Feature Article:

Solving Marketing Challenges — Focus on Communication

By Shelley Simon, RN, DC, MPH, EdD
Founder, Beyond Practice Management

This is the first article in the three-part series, Solving Marketing Challenges. Part two, Focus on Patient Education, will be in the November issue of Practice Your Way, followed by part three, Focus on Building Patient Relationships, in December

Regardless of your stage in practice, if you are going to build your business, you must market your services. And yet, healthcare practitioners resist marketing for a variety of reasons. They don?t know what to do or they?ve had inconsistent results with past marketing efforts. Many view marketing as unseemly, hold a belief that ?excellent? practitioners shouldn?t have to engage in marketing, or think that having to market themselves is a sign of failure. By reframing the way you view marketing, the process becomes not only easier but also more effective. Marketing is not an event, or even a series of events. It?s an ongoing internal and external communication process that you engage in on a daily basis.

Without a doubt, marketing presents challenges, including overcoming one?s own negative bias toward the process. It?s helpful to remember that marketing is not selling. Done properly, marketing presents opportunities for improving communication with patients, furthering the educational process, and building long-term relationships. If you?ve ever felt that patients don?t appreciate the value of your services, can?t understand why they should continue with a course of treatment or why they enjoy good results but fail to refer others to your practice, then you?ve come face to face with some of the classic and universal marketing challenges that healthcare practitioners struggle with every day.

In the May issue of Practice Your Way, we discussed five universal challenges that healthcare practitioners face relative to marketing their services. If you missed that issue read it here. To recap, the five challenges are:

• Attracting the attention of potential patients.
• Providing the right information at the right time.
• Converting ?interested? potential patients into active patients.
• Maintaining the doctor-patient relationship.
• Providing a level of service that results in retention and referrals.

In all likelihood, most of your current patients were once complete strangers. The purpose of marketing is to develop affiliations and build relationships with relative strangers until they are comfortable enough and motivated enough to allow you to care for them. This process can take a few minutes or several encounters, but either way the steps are the same: getting attention, gaining familiarity, sharing information, and giving the individual an experience of you and the necessary time to conclude that there is something in it for them to work with you.

This article is the first in a series of three on how to address universal marketing challenges and get better results. By better understanding the principles and skills associated with communication, patient education (coming in November), and building relationships and patient loyalty (December) — and by framing marketing as an opportunity to develop and use skills in these three areas — a great deal of the mystery and frustration around promoting your practice will disappear.

Many marketing problems are really communication problems in disguise. Let?s look at the first three universal marketing challenges and how they can be solved with skillful communication, which is about much more than simply listening and talking. Communication involves being fully present, demonstrating genuine interest in others, expressing empathy, and putting the desires of the patient first.

1. Attracting attention. Your potential patient may not know anything about your services, who you work with, or the kind of results you produce. Or, if they do know, they might have misconceptions or biases about what you do. Before you can begin any kind of meaningful dialogue, you must have an individual?s attention and interest. The initial aim in the marketing process is to establish a connection with an individual and then offer a brief, concise message that communicates the essence of what you do. This means sharing the basics, not relating everything you know and especially not delving into how your services work — the process and mechanics, your philosophy, credentials, etc.

When someone asks what you do, how do you answer? The easy response is to offer a label or title: I?m a dentist, I?m a chiropractor, I?m a dermatologist. This is fine, but it says nothing about what you can do for the person asking the question. Naturally, when someone asks what you do, you?ll give a straight answer, but you can easily expand your reply to raise interest on the part of the person inquiring. For example:

• "I?m a dentist. My office specializes in caring for patients who want a gentle approach when it comes to taking care of their teeth and gums.?
• "I?m a chiropractor and work with patients who want to stay active well into middle age, and beyond.?
• "I?m a dermatologist. I care for patients who want to keep their skin healthy and maintain a natural, youthful appearance.?

If a potential patient continues to express interest at this point by sharing something about themselves, you can tell a story to engage them, one that relates to their need or interest. For example: ?One patient came to me with persistent, disabling lower back pain. She?d tried everything, but nothing helped and she was feeling pretty hopeless. We customized a treatment plan for her and within two months her back was markedly improved and her overall energy and enjoyment of life returned. Now, about a year out, she rarely has pain. She tells me she?s more productive and successful in her job, she?s has gone back to running without injury, and she?s lost 30 pounds.?

The purpose of this initial communication is not to get the prospect to sign up for care or ?buy,? but to pique their curiosity, perhaps help them see where they may have gaps in their knowledge base, and get them to ask for more information. At this point in time you simply want the potential patient to have a stake in the conversation and explore what might be in it for them to engage with you (during this current conversation, not to mention future care). Stay focused on their immediate concerns and think about what and how much they need to know at this time. Assuming a person remains interested, you can then move the conversation forward by letting them know you understand their problem, by demonstrating empathy, and by sharing, in slightly more detail, how you can help them.

2. Providing the right information at the right time. By engaging a potential patient as described in challenge #1 above, you?ve earned the right to begin offering more information about how you work. This can be a trap because it?s easy to assume that we know what people want or think they need. Most practitioners launch into a way-too-detailed process of what they do and ramble on ad infinitum about their approach and philosophy, when they should be focusing on the one thing that?s really on the patient?s mind which is: what do I have to gain by becoming your patient? At this point the practitioner?s job is to answer that question without being pushy. By understanding the patient?s genuine needs and desires, you can address the question of what?s in it for them and, in doing so, begin to establish trust and credibility. Here?s an example:

The potential patient says (upon finding out you are a dentist): Two different dentists I?ve seen have recommended really expensive treatments, like crowns or a bridge. Why can?t they just fill the cavity?

