Focus Fall 2018 Conference
May 14, 2009
How to Successfully Niche Marketing
Your Sleep Services
Kathryn Hansen, BS, CPC, CPMA, REEGT
Integration Consultants, LLC
Sleep Education Partners
Executive Director – Kentucky Sleep Society
Executive Director – Society of Behavioral Sleep Medicine
Agenda • Sleep Lab Attraction Quiz
• What is Marketing?
• Why Market?
• Six ‘Must Implement’ Attraction Principles
• Target Markets
• What is a niche?
• Twelve Sleep Niche Market Opportunities
• The Basics of Marketing
• Use the 7 Step Sleep Market Pyramid
• More Techniques of Marketing
• Promotions You Can Easily Do
• Enhancing Your Referral Network
• Measuring Your Success
• Tips for Success
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Sleep Lab Attraction Quiz
3
Is there a written sleep lab marketing plan?
Yes No
Has your sleep team done a focused ‘walk through
the sleep lab in the patient’s shoes’ internal audit in
the last twelve months?
Yes No
Has a member of your sleep team contacted each of
your top twelve referral sources for their feedback
within the last six months?
Yes No
Sleep Lab Attraction Quiz
4
• Have you had a sleep patient ‘focus group’ provide feedback within the past twelve months?
Yes No
• Does your sleep lab have a website?
Yes No
• Is there one team member designated and accountable to monitor and grow your sleep lab’s street appeal?
Yes No
Quiz Results
Key:
Yes’s
5-6 – Excellent! Get even better!
3-4 – Good! But missing a lot of opportunity
1-2 – Poor. Needs immediate attention and commitment!
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What is Marketing?
• Marketing is EXPOSURE – Internal & external communications
– Build a reputation in your marketplace
– Create awareness among physician referrals
– Compete against other sleep centers and labs
• Marketing is also EDUCATION – Teach physicians about the effects of sleep disorders
within their specialty
– Educate the public on the symptoms of sleep
disorders and the benefits of good sleep hygiene
6
Marketing
is a
DIALOGUE!
What is Marketing?
• Marketing is A CONTINUOUS PROCESS
7
RESEARCH
STRATEGIC
PLANNING
ACTION
MEASUREMENT
The
Process
of
Marketing
Why Market?
• Attract more patients and referral sources
• Protect existing patient and referral relationships
• Beat competition
• Build your reputation
• Achieve financial goals
• Negotiate better reimbursement rates with MCOs
• Increase patient compliance rates
• Strengthen relationships with staff
• Support your community
8
Six ‘Must Implement’ Attraction
Principles
• Passion for Mission - You’ve got to
believe in it!
• You cannot NOT market
• Marketing is a Continuous Cultivation
• Perception Rules the world, not facts
• Consistent Communication is Key to
Successful Relationships
• Action Produces Results!
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Target Markets
• Don’t waste your marketing efforts by
trying to be all things to all sleep
patient markets. Concentrate on one
or a few sleep market segments.
10
What is a niche?
• Webster’s dictionary says a niche is:
“a place, employment, status, or
activity for which a person or thing is
best fitted”; “a specialized market”
11
Twelve Available Target Sleep
Markets and More
1. Family Medicine
2. Women’s Health
3. Cardiology
4. Bariatrics
5. ENT
6. Diabetes and Sleep
7. Stroke and Sleep
What role does ‘portable monitoring’ play in your target market services
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Twelve Available Target Sleep
Markets and More
7. Sedation Apnea Management (SAM)
8. OB/GYN
9. Hospital In-Patients
10. Dentists
11. Pain Management and Sleep
12. Business and Industry
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The Basics of Marketing
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Analyze Results
Measurement
Implementation
Strategic Planning
Research
Gather Information
• Market Analysis
• Competitive Analysis
• Managed Care Review
• Industry Overview
Create a Marketing Plan
• Set goals & objectives
• Select marketing strategies
• Identify marketing tactics
Take Action
• Implement marketing plan
Measure Your Efforts
• # of new patients
• # of new referrals
• Increase in patient flow
• Staff performance
Update Marketing Plan
• Change based on results
One Plan DOES NOT Fit All
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Marketing Planning
Patients Referrals Staff MCOs
Segmentation
Positioning Positioning Positioning Positioning
Marketing
Strategy
Marketing
Strategy
Marketing
Strategy
Marketing
Strategy
The Basics: Your Brand
• Your Brand Includes: – Market positioning
– Logo
– Tagline
– Tagline Modifier
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LOGO
TAGLINE
TAGLINE MODIFIER
NAME OF CENTER: Sleep Solvers
MARKET POSITIONING: Quality. Comfort. Trust.
