There are several different ways that the internet can be used for medical marketing purposes. The internet can serve as an advertising medium, a direct marketing channel, an information resource, a customer service center, and much more.
In order to succeed in online medical marketing, you must first assess internal factors such as your strengths, weaknesses, and capabilities. Then you need to size up your competition and lastly, come up with a game plan.
While planning for traditional marketing could take anywhere from six months to a year, planning for online medical marketing is much faster. What used to take weeks to implement offline only takes days online. Give yourself three to six months max to plan your online marketing strategy. This is enough time to integrate online marketing tactics into your overall marketing strategy. When getting started, your best bet is to leverage the internet through your existing marketing plan.
The ten major areas that need to be assessed for you to build an effective online medical marketing plan are the following, in no particular order:
• Goal – Determine what it is you want to accomplish with your online marketing plan. Are you providing health information? Are you building brand awareness? Are you conducting public relations activities? Are you trying to improve customer service?
• Objective – Now you must define objectives that address the goals you set for your online medical marketing plan. You can have several objectives for each goal you set. Objectives are measurable and thus allow you to determine the success of your campaign. If your goal is to generate leads for a new program, your objective can be to do so by encouraging them to visit your website and sign up for a giveaway. Set the objective of generating a specific number of leads in a specific time frame so you can measure the results of your campaign later.
• Target Audience – You need to specify who you are targeting in your online medical marketing efforts. The audience may be the same as the one you target in your traditional marketing campaign or it may be different.
• Marketing Integration – Outline which elements of your traditional marketing campaign you will be integrating into your online marketing program.
• Strategy – Outline your strategy for working towards your goals, objectives, and integration efforts. Determine what offers you will be using online, and if they will be graphically similar to your offline marketing and advertising materials or not.
• Tactics – Specify exactly what types of content you are going to develop and how you are going to deliver it, whether by email, web, download, or newsletter.
• Logistics – Determine what the technical requirements are of implementing and executing the tactics you have defined. You also need to be sure that you have the database capabilities, staffing, and competencies to go through with your marketing plan. If not, determine how you will address your shortcomings and where you can outsource. If you are running an online campaign and expect to receive emails, assign someone to answer all of those emails.
• Metrics – Measuring the success of online marketing campaigns is far easier than with other types of marketing campaigns. Determine what information you want to track, implement a tracking tool, and then collect and analyze the results. Figure out what criteria you will use to measure the success of your campaign.
• Budget – Create an overview of all the different costs associated with developing your online marketing campaign. This includes the costs of developing online content, reworking broadcast materials, and paying programmers, consultants, developers, etc.
• Timeline – When planning a timeline for your online marketing efforts, the shorter the timeline, the better. Set specific dates in your timeline for content creation, beta testing, campaign launch, etc. as milestones.
Some medical marketing campaigns focus on maximizing the potential of the current patient base whereas others focus on recruiting new patients. When you are attempting to recruit new patients, applying the fundamental marketing principle of product differentiation is useful. You must focus on the aspects of your practice that make it different from the competition. Examples of aspects of your practice that may stand out include low cost services, superior customer service, and offering services that competing practices in the area do not offer. However, given the nature of healthcare, it is not as easy for medical practices to focus on these aspects as it is for other types of businesses.
For example, Southwest Airlines may be able to cut drinks and peanuts out from their flight service in order to offer lower cost tickets. On the other hand, doctors cannot give off the impression that they would compromise operational efficiency in order to offer lower cost services. Crafting the right marketing message is very important in the medical marketing arena.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Friday, August 14, 2009
Medical Marketing Advice – Tips for Designing an Effective Medical Website
The main purpose of your medical website is to make you money and in this day and age, there is no excuse for you not to have an online presence. Websites are one of the most important medical marketing tools out there since so many people search online when they need information about medical conditions or when they need to look for a doctor in their area. Make sure your online presence is powerful by investing in an excellent website.
In the past, the yellow pages were important in medical marketing. However, they are no longer a valid option because they are costly, and produce very little results. In fact, the majority of people today rely on the internet to research medical services and procedures. Online, they can view videos, testimonials, and photos, and make instant contact. Just imagine… even if you spend just half of the money it would cost you to get an ad on the yellow pages to market yourself online, you will still get far more patients out of your efforts. If you get a full page ad in the yellow pages, it will just sit amongst hundreds of other similar ads and be seen by far fewer people.
