Remember that all of this will take time to pay off. Think in terms of long-haul relationships with community contacts and with the audiences who attend your presentations — give tactics time to bear fruit before dumping them in favor of the next exciting idea.
Do, however, track results by asking every patient how they found you. That pricey phone book ad may not be worth it if it’s only netted you a few patients after a year. A well-considered sponsorship, on the other hand, might be just the thing. Terpenning’s practice, for instance, highlights its work in breast and ovarian cancer every year by sponsoring a team in the Revlon Run-Walk for Women to raise money for research.
What’s tech got to do with it?
When most people think of marketing, traditional media is usually what comes to mind. And it’s true that folks in many areas of the U.S. are today far more accepting of radio and billboard ads from physicians than in 1982, when the AMA lifted its ban on physician advertising.
In fact, members of the new generation of tech-savvy “healthcare consumers” expect to be able to easily find and compare information on medical providers and facilities. Witness the ads from individual practices increasingly popping up as sponsored listings on Internet search pages. When carefully deployed, such electronic advertising campaigns — which can be conducted regionally, nationally, or internationally, depending on your needs — are a relatively low-cost way of dramatically increasing a practice’s visibility.
And it’s not just wired youngsters and urban professionals who are eager to connect digitally. The vast majority of people with Internet access want the ability to e-mail their physicians: One survey a few years ago pinned it at 90 percent; others say the figure is in the high 70s and going up every year. According to AARP, 82 percent of baby boomers use the Internet for everything from e-mail to managing their finances and playing online games.
New technology tools are increasingly at the intersection of marketing activities and a sound patient relations strategy. There’s value, to be sure, in having your practice perceived as a leading-edge tech adopter, but most compelling for patients may be improvements in access to information.
“Technology enables possibilities for community health, for example, letting cancer patients share information with their siblings — and their siblings’ physicians — across the country so that they can obtain targeted genetic counseling,” explains Terpenning. Patients place great value on information-sharing, she says, and appreciate her practice for providing high-quality educational resources. Serving as a trusted repository for such tools makes patient loyalty that much easier to win.
Other physicians also cite technical prowess as important for patient relationship-building, with many saying that enhanced Web services, improved links between office systems, and even e-visit capabilities are near-term goals in their practices.
Ott, for one, has accomplished the dual aims of being tech-smart and increasing her patients’ responsibility for their care: She hired a Web designer to create an easy-to-use but highly functional online scheduling system. Because Ott knew what she needed from such a system, she was able to avoid pricey software packages and subscription fees by going custom. A certain amount of DIY effort is required, she says, “but it’s no big deal — I can adjust open hours and holidays on my own through an editing function.”
Her patients, too, are expected to put in a little DIY time by selecting their own appointment types (and, therefore, visit lengths) from a menu of options. Ott’s off-the-shelf calendar program syncs up with her cell phone, allowing constant access to a schedule that she can quickly update upon receiving an automatically generated new-appointment notice from the system.
Ott says 90 percent of her patients use online scheduling, with good results (not to mention low overhead). “So far I am not having trouble with patients overbooking themselves too much,” she says. “There may come a time when I feel more pressed for minutes, but so far it is working well.”
Don’t over-promise
If you go the technology-as-patient-relations route, those solutions had better deliver what they promise. Given increasingly difficult customer service interactions in other industries, at least some consumers are primed to be frustrated at having to use automated systems rather than getting live help.
Physicians who start with manageable technologies will be able to gradually increase the services they offer, incorporating new features into their practices as revenue warrants. And don’t forget that each new capability represents a chance for patient outreach — when you start offering a hassle-free scheduling option or secure e-mail communications, your community will want to know about it.
Terpenning notes that it’s far better to begin modestly than to make a grand announcement about, say, your new interactive Web site, complete with bells and whistles. This goes for other patient relations strategies as well. Think of the eager, energetic young doctor who sends out a splashy practice newsletter, promising monthly publication, but never again finds the time to work on the project.
Patients and colleagues are left to wonder about his follow-through in other areas, and future announcements are more likely to meet with skepticism. It’s OK to have a basic Web site and add to it over time — that’s eminently preferable to having a bunch of pages perpetually “under construction” and “coming soon!”
Be aware, too, of the ways in which you’ll be judged in the brave new interconnected world. Santmyire-Rosenberger recommends paying heed to physician rating sites such as DrScore.com or RateMDs.com. You can’t always control what ends up on these sites, but as of this writing, about 120 patients on DrScore had given Santmyire-Rosenberger near-perfect scores in overall exam, timeliness, treatment, and staff.