What you?re tempted to say: Well, there?s research to show that once you?re beyond a certain age there are valid reasons for . . . it may seem expensive, but studies have shown . . . in my practice I always . . . my experience has been that . . . (until the person?s eyes glaze over).

What you should say instead: What?s your understanding about why a crown or bridge was being recommended?

No matter how many scripts you?ve read or used over the years that sound good to you, know that even a semi-savvy patient can tell when you?re giving them information only in an attempt to get them to sign on for treatment. Obviously, if a patient starts asking for more detail about your process, your experience, or what research shows, you?ll answer them. If this is the case, you?re probably easing into marketing challenge #3.

3. Converting ?interested? potential patients into active patients. This third challenge is about helping someone who is interested become someone who is committed to moving forward with care. This step in the marketing process, like the two above, cannot be rushed. And, it?s not just about getting new patients; it?s about getting the right new patients. Patients make assessments about whether or not to work with you, and you should be simultaneously qualifying patients to determine if you want them in your practice. Is this person genuinely interested in better health? Are they ready to take action? You see that the patient has a problem, but do they see they have a problem? How likely is this individual to follow through with a treatment plan? Do you offer what this particular patient needs?

Getting to the bottom of these issues requires deeper conversation than is required to address the first two marketing challenges. Once again, this is not the time to tell the potential patient what you can do for them, about all of the great services you provide, and how if only they?d sign up to be your patient today you could make them better in no time. Instead, this is the time to gently help the patient see if or how they would benefit from being under your care. While clinical questions will obviously arise at this stage in the process, this conversation is not a clinical or diagnostic interview. It is an exchange in which the prospective patient?s question is, ?Can you help me? They are assessing whether you are credible, trustworthy, and caring. Your main objective should be to assess the patient?s situation and be present and empathetic as you answer their questions honestly.

At this point in the marketing process patients are looking for substantive, individualized answers to their questions. Why do I need this service? What results can I expect? How does this all work? You may need to spend more time in conversation or this may be an opportunity to give the patient written materials about their condition, offer a complimentary consultation, or invite them to attend an educational class you are offering. Again, instead of delving too deeply into your process and philosophy, continue to collect information from the patient that will help you partner with them in providing care. Some helpful questions for digging a little deeper into an individual?s motivation are:

• What was the tipping point that brought you here today?
• What kinds of results or outcomes would make a difference to you?
• What would the impact of achieving these results be in your life?
• What is important to you in your relationship with a healthcare provider?
• How will you know that you are making progress?

Before moving too quickly into converting a prospect into a new patient, think about a patient in your practice you wish you?d never met. You know the one — demanding, slow to pay, non-adherent, and annoying. Think back to when you first encountered this person. Did you encourage her, even push her a little? Did you assume that because he was ?willing? that you had to take him on as a patient? Were there red flags from the get-go? I pose these questions to drive home this point: you don?t have to take every patient. It?s okay to play a little hard to get. Not in a coy or insincere way, but rather with a genuine interest in building the kind of practice you look forward to going to each day. As you work to convert interested patients into active patients, remember that marketing is a two-way street.

The three marketing challenges that are addressed with communication are largely about practicing restraint, being curious, and not assuming you know what someone needs before connecting with them enough to really find out. They involve learning not to over-communicate. In subtle ways throughout all of your interactions with potential patients, you should be considering how to build your practice — by conveying who you work with, the problems you address, the results you produce, and — in strict moderation — how you do what you do. The key word here is subtle. Even in your calls to action, keep in mind that pushing too hard too fast will drive away the very patients you want to attract.

You can grow your business with less struggle, erase the mystery that so often surrounds marketing, and attract and retain satisfied patients — all by developing and using skills and strategies to communicate more effectively. The solution to all marketing challenges is developing yourself professionally and increasing your marketing know-how, including communication. A new tactic or script will not help you marketing more effectively. Successful marketing is something that you incorporate into your practice on a daily basis. Let your office be you learning laboratory — your personal seminar — as you hone your skills with each patient encounter.

Client's Corner:

Storytelling 101

Q. Is it effective (without using names of course) to describe one patient?s condition and experience to another patient in an effort to help them see the value in my services?

A: Definitely. When a patient asks something along the lines of ?have you seen a problem like mine before?? an excellent way to answer is with a real story. Simply describe a patient who presented with a similar problem, discuss briefly what their course of treatment was like, and share the results they experienced. Keep the story short, but make it memorable. End with a benefit your listener can relate to such as, ?he?s back to playing golf every weekend? or ?she was able to go back to work after just a few treatments.? If your potential patient then asks for more detail, don?t keep telling the story. Instead, relate the story to the patient sitting in front of you — the one whose needs and perspective are unique to them. While you tell a story to gain credibility, remember that the individual listening probably thinks his or her symptom or complaint is special or different. When you tie the story to their situation they feel they?ve been heard. This kind of communication, rather than answering questions conceptually, can move a potential patient from information to experience. It?s more persuasive than fact after fact and highlights the value of your work and who you are as a doctor.