Posts Tagged ‘healthcare marketing’

A Basic Healthcare Competitive Analysis – Four Steps Toward a Stronger Market Position

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

You know who your competition is if you are working in a hospital.  Whether you are in healthcare marketing or physician relations, you know about the competition.  You have heard so much, you have a strong sense of where they are in the marketplace and where your organization falters.  So forgive me for dwelling on some basic principles on doing a competitive analysis but for your colleagues working in a medical practice or a new clinic, this brief overview provides an important refresher.

Step One:  Define your competition

Make sure you don’t leave anyone out when thinking about your competition.  You may have competitors that surprise you – it is possible that the local drug store is opening a “minute clinic” or a new practice is opening a concierge service.  Don’t rely on what you think you know, ask questions and do the research so you are not surprised.  This overview will also provide you with the dynamics of the overall market.

Tip —  One method for locating your competitors is to look around – physically (drive around your neighborhood) and virtually (use Google Maps, check out industry association directories and/or use a keyword search and see what other businesses are listed.

Step Two:  Learn as much as possible about your competition

Start with their website to learn what they offer, how they position their services and how they deliver healthcare.  There are several resources/methods, depending on the size of your competition, that may provide good market intelligence:

  • Harris InfoSource, a division of Dun & Brandstrett —  www.harrisinfo.com
  • Hoovers (www.hoovers.com)
  • Standard and Poors (www.standardandpoors.com)
  • Hospital association(s)
  • Hospital physician directories
  • Generic search for articles
  • FaceBook page information/posts
  • Twitter feed
  • Actually sample their service in some fashion

Step Three:  Assess strengths and weaknesses

It isn’t enough to collect the market intelligence about your competitors, work to understand what makes them strong and where they are vulnerable.  Analyzing your competitor’s market position allows you to position your organization more carefully in the market.  Consider any un-served or under-served facets in the market.  Healthcare marketing is often more about service and access than about quality because healthcare consumers struggle with identifying quality markers leaving much of the comparison resting squarely on service features.

Step Four:  Determine your competitive advantage

Once you have gained valuable insight from your market awareness, you can use this analysis to help frame or update your marketing position.  You want to emphasize your strengths as a healthcare organization.  What makes your service the most attractive to potential patients?  Do you have the most convenient schedule?  Is your staff the friendliest?  Does your physician offer a distinctive service – concierge, geriatrics, multi-specialty approach?  Focus on what makes your service appealing to your target audience.  How are you truly different from those competitors?

These four steps sound remarkably easy and they are but you would be surprise at how many organizations do not know the specifics about their competitors and rely on their gut versus true market data.  Base your actions and even reactions on your knowledge about your competitors not on rumors!





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Creating a Healthcare Marketing Budget

Monday, April 12th, 2010

Creating a Healthcare Marketing Budget – The Most Rational Method

Forgive my blog-cation.  It was not completely intentional.  There was a death in my extended family and that set solid planning on edge. I am returning to weekly publication.  Onward!

Often, I tell clients to be careful with advertising expenditures.  Of course, they know they need to be careful because typically, for healthcare providers, budgets are small, small, small and demand for return on investment (ROI) is great.  But still, with this knowledge many healthcare marketers still want to plunk down valuable dollars on traditional media outlets without doing a solid analysis of what they will get in return and worse, they place advertising because of a knee-jerk reaction instead of considering the longer term requirements.

At a minimum, I ask that you have an overall promotion plan and create a budget.  I could push you just a bit more and suggest that you develop metrics for measuring the effectiveness of your outreach but that is a different post.  Right now, the focus is on the basics of developing a healthcare marketing budget.

As a percentage of sales, advertising expenditures vary considerably from one organization to another.  Pharmaceutical companies spend approximately 20% of their sales on advertising. It is unlikely that a hospital or medical practice will spend such a high percentage on their healthcare promotion efforts.  But what should you spend?

Different Methods of Determining  a Heatlhcare Marketing Budget

Method #1 – Historical

Built upon whatever was used previously, often with a percentage increase.  This method is not typically tied to overall objective.

