails) so that you can better tailor information to my needs and interests.
Ensuring Compliance Across Diverse Regulatory Landscapes
Navigating the complex patchwork of data privacy laws is essential—especially for life sciences brands engaging with healthcare professionals and patients across borders.
Each country enforces unique requirements around consent and data use. For instance, Europe’s GDPR and California’s CCPA impose distinct obligations on how organizations collect, manage, and use personal data.
The cost of non-compliance can be steep, ranging from regulatory fines to reputational damage and erosion of stakeholder trust.
Country-Specific Nuances in Consent Management
The following image below outlines how consent requirements vary by region:
Challenges with Consent in Life Sciences Marketing Campaigns
For life sciences organizations, consent is not a checkbox—it’s a strategic pillar underpinning compliant, personalized, and effective marketing. Before initiating any campaign targeting HCPs or patients, marketers must navigate a range of consent-related challenges that can significantly impact reach, engagement, and regulatory standing.
From ensuring legal compliance to activating consented data for precision targeting, the complexity of managing consent across channels, systems, and geographies often becomes a barrier to seamless execution.
Below are some of the key challenges that life sciences marketers frequently face:
Reaching the Right Audience
Targeting the right HCPs or patients is fundamental to campaign success. An inaccurate or outdated contact list can result in wasted resources and poor engagement, as messages may reach individuals who are not relevant or interested.
These challenges aren’t easy to solve—but the right consent management platforms and team can make all the difference. That’s where a Consent Management System (CMS) and a dedicated consent operations team come in, working hand-in-hand to simplify and strengthen consent management operations.
How a CMS and Consent Operations Team Work Together
A CMS forms the technological foundation of a robust consent strategy. It enables real-time consent tracking, automates regulatory compliance, and provides intuitive interfaces for both internal users and external audiences. However, technology alone is not enough. The true power of a CMS is realized when it is supported by a dedicated consent operations team—a cross-functional group with deep expertise in compliance, data governance, system integration, and user experience design.
While the CMS ensures the technical execution of consent capture and management, the consent operations team provides the strategic oversight to align consent practices with evolving regulations, organizational goals, and customer expectations.
Benefits for CMS and Consent Operations Alignment
This synergy not only safeguards against compliance risks but also enhances operational agility, helping organizations turn consent into a strategic enabler of personalized, trustworthy engagement.
Effective Orchestration of Consent Management Operations
Together, a CMS and a dedicated consent operations team ensure that consent processes are not only compliant but also adaptable, accurate, and responsive to the expectations of HCPs and patients. This partnership transforms consent from a regulatory obligation into a strategic asset.
Here are 5 ways of effective orchestration of consent management to drive meaningful outcomes:
Enhancing Customer Trust
At the core of any relationship between life sciences organizations and their stakeholders lies trust. A transparent, ethically grounded approach to consent—enabled by a CMS and enforced by the consent operations team—reassures HCPs and patients that their data is being handled responsibly. By proactively addressing privacy expectations, organizations can foster deeper engagement and long-term loyalty.
Best Practices for Consent Operations in Life Sciences Marketing
Effective consent operations require disciplined processes, cross-functional alignment, and ongoing optimization. Below are 5 best practices that life sciences organizations can implement to ensure precision, scalability, and regulatory alignment in their consent strategies.
Ensuring Data Accuracy and Governance
Data Consistency Across Systems
Maintaining clean and consistent consent records across marketing technology platforms is critical. A specialized consent operations team plays a central role in monitoring records across systems, identifying discrepancies, and applying automated solutions—such as a Consent Validation Engine—to streamline validation and reduce errors.
Consent Data Governance
Beyond consistency, strong governance ensures that consent data is handled in compliance with regulatory frameworks. The consent operations team enforces governance policies, maintains audit trails, and ensures data reliability for informed decision-making and targeted campaign execution.
Expanding and Diversifying Consent Acquisition Channels
Multichannel Acquisition
To minimize dependence on a single source, consent collection must span a range of touchpoints—email, SMS, WhatsApp, social media, webinars, websites, and in-person engagements. This multichannel approach prevents duplication, broadens reach, and improves opt-in rates.
