Just Aud Stuff blogspot

Tips to help you with your website or blog.

2012-09-01T16:11:00.000+01:00

I have been thinking more and more about web presence and the perceptual effect that a site has on a prospective Patient. The following is a summation of my own thoughts and some of the elements that I have noted on the web.

There is a lot of information out there in relation to business web presence and strategy. From using keywords to optimise your site for search engines, to your actual ongoing strategy for having a web presence. The latter is something that a lot of companies just do not think about in a in depth manner. Simply put, why are you on the web and what is your long term strategy for your web presence.

If you do not think clearly about this question and then utilise your strategy effectively, you are wasting your time. I will come back to this subject and explain further the concepts and practices that pertain to long term web strategy in another post.

The overall goal for your website is to attract and keep visitors. If you have undertaken the hard work to have your page highly ranked in the search engines, or indeed you have undertaken some marketing to increase your web traffic, it makes sense to ensure your visitor stays on your site. These tips may assist you to accomplish that goal.

What are some of the ways you can improve the overall chances that a customer will stay on long enough on your website, to become interested in a consultation or purchase?

Make your call to action obvious on your home page. There must be a clear and concise call to action on your home page. In the case of our industry it could be a headline such as “Free Hearing Test Provided”, “Providers of Bespoke Hearing Solutions”. Be sure to include the solutions that you are providing also, however, do not get text heavy, detail the solutions as links. If they want more information they can click through to a more in depth explanation. The place to click needs to be obvious, practically shouting “CLICK ME, CLICK ME”.
Write great headlines. Attracting readers is a big part of your motivation. But don’t write outrageous headlines that do not match your content. Like traditional advertising, you need to ensure that you are not entering into any false advertising.
Improve readability. Add white space and ensure you are using fonts that are clear and attractive. Get rid of any clutter, think clean lines. Readers are more likely to stay on a site where it’s easier to see the information that they wish to see. Include clear high res pictures on your pages.
Have videos on the site. In our industry it is relatively easy to source high quality videos from manufacturers, embed them in your site. Several people within the industry are making their own videos, if you do it, make sure your production quality is high, the content is good, the presenter has a relatively decent screen presence and the finished video is edited and outputted in a relatively high resolution.
Include Patient testimonials. Ask your Patient’s for testimonials, if you have indeed treated them properly and provided solutions to their problems, they will be happy to provide them. Don’t be embarrassed to ask, a large proportion of your Patients would normally be happy to help you in some way. These testimonials will add authenticity and allow a prospective Patient to begin to trust you and your claims, they also may increase the chances a prospective Patient will look a bit deeper around your site.
Have a blog page on your site. Ensure the content is good, of interest to the potential customer and well written. Your blog the information provided and the tone it is provided in tends to be more informal, it is where your prospective customer finds out about your knowledge and ability to provide advice.
Keep the important information above the fold. Users need to see the core of your message without having to scroll down.
Make it easy to find information. Do not make it difficult to find information on your site. If somebody can not find what they are looking for easily, they will go back to the original search and try another company.
Have a prominent Search Box. Users need to have an easy way to find just what they are looking for. Make your search box enormous, ensure that any and all permutations of a search entered will lead them to what they are looking for on your site.

Look at your site from a prospective Patients point of view. What do you honestly think of your site and what elements on your site would drive you away?

WebStory: Keep Blogging!

Signing off blogger, The Blog Has Been Moved

2012-08-11T14:54:00.001+01:00

I have taken the leap and moved the blog to its own domain. I felt that this would give me more freedom.

I have enjoyed using blogger and meeting you all in an online sense. I will be leaving the blog spot site up for the moment.

Thank you all for your support, kind words and excellent feedback. The new site can be found at

Just Audiology Stuff, Commercial Strategy In Healthcare

I hope to see you there

Regards

Geoff

HearForm, Everything But The Kitchen Sink

2012-08-04T22:58:00.001+01:00

HearForm, Practice Management Extraordinaire

The HearForm story began in July of 1992, it was introduced in response to a growing demand for an affordable and easy way to automate the basic rituals of a hearing healthcare practice. HearForm is in fact an elaborate template that runs on Apple’s FileMaker Pro software. I actually used FileMaker Pro to design the CRM for my Investigations company many years ago. As comprehensive and connected as HearForm it was not, but hey, it did the job for us and that was all that mattered.

Patient Care On HearForm

HearForm is another pretty impressive piece of software, I found it easy to navigate and use, it also follows a logical work process. The functions of HearForm are in depth and comprehensive, it is designed to cover the full operation of a Practice up to the point where it becomes completely paper free.

HearForm has made this possible by providing a really complete set of features and powerful integration with other software such as QuickBooks, Noah 3, Noah 4, Counsel Ear, credit card processing and any number of insurance clearinghouses. The software is available as a stand alone system that can be deployed in a client server configuration within your Practice. However, Mike and his team now offer HearForm 11 as a cloud based option.

The onsite version is accessible via an LAN, Local Area Network, or a WAN, Wide Area Network. This means that it is eminently suitable for a multi Dispenser, multi branch deployment. In fact HearForm boasts that it can service unlimited Office Locations and unlimited Audiologists/Dispensers. The software runs on a Client-Server basis, with each client instantly syncing data to the main server. The Cloud based software operates in a similar manner.

The software is very powerful and has all the features you would expect in order to run your Practice from one place. The Patient Care interface is the heart of the software. It includes at a glance pretty much all of the details surrounding your Patient. It is also the main entity that all other entities, appointments, transactions, scanned forms etc. are connected to.

The software is designed with a paperless office in mind, so all and any scanned forms or electronic forms may be attached to the Patient record. You can record unlimited recalls/reminders against every Patient. You can also record unlimited hearing devices per patient. You can also record quick entry chart notes that are instantly searchable in the software.

As with other software packages HearForm gives you the ability to enter a referral source against each Patient record or appointment. This feature is fully customizable which gives you a very powerful function for reporting. As you are probably aware at this stage I think it is imperative for a Practice to have access to as much data as is humanly possible. This allows you to know exactly what is going on in your Practice.

These functions allow a Practice to track all marketing activities that are undertaken for impact and ROI. If deployed properly it allows you the comprehensive ability to ascertain what works and what doesn’t. It also clearly lets you know exactly where your Patients are coming from, how much they are spending and what they are spending that money on. The amount of data that can be retrieved from HearForm and the versatility of the search functions are almost overwhelming even for a data junkie like me.

Audiometric Data In HearForm

HearForm has a complete audiometric module. The module contains just about every test known to man. The Patient’s audiogram and other diagnostic tests may be entered manually or imported from NOAH 3 & 4. It also integrates a quite amazingly powerful Physician/Patient reporting function. The reporting function is quick, powerful and easy to use.

The screen above shows the reporting engine and all of the test options that can be included in the report. It is easy to use and extremely versatile, basically you can output extremely informative and professional reports with a few clicks. These reports can be then e-mailed, faxed or printed from within the software. The software also allows you to use a customizable check list in order that everyone is singing from the same hymn sheet. The one bugbear I have is that HearForm is not completely integrated with Noah. Hopefully now that HIMSA has made Noah 4 more open and connectable through web services this will cease to be an issue.

