March 2008
10 Good Reasons to Market Your Practice Online
Physicians and other healthcare practitioners today face a converging array of market conditions that challenge and change the way they do business.
Malpractice premiums, proposed Medicare reimbursement cuts, and dwindling availability of employer-sponsored health coverage are just a few challenges that threaten to shake up many already-fragile bottom lines.
Today, it’s more important than ever to reach out to new patients in compelling ways that don’t cost an arm and a leg or take up too much valuable time.
Online patient prospecting is a marketing tool many medical professionals have largely ignored because of per-ceptions that personal practice Web sites are too complex, costly, and time-consuming to set up and maintain.
The good news is you can market your practice online today through professional associations, insurance plans that promote affiliated providers, or consumer-focused physician-finder Web sites that cater to the public’s growing demand for a faster, easier way to find a local physician.
A number of reputable, online physician search engines exist where healthcare practitioners of all specialties can sign up to obtain a variety of free listings across the Web universe.
Below are the top 10 reasons physicians should strongly consider marketing their practices through an online physician-finder search engine.
1. It’s free. Unlike such traditional advertising tools as the newspaper, phone book, or direct mail, many online physician-finder sites advertise your practice at no cost to you. And there’s no charge to prospective patients either.
2. It’s targeted. Online Web sites market your services to “warm” patient prospects already seeking a new provider. Some sites let patients post their medical problems, so appropriate providers can respond to concerns about cost, quality, experience, hours, or practice philosophy upfront.
This enhances the patient’s chances of finding the right provider before taking up time at the doctor’s office, and increases the provider’s opportunities for finding a “patient for life.”
3. It’s appealing to private pay. Many patients who are looking beyond their health maintenance organization (HMO) or preferred provider organization (PPO) provider directories have conceded their insurance plan doesn’t cover services they need.
Because they plan to pay out-of-pocket, they shop for a provider who voluntarily posts office fees or will provide an estimate for basic services. Some physician-finder sites let you post basic office charges or communicate about pricing via e-mail.
This need for price transparency is growing so rapidly that the American College of Physicians and a number of other physician organizations now recommend members voluntarily provide retail prices to self-paying patients for the 10 most commonly provided services and procedures.
4. It’s differentiating. Many patients seek doctors who are in sync with the times and can communicate online, yet most physicians cannot. In a 2007 survey of more than 4,000 Americans, 62 percent of respondents said their doctor didn’t offer even the most basic of Internet tools. Frustrated patients couldn’t e-mail them, schedule an appointment online, or check a Web site for information on the practice or the doctor’s credentials.
By utilizing technology to advertise your practice, you project an image of a contemporary practitioner who is in sync with technology and, thus, likely to also be in sync with the latest medical news and practices.
5. It’s responsive to market demands. The rapid growth of consumer-directed healthcare and the decline of employer-sponsored health insurance are driving the public to make more informed and cost-conscious healthcare choices. Online physician listings enable consumers to rapidly find local physicians and identify those whose services and prices are in line with their needs.
6. It’s easy. Do you have 10 minutes? Then register online at a physician-finder Web site. Simply sign in and fill out as much or as little information as you want, then post your practice and let patients find you. Remember, the more information you provide about your hours, specialty, years in practice, office visit fees, and other items, the greater the chance that the best patients will seek you out.
7. It’s flexible. Unlike an ad in a phone book or newspaper, which has very limited space, online Web portals provide the opportunity to offer as much information about your practice as you want, including what’s important to prospective patients, such as how long you’ve been practicing, whether you’re accepting new patients, and even what your basic office fees are.
8. It’s efficient. Traditional advertising requires contracts, contract renewals, tracking, billing, filing, and money. With an online posting, there is no paperwork, no contract, no invoice, and no money required.
9. It offers a risk-free payoff. Physicians who become early adopters of online technology and utilize free, online listing sites can reap the rewards of an expanded marketing reach and a growing patient base — with virtually no investment risk.
10. It’s the future. Millions of consumers find their homes, spouses, pets, cars, and clothes online — and now they want to find you.
Online patient prospecting is a marketing tool whose time has come for those in the healthcare field. So what are you waiting for? New patients are out surfing the Web right now, and they may be seeking a doctor just like you.
