Health Care Marketing During Changing Times docx

Health Care Marketing During Changing Times
Fred J. Tyson PhD
Published by BayResearch & Consulting at Smashwords
Copyright 2011 BayResearch & Consulting
Health Care Marketing During Changing Times
Index
Sales & Marketing Strategies
HealthCare Marketing 101
Reasons to Have a Marketing Plan
What Is a Health Care Marketing Plan?
Elements of a Marketing Plan
**A Target Marketing
**B Competition Analysis
**C SWOT
**D Goals, Strategies and Tactics
Marketing Budgets
Marketing Without the Risk
Guide to Market Research for Small Practice
How to Define Your Target Audience
Marketing as a Business Too
Writing a Press Release
Web Marketing
Sales & Marketing Strategies
In today’s changing economy people’s priorities in regard to health care
are also changing. Consider what the prospective patients want or need
the most. Don’t think about what you want to sell, but determine what it
is that they want to buy, and then deliver it to them.
In a down economy the last thing you want to do is eliminate you
marketing budget, but instead at least keep it consistent. The healthcare
entity that stops communicating to the community is totally invisible to
people who need its services. The entity feels like it is preserving

resources, but it is giving up more in lost revenue and opportunity.
Every dollar wisely invested as a stronger ROI potential when the
competition is reducing or stopping all marketing. Take advantage of the
competitive vacuum by using this time to grow market share.
Instead of reducing marketing, slash any wasteful spending that has crept
in. Take this time to carefully examine where there may be waste or
more efficient processes.
Now is a good time to look at new tactics that might not have otherwise
been considered. Healthcare professionals tend to be conservative and
dismiss good or new ideas without consideration, ideas that could vastly
improve profitability of their organization. Remaining open to new ideas
is especially important right now.
Since all other healthcare organizations are facing the same economic
downturn, it is important to fortify and strengthen all professional
relationships. These referral relationships are more important than ever,
and better partnerships make a win-win situation.
Refocus on lower risk internal marketing that may have been overlooked.
Internal marketing, working with existing patients is low cost, low risk
and high ROI. Your best assets are your patient base and it is a solid
source of referrals, especially in declining economy.
Begin or increase your marketing in the internet arena. It is getting
harder to be found on the internet; therefore just having a web presence
is no longer the only answer. Look into Search Engine Optimization, Pay
per Click, Cross promotion, Content Utilization, Blogs, Facebook, Twitter,
etc.
If your healthcare organization is advertising with different media, us the
opportunity of the rough economy to negotiate your pricing schedule.
This is a time when the media is hungry for new business and they can be
much more flexible about rates.
Look for ways to bundle your services that can create a value-laden and

compelling package. For example:
*Plastic surgeons are bundling together Liposuction, Botox, and Tummy
Tucks into a product they call the “Mommy Makeover.”
*“Executive Physicals” consist of all the normal and necessary test usually
spread out or ignored by busy people.
*Cancer centers offering full coverage offering from prevention, testing,
treatment, rehab, “Mind, Body, Soul” areas of retreat, education
centers, and many other services bundled into one center.
You can test low risk offers by using existing valued customers that are
willing to give you honest feedback. Consider how you might use and
profit from a trial offer on something in your office or facility. Allowing
for a low-risk or introductory trial is appealing to a conservative
audience. Make sure you provide above expected value and word of
mouth will drive the marketing.
Your marketing message should be much more about the value you
provide and less about gimmicks or fluff. People respond to value as a
means to get more for their expenses. They are tired of being marketed
to, and then discovering the value was not as promised.
Make sure your marketing budget and plan is at least 12 months long, and
based on specific objectives and your ROI goals. This plan must be based
upon who you are, how you practice, what you are trying to achieve, and
your goals. It should be organized by category. Example:
*Internet Marketing
*Internal Marketing
*External Advertising
*Professional Referral Marketing
*Publicity
*Branding
During rough economic times, stopping your marketing plans sacrifices
your previous marketing investment. What you have put into building