Omnichannel Integration
Going beyond multichannel, an integrated omnichannel strategy ensures a seamless user experience. Consent captured across touchpoints is unified, eliminating silos and improving the accuracy of HCP and patient profiles.
Activating Consent Through Preference Management
Self-Service Consent Portals
Enabling HCPs and patients to manage their own consent preferences via intuitive self-service portals empowers users while reducing operational burden. These portals allow individuals to specify their preferred communication channels, content types, and opt-in/opt-out preferences.
Personalized Communication
With insights derived from these portals, marketers can deliver content that aligns with individual preferences—leading to more relevant, timely, and effective engagement. Personalization based on consented data enhances both user experience and campaign outcomes.
Turning Insights into Action
Opt-Out and Feedback Analytics
Monitoring opt-out behavior and user feedback provides valuable insight into what’s working—and what isn’t. Consent operations teams can analyze these patterns to refine messaging strategies, content formats, and outreach timing.
Data-Driven Optimization
An omnichannel approach also enables richer analytics. By combining data from multiple touchpoints, organizations gain a 360-degree view of HCP and patient behaviors, allowing for better segmentation and ongoing optimization of marketing programs.
Providing Centralized Support and Expertise
Consent Help Desk
A Centralized Consent Help Desk offers a single point of support for all consent-related inquiries—whether from internal teams, HCPs, or patients. This increases responsiveness, reduces bottlenecks, and ensures issues are resolved efficiently.
Expert Guidance and Compliance Oversight
Staffed by consent experts, the Help Desk supports compliance monitoring, system troubleshooting, and campaign readiness checks. It also ensures that marketers and field teams are equipped with the right guidance for managing consent.
Strategic Benefits of Partnering with a Consent Operations Team
Partnering with a dedicated consent operations team enables scalable, efficient, and user-centric consent strategies. These experts help life sciences marketers build trust, enhance personalization, and improve campaign performance across markets.
Regulatory Confidence Across Markets
With in-depth knowledge of country-specific laws like GDPR, CCPA, and LGPD, the consent operations team ensures every campaign meets local compliance standards—minimizing legal risk and building market trust.
Streamlined Campaign Execution
The team manages consent workflows and system checks to reduce delays and speed up approvals. This ensures consent data is validated and ready—enabling faster campaign launches.
Enhanced Data Quality and Targeting
By maintaining accurate, current consent data, the operations team empowers marketers to confidently personalize outreach and improve targeting based on user preferences.
Increased HCP and Patient Trust
Transparent, user-centric consent processes build trust among HCPs and patients, fostering long-term engagement and loyalty through respectful privacy management.
Scalable and Future-Ready Consent
As new channels and strategies emerge, the consent operations team ensures scalable, compliant consent practices that adapt to evolving technologies and regulations.
Key Takeaways
Effective consent management is foundational to building trust and ensuring ethical data practices in the life sciences industry. As organizations increasingly rely on personal data to deliver meaningful, personalized experiences, robust consent lifecycle management solutions—especially person-based consent—become essential for deepening relationships with HCPs and patients.
A dedicated consent operations team plays a pivotal role in this journey. By overseeing data governance, enabling multichannel consent acquisition, and managing user preferences, they help marketers deliver personalized, compliant, and high-impact campaigns. Their expertise ensures consent processes are accurate, adaptable, and aligned with global regulations.
By embracing a strategic approach to consent—with both technology and expert operations in place—life sciences marketers can:
Build trust and credibility with HCPs and patients
Ensure regulatory compliance across diverse markets
Leverage accurate consent data for personalized communication
Improve marketing efficiency and effectiveness
Strengthen overall brand integrity and ethical standing
At Indegene, we help life sciences organizations turn consent compliance into a strategic advantage. Whether you’re scaling multichannel consent programs, navigating global privacy regulations, or improving HCP engagement, we partner with you to operationalize consent with clarity, agility, and measurable impact
Talk to us to orchestrate smarter, compliant engagement—together.
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