Financials In HearForm

Above is the sales by city report, you can also print out a sales by circuit and sales by size report among others. HearForm is stuffed with financial forms, receipts, invoices and reports including KPI reports. It also has really flexible accounts receivables statements. For Practices in the States it also incorporates insurance billing through your chosen clearing house. There is also a commissions module which allows you to quickly assess commissions. I thought that really was a piece of small genius.

You have integrated credit card processing right from the software. Of course all the financials can be integrated with QuickBooks saving you on double entry. You can also track all your stock devices through HearForm, including loaner stock if you in fact make that facility available to Patients. It will also track your trial stock very effectively. It allows you to set up and track charges for diagnostics, batteries, accessories, devices, warranties, etc..

HearForm Search Facility & Marketing

Data mining for marketing is very powerful and detailed; searches can be undertaken via numerous filters. A friend of mine who uses the software says if you want to send a mail to a one eyed, one legged man who Morris dances on a Thursday night and was referred by a certain physician, HearForm search will find him for you. The queries can be specified on a significant number of criteria using any or all of the numerous customizable fields.

This versatile search capability allows your Practice to undertake detailed queries of your database for marketing purposes. It allows you great flexibility to clearly and carefully define your targets for Campaign mailing. This will allow you to undertake comprehensive and intelligently focused marketing activities. It will also allow you to carefully manage your Patient Journey mailing activities. All searches can be saved as templates in order that they may be reused as needed.

The software is stuffed with mail merge letters for every possible circumstance, there are over 600 letter templates and 600 form templates. You can also design and customize your own using the built in word processing feature. These new letters can be added to the mailing templates. For day to day mailing and mail marketing purposes, HearForm could not be beaten with a big stick.

Once the templates have been defined it's a simple process to run the mailers. It is a fully integrated process from data extraction through to mail merge and print, which makes it very easy even for novices to create and send a mailer in a very short time without needing to leave the software or use other tools such as Word or Excel. Another nice touch is the ability to add electronic signatures of any of your staff to any form or letter.

Scheduling On HearForm

Scheduling on HearForm can handle up to 70 Audiologists/Dispensers. Appointments scheduled can be dragged and dropped along multiple columns allowing for quick and easy changes if need be. Another really excellent feature is the Telemarketing Module. The Telemarketing Module can be opened from any point but I raise it here because it is ideal for calls into or out of the office for scheduling.

Basically the Telemarketing Module contains scripted prompts for phone calls in nearly any situation. This is a small stroke of genius, I have said before that your front office staff are probably one of the most important assets you have. They can also be the worst thing for your business, which depends on training. The Telemarketing Module really helps out here.

Another feature that I really liked is the mapping add on, within the software is the ability to tap into maps and provide directions from a Patient’s home to their chosen office. You can then e-mail them a copy of those directions and the map from within the software. How cool is that? This is just one of the many little genius features that I like within HearForm.

The features of HearForm are endless and to even touch on them would ensure that this was an eighteen page post so I will give you a flavour of some of them.

Print Mailing Labels Quickly
Print Smead, Brother or Seiko Labels
IPad and IPhone App allows for patient to sign device with fingertip
Instant Exporting of any data to Excel
Integrated ESCO export for Free Mailing Campaigns
Unlimited New Order, Earmold, Repair, Loss and Damage and Return Credit Forms to Vendors by Print, Fax or Email
Accessory, New Order, Earmold, Repair, Diagnostic and Return Credit Receipts to Patients
Speech Language Forms and Reporting
Innovative Battery club
Physician Reference Module
Payer Reference Module
Progressive Appointment Tracking
Full security module allows Account Names, Passwords and Privilege Sets

HearForm allows creation and customization of unlimited forms, letters, reports, fields and screens. Forms from your local or government organizations can also be inserted into the program allowing time saving automation of repetitive tasks. Apple has invested significant resources to allow FileMaker to work powerfully on Windows, Macs, IPads and IPhones. This fact will allow HearForm to continually innovate within their software. It also opens up many possibilities for mobile integration and development.

The staff at HearForm are excellent, support levels you can expect from them are second to none. Initial deployment of the software within your Practice is fully supported and for a reasonable fee, Mike and the team will customize the software to an inch of its life at your request.

I have some experience with HearForm as one of my customers uses it within his Practice. It is not the most intuitive software, nor is it exactly the prettiest; however, it is amazingly powerful and comprehensively featured. It will take either some training or a serious amount of poking around to become familiar with the software. You should seriously have a look at this software, download the demo and have a poke around.

You can see the software at HearForm .Com

Regards

Geoff

HearForm, Everything But The Kitchen Sink

2012-08-04T13:41:00.001+01:00

HearForm, Practice Management Extraordinaire

Patient Care On HearForm

HearForm is another pretty impressive piece of Practice Management software, I found it easy to navigate and use, it also follows a logical work process. The functions of HearForm are in depth and comprehensive, it is designed to cover the full operation of a Practice up to the point where it becomes completely paper free.

HearForm have made this possible by providing a really complete set of features and powerful integrations to other software such as QuickBooks, Noah 3, Noah 4, Counsel Ear and Optimum Insight. The software was an on site software that could be deployed in a client server configuration in your Practice. However, Mike and his team are now bringing HearForm 11 to market with a cloud based option.

The onsite version is accessible via an LAN, Local Area Network, or a WAN, Wide Area Network. This means that it is eminently suitable for a multi Dispenser, multi branch deployment. In fact HearForm boasts that it can service unlimited Office Locations and unlimited Audiologists/Dispensers. The software runs on a Client-Server basis, with each client syncing data to the main server. The Cloud based software will run in a similar manner.

The software is really powerful and has all the features you would expect in order to run your Practice from one place. The Patient Care interface is the heart of the software, it includes at a glance pretty much all of the details surrounding your Patient. It is also the main entity that all other entities, appointments, transactions, scanned forms etc. are connected to.

The software is designed with a paperless office in mind, so all and any scanned forms or electronic forms may be attached to the Patient record. You can record unlimited recalls/reminders against every Patient. You can also record unlimited hearing devices per patient. Quick entry chart notes can be entered and are instantly searchable in the software.

As with other software packages HearForm gives you the ability to enter a referral source against each Patient record. This feature is fully customisable which gives you a very powerful function for reporting. As you are probably aware at this stage I think it is imperative for a Practice to have access to as much data as is humanly possible. This allows you to know exactly what is going on in your Practice.

Audiometric Data On HearForm

HearForm has a full audiometric module, the module contains just about every test known to Man or Woman. Near fatal slip of the tongue there. The Patient’s audiogram and other diagnostic tests may be entered manually. It also integrates a a quite amazingly powerful reporting function. The reporting function is quick, powerful and easy to use.

The screen above shows the reporting engine and all of the test options that can be included in the report. It is easy to use and extremely versatile, basically you can output extremely informative and professional reports with a few clicks. These reports can be then e-mailed, faxed or printed from within the software. The software also allows you to use a customisable check list in order that everyone is singing from the same hymn sheet. The one bugbear I have is that HearForm is not completely integrated with Noah. Hopefully now that HIMSA have made Noah 4 more open and connectable through web services this will cease to be an issue.

