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.” –Albert Einstein

Like many of you, I am assessing how I should react to the downturn in the economy. It may come as a surprise to many of you, but you should increase your advertising and marketing during a recession.

Over the last 100 years there have been 20 recessions - ten since World War II. Consensus would indicate that we are soon entering a new one. Studies show that when the economy enters a recession, 75% of companies respond by cutting back, hunkering down, and trying to “tough it out”. In big companies one of the first things to go is advertising, because it is an easy expense to eliminate. But this is a Big Mistake!

Research shows that companies should increase advertising during periods of economic slowdown. The idea is that competitors will spend less and, so, the company that continues to advertise will come out of the economic downturn with better name recognition and a better customer base.

Well the same is true for your practice. You need to continue to mail your newsletter, you need to continue to run lead generation ads, and you need to continue to have celebrations like open houses, patient appreciation days and anniversary celebrations. As a matter of fact, because you are offering the event for free, with a down economy the event will probably be better attended.

One of the things you can do to benefit both your unemployed patients as well as your practice could be to offer any existing practice member who has been laid off during the past 60 days and has lost their health benefits free care for a given period of time, say 4-8 weeks. During this time you should encourage them to bring their children, the whole family, explaining to them that chiropractic is a great way to avoid costly medical expenses by keeping you healthy.

The idea here is best explained this way.

The patient will appreciate you going out of your way for them

1. In most cases the patient will regain employment and thus again have health benefits available to them or cash if you are non insurance.
2. If a large percentage of your community is working and not unemployed, you could open up the promotion to the entire population and of course get tons of free publicity for it, which, would elevate you in the community at large.

You could even do a modified job fair in the office. Get creative, always try to make lemonade from lemons

It’s important to remember that during a recession consumers don’t stop buying. While they become more selective, they are still going to buy from someone. They are more likely to buy from businesses that they know and like. The same holds true for chiropractic and health care. If you have done even a fair job in educating your patients in the benefits of chiropractic, then they will stick with you.

The Power Of Celebrations
According to authors Jack and Suzy Welch, co-authors of the book Winning, celebrating makes people feel like winners. It also creates an atmosphere of recognition and positive energy.  ”Imagine a team winning the World Series without champagne spraying everywhere,” they say. “You just can’t! And yet companies win all the time and let it go without as much as a high five.

Not to recognize moments of achievement in peoples lives is a huge mistake in any business. There are so many opportunities, with our staff and with our practice members, grab as many as you can. Make a big deal out of them. The sad fact is that if you don’t, chances are no one will, thus making you even more special in the mind of the employee or practice member.

Reality check: “Do you know why most employees leave their jobs?” asks a newsletter from Lawrence Ragan Communications, Inc. “Because they get in a ‘rut’ and are, in a word, bored. Sweep employees out of their ruts by launching ‘guerilla celebration’ attacks. Have bagels and coffee waiting for employees on a random Tuesday. Keep employees off-balance about what you’re going to do next. It’s the sort of thing that separates one company from another - and convinces employees to stay put when they are thinking about leaving.”

For your practice members public pats on the back are a great way to make them feel special. You can put up a white board in the waiting area listing and celebrating the various accomplishments of your practice members.  Or include them in your monthly newsletter. You can say something like; “Congratulations to practice member Mary Smith on her son becoming an Eagle Scout” your staff and practice members will feel like they’re on a winning team. Here’s a short list of possibilities that you can celebrate:

• Employee anniversary milestones;
• The achievement of practice goals;
• Your practice’s anniversary;
• The busiest day, week, or month since the beginning of the year; or
• To mark the end of a project, such as implementing your practice’s Web site, a major change in appointment scheduling, or remodeling the office.
• Practice members marriages or their children’s marriages
• Practice members college graduates or children or grandchildren of members graduations
• A practice members retirement
• A practice members promotion
• The accomplishment of practice member’s children. Parents take a great deal of pride in their children’s successes
• Practice members anniversaries, (a big one only) such as 50 years
• Etc, etc.

Ron Zemke and Chip R. Bell, co-authors of Service Wisdom, say recognition and celebrations are ways of reaffirming to people that they are an important part of something that matters. They say that little ceremonies can be significant motivators for people. It can motivate your staff to work harder and take more pride in their personal performance. It can motivate practice members to refer friends and family.

