Marketing a specialty requires a different tack
Marketing a specialty requires a different tack
Entice patients and referring physicians
Just as marketing business attire requires a different tack than promoting a line of athletic clothing, marketing a specialty practice has its own subtle nuances compared to primary care medicine. Whether your practice is just entering the multispecialty arena, or you are an established specialty practice, we've gathered some strategies designed specifically for the specialty arena.
The primary difference between a specialty marketing plan and a primary care marketing plan is that you're going after a different audience, says Linda Waymire, marketing and public relations director at the Arnett Clinic in Lafayette, IN.
The 75-year-old clinic has 140 providers, about 80 of whom are in specialty care. With primary care, you have to appeal to the purchaser in each family, and for about 90% of health care purchases, that is the wife or mother. You concentrate your efforts on those women. Once you bring those patients into the practice through obstetrics, pediatrics, breast care, or health and wellness, you have a good chance of getting the rest of the family in if you provide good patient care.
But with specialists, the main selector of your services is a primary care physician, she says - and that is especially true as managed care penetrates more markets. Your marketing efforts then have to be directed at making yourself and your services known to those referring doctors.
While you have to be aware of the referring physician, Waymire cautions that no practice can ever forget the patient. "There are always situations where patients select you, too," she says, noting that some people are either self-insured, have an older style insurance program that doesn't include a gatekeeper, or have opted to go outside their preferred or mandated provider list.
"There are always exceptions," she says. "The point is that you don't market only one way - to the patients - or the other - to the referring doctor. What happens is you add one on to the other."
"The problem is that additional marketing means you need additional resources," Waymire says. "It's so hard, because reimbursements are going down, and money is tighter. Most organizations just don't have the resources for focus groups and surveys. Even if they pay in the long run, even if it's better than throwing marketing money out there on a hunch, it's hard to justify the expense."
Make the marketing dollars count
But that doesn't mean you should throw in the towel, she adds. "For your primary care physicians, you can keep doing what you were doing - letting the prime purchasers know about your services and about you. We do this through wellness programs, health risk appraisal services, and educational programs. We are giving something away, but it gets our name out."
Just doing that is enough to attract one segment of your specialists market, Waymire says. If you do a good job with those patients on wellness issues, then they will come to you when you need a specialist.
Marketing to the referring physician is different. "Physicians have preferences," she says. "You have to make sure that referring doctors prefer you." (For a look at how one practice markets to referring physicians, see related story, p. 46.)
Waymire says she shuns radio and newspaper spots for her specialty services. "We feel that if we direct our efforts to the primary care doctor, making sure they know who and what we have to offer, what new treatments and techniques we have, and when new staff arrive, then they will feel comfortable referring their patients to us."
Arnett Clinic publishes an elaborate referral guide on its physicians for the referral market. It includes a photo of its doctors, where they did their undergraduate work, where they attended medical school, where their residencies were, as well as any fellowships, certifications, and leadership positions in their specialty organizations. The guide also notes any special focuses the physicians have - for instance, if they are interested in minimally invasive procedures or if they like to mix alternative medicines with traditional treatments.
"We have a similar guide for our patients," she says. "But this one is much more in depth."
Waymire also schedules continuing medical education seminars with her specialists for the medical community in her area. "We give them updates on what is new and different in a given specialty. Often, the seminars have a class-like feeling, with a specialist showing an X-ray and asking participants to write their diagnosis on a piece of paper. Then they talk about the finer points of the case," she explains.
Waymire says that while continuing medical education courses aren't something physicians are always eager to attend, these programs have helped keep referrals up. In the near future, The clinic will start evaluating which physicians don't refer, and then possibly, one of the senior medical staff will go to that individual's practice to see if there is some correctable problem that will bring that referral rate up.
Recently, Waymire also started another effort to improve relations with the referring community - a newsletter for the medical community in the Lafayette area. Doctors write articles about clinical trials they are working on or new treatment options for their specialties. There is just a little notation that it is from Arnett Clinic, she says. Waymire hopes that physicians will be able to look at the mailing list and check it for increased referrals. In addition, she wants to see if the CPT codes covered by article topics go up.
Two more variables in the equation
Vance Chunn, FACHE, executive director of Cardiology Associates in Mobile, AL, says that there are two other decision makers specialists have to target when marketing - managed care companies and employers. "These [entities] both make decisions about a lot of things," he says.
To help those factions feel good about choosing his practice, Chunn developed an image brochure which can be sent to both employers - who will lobby insurers to include various practices on their provider panels - and the managed care companies themselves. "We use it to get the word out about our practice," he says. "We want to help them formulate good opinions about our organization."
Chunn spent about $9,000 to do a 4,000 print run of the brochure, which includes photographs on one side and statements about the practice's mission, its commitment to education and prevention, the use of technology, and information about its heart care team on the other side.
"We know that the feedback, verbally, is good," he says. "It's part of a collection of things that have helped us to succeed in the market. You can have great service. But if no one knows about you, what's the point? You need multiple ways of telling people about you, and this is one."
An important point to remember: Think of your marketing not as one set message but as a combination of ways to deliver a core message based on the audience, says Waymire. "Patients need one kind of information, and your referring physicians need another. You have to separate the two."
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