Allison Guimard is a consumer advocate and CEO of Alijor.com, one of the nation’s premier physician search engines that enables consumers seeking medical services to shop for and connect with local physicians and other healthcare providers seeking to expand their practices. For more information, visit www.Alijor.com or call 408-733-6400.
Riches in niches
Marketing to today’s consumer
By Susan A. Friedmann, CSP
Your patients are changing. You might not notice because the changes are not physical.
Clients aren’t walking in noticeably heavier or lighter, or complaining of new aches or pains.
But they are changing in a way that could cost your practice serious money, unless you act now to prevent it.
What has changed? Today’s buying public — consumers of everything from DVD players to healthcare — has undergone a dramatic shift in the way they do business. The day of the mass market is rapidly fading into the golden glow of history. Today’s consumer is firmly ensconced in the long tail — a phenomenon described by best-selling author Chris Anderson in his book of the same name, The Long Tail.
In his book, he outlines the cycle of specialization and niche marketing, largely inspired by the technological changes wrought by the Internet.
The public has been trained, Anderson argues, to expect products and services targeted exactly to their wants and needs — no matter how obscure those wants and needs might be.
Many service providers — especially those in the healthcare and wellness field — have been taking advantage of this phenomenon for years. By marketing themselves as experts in their field, they have managed to find riches in niches.
Niche marketers succeed by combining their professional skills with personal passion, focusing on the area of their practice that brings the most satisfaction and financial reward. Finding a successful niche is an art and a science, and relies in large part in finding the target audience most suited to the healthcare you want to provide.
Let’s take a look at how the cultural changes brought about by the niche marketplace have changed your clients:
• They want what they want. Customers are no longer satisfied with one-size-fits-all service providers. Instead, and in increasing numbers, the public is seeking professionals who specialize in the particular issue that concerns them.
This may be pediatric care, sports-related injuries, chronic pain, or other narrowly defined specializations.
• They expect to pay more. With the expert caché comes an expert price tag. Strongly ingrained in the trend toward niched service providers is the expectation of higher prices for specialized services.
This, of course, is incredibly beneficial for those service providers who may be offering the same exact services as their generalist contemporaries, but marketing themselves differently.
• They are online. Today’s consumers — no matter what generation you’re targeting, from the young athlete to the active senior — begin their research in one place: Online. Having an effective online presence — which includes a Web site, inclusion on targeted vertical search engines, and participation in relevant online communities — is essential if you want
your practice to enjoy maximum profitability.
• They are skeptical. Raised on media, and with a healthy distrust of everything they read, hear, and see, consumers are increasingly placing reliance on word-of-mouth referrals. This is staggering, considering research tells us that 87 percent of all business is driven by word-of-mouth referrals. People are becoming almost exclusively influenced by what they hear from friends and family.
ESTABLISHING YOUR EXPERTISE
What does this mean to you? If you want to effectively reach out and meet the changing client expectations, you need to embrace the tools that resonate well and create the expert identity essential for success, including:
1. Selecting the best name for your practice. A rose by any other name may smell as sweet, but what you choose to call your practice can make or break your fortunes. Careful market research is essential to ensure you’re attracting more clients than you’re alienating.
2. Building your media muscle. Media is an omnipresent force in our lives. Average Americans are engaged with some form of media for up to nine hours a day.
The best way to generate positive word-of-mouth for your business is to appear in media your target audience respects and values.
3. Catching the writing fever. Between the Internet and print media, the written word is more powerful than ever before. If you want to separate yourself from your peers and firmly establish your expert identity, few things are as effective as putting pen to paper and creating a body of knowledge.
Creating an expert identity allows health professionals, such as yourself, to capitalize on the changing buying habits of today’s consumer. At the same time, by combining personal passion with your professional skills, you’ll be able to spend more time doing the work you love to do and less time mired down trying to be all things to all people.
Susan A. Friedmann, CSP, is the NichePreneur Coach. Author of Riches in Niches: How to Make It BIG in a Small Market and Meeting & Event Planning for Dummies, she works with service professionals to increase their niche marketing potential. She can be contacted by e-mail at Susan@RichesinNiches.com or through www.richesinniches.com.
THE ART OF SELLING WITHOUT SELLING
3 secrets to help boost your income
By Patrick V. Valtin
Do you provide nutritional or other products to your patients? What portion of your income do they represent?