Some of the benefits of celebrating include:

• Promotes teamwork because people feel bonded with one another;
• Creates energy. People feel renewed, their batteries recharged;
• Builds people’s self-esteem by recognizing their contributions and achievements;
• Communicates you value them, this goes for both employees and practice members.
• Makes work more fun.

Action steps: There is no right way to celebrate. In fact, try to explore different forms of celebration to keep things from being routine and predictable.

Make events fun and festive. Get lots of ideas by getting everyone involved with the planning and execution. And keep the focus on the people and achievements you’re recognizing. Otherwise, it’s just another party.

Celebrations remind everyone that goals not only exist, but are exciting, important, and attainable. Celebrations are also a way of nourishing team spirit.

A celebration represents a moment in time when the efforts of many people can be seen, felt, and enjoyed.

In highly human terms, celebrations let your staff and practice members know you are paying attention.

 

Finding the Right Consultant

Let me begin by stating this is not going to be an attack on other practice management consultants. On the contrary. Most of the consultants I have heard about serve a very useful purpose and can be of tremendous help to any practitioner. Many horror stories abound and I have no way of knowing which are true and which are urban legend, they include the consultant who told his client not only how to lay out the office, but what colors to use, and the doctor’s wife was an interior decorator. Needless to say, the sparks flew during this encounter. There was also the one where the doctor had to literally pay off the consultant so he could start running his own office. Some doctors complain they are not only told what to say and when to say it, but they even try to control their thinking! After chatting with the doctor, I wasn’t sure that he could think without a little prodding from someone. Then there was the doctor who attended all of the “free” seminars offered by the consultant and then decided to sign up. After he did, he quickly realized that he had already seen the best of what the consultant had to offer. This reminds me of the definition of an “expert.” “An expert is a regular guy who is in from out of town”

It amazes me how most chiropractors choose a consultant. They wake up one morning take a look at their practice, where they are at, and I don’t mean that in a physical sense, and they just push the panic button. They then pick up the phone and call the first consultant who comes to mind and say, “fix me!” Does this scenario sound all too familiar? It should, it’s what most of your patients say and the want it done NOW and usually with little effort on their part. All they want is a quick fix.

This is exactly what a lot of chiropractors expect too and of course without even having to do any of the work. The consultant is thrust into a role they would rather not be in. Some, however, lose sight of what they are really there for and enjoy this new position and just go with the flow. They then take on the role and say to their disciple­­, excuse me, I mean client ­­just take two ideas and call me in the morning.” For the chiropractor who goes into this type of relationship, it isn’t long before the honeymoon is over. They feel like they have gone to a feast at an oriental restaurant, and after stuffing themselves with a lot of fluff, the hunger returns all too soon!

We have all seen chiropractors who have “been there, and done that,” and heard their sad tales. Over 90 of my clients have been with at least one other practice management group, some have been signed to as many as 5.  Why have these doctors gone through multiple consulting programs?  The main reason is that the chiropractor does not set any realistic goals of what he or she expects the consultant to do for them. Instead, they buy into the BS that the consultant spews not knowing that the consultant is really working with a numbers game. There are only a small percentage of those who sign up who will ever reach their goals, but the consultant does say anything about that, instead he touts the testimonials from the 10% who have achieved the goals they have set, while the other 90% keep hanging on hoping to reach that $1 million dollar mark.

Before you enter into any relationship with a consultant, you should set some realistic goals for what you want to correct and accomplish and then make sure the consultant understands what your goals are. He/she should over a month or two know you on a personal basis and what the problems in your practice are. You should ask them if they can really help you accomplish these goals.

Step One: Can they really help you accomplish what you want to accomplish? Remember, what you want to accomplish; not what they want to accomplish for you.

Step Two: Very simply, do you like the consultant? Do you feel you can work with them? Since you are going to be working with this person, make sure you can stand being around them. If your gut feelings are not good, listen to your gut.

Step Three: The financial consideration. There will be a fee involved, and you need to be very clear as to what the fee is and what the contract you are expected to sign states in language you can understand. If you are not sure, have them put it in a letter form that spells everything out and that it becomes part of the contract to avoid any future misunderstandings. Don’t feel that you must play the role and act like you understand every contract you read even though you don’t. You may later find out what you didn’t understand in a court of law, a very expensive way of getting an explanation. A much better and cheaper way is to ask for clarification in letter form, which, upon acceptance, will become part of the contract. It might not hurt to have your attorney review it too.