Your Brand Ensures A Consistent Image
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The Basics: Your Brochure
• Brochure – Information to identify with patient
• Excessive snoring
• Insomnia
• Restless Leg Syndrome
– How your services benefit patient
– About you
– Credentials
– How to schedule a sleep study
– Map & directions
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The Basics: Signage
• Signage – Office signage
– Posters
• Schools
• Hospitals
• Companies with shift-work
• Local businesses
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The Basics: Directory Listings
• Yellow Pages
• Medical Directories
• Digital Markets – Linked In
• Online Directories – www.aasmnet.org
– www.citysearch.com
– www.webmd.com
– http://yellowpages.msn.com/
Search Engines – Yahoo http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html
– Google http://www.google.com/ads/
– MSN http://beta.search.msn.com/docs/submit.aspx?FORM=WSDD2 20
Colleagues
Community
Patients
Health fairs
The Basics: Website
• Informs, educates and PERSUADES
• Explains your services
• Showcases experience and credentials of staff
• Answers questions of potential patients
• Attracts new referral sources
• Conveys quality and level of service
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CAUTION: Your website is NOT an online
brochure! What will keep your patients and
referral sources coming back?
Sleep Website Tips
• Be easy to read
• Have conversational format
• Be easy to navigate
• Have substantial/helpful sleep information
• Offer confidential email, informational
resource
• Simple way to contact your sleep lab for
appointment or more information
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Customizing Your 7 Step Sleep
Market Pyramid
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Patient/Referral Relationships
Target Market
The Marketing Self Audit
Public Relations
Understand Your Environment
Determine Your Goals
Advertising
Understanding Your Environment
• 4 Controllable Elements
– Fees
– Services Offered
– Location
– Promotion
• 4 Uncontrollable Elements
– The legal and political environment
– The social and cultural environment
– The technical environment
– The competitive environment
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The Marketing Self Audit
• What is a self audit?
– A comprehensive list of questions about
your sleep lab
• What is its purpose?
– To identify your sleep lab’s strengths
and weaknesses
Walk through your referral process and patient
services in the ‘referrer’s shoes’ and in the
‘patient’s shoes’.
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More Techniques of Marketing
• Word-of-mouth Marketing
• Asking for a Referral
• Patient Satisfaction Surveys
• Direct Mail – Introduction of center (lab) + free consultation offer
– Welcome Kit
– Postcard “appointment reminder”
– “Thank you” for visiting our center (lab)
– Asking for Referral
– Patient reactivation (new services announcement)
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More Techniques of Marketing
• Online Marketing
– Website
• Search engine optimization
• Key words
– Email campaigns
– Newsletters/Blogs
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Action
Sponsor
events and activities
that relate to sleep.
It is your opportunity
to educate the
public.
More Techniques of Marketing
• Public Relations – Column in local paper
– Regular press release distribution
– Articles in sleep & sub-specialty
publications
– Speaker on relevant news / talk radio
– Panelist on relevant discussion topics
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More Techniques of Marketing
• Special Events
– Open House
– Educational in-service meetings
– Speaking engagements
– Free seminars
• Community Outreach
– Sponsorship of foundation & charity events
– Active participation in relevant support groups
– Active participation in business associations
• Advertising
– Radio
– Television
– Online
– Billboards
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Action
Time Tested Marketing Promotions
You Can Easily Do
Visit regular and potential referral sources
Provide ‘patient sleep screening’ for family medicine groups at their practices
Consistently provide once a month ‘lunch and learn’ at selected group practices in your area
Return sleep study result reports to referring physicians within 48 hours. Always assure you will return their patients to them
Ask patients for referrals
Offer a ‘sleep health and disorders’ program to your community in a community meeting room at a library, church or other meeting venue
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Time Tested Marketing Promotions
You Can Easily Do
Speak to civic clubs (Rotary, Lions, etc.), PTA’s, churches, special interest groups, medical rounds.
Provide sleep screenings in churches, synagogues, shopping malls
Write special sleep article or column for community newspapers, neighborhood publications
Advertise your website with special, confidential sleep evaluation quizzes and inventories.
Do ‘community sleep health spot’ on local radio and TV stations
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Enhancing Your Referral Network
• Identify your best source of referrals
– Review existing referral sources
– Identify new referral sources
• Geographic location
• Sub-specialties
• Community
• Hospital
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Action
REFERRAL
DATABASE
Enhancing Your Referral Network
• Marketing Liaison
– Build relationships with referral sources
– Educate on sleep
– Host educational in-service meetings
• Create joint marketing opportunities
– Multi-specialty promotions
• Brochure
• Website linkage programs
• Special events
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Action
Measuring Your Success
• Spend your promotional dollars wisely – Based on goals
– Based on capacity
– Based on market need
• MEASURE every tactic – Establish metrics for all marketing programs
– Track the success / failure of programs
– Understand your Return On Investment (ROI)
• RE-EVALUATE your programs regularly – What may work for others may not work for you
– Discover your best practices
– Use findings to refine marketing programs
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Measurement
Tips for Success
• Start with the basics
– Increase efforts with targeted marketing
• Strategic planning is key
– ONLY implement the programs that directly match
your goals and objectives
– Understand your capabilities
• One-size DOES NOT fit all • Target your marketing efforts to make them count
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RESEARCH
STRATEGIC PLANNING
IMPLEMENTATION
MEASUREMENT
The Marketing Process
Action Planning
ACTION
PRODUCES
RESULTS!
36
Questions?
???
859 312 8880
Email: kathrynhk
@msn.com
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