Financials On HearForm

You have integrated credit card processing right from the software. Of course all the financials can be integrated with QuickBooks saving you on double entry. You can also track all your stock through HearForm, including loaner stock if you in fact make that facility available to Patients. It will also track your trial stock very effectively. It allows you to set up and track charges for diagnostics, batteries, accessories, devices, warranties, etc..

HearForm Search Facility & Marketing

Data mining for marketing is very powerful and detailed, searches can be undertaken via numerous filters. A friend of mine who uses the software says if you want to send a mail to a one eyed, one legged man who Morris dances on a Thursday night and was referred by a certain physician, HearForm search will find him for you. The queries can be specified on a significant number of criteria using any or all of the numerous customisable fields.

This allows your Practice to undertake detailed searches of your database for marketing purposes. It allows you great flexibility to clearly and carefully define your targets for Campaign mailing. This will allow you to undertake comprehensive and intelligently focused marketing activities. It will also allow you to carefully manage your Patient Journey mailing activities. All searches can be saved as templates in order that they may be reused as needed.

The software is stuffed with mail merge letters for every possible circumstance, there are over 600 letter templates and 600 form templates. You can also design and customise your own using the built in word processing feature. These new letters can be added to the mailing templates. For day to day mailing and mail marketing purposes, HearForm could not be beaten with a big stick.

Scheduling On HearForm

Scheduling on HearForm can handle up to 70 Audiologists/Dispensers. Appointments scheduled can be dragged and dropped along multiple columns allowing for quick and easy changes if need be. Another really excellent feature is the Telemarketing Module, the Telemarketing Module can be opened from any point but I raise it here because it is ideal for calls into or out of the office for scheduling.

The features of HearForm are endless and to even touch on them would ensure that this was an eighteen page post so I will give you a flavour of some of them.

Print Mailing Labels Quickly
Print Smead, Brother or Seiko Labels
IPad and IPhone App allows for patient to sign device with fingertip
Instant Exporting of any data to Excel
Integrated ESCO export for Free Mailing Campaigns
Unlimited New Order, Earmold, Repair, Loss and Damage and Return Credit Forms to Vendors
Accessory, New Order, Earmold, Repair, Diagnostic and Return Credit Receipts to Patients
Speech Language Forms and Reporting
Innovative Battery club
Physician Reference Module
Payer Reference Module
Progressive Appointment Tracking
Full security module allows Account Names, Passwords and Privilege Sets

The staff at HearForm are excellent, support levels you can expect from them are second to none. Initial deployment of the software within your Practice is fully supported and Mike and the team will customise the software to an inch of its life at your request.

I have some experience with HearForm as one of my customers uses it within his Practice. It is not the most intuitive software, nor is it exactly the prettiest, however, it is amazingly powerful and comprehensively featured. It will take either some training or a serious amount of poking around to become familiar with the software. You should seriously have a look at this software, download the demo and have a poke around.

Again, I have no connection to HearForm and I have not accepted any financial inducements from them or anyone to review this software. You can see the software at HearForm .Com

Regards

Geoff

SEO Tactics For A Modern Hearing Health Practice

2012-08-02T15:57:00.001+01:00

SEO Tactics, What Are They & What Are You Trying To Achieve?

Search Engine Optimisation. Search Engine Optimization (Photo credit: Hobo!)

One of the few things that I can say about most of the people within this business with some confidence is that search engine optimization (SEO) is the last thing on their minds. After all most people have a thousand things on their to do list and they continually think in terms of conventional traditional marketing. So they pay little if no attention to the concepts of search terms, key words or backlinks. Unfortunately, this mind-set is short-sighted in the extreme, we realise that in this business word of mouth is key, how good your products or services are really matter. Existing Patients and their referrals probably account for a massive proportion of a healthy business. We also know that the attrition rate of our database is probably 10% per year. With these factors in mind, it is clear that we need a cycle of new customers to our business in order to survive, let alone grow. If people can’t find you online, you’re going to have a seriously tough time sustaining the momentum you need to drive your business forward. So instead of dismissing SEO and other online strategies, you should seriously consider implementing them as a matter of urgency.

So what are SEO techniques and how can you implement them? I have researched the most common SEO techniques that have been utilised over the last few years and the following list of techniques are probably the most used and efficacious.

Implement Branding Efforts

Branding is imperative across your business, not just in your online presence. Decide on a set logo, colour scheme, tagline, and promotional phrasing for your business. Use these elements consistently not only across your web presence but also on all your marketing material. This is important, it speaks to the professionalism of your business and therefore the perceived trustworthiness. Perceived professionalism and trustworthiness is imperative for your web presence. Consider working with a graphic designer or marketing consultant if you don’t feel capable of coming up with a cohesive brand on your own.

Identify Target Key words & Key Phrases

Key words and key phrases are what your potential customer are entering into search engines to access information around our industry. Your number 1 marketing goal should be to identify at least a handful of potential SEO keywords to target within organic search results. Then you should optimize your site accordingly in order to rank highly on the organic search results for those keywords or key phrases. You base your chosen keywords and phrases on research data you can easily compile from search volume figures found in keyword research tools. Once you have identified these keywords, you should integrate them into your site in key areas. These key areas include your page titles, your heading tags, and your body content. Basically they should be leveraged throughout the structure of your page. However, you should avoid excessive inclusions, stuffing your site full of keywords will actually be counter productive. The search engines will actually punish you for it, but do take advantage of the SEO value these positions hold to inform the search engines about the subject of your web content.

Use Content Creation To Leverage Your Strategy

Running a company blog is an important part of your strategy. You should post informational articles, product updates, industry news pieces and your reactions to them. You should also post personal interest pieces based around your Practice, your Staff and your Patients. This a vital part of your SEO strategy for two reasons.

First, publishing content to your site regularly increases the number of different keywords related to our business on your site. By improving keyword exposure in this way, you will find yourself receiving traffic via not only the search phrases you target. But also other search phrases you never thought about.

Second, filling your site with content of value is a good way to build up a relationship with and engage your potential Patients and Patients. Good content also reduces bounce rate and increases time on site. Both of which are believed to play roles in search ranking algorithms.

Publishing regular content also allows you to leverage your social media channels to build links back to your site and your blog. It may also be of value to run your blog as a separate site as opposed to a page on your main site. This will also allow the leverage of backlinks from one to the other. Something that search engines value.

Commit to Social Networking

Many of the people in our industry see little or no value to participating on social networks. Their main argument that our demographic are not using them has some validity, although only of social networks outside of Facebook. But, you still need to integrate social media into your online strategy. It is in fact imperative for your entire online marketing strategy.

Both Google and Bing have acknowledged that social traffic, including link shares and brand mentions on social network status updates are currently playing a role in organic search rankings. This fact alone means that maintaining a presence on these sites is vitally important for your online strategy. You can also leverage links to your website and your blog through your social media channels. Again this helps to create a buzz around your online presence and boost your organic rankings.

