How do you market the employed physician?

With dynamic changes occurring in the healthcare industry as a result of the Patient Protections and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), leading to ACOs, medical homes and such, employment of physicians is making a big comeback to the hospital industry. Born of necessity, hospitals and physicians are being driven by reimbursement changes from production of care payment, to value-based care payment and opportunity.

With this new opportunity to reinvent, revitalize and recapture what previously before had been an adventure on the part of hospitals with mixed results, its time to discuss how one goes about marketing the employed physician.

What is needed is a new look at what you are doing and changing to meet the needs of your healthcare consumer, not you.

With great change comes great opportunity. That is if one is willing to embrace that change and find new ways of moving forward and creating value.

Your Brand. Your Value. The Healthcare Consumers Choice.

You need to communicate very strongly your brand and brand promise you are associating with the employed physician. Doesn't matter if he or she is in a Medical Office Building (MOB) you own, Accountable Care Organization (ACO) or Medical Home (MH). Bring your brand to the forefront and brand the doc to you. He or she is no longer an independent practitioner. They represent your brand at an individual level. Capitalize on that opportunity and leverage it.

Communicate the value that this physician brings to your community and the healthcare consumer. Communicate the value that the doctor brings to your brand. Leverage that opportunity. Stop talking at people, talk to them. Talk to them with a compelling value driven reasons why they should select that doctor, or even why they should even considering switching physicians.

Stop wasting your money putting ads in papers that expect people to take action simply because the doctor is on your medical staff, or in one of your buildings. That treats the healthcare consumer like they are idiots. They're not. They are demanding value and acknowledgement that they have a say in what's going on. If you won't meet their needs they will go somewhere else.

Consumers are and will be paying more of the medical bill as time goes along. If you're not communicating value and what's in it for them for selecting your physicians, then you can put it in the bank that the healthcare consumer is will pass on by, and go where they perceive the value to be greatest for them in line with the price they are paying.

Michael Krivich is an internationally followed healthcare marketing blogger with over 4,000 monthly pages views in over 52 countries worldwide. He is founder of the michael j group, a healthcare marketing consultancy dedicated to creating value through strategic marketing for hospitals and health system regardless of payment mechanism either fee-for-service or value-based to increase market-share, revenue , brand and demonstrate actual return on marketing investment. Fellow, American College of Healthcare Executives and a Professional Certified Marketer, American Marketing Association.

Has the role of healthcare marketing changed?

Back in December of 2010, I wrote about the changing role of healthcare marketing in the context of PPACA. Earlier this week a reader asked if it had changed nearly two years later. Sadly, not much has changed in the current state and role of healthcare marketing.

Oh, we have added an expanded social media and online practice, but much of the changing role and strategic marketing leadership that I envisioned with the passage of PPACA hasn't taken place. It's pretty much standard operations as in the past. And that is disappointing.

Understand that I am not talking about pharma, medical device manufacturers, insurance companies, suppliers and retailers moving into the healthcare space. They get it. They understand the power and importance of marketing. This is for all the other healthcare providers that are still trying to operate like its 1990.

What I wrote about two years ago, still stands. Healthcare organizations are falling behind daily in their marketing, with little room for error or recovery. To recap that post:

Marketing Leadership

Marketing is strategy first, tactics second. The voice of marketing should reflect the voice of your customers and not be a second thought. Your future programs and services will be determined by the needs of the market, not your gut feeling. You cannot become a customer-driven or market-driven organization if the skills and experiences of marketing is not at the leadership table. Needs to be a Senior VP or VP of Marketing reporting to the CEO.

Managing the Patient Experience

If anyone is prepared to understand and mange the patient experience across the organization it's marketing. Hospitals in particular are making the mistake of putting operations in charge of patient experience. This is an oxymoron really. For the most part Ops can't get a discharge process together in less than 3 or 4 hours. How can you expect them to manage the patient experience? Patient experience means just that- understanding what that patient experiences is at all touch points. And then changing or managing that experience to its fullest potential for the benefit of the patient and the organization. Patient experience is an integrating process across the entire organization internally and externally. One organization to the patient, one patient to the organization. It is not simply another quality program or flavor of the day.

Understanding and Executing Demand Management

The hospital is no longer the center of the healthcare universe. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is designed to keep people out of the hospital. You can actually see a hospital admission as a defect in the process of care. Marketing needs to understand what the demand for healthcare services will be, when they will be needed and manage that demand making sure that the hospital or health system has the right resources, in the right place, at the right time to meet demand. Gone are the days where marketing departments will be driving demand to fill hospital beds. They will drive demand to the appropriate place and location of service.