Most consultants want you to sign a contract that states it will run for a specified period of time. If you are still not sure you want to work with this person, you might ask if they will give you a “test period,” or at least an option to get out of the contract without a high penalty. They may or may not be willing to agree to this, but it never hurts to ask if you are unsure.

By the way, it is not out of line to ask the consultant for a time line they feel is realistic for them to get you where you want to go. After achieving this goal, like your patients many chiropractors require in “maintenance” for the rest of their professional life!

Building Your Practice The Old Fashioned Way. It Still Works Great

What is the number one method medical and dental offices use to build their practices? Referral cards.

What is the number two way? Employee referrals.

The best established strategy is to put existing patients and staff to work for you!

If you think that building your practice is always an expensive proposition that makes use of aggressive advertising techniques, you’re in for a big surprise. In fact, you can develop a strong, profitable practice by putting to work your two best resources–your patients and your staff.

Once you make the decision that you need to do some marketing to build your practice, you must decide what form that effort will take. In my opinion, internal marketing is the most efficient way to enlarge a practice, and that is best accomplished by maximizing referrals.

Your patients are the ones who hold the key to increasing referrals. A satisfied patient will gladly refer his or her friends to you. One study of 80,000 patient interviews found that most doctors (less than 3%) do not overtly ask for referrals from their patients, and this is an enormous untapped source of marketing–for in this same study over 97% of the patients interviewed were willing to refer.

As a consultant, the primary (#1) practice builder is the patient referral card. It looks like a business card but it includes a message such as the following: “Dr. (your name), Please give ______ the same good attention that I have been receiving. Sincerely, (your patient).” (Not invented by me, but probably by the old master, Jim Parker)

I suggest that you say to your patients, for example: “Mrs. Black, would you mind doing me a favor? I would like you to take two of our patient referral cards and give them to two of your friends or colleagues who would like to receive the same good chiropractic care you are receiving.”

If patients do not mind (and 97% of them do not), give them the cards. Then ask your patients to place their name on the cards so that when individuals they referred come in for an appointment, you can personally thank them for passing on your name.

I strongly recommend that you, the doctor, make this request yourself rather than delegating the job to a staff member. Surveys indicate that some practices will get a 70 to 90% referral rate if the chiropractor does the requesting, compared with only 20 to 40% if it is done by the CA. Making that request takes only 10 to 30 seconds of your time, and it is the cheapest marketing tool you will ever find. With a referral card system, the size of your practice can be doubled within 12 to 18 months.

Of course, maintaining a professional image in your office is also an important consideration for retaining and enlarging your patient base. The dress and demeanor of your staff should communicate competence. Staff members working with patients in technical areas should wear lab jackets with name tags, while those in the front office should wear upscale street clothes with name tags.

The second best practice-builder is employee referrals. Patients feel good about a recommendation from an employee because they know it comes from someone who knows the practice inside out. Try using an employee incentive card, which is simply a business card with a short message on the back inviting the prospective patient to come into the office with or without an incentive. The card should also include a place for the employee making the referral to sign his or her name.

When a new patient comes in with the card, you can reward the responsible employee $5 or $10 per patient, if this is legal in your state, otherwise a non monetary reward system could be put in place. Every employee sees and talks to at least one person per day who is not a part of the practice.

Think of how many referrals you can get from just one employee’s efforts.

Don’t Be Left Out Again; Only 4 Spots Left For April Coaching Class

Many of you continue to struggle and now you are even more worried with the dramatic downturn in the economy. I know in my own practice hardly a week goes by that I don’t hear of layoffs, either my patients or their places of employment.

As you know, when someone loses their job the next they lose is their health benefits. So there is a trickle down effect that even affects you, the chiropractor. 

As things start to get tighter you’ll need to have a plan in place, a plan that can tell you who to attract to your office and how to attract them, a plan to show you how to structure fees, so that your care is affordable and yet fair to you.

I have been doing this for 3 years now and have weathered many an economic storm.  Dam! I was in practice when Jimmy Carter was president and survived and thrived, it does get worse then Jimmy.

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