your branding message is lost without continuing it. Patients may think
that you and the organization have disappeared because you are silent
and market share goes down. A continuing marketing effort maintains
your connection with the community, your recognition is brighter on
everyone’s radar and it inspires greater confidence.
In rough economic times, buyers are more selective. Individuals will look
carefully at purchases, and they might even delay their decision, but they
are likely to buy from someone. Healthcare organizations that remain
visible communicate trust and patients gain confidence in knowing you
will be there for them when they need you.
Prospective patients are looking for strong value in all their purchase
decisions. Carefully review and adjust your marketing message to
emphasize how you deliver solid value. Communicate high value, not
fluff. Prospective patients want reassurance that you understand their
needs and deliver effective solutions that directly answers these needs.
Satisfied patients are a great source of referrals, but you have to ask
them. Because decision makers are more selective in soft economic
times, the referral of another patient carries added weight. It is a simple
process that is effective in any economic climate, but it can be easily
overlooked when the office is busy.
Many Healthcare organizations revert to “feel good” marketing. Soft
marketing is like giving away coffee mugs or sponsoring a little league
team. While these actions might feel good and seem safe, they simply do
not produce results. Others will just “throw spaghetti at the wall.” They
feel they need to do something, but they begin with no plan and no idea
of what does or does not work.
The better plan is to stick with your marketing and stay in the game.
Obviously the most productive and cost effective marketing opportunity is
when there is little or no competition. When other Health Care
organizations duck and cover with negative economic news, it opens the

playing field for the smart marketers. The competitive vacuum is a rich
opening to reach and attract the patients who are still seeking services,
to protect your patient base and to build a larger market share.
Focus on strategies that deliver a positive ROI. Narrow your promotional
sights from the wide field of all things you do to selectively focus your
promotional messages on the professional services that build profits. If
money is super tight, it is ok to tread a little carefully at first, but again,
do not disappear from the marketplace. Instead, take smart risks and
reasonable steps until you find the combination of variables that works.
Once you do, turn up your marketing while everyone else sits on the
sidelines.
Health Care Marketing 101
The bottom line objective in Health Care marketing is to grow the
organization. Often this means attracting more patients, but a well
executed marketing plan will achieve more for the providers. Effective
and ethical marketing opens the door to benefits for providers to:
*Achieve profitable growth;
*Attract cases that the doctors either enjoy or have special expertise;
*Protect and grow market share against competition;
*Build the professional reputation of the provider with the community
and peers
These high-level objectives also translate into answers for challenges and
opportunities such as:
*Attracting better paying or more profitable cases;
*Reaching "ideal patents," directly and cost-effectively;
*Changing the mix of patients or types of cases;
*Winning more professional referrals;
*Supporting a new location, provider or technology (or all of these);
*Building volume for an ancillary service;

*Transitioning to a "cash business" or "all-referral" practice;
*Standing out from the crowd in positive ways;
*Answering competitive challenges;
*Finding more personal time and greater professional enjoyment;
*Tastefully building and extending your reputation
Many Doctors and Health Care organizations remain “marketing-shy”
more than 30 years after the landmark 1977 Supreme Court case made
marketing legal for doctors and other professionals. While the licensing
boards deemed marketing to be ethical in the 1980’s, many doctors still
feel uncomfortable because they are worried about coming across as
“needy, cheesy, or greedy.”
Marketing is an important channel for positive influence in shaping how
others think of you. You are telling patients what you do, and reminding
them when, how and why to think of you and your organization. Health
Care marketing will produce professional results in measurable growth
and enhance your reputation in positive ways.
The starting point for Health Care marketing is like a blank canvas.
People who do not know you are completely unaware of what you do and
have no image of you at all. The professional marketing messages of your
organization communicate your credible, impressive, ethical and highly
professional image and reputation.
Health Care marketing is a positive tool to inform and influence people
toward a better quality of health and life. Unfortunately marketing can
deliver a disastrous outcome if you do not know what you are doing or
understand how to use it properly and effectively. You will want to do
proper homework and then seek out expert guidance prior to embarking
upon a new marketing program.
The key steps in reducing risk and achieving success include:
*Learn from the marketing outcomes of other healthcare practices and
organizations;