According to Chiropractic Economics 10th Annual Salary & Expense Survey, respondents say less than 3 percent of revenues come from the sale of retail products. If you are “average,” why don’t you sell more?
The classic answer is, “I don’t like to sell” or “I don’t like to push. I am a doctor, not a salesman.”
People have a lot of misconceptions about selling. The original meaning of “sell” was “to give.” Later, it took on the negative meaning of “to cheat” or “to betray.” Although today it is defined as “to persuade,” many successful people prefer to think of selling as helping.
What do top sales professionals do that others do not? What is it about them that makes their customers (or patients) want to buy from them?
Selling has nothing to do with special techniques or “magic.” Nor are salespeople “born.” You can sell — and feel comfortable about doing so. Just keep in mind these three “secrets.”
1. Selling starts by acknowledging your patients’ wants. In today’s market conditions, the patient does not buy what he needs; he buys what he wants.
Desire is much stronger than need in a marketplace in which the power of choice becomes your biggest barrier to a close. Your challenge is to discover what can trigger an impulse or a strong, unbearable desire to make a buying decision in your favor. Your success in selling your treatment or product depends on your ability to make the customer want to buy from you and not from someone else.
The first thing a patient buys is trust. He buys confidence about your ability and desire to help him resolve a problem, pain, or discomfort. If he does not trust you and does not feel confident in what you say, he will find what he is seeking somewhere else.
Your challenge is to demonstrate early in the appointment that you care more for him than his money.
2. Buying decisions are emotional — not logical. Consider all of your arguments on why your patients should follow your treatment plan or purchase a particular product.
No matter how good or how strong your arguments are, other chiropractors are probably using the same argument. Relying on your best argument to persuade a patient does not make you any different from your competition. And, using the same arguments as others is confusing to patients.
Most salespeople work the customer in a superficial zone; the zone of logics. They do not understand that people do not buy based on logic. Buying — in healthcare — is always more emotional than logical. So, using logical arguments usually does not trigger a desire. Arguments only trigger “thinking” or counter-arguments.
Patients want to feel as though they are making the right decision. To make them feel confident, you need conviction because patients buy your dedication to find the right solution for their pain, discomfort, or concern.
Instead of using logical arguments with patients, convert your arguments into emotional triggers.
For example: Assume you have a great superfood-based product, known to reduce fat and environmental toxicity (two good arguments). Your patient is overweight and suffers from respiratory problems in addition to chronic low-back pain.
Your challenge is to figure out how your patient’s conditions affect her life. In other words, why could it be emotionally important for this patient to use your superfood product? Do her conditions affect her social life? Could you ask her that? Or, does she feel tired during the day, unable to focus because of choking and coughing?
These are examples of emotional subjects related to the product. If you can use your patient’s emotional subjects and then demonstrate that your mission is to help her handle or resolve them, she will want to buy from you.
3. The most important quality in selling is curiosity. Everyone has heard that a good salesperson needs to be enthusiastic, convinced about her product, persistent, caring, honest, passionate, and dedicated. And she must be able to listen, too.
All these qualities are definitely needed to succeed. But one quality surpasses all others in importance — curiosity.
Great salespeople are curious; they are interested. They want to know as much as possible about their customers or patients — about their needs, personal desires, fears, and concerns. They want to find out what turns their patients on.
They also want to know all about their past good and/or bad experiences with similar products
or services.
Great salespeople do not try to bombard the customer or patient with arguments. They try to find out three things:
• “Who is this person I am treating?”
• “What are his problems, concerns, likes, and dislikes?” and
• “What are his desires, concerns, or fears relative to my product and service?”
Remember this truism: The more you know, the more you sell.
It is not “The more I talk, the more I sell,” as many have been taught to believe.
Consider this: An average salesperson asks between five and eight questions before starting to talk and argue about his product.
Successful salespeople reveal they ask from 25 to 40 questions before presenting their product or service. Their questions show they are genuinely interested in their customers.
Once you adopt an attitude of genuine curiosity, you will see a big change in your profession, as well as in your life. You will soon realize a person is as successful as he grants importance to others.
Patrick V. Valtin, president of M2-TEC USA, Inc., is an international consultant and trainer who specializes in human resources and business performance. He is the author of The TRUST$ELLING System and The RECRUTECH System. He can be contacted by e-mail at Patrick@NewEraSelling.com or through the Web site, www.neweraselling.com.
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