You should spend at least ten minutes a day on your social channels, posting links to content, re-tweeting interesting articles and engaging with followers and like minded individuals.

Install Google Analytics

You have set out your web strategy, built your online presence, now you need the ability to measure and test different metrics. To gather the data needed to do this effectively, you’ll want to install a program like Google Analytics. It’s free and easy to use, and it provides an incredible wealth of information that can be used to improve your website’s performance. With analytics at your disposal you can assess viewer numbers and bounce rate. These two metrics actually give you a wealth of information about how popular an article or post name is versus how popular the actual content was. It also gives you a clear idea of visitor numbers to your website and referral sources.

Build Links & Backlinks To Your Site

Links and backlinks are the lifeblood of your social media strategy, it is links and backlinks that give your site authority. In text links, sidebar links, header and footer links all have value within your social media strategy. It is thought that links and backlinks are perhaps 50% of the data that affects your organic search ranking. In order to take advantage of this you need to leverage links to and from your site. One strategy natural strategy for this is to run your blog and website as separate sites. Then taking advantage of this fact by building links between them. This will bring you so far, what you are looking to do is to design and deploy content that is rich enough for someone else to link to.

Guest Posting

One link building technique that deserves mention is guest posting. As a guest author, your content allows you to connect with other websites in your industry to provide guest blog posts in exchange for a link back to your site. When done well you will receive a high-quality, highly-relevant backlink and you also stand to achieve additional web traffic. The perceived recommendation of your content by the referring site’s author will help to drive this. With just a few good guest post posts, it’s possible to increase both your rankings in the organic search results and the amount of traffic flowing to your website.

Launch Press Releases

Finally, one link building technique that is also very effective is the use of press releases. Whenever your company has something newsworthy to report, write up an interesting press release and send it out through a distribution service. There are many such services across the web such as UK PR Web and PR Web. Again promoting your site in this way really has the potential to both increase traffic and backlinks through the sites that will hopefully carry your press release.

Regards

Geoff

Pass On Your Experience and Expertise

2012-07-26T15:41:00.001+01:00

The Future Of Audiology

I came across a great little forum recently, it has been set up as a knowledge and conversation point for Audiology Students. The idea is that they may share their experiences and pose questions pertaining to all things audiology. The questions posed and the posts made are intelligent and interesting, they give a fresh view to wizened old eyes.

I think it is worth a visit for experienced hands, it is a good opportunity to pass on hard won experience to people beginning their journey.

The forum can be visited at www.audiologyforum.net

Ear Works, Bringing Comprehensive Practice Management Tools To Your Practice.

2012-07-22T00:37:00.001+01:00

A Comprehensive And Powerful Management Software Bringing Real Control Over Your Practice

Ear Works is a pretty impressive piece of software, I found it easy to navigate and use with a logical work process, more of that later. The functions of Ear Works are comprehensive, it is designed to cover the full operation of a Practice up to the point where it becomes completely paper free. This is only possible due to a really complete set of features and powerful integrations to other software such as QuickBooks, Interacoustics, OtoSuite, Outlook and iCal for you Mac lovers. The software is a stand alone software that lives on a server in your Practice. It is not cloud based, however, it is accessible via an LAN, Local Area Network, or a WAN, Wide Area Network. This means that it is eminently suitable for a multi Dispenser, multi branch deployment. The software runs on a Client-Server basis, with each client syncing data to the main server. They have also included a cool feature called Ear Works Lite, which allows you to remove one Client computer, such as a laptop to do some home visits. Any work undertaken on the Client during this period can then be synced back to the server when you are back in the office and connected to the server.

The software is really powerful and can be utilised to run your Practice efficiently with the minimum of fuss and energy. It is a powerful CRM tool with a lot of the features that you would expect from a high end CRM. From within the software each member of the team has the ability to set tasks for each other, send memos to each other and schedule appointments for each other if needed. The software also allows a Practice owner to set up workflows in order to control how things are done. In other words, when you do this, it prompts you to then do that. This also sets out clear protocols, something that is particularly useful if somebody new joins the team or a Temp needs to step in. There is also the ability to set up a checklist for appointments. Another good feature that ensures everybody is following the same protocols.

Ear Works Software Interface

The screen shot above shows the interface of Ear Works with the Scheduler view chosen. If you look closely you will notice that there are in fact two tabs open on the software. A Patient file for a Veronica Bjornson and the scheduler. This is a really cool feature which cuts down on the amount of floating windows that the software produces. As I have said the software is a particularly impressive piece of kit. It is pretty, that is pretty with a capital P, it is beautiful to look at. It also has substance, it is a really impressive piece of software. The interface is well designed and seems almost familiar, this is mainly because it is reminiscent of some Microsoft products. The tool bar is clear and intuitive, it also delivers all of the power you need to quickly and easily navigate through the software. The tool bar also has a my actions drop down box which can be customised. It allows you to set a quick option to access regular actions that you undertake as part of your duties in the Practice.

Ear Works Work Zones

Another really innovative feature of the Ear Works interface is the use of Work Zones. People who have used Linux or Mac will be familiar with the concept. There are up to four Work Zones that you can quickly flick through. This allows you to switch between different areas and different Patients with ease and without having to close up something you are working on if you quickly need to switch to something else. It is obvious that this software is very carefully thought out, this shows in the design and usability.

Ear Works Patient Record

The Patient file feature is comprehensive and is the root of all the connections to other elements of the software such as financials, stock control, scheduling etc. The software has been designed with a completely paperless office in mind. So you can scan and attach any document or just attach any electronic documents you receive to the Patient file.

One of the features I particularly like is the ability to enter a referral source against each Patient record. This feature is fully customisable which gives you a very powerful function for reporting. I think it is imperative for a Practice to know exactly where their Patients are coming from. This allows a Practice to track all marketing activities that are undertaken for impact and ROI. If deployed properly it allows you the comprehensive ability to ascertain what works and what doesn’t. It also clearly lets you know exactly where your Patients are coming from. They also have a very detailed report on Referral Sources showing both the number of patients referred and the total sales generated for each referral source. Exactly what you need to make strategic decisions on your marketing activities.

Ear Works Clinical Records

The Patient’s audiogram and other diagnostic tests may be entered manually. However, you can import the data from an Interacoustic module or Otosuite. So there is not full integration with Noah, although with the advent of Noah 4 and the new Earworks 5 software coming, that is something that Ear Works are looking into.

Ear Works Data Mining Features

Data mining for marketing is very powerful and detailed. The queries can be specified on a significant number of criteria in any AND/OR conditional formula. This allows your Practice to undertake detailed searches of your database for marketing purposes. It allows you great flexibility to clearly and carefully define your targets for Campaign mailing. This will allow you to undertake comprehensive and intelligently focused marketing activities. It will also allow you to carefully manage your Patient Journey mailing activities. All searches can be saved as templates in order that they may be reused as needed.