A good medical website will create a positive cash flow for you. If you are a doctor, however, it probably means that your web developing/designing skills are limited. Furthermore, you’re probably too busy to bother with the details of building an effective website and promoting it. That’s why it’s important to hire an internet marketing company with experience in medical marketing to build your website for you and run its search engine optimization campaign.
If you hire a quality company to take care of all of your medical marketing needs, there won’t be much to do on your part besides monitor the results of the campaign. However, there are a few tips you should follow that will minimize hassle and allow you to make the most out of your campaign.
Prior to hiring an internet marketing company to lead your medical marketing campaign, purchase your own domain name. It is important that you are the owner of your domain because you never know what could happen in the future. For example, if you hire an internet marketing company, and they buy your domain and build your website for you, if you ever have any problems with them and would like to switch to another company, they may not transfer the domain to your name unless you pay them a fee. To avoid these kinds of problems, make sure you own the domain of your medical website prior to signing any contracts.
Find a company who can both build your website and take care of SEO. A common mistake that many doctors make is that they hire a web design company with no clue about SEO to design their website and then hire an SEO company to optimize their website for the search engines. The SEO company ends up having to make a lot of changes to what the web design company did in order to make the website SEO-friendly. As a result, you end up paying more for a website that is less effective. For optimal results, search engine optimization must be built into your website rather than added as an afterthought.
When looking for a company that can provide you with both search engine optimization and web design/development services, ask to see examples of their previous work and ask them to show you verifiable results of the success of their previous campaigns. Most companies will have a long and convincing sales pitch but you should prepare plenty of questions to ask to ensure that you don’t get lost in their sales message.
When interviewing companies, find out whether or not they charge for updating your content and website. Some internet marketing companies charge each time you request to have new content added or information changed. These charges can add up and end up being a substantial amount of money. Furthermore, when such charges are tacked onto your bill, it may make you reluctant about updating your website. This is bad since a constantly updated website is essential to your online success. Find out what the company’s SEO and web development package includes. Ideally, updates will be included in your monthly fee.
In order to research the background of a company and determine whether or not they are reliable, search for the company name on Google. It should be relatively easy for you to find the names of some of their clients that way. You can contact their clients to get feedback about their services. This is more effective than asking the company directly for references since they will obviously give you the names of clients that they know will only say good things about them. To get real information and answers, do your homework.
In the past, the yellow pages were important in medical marketing. However, they are no longer a valid option because they are costly, and produce very little results. In fact, the majority of people today rely on the internet to research medical services and procedures. Online, they can view videos, testimonials, and photos, and make instant contact. Just imagine… even if you spend just half of the money it would cost you to get an ad on the yellow pages to market yourself online, you will still get far more patients out of your efforts. If you get a full page ad in the yellow pages, it will just sit amongst hundreds of other similar ads and be seen by far fewer people.
A good medical website will create a positive cash flow for you. If you are a doctor, however, it probably means that your web developing/designing skills are limited. Furthermore, you’re probably too busy to bother with the details of building an effective website and promoting it. That’s why it’s important to hire an internet marketing company with experience in medical marketing to build your website for you and run its search engine optimization campaign.
If you hire a quality company to take care of all of your medical marketing needs, there won’t be much to do on your part besides monitor the results of the campaign. However, there are a few tips you should follow that will minimize hassle and allow you to make the most out of your campaign.
Prior to hiring an internet marketing company to lead your medical marketing campaign, purchase your own domain name. It is important that you are the owner of your domain because you never know what could happen in the future. For example, if you hire an internet marketing company, and they buy your domain and build your website for you, if you ever have any problems with them and would like to switch to another company, they may not transfer the domain to your name unless you pay them a fee. To avoid these kinds of problems, make sure you own the domain of your medical website prior to signing any contracts.
