With each healthcare professional I meet one-on-one for the free practice analysis we offer, one of the many questions I always ask is: “Who’s in charge of your marketing?”
Over the last 28 years, I have gotten quite a variety of answers:
- What marketing?
- Nobody!
- We don’t do marketing in our practice – all our new patients are from word of mouth (that’s because they don’t do any other marketing).
- Me?
The next question I ask is: “Do you have a written, organized Marketing Plan?” The answer has been resoundingly “no.” The next question is: “Is it because you don’t think one is necessary or is it because you don’t know how to do one?” The answer is usually the latter.
The point is: If you want a lot of new patients coming in the front door, you need to market (in addition to increasing the word of mouth by your patients, of course). You have to make yourself known and chosen by all the right people. This is called Target Marketing.
Don’t subscribe to the theory that “if you build it, they will come.” That is passive marketing and it is a slowwww way of growing (at best). Pro-active marketing is the way to go, whether by fliers, open houses, fun events, give-aways, sponsoring teams, social media marketing, websites and other Google marketing methods, YouTube videos, podcasts, email newsletters once a month to your patients, etc. etc. etc.
There is absolutely no shortage of cheap and easy marketing methods. The main thing is to decide who is in charge of your marketing and then get a written marketing plan in place and START. If your marketing is not driving the New Patient numbers up, change it up and try again. Don’t relax on this.