Another nice feature is that a recurrent task can be set for anybody in the clinic to run a templated mailer and simply print it out with just a few clicks. Once the templates have been defined it's a simple process to run the mailers. It is a fully integrated process from data extraction through to mail merge and print, which makes it very easy even for novices to create and send a mailer in a very short time without needing to leave the software or use other tools such as Word or Excel.

Ear Works Management Interface

The management interface in Ear Works is a comprehensive and powerful tool. The management package will spit out reports from the regular AR/AP, Sales per month/clinician/source/hearing aid type to Year-To-Year comparisons, Return Rate, Exchange Rate and Binaural Rate reports all the way to full blown Profit and Loss reports. There is also a very useful Daily Report showing the most important KPIs of the clinic (AR, AP, Sales to Date, Estimated Sales vs. target, Sales performance), the scheduling status and the team efficiency in term of pending vs. completed tasks.

There is also a very powerful self-audit tool called Ear Works Alerts, showing various areas that might require attention. Other useful management tools are Find the Money, a report feature that allows business administrators to find, understand and collect their receivables. Schedule template builder, which allows a Practice Manager to create a preset schedule structure designed to reach a certain sales target, based on historical sales performance and available appointment times

The financials in Ear Works cover patient transactions (invoicing, credits, payments, refunds), third party billing (for insurance, organizations or companies), supplier financials (bills, credits, payments and statement reconciliations), cash counts, bank deposits, inventory (ordering, receiving, selling from stock, returning to stock, loaners, demo products, warranty activation/deactivation, internal supplies management, inventory counts, stock value reporting). The export to QuickBooks takes all the financial information recorded in Ear Works, maps it and transfers it to QuickBooks avoiding double data entry. There the accountant can take the Ear Works info - pretty much all the operational financials - and combine them with payroll or any other non-patient transactions and create complete accounting reports.

Even though Ear Works is packed with many features, it has been designed to be easy to grasp and to use even by novice users. I think that the upcoming Ear Works 5 will take this even further to turn Ear Works into possibly the most user friendly OMS in the hearing industry. The Management system offering in our industry is split in two categories subscription web applications and local systems with upfront purchase. Ear Works is offered differently you pay a monthly subscription payment with the advantages of owning your data, given by the local installation. Earworks say that the subscription price is very competitive, even lower than standard cloud subscription apps.

Ear Works has been traditionally present in Canada, US and Australia. With a distributed team in both Europe and North America, Ear Works became uniquely positioned to enter the European market and starting in 2012 Ear Works is being used in the UK by a first set of partner clinics. They hope that soon the software will be available for all UK and Irish hearing practices. They are also hoping to make the software available to other European countries in the very near future.

I have to say that I am really impressed by the power of Ear Works. It can control every facet of your business, the possibilities are really endless. The only problem or failing that I see is the lack of real integration with Noah. Although with the advent of Noah 4 I think Ear Works are going to address this issue. Support services for the software are reputedly good, with fast response to issues reported to me by a dedicated user. If you are thinking of investing your hard earned money in a Practice Management software, Ear Works is definitely worth your consideration.

Just to make it clear, I have no connection to Ear Works and I have not accepted any financial inducements from them or anyone to review this software.

Regards

Geoff

I have to apologise to you, the readers of the blog, it has been a long and difficult couple of weeks. In my state of slight dementia, I posted an early version of the post instead of the finalised version. I have decided to add on the pieces that I missed out and own up to stupidity!

Ear Works is available in differing packages, offering different levels of feature set. In essence you can choose which package suits your Practice and your preferred needs. This gives a lot of versatility and means you are not paying for something you don’t want or need.

Ear Works is the product of combined conceptual thinking of a working Audiologist and a Software Designer. This really shows in the ease of use and the logical processes. It has steadily evolved over several design and feature upgrades to the position it is at today.

Another thing that first brought my interest to Ear Works is the fact that it is the same team that deploy Hearing Pages. Which I think is a very innovative site that is hugely forward looking. The team is obviously innovative and close to the pulse of both our industry and the wider innovations in disruptive technologies.

The designer of the Software is somebody I have spoken to from time to time and I have always felt that he is not only quite an intelligent and driven individual. He is also open to intelligent input from all comers with an intelligent point of view and suggestions. I think that this will continually allow the Software to evolve to meet the changing needs of our industry.

Ear Works, the company and the platform can be viewed at Ear Works Inc , pay them a visit, have a poke around.

Word Of Mouth Has Moved Online, Have You?

2012-07-21T00:36:00.002+01:00

Take note, these are the statistics that matter, word of mouth has moved online, have you?

Regards

Geoff

Are World Is Changing, Are You?, Did You Know?

2012-07-21T00:16:00.002+01:00

Our world is changing, are you?

Thank you to Mark Campbell for pointing this out to me.

Regards

Geoff

Keyword Searches Around Our Industry

2012-07-09T23:05:00.001+01:00

Just exactly what is being searched pertaining to our industry

In order to establish an SEO strategy for your business, you first have to identify the search terms that you want to target. I have done some generic searching based on our industry, I have not localised the results nor did I try any of the longtail phrases that I would if I was doing so for my business. However, what I did find out was really interesting.

Firstly, the most used search term pertaining to our industry was “Hearing” this term is used in search over six million times monthly. This doesn't always relate to our industry, it could be court hearing etc., but it begins to give you an idea of the search traffic on-going. it becomes more interesting when it gets to the term “Aids hearing”, this term is searched globally 823,000 times monthly. As our terms such as “Where to get hearing aids”, “What is hearing aids” and the simple term “Hearing aids”.

The next level of searches begin with “Hearing impaired”, “Hearing devices” and “Hearingaids” at 368,000 searches globally monthly. The next tranche of searches are really based around the term “Hearing test” which is searched about 100,000 times globally monthly. We then move to the meat of the last post, search terms around “Price of hearing aid” get over 40,000 searches monthly globally. There is nearly a dozen differing search terms around searches for the price of hearing instruments that all get massive traffic.

The next real tranche is the search term “Hearing aid reviews” which get a little over 27,000 searches each. As you can see, the net is alive with traffic, sorry got a bit sound of music there, traffic that pertains to our industry. Don’t forget those numbers are monthly searches, every month on average. The question is would you like some of that business? I am sure you would, but in order to get it you need to deploy a well planned and executed online strategy.

That alone is not enough, that will get you visitors, but you also have to then convert those visitors to prospects, then you can begin the conversion of those prospects to sales. I did not say it would be easy gentlemen and ladies. Please find below a table with the first 100 odd search terms and search numbers.

Regards

Geoff

Our Demographic Are Not Online, The Lie Put To Bed

2012-07-07T18:58:00.001+01:00

Internet stats, how they shape up

When I speak to people in our industry about online marketing channels, I hear consistently “Well our demographic aren't online really”. I have one word to say to that, Bunkum, here's a second, Balderdash! Only this is a family blog and I have re-discovered my faith there would be other more interesting words.

I present, to the left, thanks to Pew Research Centre, the survey stats of internet users in the United States. I would like to point your attention to the age demographics results. 91% of individuals between 30 and 49 are active on the internet. These are the children of your prospective Patients.