Becoming a Revenue Marketer and Having Revenue Accountability

Return on Marketing Investment (ROMI) is necessary for anything marketing accomplishes, traditionally, socially or online. Marketers in healthcare organizations need to become revenue producers, not resource consumers that show little value beyond, it looks nice. In fact, marketing should have P&L as well as an SG&A accountability for many of the products and services being offered by a healthcare organization.

Marketing the Manager of Change

Who better in an organization than for marketing to manage the healthcare organizations transformation from an inward-focused it's all about me, to an outward-focused market and consumer driven organization? Open to much debate, this is probably the most controversial look at the expanding role of marketing. Individual who have looked internally at their organizations all of their careers, do not necessarily have the skills, training or abilities to change an organization 180 degrees. And that is the type of change we are talking about here.

Clocks ticking and you're being left behind.

Is your healthcare marketing department a sweatshop?

Though there are many great examples of healthcare marketing across the country, it seems that these are far and few between. This is a shame really because of all the talented marketers that are in the industry. More often than not, we let well meaning individuals who have no formal training or clear understanding of marketing hold sway over the direction.

I do understand the leverage that CEOs, docs, product managers and others hold over marketing. At the end of the day, he or she that signs the check or has the backing wins, right or wrong. And there is way too much of that in healthcare marketing.

With non-marketing trained people running the show causing chaos and confusing tactics with strategy, companies fall behind in markets and are either sold, became acquisition targets since they underperform, or die a slow and painful death.

So how do you exercise marketing leadership in that kind of environment? You need to understand the needs, politics and marketing understanding of the key decision makers.

Here are some questions for your consideration:

Have you let your marketing department become a sweatshop rued but others expecting you to do their bidding no matter how ridiculous the request?
Have you done everything possible to create an understanding of marketing?
Have you ensured that the marketing plan is in full alignment with the strategic and business plan of the organization?
When you suggest a strategy or tactic have I communicated what the return on investment is?
Do you in engage leadership in a discussion of the why of a strategy?
Have you been thinking strategically and not confusing tactics with strategy?
Have you reached out to key leaders and department heads when building the annual marketing plan for their input?
Have you been visible in the organization as the “go-to” marketing expert?
Have you allowed yourself to be an order taker producing lots of “stuff”?
Are you the organizational brand champion?
Are you willing to stop doing things the same old way with the same old result?
Does your organization respect what you do?
Are you willing to just say no, that's not marketing?

In a world of immediate gratification, lack of focus and favor of the day, a marketing executive’s tenure has dropped from 3 years to 12 to 18 months. With such a short time horizon, you might as well lead and know no matter what the outcome is, you gave it your best effort.

Time to stop working in a marketing sweatshop.

Are you using social media and online brand presence to make the patient experience exceptional?

With healthcare moving to a place where price and quality are drivers impacting a consumer who is sharing a much greater burden of the cost, those same consumers will eventually demand online social media experiences commonly found with other companies and services.

Online represents a great opportunity for patient-centric healthcare organizations to break from the pack and create an online healthcare experience that is memorable, exceeding an individual or families experience and expectations.

Are you ready for the challenge?

Most healthcare sites today are static and contain the usual about us, our services location, etc,., etc., etc. Little use of video or other creative ways to engage the customer. Notice that I said customer and not patient. Not everyone that comes to your site is a patient or will be a patient. They are consumers looking for information. Could be a competitor too.

In any case, when you evaluate your social media and online presence, does it:

Delight your customer?
Create sustainable differentiation?
Is adaptable to new opportunities?
Leverages your investment?
Deliver in every situation?

This is the lens that you need to look through to objectively evaluate your social or online presence. If it's not doing these things, then chances are you are not delivering an exceptional experience. But for that matter, neither are your competitors. In the world of healthcare which is too much "me too", the online healthcare experience is pretty boring.

Don't take me wrong, healthcare sites are usually pretty good if people internally have been paying attention to them. They can be described as warm, comfortable, informative, friendly. They can be described as "good enough". Not exceptional. Not delivering anywhere to the capability inherent in an online presence.

I would suggest to hospitals, IDNs, nursing home, specialty pharmacies, home healthcare operations and many others, that you look outside of the your segment of healthcare to consumer facing retail organizations, as well as pharma and medical device, viewing the type of online presence they have.

Make your online presence not just "good enough" but exceptional.

The time is now. The opportunity to change is here.

Can you have patient/customer evangelists in healthcare?

With the dynamic and changing healthcare environment, satisfaction with services is but one indicator, abet an important one, in qualifying for additional incentive payments in a value-based payment model. But satisfaction is really only a measure of future potential purchase or repurchase. It is not as commonly assumed, to be a predictor of loyalty. Just because someone says they are likely to return or recommend you to another, is only an indicator of potential purchase not loyalty.

The hospital CEO, medical business leader, managing partner, vice president, director, manger and employees need to be focusing on creating customer evangelists to not just survive, but grow and thrive in a value-based healthcare payment system.