Find a company who can both build your website and take care of SEO. A common mistake that many doctors make is that they hire a web design company with no clue about SEO to design their website and then hire an SEO company to optimize their website for the search engines. The SEO company ends up having to make a lot of changes to what the web design company did in order to make the website SEO-friendly. As a result, you end up paying more for a website that is less effective. For optimal results, search engine optimization must be built into your website rather than added as an afterthought.
When looking for a company that can provide you with both search engine optimization and web design/development services, ask to see examples of their previous work and ask them to show you verifiable results of the success of their previous campaigns. Most companies will have a long and convincing sales pitch but you should prepare plenty of questions to ask to ensure that you don’t get lost in their sales message.
When interviewing companies, find out whether or not they charge for updating your content and website. Some internet marketing companies charge each time you request to have new content added or information changed. These charges can add up and end up being a substantial amount of money. Furthermore, when such charges are tacked onto your bill, it may make you reluctant about updating your website. This is bad since a constantly updated website is essential to your online success. Find out what the company’s SEO and web development package includes. Ideally, updates will be included in your monthly fee.
In order to research the background of a company and determine whether or not they are reliable, search for the company name on Google. It should be relatively easy for you to find the names of some of their clients that way. You can contact their clients to get feedback about their services. This is more effective than asking the company directly for references since they will obviously give you the names of clients that they know will only say good things about them. To get real information and answers, do your homework.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
5 Easy Steps for Developing Your Medical Marketing Plan
If you want to establish a strong referral base, increase the number of patients you receive in your practice, and build a positive reputation for yourself in the local community, you must have a solid medical marketing plan. Carrying out medical marketing activities without a plan will lead you to walk in circles without arriving anywhere at all.
Build a medical marketing plan so you have a course of action to follow and objectives to meet. Contrary to popular belief, developing a marketing plan for your practice doesn’t have to be a long and tedious process. Follow these 5 easy steps to craft a plan of action so you can start marketing your practice today.
1. Analyze Your Situation
The first step in developing an effective medical marketing plan for your practice, and a very important one at that, is looking at your current situation. You have to analyze your competitors and understand your target market and environment. Start out by analyzing the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats relating to your practice and marketplace.
In order to determine what your strengths and weaknesses are, you have to look at your practice’s internal situation. Analyze areas such as your services, the credentials of medical staff, office hours, financial policies, the location of your office, the office itself, and the attitude of staff members. Determine what your weaknesses are so you can improve those areas and determine what your strengths are so you can use them as competitive advantages.
Factors that are external to your practice are opportunities and threats. Find opportunities in your marketplace to improve the reputation of your practice and build your brand. You have to counteract threats in the marketplace that could put your practice in jeopardy. Threats include variations in referral patterns, fluctuations in your population base, an increase in competition, or changes in reimbursement.
When you assess your practice and marketplace, be honest in your analysis. You need to be honest in order to uncover your weaknesses and emphasize your strengths. Discover what your obstacles are as you develop strategies.
2. Set Marketing Objectives
After you analyze your situation internally and externally, you need to set marketing objectives. Objectives in your medical marketing plan must be specific, measurable, achievable, and relevant to the mission of your practice. You should set timelines for achieving your objectives.
Examples of objectives that meet these requirements include:
“The practice will expand by opening a satellite clinic in Toronto by October 2010.”
“The practice will increase the number of referring positions by 20 in 2009.”
Your objectives should relate to your clients, the services you offer, your image/brand/reputation, customer service, and the profitability and growth of your practice.
3. Determine What Strategies You Will Use to Meet Your Objectives
In order to meet your objectives, you must develop specific marketing strategies. Strategies you can use include introducing a new form of technology or service, using advertising and media relations campaigns to market your practice, providing superior customer service to achieve higher patient retention, doing community outreach to improve reputation, and conducting activities that would lead to the development of referrals.
You have to choose marketing strategies based on the type of market you are targeting. Obviously if you are trying to target physicians for referrals, you wouldn’t use the same marketing strategies as you would if you were targeting the general public. Your best bet is to use a combination of different strategies. That way you aren’t putting all of your eggs into one basket. The marketing strategies you choose will also depend on the specific objectives you have and the budget and resources you have available.