77% of adults aged between 50 and 64 are online, these people should be viewed as your long term prospects. In fact some of them are your prospective Patients right now. 53% of 65 year old and plus use the internet. These are your prospects and your Patients. 53% ladies and gentlemen, theoretically you have the opportunity to reach 53% of your prime target market via the internet.

Who are we kidding here, your prime demographic is online, they are online and they are active. But lets go one step further, what are they doing online? Back to Pew for this information. I have posted a table below with their latest survey results. What jumps out at me from this list are the following facts:

80% of people online use the internet to research health issues.

78% look for information on a product or service they are thinking of purchasing.

91% use search engines to find information.

These figures include members of your Patient demographic, these figures also include your long term prospects, these figures also include the children of your Patient demographic. So quick question for you,

Would You Like To Reach Out And Touch These People?

Of course you would, if these people are searching for services you provide you would like them led to you. It is imperative for the health of your business that you are online, not only that you are online but that you have a clear strategy for your online marketing channels. So have I clearly dispelled the notion in your mind that our demographic is not online? Please don’t say well only 53% of our demographic is online, because I may be forced to slap you!

Below you can find the read out of internet activities, for my Irish readers you can also find some statistics for internet use in Ireland. While the penetration in Ireland is just under 68%, that is ever changing upwards. That penetration is based on whole population figures also, so if you minus babies and young children, you will see that actual penetration in the adult population is very high. I believe that between 50 and 60% of our demographic in Ireland are online. But probably 100% of their children are online. Don’t forget, their children are the researchers, they are the support, they are the people who will encourage or discourage a purchase.

Regards

Geoff

Hearing Instrument Price List, Publish And Be Damned?

2012-07-07T16:34:00.001+01:00

Could You, Should You, Would You?

Your instrument pricing, should you make it easy to access?

I have come across several different views on this question over the years. Historically I was taught that I should never really discuss pricing with prospects unless I was in consultation with them. Over time the thoughts on this changed and we discussed general figures over the phone but qualified our statements with the information that definitive pricing would depend on consultation.

But our prospective Patients have changed, they are better informed, they or their loved ones have usually done some research. That research is usually undertaken into their problem and the solutions available. They may even have researched types of instruments available and some of the manufacturers of those instruments. They are also keenly aware of pricing, particularly in our market here.

So is it time for us to change our ideas about our price lists? There are a few businesses publishing their price list online on their website. But it is only a few, why? Is it a throwback to the old “Don’t discuss the price!” or is it for commercial reasons? I understand that some people consider their instrument pricing to be sensitive commercial information. But is it? If your competitor really wants to know your pricing they can find out. We know that in the UK and Ireland Specsavers publish their price list, which is quite cheap. But it has not stopped Patients going to Independent businesses and buying more expensive and better more modern technology.

So it is obvious that the purchase of hearing instruments is not all about the price. Otherwise the cheapest offering would always win. Admittedly, new users are price sensitive, but experienced users are far less price centred, they are definitely more service centred. So what are the pros and cons

Pros:

Search Engine Optimisation advantages
Perceived as open and honest by your prospects
Patients expectations moderated
Extends the opportunity to a Practice to explain product placement and pricing

Cons:

Competitors view your prices
Open to price comparison

Sorry cons are short, because I can’t really think of any outside the two I have offered. The pros of the approach have real value to you as a Practice. First the SEO advantages will drive you up the search rankings, always a wonderful thing. Second you increase the perception of openness and honesty in prospects. Just those two points have to be winners for any business. Whilst the cons also need to be carefully thought about, the first one is really a non entity. As I have said, if a competitor wants to know your pricing they will find out. Admittedly you publishing it makes it easier, but if a competitor is worried about what you are doing they are not helping their business.

The price comparison point is valid, again I think it is more valid for new users than existing users. But if you have pitched your site correctly even new users will get a sense that service is the key and that price is not all. What do you think, will you publish and be damned?

Regards

Geoff

Online Marketing Channels, Applying Commercial Strategy To Your Hearing Health Care Practice

2012-06-29T23:31:00.001+01:00

Strategy For Lead Generation On A Hearing HealthCare Website

In my post "Leveraging Keyword Search" I went through identifying the localisation of search phrases that you should cater to on your site. That is just the start of our task, after identifying those long tail phrases we then have to integrate them into content on our site in order that we rank high on organic search rankings. We also need to integrate them into metatags, headings etc. When we have done all of this, following excellent and modern SEO principles, we appear at the top of the search rankings for our chosen search phrases. We are the kings of the local search rankings.

So What?

This only gives you the opportunity to impress your possible customers, it merely points your possible customers to your website.

What is of ultimate importance to you as a business is what they see there.

What is of ultimate importance to you as a business is what they do there.

What is of ultimate importance to you as a business is the psychological impact of your website on those visitors.

Finally, what is of ultimate importance to you as a business is that you capture their data or drive them to contact you.

In simple terms, the real key to your online marketing strategy is your website. Social media and SEO strategy is purely leveraged to bolster and support your main online marketing channel. You need to ensure that you deploy a strategy to ensure that your website actually engages your prospective customer. Not only engages but encourages them to contact you or even better submit their data to you. Celtic Hearing Ireland is one of my customers, they have put great thought into their online strategy. It has been my great pleasure to help them with it. They clearly set out goals for keywords and long tail phrases that would be of benefit to them in their locations. They then deployed a web presence that would allow them to leverage those searches to drive people to their website and eventually to their stores.

Strong Calls To Action

Their website is relatively well deployed, eye catching, quite slick and on brand. It is easily navigable and is chock a block of calls to action. The initial call to action I would like to mention is in fact on their home page. Very clearly in a red button is the hearing aid batteries from one Euro. The button links to their web shop, where you can purchase packs of batteries and some other ancillary items. One Euro batteries is a relatively strong call to action in Ireland. It also allows Celtic to use a loss leader as a lead generation and data capture tool. Contact details are given in the online shop, which on opt in, Celtic can then use for sending out offers etc. People who are buying the batteries are obviously existing users or know existing users. They are not buying them for their watches.

Celtic also leverages the contact portion at the bottom middle of the page to display some further calls to action. One is the special offer they are running on IIC instruments. Two for the price of one on invisible hearing aids is a relatively strong call to action for most prospective customers. They also publicise their online hearing test and give prospective Patients the opportunity to download their Practice Brochure. Which can be downloaded here Celtic Hearing Ireland Practice Brochure. The brochure is a very well deployed piece of collateral that speaks highly of the professionalism of Celtic Hearing. It also arms a prospective Patient with a lot of generic information before they ever approach the Practice. The Practice Brochure concept is something that is easily deployed and it speaks highly of your Practice and your brand when done so properly.

They make sure that each call to action is a link to a page leveraging that call to action. This allows them to leverage those campaign offers with their own metatags, headers and other SEO principles. Again, this helps drive them in the organic search rankings.