*Create a strategic marketing plan based on strategies and tactics most
likely to be successful, including geography, specialty, personalities,
strengths and weaknesses, etc.;
*Test whenever possible before committing significant sums of money;
*Track results carefully;
*Roll out the "winning" strategies
Health Care marketing is not an issue of expense or “expensive.” Some
highly effective marketing strategies and tactics are low or no cost.
Other tactics may require a reasonable investment of some kind. No
matter the cost, there should always be a ROI that is positive.
The correct approach to a sound marketing budget is to begin with the
end in mind. Clearly define what you intend to achieve in specific and
quantifiable numbers. Start with the overall incremental growth
objective even if your marketing plan has several segments. Your goals
and your budget are two parts of an equation that need to be aligned
with each other. The purpose of your 1 month budget is to assign
adequate resources to achieve realistic goals, and this goes hand-in-hand
with tracking and calculating ROI,
Health Care marketing should not be confused with Medical Practice
Management. Medical Practice Management embraces operational
matters such as coding, payer selection, accounts receivable, staffing,
HIPAA, software, cost cutting, and other issues that are the day-to-day
business of the business/practice. Health Care Marketing is about
building a positive reputation, getting your phone to ring, getting people
to come in for a first appointment and converting them into patients.
Practice Management is largely about the wheels that turn inside the
practice.
Health Care Marketing is the planned process of communications that
goes on with individuals who, for the most part, are not yet aware of or
part of the practice.

Advertising is a small sub-set of marketing, and one that you may not
even need.
While marketing and advertising are often mistakenly used
interchangeably, marketing is the very broad, overarching heading.
Marketing encompasses many variables, oftentimes referred to as the
Seven Ps of Marketing. These "Ps" include:
*Product (the services you deliver and needs you fulfill)
*Packaging (how you bundle services)
*Price, Place (physical facility and geography)
*People (you and your staff)
*Positioning (why you)
*Promotion
That final "P" for promotion includes doctor referral marketing, patient
referral marketing, publicity (free press), branding (the sum total of
experiences the patient has with you), internet marketing, community
marketing, case presentation, point of purchase displays and finally
advertising. A well-considered marketing plan may or may not include
some form of advertising, depending upon objectives, budgets,
philosophy, marketplace and many other factors.
The fact is that you DO market your business. Like it or not, call it
something else if you like, but virtually everything you do is sending a
marketing message
"You cannot NOT communicate." Paul Watzlawick
It may be that an organization does not have a written Marketing Plan, or
that it deliberately avoids newspaper or other forms of external
advertising. It is a mistake to think that a provider "never markets“, this
is more than semantics. Marketing includes;
*The way a business greets and interacts with patients
*The decor and appearance of the office
*The demeanor of the staff in person and on the phone

*Caregiver manner
*What patients are likely to say (or not say) about the business to others
The result of this—intentionally or unintentionally—represents the
messages that are communicated about the business. Marketing includes
communications, by any means, about a business that encourages the
recipients of the communication to respond positively. The question is,
"Are you actively controlling your message and therefore reputation and
results, or are you simply allowing things to happen by chance?"
Reasons to Have a Marketing Plan
Answer aggressive competition which has emerged in the area
Attract higher paying, elective and/or cash cases
Attract more cases that you enjoy or have special expertise
Be able to hire the right people
Become more profitable
Become recognized as a leader in a specific field or community
Bring cash or ancillary cases into the practice
Build a practice recently joined or purchased
Build the organization's reputation (brand) for positive recognition
Build volume for new technology, equipment, procedures/services
Ethically attract cases that reimburse well
Grow the number of new patients
Increase revenues
Increase the marketing effectiveness
Move the office and/or add another office; assure all locations are
successful
Multiply patient referrals
Reach more people to provide service to the community
Rebranding for better differentiation in face of change
Reduce reliance on low paying insurances
Reduce over-reliance on a small number of referral sources

Spend more time as a doctor (not an administrator)
Support new providers, new partners, and new locations
Take more time off for family and/or other interests
Win more doctor (or other professional) referrals
Work smarter not harder
What Is a Health Care Marketing Plan?
A Health Care Provider marketing plan is not just a list of marketing ideas
from which the marketing department randomly selects different ideas to
test or combine for trial-and-error or experimentation. This concept is
just random, “spaghetti on the wall” marketing activity. This technique
is almost always a high risk attempt that results in disappointment,
failure, frustration, and very expensive.
A marketing plan should be a strategic document that is designed to
achieve specific business goals and objectives over a specific time period.
Compare not having one to hiring contractors to build a new hospital
without first developing and approving blueprints. Without a marketing
plan you are engaging in random, reactionary marketing processes
without first strategically developing a well thought out plan.
Most marketing plans are conceived to extend no longer than a year
before the plan goes through a reassessment for modifications, additions,
subtractions or entire evaluation depending on changing business goals. A
well designed marketing plan is constantly being assessed by accurate
and consistent tracking systems to evaluate the plan’s performance
against the goals set down. The continual evaluation is done so that
ongoing adjustments can be made to improve the plan’s end results.
A good marketing plan allows you to:
*Anticipate
*Assess progress
*Prepare for volume of patients
*Build a road map to follow