Method #2 – Fixed percentage of sales

Often used in markets with stable revenue volume and where it is easier to see the direct relationship between sales and advertising.  Organizations have recently found this method to be problematic with the economic downturn for advertising budgets have been slashed just when they needed to be increased.

Method #3 –  Based on marketing objectives or tasks

This approach centers on creating objectives that the actual advertising needs to complete – i.e. number of physician referrals requested based on advertising about physician referral service.

Method #4 – Accepting industry average or based on competition

This approach is not dissimilar to method #1 but is based on the concept of an industry average that is accepted by market leaders.  This method does not work in favor of an organization wanting to increase market share by detailing competitive advantages or spending beyond the acceptable average.

Method #5 – What’s left

I don’t even like to include this method because it is counter-intuitive.  Essentially, an organization budgets for all other costs and then determines that the remainder of funds can be expensed to advertizing.  This method is reactionary and does not recognize the value of outreach and promotion.

Recommended Method

In lieu of the above methods, I suggest that you decide on your objective(s) first which is like method #2.  What are you trying to do with your promotion dollars?  Are you trying to increase visibility for your new wellness center or do you want to promote the new primary care physician?  First, delineate what you want to accomplish.

You will also need to consider who is your target audience and how you might best reach them. There are blog posts about marketing segmentation that can help you think about your targets.  Once you know your objective and target, it will be easier to consider the methods to employ to reach that market.  If you are targeting new moms, you may want to reach out to parenting bloggers.  If you want to focus on new members to your community, then piggy-back onto new neighbor outreach programs or consider library postings or even direct mail to new homeowners.

In some cases, you might want to have a large bill board, especially if you intended objective it to build overall brand awareness.  The point is to match you tactics to your objective.

Then prioritize based on resource availability.  Gather estimates for each medium and pick and choose your promotion endeavors carefully.  If you are building a longer term budget, you can experiment with alternatives and make quarterly or annual assessments based on effectiveness.

Okay, I know I am cheating because I told you that I wouldn’t cover metrics in this post, but let’s just take one moment to consider results tracking. Set up a tracking report for every promotion action, a spreadsheet will be just fine and include, at a minimum, the following categories:

  • Outreach description
  • Contact information
  • Placement date
  • Repeat runs
  • Cost (labor, design and placement)
  • Intended target
  • Impact (measured how)
  • Comments

Advertising, to be effective, needs to be planned, tested and analyzed. And always be able to answer the question – Is our advertising most-effective in this medium?


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How well do you employ technology to assist in developing your consumer relationships? Creating Customer Value, Part 4 of 5

Monday, February 1st, 2010

For many medical practices and hospital departments, technology can sometimes be a frustration and trying to tame it is often left to the IT workers.  But don’t let prior experiences or installation/training frustrations limit your progress is using technology tools to enhance relationship development.

Step one should be the collection and analysis of consumer data from all possible sources.  This helps all who communicate with customers know the content of that communication and potential next steps.  This central repository helps an organization personalize the communication and track the process.

For a tool, you have a wide choice of options.  You can use something as simple as Access.  Or off-the-shelf options include GoldMine and ACT!  There are many other software tools that can help you collect data, monitor communication and transactions and they range from simple on-tool tools (HighRise) to more complex, enterprise wide options.

Having a database of information for your consumer allows you to focus on the needs and preferences of your “customers.”  Understanding what your customers want will help you work toward their needs and develop relationships.  You can organize and analyze the data that you collect to determine preferences and drive your efforts toward responding to those needs.

Customer relationship management as a tactical technology tool can help you gain insight into the behavior of your customers.  This can ensure physicians and patients are served in the best possible way. Customer relationship management helps organizations recognize and pay attention.  Keep in mind that while a technology tool can help collect and analyze this kind of information, it is the overall strategy and culture of the organization that puts energy behind this information and creates a responsive process.

Step two should be using your insight to improving communication with your consumer. Targeted communication that gets in the hands of your potential customer as they need it versus sending blanketed mailings to everyone with no particular focus hoping something will appeal will save the organization money and will improve the relationship with the individual target.  They will not feel bombarded with non-focused communication.