Online Hearing Test Deployment

A quite strong call to action they have deployed is the Online Hearing Test concept. The test is in fact the one that I spoke about in the post Online Diagnosis And Lead Generation. A piece of software that is deployed by C Tone. In order to take the online test you need to submit your details. You then are taken through the test and given your results. this then leads you to another excellent piece of kit called the Online Hearing Aid Selector. More about that in a moment. The entire deployment is excellent, follows an intelligent work flow and people like it. It is also a strong part of their SEO deployment as are all of the features and calls to action they have taken care to incorporate into the site. This particular feature will drive strong data capture and leads over time.

Online Hearing Aid Selector

The Online Hearing Aid Selector is an excellent piece of kit that uses lifestyle and perceived disability questions to lead to an instrument suggestion. If used in the workflow of the online hearing test it also takes severity of tested loss into account. It is just a really nice offering that increases engagement on the site. As before, it also bolsters Celtic’s SEO activities. Consistent leveraging of this feature will again help them to the top of the search rankings in the areas and for the search terms that they need to be.

They also use the data capture tool to the left on nearly every page. It does in fact encourage people to enter their details in order that Celtic may call them back. It is a nice touch, a well thought out one as are many of the strategies that are deployed on the Celtic Hearing Ireland website. Chris and Lisa have thought about their online channels carefully. Whilst they are very active on social media channels, they use them for strategic purposes. They use them to bolster their SEO strategy. They use them to support their main online channel, their website. They have turned their website into a lead generation and data capture engine. It singularly gives them the best return on investment of all of their marketing channels outside of targeted direct mail. They also have plans to add a landing page later on, one which they will leverage for all campaign offers. They continuously asses and update the site in order that it is fresh and continuously driving their business to the top of the search returns that matter.

Celtic is a proof of concept, they see results from their online channels. The future of marketing within our industry is online, at present it is a multi channel strategy with your website being the main channel. Social media is really only leveraged to strategically support your main channel. That is the case within our industry at present, but that may well change in the future. The key is that you need to stay current, to stay on top of things in order that your business has the best chance to succeed. These are the things that you as an Independent Hearing Health Practice need to be doing to compete in our current and future market.

Regards

Geoff

Online Diagnosis And Lead Generation

Leveraging Key Word Search Knowledge

Social Media Marketing For Audiological Practices

Why Do You Have Social Media Involvement

Practice Management Software, What Do You Need From Your CRM?

2012-06-23T18:04:00.000+01:00

Assisting Your Commercial Strategy In Your Healthcare Practice, Features & Benefits Of A CRM

What features does a CRM need to deliver to become a real asset to your commercial strategy?

A CRM can be of immense use to your Practice, it can gather data that is of real use to you in the management of several facets of your day to day working life. It can also automate a lot of the day to day workings of a Practice. In your busy day to day Practice, you are consistently caught up in the tactical. You need something or someone to look after the strategic. A good CRM system should do that for your business. Of course, you need to set out your strategic goals and plans, but with the automation of the deployment given to this by a good CRM, you should only have to consider it quarterly.

So with this in mind what features does a CRM have to have? What benefit do you want from those features in your business? Let's look at the processes, procedures and data that would be of benefit to you in your Practice if they were automated.

Patient Journey Automation

You set out a Patient Journey, it consists of several consult visits over a period of years. The Patient journey is deployed as part of your value added service and it consists of different types and length of appointments. These appointments are strategically designed to bolster your Patient retention and referral strategy. Excellent so far, but, in order for this to work effectively it involves a lot of thought and administrative time to run. However we know that this strategy is worth the effort because of the on-going payoff to your business.

We need a CRM to be able to automate this process somewhat, but how automated can it be? In an ideal world what exactly would you like it to do?

Automatically schedule the differing follow up visits and label them
Automatically set up reminders for staff to contact Patients at appropriate times
Automatically mail merge the correct contact letters

So in an ideal system you would be able to input your standard Patient journey. Once a Patient was changed from a Prospect to a Purchaser, the CRM would have several workflows that kicked in that took care of everything else. Like I said, in an ideal world, however most CRMs I have come across so far are not nearly as automated. In order to allow any CRM to assist you in your business you need to input the data in order that you can later pull it out. So in the case of the three objectives we have set, we need to set out strict processes to achieve the benefits.

The simplest manner to meet our goals is to set up a search on the CRM for a Purchasing Patient that has had not appointment for five months or more or eight months or more etc. In that way, your receptionist may run that search at the start of a month and spit out a list of Patients that need to be called back. You can then call, mail and schedule to your hearts content. Several of the CRMs available will allow you to call and mail from within the programme. Therefore recording an activity that you can search against. This is the type of power that you need and should want.

Mail Marketing

Again, in an ideal world, we would like to set out the parameters of our mail marketing and our CRM automatically takes care of that marketing. Sorry, probably is not going to happen for you. However, if we again set up parameter searches we can run them at will, the searches will allow us to easily pull marketing lists that we can then merge with our letter templates. The search parameters could include CNP (Consultation No Purchase) last appointment 12 months or more. Purchaser, last sale forty eight months or more etc. In this way we can run this searches on a monthly basis and take control of our mail marketing. Again several of the CRMs available allow you to undertake this with ease.

Medical Reports, Medical Referral Letters

A good CRM will allow the automation of these letters allowing you to concentrate on something else. However, you will first have to set up the letters and reports in your templates in order that you can quickly and easily mail merge them. If you wish to automate this process in order that your receptionist can undertake the mailing you will need to enter a category in order that she or he can search and merge.

Financials

Integration of financial data in a CRM gives you a powerful management tool. It allows you to quickly and easily spit out the data that you need to assess the health of your business. It also can clearly point out where you have issues if you know what you are looking for. Of course that is if you have set up the CRM to record the data in the first place. What data is of real relevance to you in order that you can truly assess the health of your business and the efficacy of your staff?

Sales Conversion Rate
Monaural Rate
Binaural Rate
Cancellation Rate
Aftercare Appointment Rate
Cancelled Appointment Rate
Referral Sources
Average Sales Price
Unit Volume

All of these KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) are imperative in order that you can make assessments of how your business and your employees are doing. Watching these KPIs over time allows you to continually monitor the health of your business. It will also allow you to quickly recognise and deal with issues that are arising.

Marketing Monitoring

A good CRM will also allow you to continually assess your return on investment of your marketing activities. You need to ensure that there is a referral source field and you need to ensure that you have set out clear and simple categories. But once you have done this you can set up searches that allow you to continuously pull the data on referral sources allowing you to make factual decisions on marketing.

This post is not exhaustive, the more you realise the power of a CRM, the more things you would like it to do. As I have said in an earlier post, I am currently researching several of the commercially available CRMs in our industry. I will be testing them against some of the parameters I have discussed here. If you have any experience with them, or if you think I have missed anything that you think is really important, let me know. I promise I will test them with any of your suggestions.

Regards

Geoff

Leveraging Key Word Search Knowledge For The SEO Of Your Web Marketing Channels

2012-06-23T17:59:00.001+01:00

Healthcare Key Word & Long Tail Phrases, How To Leverage Them For Your Commercial Strategy.

If you wish to turn your site into a lead generation site which allows you the opportunity to convert visitors to prospects, you need to localise your SEO strategy. The question as always is how?