4. Ready, Set, Action!
Write down the steps that need to be taken for each marketing strategy you plan to use. Also include a timeline and budget for your plan. Assign staff members to be in charge of different parts of the campaign. Once you’ve done all of the above, put your plan into action.
5. Measure and Track Your Progress
You need to develop indicators of your progress to ensure that your campaign stays on track. Evaluate key indicators on a regular basis so you can see the rewards that have come out of all of your hard work. Tweak your campaign and make revisions as necessary based on your findings.
When you talk to new patients, ask them how they heard about you. Then you’ll know whether or not they found you as a result of one of your marketing/advertising campaigns. Keep track of any mentions of your practice by paying attention to media and counting all the times the name of your practice is mentioned. Assess the number of new patients you receive each month and keep track of the numbers of patients coming from physician referral sources. Evaluate any variations in the number of patients coming from physician referral sources over time.
Build a medical marketing plan so you have a course of action to follow and objectives to meet. Contrary to popular belief, developing a marketing plan for your practice doesn’t have to be a long and tedious process. Follow these 5 easy steps to craft a plan of action so you can start marketing your practice today.
1. Analyze Your Situation
The first step in developing an effective medical marketing plan for your practice, and a very important one at that, is looking at your current situation. You have to analyze your competitors and understand your target market and environment. Start out by analyzing the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats relating to your practice and marketplace.
In order to determine what your strengths and weaknesses are, you have to look at your practice’s internal situation. Analyze areas such as your services, the credentials of medical staff, office hours, financial policies, the location of your office, the office itself, and the attitude of staff members. Determine what your weaknesses are so you can improve those areas and determine what your strengths are so you can use them as competitive advantages.
Factors that are external to your practice are opportunities and threats. Find opportunities in your marketplace to improve the reputation of your practice and build your brand. You have to counteract threats in the marketplace that could put your practice in jeopardy. Threats include variations in referral patterns, fluctuations in your population base, an increase in competition, or changes in reimbursement.
When you assess your practice and marketplace, be honest in your analysis. You need to be honest in order to uncover your weaknesses and emphasize your strengths. Discover what your obstacles are as you develop strategies.
2. Set Marketing Objectives
After you analyze your situation internally and externally, you need to set marketing objectives. Objectives in your medical marketing plan must be specific, measurable, achievable, and relevant to the mission of your practice. You should set timelines for achieving your objectives.
Examples of objectives that meet these requirements include:
“The practice will expand by opening a satellite clinic in Toronto by October 2010.”
“The practice will increase the number of referring positions by 20 in 2009.”
Your objectives should relate to your clients, the services you offer, your image/brand/reputation, customer service, and the profitability and growth of your practice.
3. Determine What Strategies You Will Use to Meet Your Objectives
In order to meet your objectives, you must develop specific marketing strategies. Strategies you can use include introducing a new form of technology or service, using advertising and media relations campaigns to market your practice, providing superior customer service to achieve higher patient retention, doing community outreach to improve reputation, and conducting activities that would lead to the development of referrals.
You have to choose marketing strategies based on the type of market you are targeting. Obviously if you are trying to target physicians for referrals, you wouldn’t use the same marketing strategies as you would if you were targeting the general public. Your best bet is to use a combination of different strategies. That way you aren’t putting all of your eggs into one basket. The marketing strategies you choose will also depend on the specific objectives you have and the budget and resources you have available.
4. Ready, Set, Action!
Write down the steps that need to be taken for each marketing strategy you plan to use. Also include a timeline and budget for your plan. Assign staff members to be in charge of different parts of the campaign. Once you’ve done all of the above, put your plan into action.
5. Measure and Track Your Progress
You need to develop indicators of your progress to ensure that your campaign stays on track. Evaluate key indicators on a regular basis so you can see the rewards that have come out of all of your hard work. Tweak your campaign and make revisions as necessary based on your findings.
When you talk to new patients, ask them how they heard about you. Then you’ll know whether or not they found you as a result of one of your marketing/advertising campaigns. Keep track of any mentions of your practice by paying attention to media and counting all the times the name of your practice is mentioned. Assess the number of new patients you receive each month and keep track of the numbers of patients coming from physician referral sources. Evaluate any variations in the number of patients coming from physician referral sources over time.
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