No surprise that different customers prefer different communication channels.  Certainly newer digital channels and social media tools offer greater opportunities to directly personalize messages.  But don’t throw out traditional methods which may appeal to a sector of your market.  The message is to carefully segment your market for both message and channel.  That new mom might find information on your FaceBook Fan page really helpful as she deals with the adjustments of having a baby in the house.  The grandfather who can’t finish a golf game without visiting the restroom several times might find a post card about your prostate services more helpful.

Working out the above is a matter of re-prioritizing your internal communication approach based on the insight you garner from data collection – the following are basic but sound steps to employ:

  • Communicate to the customer based on their needs; avoid silo approaches.
  • Use customer information from the entire organization and centralize it to make customer profiles and develop a more in-dept understanding of your customer.
  • Segment your market.
  • Communicate with the various segments as one entity – do not overwhelm your target with multiples communications and messages.

Whether you are focusing on your physician relations program or want to have  a more targeted approach with potential patients,  the need to track and measure nurturing activities is a basic outgrowth.  The information flow works in both directions so that significant market intelligence is collected as these relationships are cultivated.  The more individuals working on a specific relationship, the more navigation is required so that the target is not overwhelmed by a disorganized flow of information from various sources.  Technology can serve the process by easing the management and integration of information.  Use technology to enhance your developing relationships by being more focused in your communication and more aware of what your individual customer wants and needs.





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Creating Relationship Value through the Patient Experience (Part 3 of 5)

Thursday, January 21st, 2010

How high have you set the bar of satisfaction for the patient experience?  Here are what some other healthcare organizations are saying on their websites, this January (2010) about their view of the patient experience:

Cleveland Clinic

“Patients are the purpose of our work, and Cleveland Clinic has embarked on an ambitious plan to examine and improve every facet of the patient experience. This effort encompasses every point of contact between patient and provider, from parking to prescription pick up.”

Johns Hopkins Health System

“Our quest for excellence isn’t limited to the treatments we provide. Several initiatives are under way at Hopkins to help physicians, nurses and staff to deliver the best possible service to customers.”

Gettysburg Hospital

“Gettysburg Hospital is ramping up its commitment to patient satisfaction with the aid of a qualified specialist. Tracy Lee joined the hospital last September as director of patient experience. Lee tracks patient satisfaction survey results and develops strategies for improvement.

Lee explained that many health systems have placed renewed emphasis on patient satisfaction in recent years.  A federally mandated consumer survey known as HCAHPS—the results of which are available to the public—has driven that trend.

“We all know what it’s like to either be a patient or have a loved one in crisis, and I enjoy helping make that experience a better one,” she said.”


These three organizations could not be more different from one another. And yet is placing special emphasis on the patient experience.  Each of them are defining that experience as beyond taking care of a patient clinically:

  • “…every point of contact between patient and provider.”
  • “Excellence isn’t limited to treatments we provide.”

When a patient visits the hospital or a doctor’s office, that individual experiences a series of events that often overshadow the actual contact with the medical provider. On a recent medical visit , I spent 15 minutes with the physician and 45 minutes “in process” once I entered the office – time at reception, time in the waiting room, time with the med technologist, time waiting in the exam room and time checking out after the visit.  It is easy to see how a good interaction with the physician can be overtaken by less than stellar service interactions.

You have heard me say that service is the marketing and that phrase is so true when it comes to the patient experience.  If you patient leaves happy, they will consider the experience positive and likely share that with their friends and family.  They will probably want to be your patient for a long time and will refer others to you. Their positive experience will create a long-lasting relationship value for them.  If your patient leaves grumpy, none of these good things happen.  In fact, a patient is more likely to share bad service news than good news and in telling their friends and family, you are on your way to a poor reputation.

So, think about, how high is your patient experience bar?


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Creating Relationship Value: Do You Treat Your Patients Differently Than the Competition? (Part 2 of 5)

Tuesday, January 12th, 2010

If you are a hospital marketer, you might be thinking, as you ponder the title question, that you obviously treat your patients differently because you have different service lines or have an amazing orthopedic surgeon who attracts referrals from a wide reach.  And, of course, that is a good thing.  But is there an 80/20 rule at work when you think of your competition?