A customer evangelist is an individual, who has such an outstanding experience that they freely become your brand spokesperson in the community. They are not paid. They have no financial sake in your survival, but have come to believe so completely in what you do, they drive business to you.

Notice I did not say patient or customer satisfaction. Anyone can have good and even high patient satisfaction scores. But, that my friend is the fix you are in. High satisfaction scores do not for one minute translate into customer evangelists. Don’t stop measuring satisfaction; you have to for a variety of reasons. I say focus on creating customer evangelists through outstanding patient-centered, or customer-centered experiences and the scores will be fine.

Ask yourself these questions.

Do you want an unassailable position in the market?

Do you want to be the market leader in healthcare?

Do you want to grow and not merely survive?

Do you want the area's best doctors on your medical staff?

If you answered yes to all the above, then you need to focus on creating patient/customer evangelists.

No better time then like the present to start.

Do you put context and content around your healthcare awards for consumers?

It sure seems like it's the season to display all those healthcare award logos in advertisements, direct mail pieces, billboards, lobby displays and a myriad of other places. This becomes even more entertaining when two or more hospitals in the same market display the same award. Don't take me wrong. Tremendous organizational effort has taken place to achieve a quality ranking by an third party.

Is just putting the award logo out there without the contextual content about what it means, serving the healthcare consumer in a meaningful way?

This is an important question for you to consider. It's not easy putting context and meaningful content together for consumers around a quality or certification award. But just putting the logo out there as some "Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval" isn't working either.

And the evidence starting to appear anecdotally, that healthcare consumers aren't buying what you are selling. An award logo means nothing to them and has no influence on their decisions.

They don't believe you.

In an industry where meaningful differentiation is hard to come by, one would think that healthcare organizations would make an attempt to educate, explain and place context around the award. With healthcare changing so rapidly on a what seems to be a daily basis, how is a healthcare consumer to make any kind of informed utilization decision based on an award logo?

What does it mean to a consumer to be named best-in-class?

You have a responsibility to place contextual content around what that award means, so that in the minds and eyes of the healthcare consumer, they gain understanding what that award means and what it means for them.

Consumers are expecting you to put contextual content around the quality award.

This is your chance in a meaningful way, to differentiate you from your competition in the marketplace. You can achieve that differentiation with those quality and operational awards from third parties, provided that you wrap them in context and content.

It will enhance your brand.

It will enhance your reputation.

It will enhance your value proposition.

It can drive revenue.

The healthcare award will not make a difference, untless you stop displayong the award logo out there, without meaningful context and content that resonates with the healthcare consumer.

Educate. Explain. Inform. Differentiate.

You may have noticed that I haven't posted much in the last couple of weeks. I have accepted a full-time position in healthcare information technology marketing. Now that things have settled down somewhat, I am back to writing about my love and passion, strategic healthcare marketing. The schedule of postings will be different, but weekly they shall remain.

Thanks for reading.

Where is your market research in patient/customer experience management?

Or, the dangers of viewing the customer-patient experience management process, thinking you know it all, it's easy to do, or only use patient satisfaction survey results.


And from the questions I get from healthcare professionals around the country, it became very clear that a key element is missing from most efforts at improving the patient experience.

Healthcare providers, aka hospitals for the most part, are not doing the required quantitative and qualitative market research on patient experience, attitudes, behaviors and expectations in their market place. They are assuming that because they read an article, go to a seminar that they know it all. They are only using patient satisfaction survey data, lean six sigma results and their previous quality improvement efforts. Few are actually talking to patients.

Had you been conducting market research on your customers-patients in the experience management process outside of  internal patient interactions, you would  be much better off. But unfortunately, most customer-patient experience management programs are focused on the 1/3rd of the encounter as a patient.

Where do you go from here?

It's important to view Customer-Patient Experience Management(CEM or PEM) in its totality, not as one service or clinical line experience. It may be for you, but to the healthcare customer-patient who experiences your organization across numerous touch-points, it's not. They aggregate all of it into one overall experience. You, as a healthcare provider, need to understand the expectations and experiences through quantitative and qualitative analysis. Then integrate that information and learning's into your efforts.

Part of the process of experience management, is actively managing customers-patients experiences to meet expectations and change their experiences, to drive revenue and market share. It's not all about the patient satisfaction numbers. CEM or PEM have definable and measurable financial outcomes. But you cannot achieve those revenue outcomes if you are not looking at experience management in its totality. And that means doing the necessary market research.

By not fully understanding your customer-patient in their totality, you are not successfully managing their experience or expectations.

The wave is here to use an oft quoted metaphor. Its consumer-directed not provider-directed healthcare. And the sooner you get it, that its not about you, but about the patient, and start looking at the customer experience in its totality, the better the chances of your survival in the coming years.

You don't have all the answers.