*Cover-Your-Bases
*Construct necessary support systems
*Improve chances of marketing success
Elements of a Marketing Plan
Target Marketing
Competition Analysis
SWOT
(Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats)
Goals
Strategies and Tactics
Marketing Budgets
A Target Marketing
The marketing budget of a Health Care provider is going to be more
effective when it reaches its selected target market. Efficiency is the
benefit of target marketing. Solid target marketing is a method to more
efficiently reach you intended audience. Target marketing is a better use
of the most valuable resources, time and money, to generate additional
revenue.
The goal of targeted marketing is to get to know as much as you can
about your existing or prospective customers. The more you know about
your customers, the better you will be able to make decisions that will
enhance your ability to communicate and influence them.
There are four general ways to identify Target Markets:
Demographics: The age, gender, income, family composition and size,
occupation, and education of your customers. Example:
Married
Between the ages of 21-35
At least one child
Home Owner
Educated

Income of $75,000 or higher
Geographics: The location, size of the area, density, and climate zone of
your customers. Example:
Lives within the Zip Codes 71223-71556
Psychology: The general personality, behavior, lifestyle, rate of use,
repetition of need, benefits sought, and loyalty characteristics of your
customers. Example:
Values time and considers it their single most limited resource
Excited about accepting and using innovative ideas and products
Consistent Web users
Prefer the Internet over magazines and newspapers for information they
trust
Increasing resources invested into safety and security issues
Beginning to plan for their future
Behaviors: The needs and wants your customers seek to fulfill, the level
of knowledge, information sources, attitude, use or response to a product
of your customers. Example:
They are leaders in product selection and respond to the opinions of the
“industry experts” when making purchase decisions
This group will first look to the Internet to acquire this information
They defend these decisions under most any circumstance and will
adamantly “sell” those that ask why they use the product or service and
why they made the choice they did
One of the marketing fundamentals is focusing on benefits, this
perspective is critical to target marketing. Establishing an intimate
understanding about the needs and wants of your desired target market is
critical. Questions to ask about your targeted marketing:
*How will your customer benefit from using your services or products?
*What intangible or tangible benefits might customers realize, and is it
possible to quantify these benefits?

*What is your customer really buying? (No one wants to buy surgery, or
dentistry, physical therapy, or invasive procedures)
People purchase services and products to realize life-improvement
benefits: Therefore focus on the Benefits:
*Pain Relief
*Productivity
*Abilities
*Confidence
*Appearance
*Personal Relationships
*Peace of mind
Target marketing allows you reach customers, create awareness in, and
ultimately influence the group of people who most likely will select your
products and services as a solution to their needs. The more information
you have, the more detail you have about your “ideal” clients, the better
you will be able to make them aware of your products and services, and
how to purchase them through you.
When target marketing consider who will benefit the most from your
products and services. Consider the client and their most common
characteristics and attributes. Start with looking at your existing
customer base. Who are your ideal clients and what do they have in
common.
B Competition Analysis
Health Care success is not achieved by ignoring the competition, but
rather anticipating competitive issues and influences so you can always
have a proactive plan and strategic strategy for staying ahead of the
completion. Ways to compile a good research on your competition:
*Simple Google search
*View their website and take note of:
**How they are positioning and differentiating themselves

**List of the scope of programs, services, and products they offer
**Hours of Operation
**Special features and benefits
**Emergency access
*Articles they have authored, media interviews, legal actions, see where
they are listed:
*Yellow pages-Size and Placement of Ad
*Physician location sites on Web
*What categories they are listed
*Order they come up using search engines
*Scan and collect competitor advertising from local newspapers, direct
mail, TV commercials, radio commercials, billboards and other media
*Search Social Networks like Face Book, Twitter, Blogs, etc.
Keep your ear-to-the-ground. Competitor Research is a very effective way
to gain competitive intelligence, especially from those competitors whose
marketing is not advertising-based or visible in the media. Have others in
your employment act as information gatherers and pass along any
information they hear, see, or learn about your competitors. Another
great source are those outside your facilities:
*Pharmaceutical reps
*Vendors
*Loyal patients
*Colleagues
*Friends
*Relatives
When you have collected the competitor information, you need to take
advantage of what you have learned. Success in business is about
anticipation, strategic planning and action.