In the majority of cases, patients choose your service or your practice because someone they know suggested it – the old “word-of-mouth” rule.  Whether that person is their primary care physician or their Aunt Millie, that referral gets the patient in the door.  That’s where the 80/20 rule comes into play.  That referral is only 20% of starting the relationship.  What happens next to that patient creates the bulk of their sentiment toward your service.  It sets the platform on whether they will come back and what they will say to their family and friends.

Fortunately or not fortunately, in health care, we have a pretty low bar when it comes to the patient experience.  While you might want to make a site visit to your competition and see what they are actually up to when it comes to the 80% factors, you can run down the following list and ask yourself the likelihood of any medical organization doing the following things well:

  • Will your patient have an easy time parking?
  • Will it be easy for your patient to make their way to your office?
  • Will your patient be greeted warmly and with rapt attention?
  • Will visit expectations be established and communicated to the patient so there will be few surprises for the patient?
  • Will anyone coming in contact with the patient be polite and attentive and limit conversation to others if not relevant to the patient?
  • Will the patient’s privacy be respected?
  • Will the patient’s comfort be of the utmost concern for all who come in contact with the patient?
  • Will the process and procedure be explained in advance of action and with the patient’s comprehension?
  • Will the service being provided be for the patient’s convenience?
  • Will the providers who come in contact with your patient act as if the patient were a close family friend?
  • Will instructions and expectations for after the visit be explained, perhaps even written,for the patient?
  • Will follow-up calls be made to check-in on the patient after they have gone home?
  • Will family members or those accompanying the patient be kept apprised of the patient’s progress and made to feel comfortable?

You can make your own check-lists and be more specific, but the point is make a difference in the life of your patient by working on those 80% factors that will help the patient prefer your service to your competition’s service. This good and hard work will help the patient choose your organization for other services and establish the foundation for a long-term relationship.


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Who Are Your Connectors?

Tuesday, September 8th, 2009

Who is spreading your idea? Seth Godin asked this question in a recent blog post. Seth makes the point that in order for ideas to spread, there has to be conveyances for that spreading.

Too often in healthcare, especially with medical practices, the conveyance is advertising. It is in fact, the most tradition form of promotion and therefore is the first one that people think of when they want to promote their idea or new service. More recently, the concept of viral marketing has taken some attention and the hope and desire that you can gain great awareness via people spreading your good news is attractive to many because it seems so cost effective.

We almost always encourage our clients to limit the expensive advertising efforts in exchange for testing other methods. Of course, if you are a physician, developing your referral channels takes relationship marketing to a new level. But let’s save that for another blog entry.

If you want to reach out to potential patients, one method (not THE method for we recommend trying a variety of endeavors to build your practice base) is the reach out to those “connectors” in your targeted community. Who are the people in a position of referring to your practice to a wide variety of potential consumers? The answer to this question varies on the type of medical practice or service you are providing.

Think about where your patients might come from? If you are a pediatrician, new patients might come from new families in the area. You might reach out to these families via newcomer groups or human resource departments at larger employers. If you offering sports medicine services, the local gyms and fitness centers might provide good connection bases. If you are an endocrinologist and want to build your diabetic treatment options, podiatrists often see many early stage diabetics.

Once you identify the possible connectors, you need to take some action. You want to reach out to these connectors and make sure they know about you and your service. You want them to feel good about recommending you, so you need to spend extra time to explain why your service is worthy of their attention. You might want to offer an open house/info session during a coffee break. Make sure you offer the coffee and snacks. Or you might do something that works with them but also demonstrates how your services are aligned. For example, a new pediatrician might coordinate with the local high school to provide sports physicals late in the summer before teams and their health forms need to be completed. Or a gynecologist might want to work with a women’s fitness center to offer an info session on menopause and exercise. The goal is to bring more people to the connector and to demonstrate your service in the process.

The focus, as Seth Godin relates, is to “find, court and delight the people” – the connectors — who are most likely to spread the good word about you and your service. Once you determine who those people are likely to be, it is then up to you to woo them and help them see the value and spirit of collaboration!


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