“I send referrals to the last person who brought me lunch.” Even if a doctor has not been this forthright with you, most of you probably have wondered if this is not true.  The referral-based provider might think this doctor is just being selfish.  In truth, this doctor is really saying that he does...
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Entrench Your Place in the Minds of Your Customers Market positioning is arranging for a brand to occupy a clear and desirable place, relative to competing brands, in the minds of target consumers.  Medical professionals are overloaded with information about products and services.  They cannot re-evaluate providers every time they make a referral decision. ...
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A new study completed this week provides continuing validation of a marketing strategy that Brazzell Marketing Agency calls the “Referral Doubling Strategy.”  The study finds that home health care agencies using the strategy are more likely to experience growth and that their rate of annual growth is 375% above average (38% vs. 8%). One...
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“Excellent firms don’t believe in excellence, only in constant improvement and constant change.” – Tom Peters, a renowned management consultant - Business always has been and always will be about “What have you done for me lately?”  From the way you respond to your employees to the way your referral sources respond to your...
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Brazzell’s Boiling Pot model for understanding referral-source behavior. Conventional wisdom in the marketing industry holds that your advertising must reach customers 12 times before they will take action.  While this is largely true, healthcare providers who have conducted successful communications programs know that many referral sources respond long before 12 communications.  How can the...
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Many of you were probably told to never name the competition.  Naming the competition in your advertising or sales efforts is tantamount to buying advertising for them.  Naming the competition runs the risk of familiarizing one of your loyal customers with one of your competitors for the first time.  However, in marketing, spoils go...
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Quick! Name a Good Place to Call for Home Infusion! The first place that you name has your top of mind awareness.  The minds of every nurse, physician, and PA contain lists of health care providers.  Your position on the lists determines the number of referrals you receive.  More importantly, you can control your...
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“Familiarity breeds contempt,” or so the old saying goes. In healthcare marketing, familiarity breeds trust. Doctors and patients prefer to work with those whom they know. They might know you from a previous work place, church, or recreational activities, and this relationship gives you the edge when it comes to getting future referrals. However, even in small communities,...
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When designed well, brochures can act as consummate salespeople that sit in the lobbies of doctors’ offices, in the homes of your patients, and any other place you choose.  The degree to which those brochures actually help the provider varies widely.  Here are some tips for designing brochures that sell. Throw Them Off a...
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A Success Strategy from Drug Company Marketing Inasmuch as Big Pharma boasts some of the highest profit margins in the world, their business models including their impressive marketing strategies deserve study.  In this article, we explore one strategy in their advertising that makes all their advertising endeavors more successful.  In 1997, the US Supreme...
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