Keywords are an excellent place to start when designing and deploying a lead generating website. However, they are not the only thing you need to consider and they will not deliver to you all the results you require. Let me explain, you have identified Hearing Aids as a prime keyword. That is fine, in fact it is excellent, you leverage your site for that keyword. In doing so you reach the height of the organic search rankings and everybody in the world who searches for hearing aid gets to see your site.

Their in lies the issue, everybody in the world is not going to attend your Practice. So as a lead conversion strategy it is probably not the best one. What you need to leverage is local searches, therefore what you need to think about is long tail key phrases. A long tail key phrase is a search term that surpasses key words, in fact most people would use search phrases. In Ireland a long tail key phrase that is referenced relatively frequently is "Hearing Aid Prices In Ireland".

If you wish to turn your web site or blog into a lead generation site which allows you the opportunity to convert visitors to prospects, you need to localise your SEO strategy. The question as always is how? Initially research is the answer, don't go on gut instinct here. Use the Google Key word tool to assess not only the key words but also the keyword phrases used around searches for our industry. You also need to ensure that you localise the results by entering your location or locations. In doing so, it will allow you to see not just the top phrases or key words searched around your industry. But also how many searches are done in your location or locations near to you.

This is the data that you need in order that you can design a site that can be used as a proper lead generation tool. This wealth of data can also allow you to design and deploy content that will keep your site fresh and keep you at the top of the search rankings that actually matter to you as a business. I have always been wary of sales speak, it always smacks of Gordon gecko rubbish to me. But if you want to continually fill your sales funnel with prospects through your online marketing channel, this is how you do it.

Identify Key Words & Phrases around your industry
Localise the data in order that you can target real prospects
Deploy a SEO strategy designed to leverage those localised terms
Design and deploy content through your online marketing channel to leverage the data
Leverage that content through multiple online channels, Twitter, Facebook, Google+, in order to create solid backlinks that drive your organic search returns

If you plan and deploy this strategy you will begin to drive lead generation through your site. This is not the entire answer of course, getting them to your site is half the battle only. Getting them to stay on the site and indeed give you their contact information is the end goal. So your site needs to be clean, easily navigable and contain several well researched calls to action. That my friends is for another post.

Regards

Geoff

Internet Strategy, Why Do You Have Social Media Involvement?

2012-06-15T12:00:00.000+01:00

Applying a solid multiple channel internet strategy to your Practice

I have watched with interest some debates of late pertaining to suitability of the Internet as a marketing channel for our industry. Particularly debates centred around social media and it's power or indeed lack of power for marketing. Social media, in all it's differing guises and platforms, will not necessarily connect you directly to your Patients. Although some platforms such as Facebook may give you a higher opportunity than others to do that.

So with that in mind, why would you get involved, why should you spend any of your rather pricy time on it as a strategy? Because touching Patients or prospective Patients through social media is not the goal. If you do manage to do that and it is rare, well done. Social media as a strategy is deployed to support and bolster your main Internet marketing channel, your website. Your involvement with Social media is actually to bolster your organic search returns on the keyword phrases that you wish to target. Therefore giving you higher page view rates on your existing website.

The strategy for this is consistent and combined backlinks to your website through social media sites. However in order to undertake that campaign the backlinks have to be to content of worth. That is content that is actually worth reading, that is of value to somebody who is your prospective Patient. It is this content that will contain the keyword phrases that they will be searching for. I recently undertook an experiment with my own blog that proves the point to a certain extent.

I decided that I would like to test how high I could come on the organic search rankings for the search phrase "Commercial Strategy in healthcare". I posted some blog posts and undertook a cross channel campaign to promote those posts. I was at the top of the search rankings for a while but I have slipped to second. Interestingly enough though I am also third and fourth. Following a combined strategy like this allows you to be ahead of the game when it comes to Internet search rankings.

Do not fool yourself in anyway, being up there on the organic search returns is imperative to your continuing business well being. However that is only half the battle, when your prospective Patient or their motivator/researcher clicks on your link, you want them to be impressed by what they view. So what elements do you need to deploy to really leverage this commercial strategy in your Healthcare Practice,

A well designed clean and informative website
An attached blog or news page with regularly updated content
Content that addresses the keyword phrases that you wish to capture
A multiple channel social media strategy to promote the content

Each of the facets of this strategy are intricate and rely on each other for best results. They need to be well thought out and well executed in order that they deliver maximum returns to your business. One of my customers is following this strategy in Ireland at present and is getting excellent results. Their website is quite impressive, it is clean, easy to navigate and attractive. They are leveraging a lot of different elements to drive search returns and more importantly engagement and conversion.

Because that is what we are striving for, conversion of leads to sales. They also use an online shop for consumables to drive their loyalty scheme and data collection. It also funds the website and their other Internet marketing channels to a certain extent. In this way you can drive not only engagement but also your sales funnel and indeed your sales. Of course just gathering the data is not enough, the key is then how you use that data, that though is for a different post.

Regards

Geoff

CRM, CRM, CRM, I Dream Of CRMs

2012-06-12T21:48:00.001+01:00

Leveraging CRM Functionality As A Commercial Strategy In Healthcare

I have been quiet of late because I have started to research some of the commercial CRMs (Customer Relation Managers) that are designed for our sector. I hope to post reviews of each one over the following weeks here. I believe that a good CRM with strong, comprehensive search facilities and mail marketing functionality is imperative to the on-going success of a Practice.

These facilities assist with your Patient retention strategies and your on-going re-purchase figures. Marketing to existing Patients has a far superior return on investment rate. The on-going engagement through a properly structured and automated Patient journey also boosts Patient referral business. I have said more than once that your existing Patient is your cheapest marketing channel.

Acquiring a new Patient from traditional advertising has become one of the costliest ventures you will undertake. There is a strong move towards new media channels and I support that fully, however they are un-tried to a certain extent, particularly the social media elements. I plan to discuss that in a later post, before you invest in any marketing channel, you should set out strategies and procedures to leverage your best and cheapest marketing channel. Your Patient! The easiest way to do this is to acquire a good CRM that suits your needs.

So follow me on the journey through CRM land over the next few weeks and if you have any suggestions or if in fact you are using what you think is the best CRM ever invented, drop me a line.

Regards

Geoff

Taking The Sting Out Of Seasonality

2012-05-23T23:46:00.001+01:00

Mail Marketing To Harmonise Cash Flow

Seasonality is an issue in most businesses across many industries. We tend to see it in our industry as well, a lot of my customers have talked about the slow month or months. I had a conversation with one of my customers lately and it made me think about mail marketing. Mail marketing is still a fantastic channel for your business, however, the efficient deployment rules of mail marketing to your database have changed radically.

If you want good return on investment on mail marketing, you need to efficiently define your target market for each offer. It is of no use and in fact may be damaging to you to send non targeted mailings. A plethora of non targeted mailings will lead to fatigue in your target market. Fatigue is something which you need to avoid, it is something that will damage your Patients’ perception of your Practice.

So, who do you target, how do you target them and what campaign do you use? Initially you need to define your target search by your campaign, certain campaign offers will attract different people. For instance, you have a great campaign offer on a new high end product. Who do you target in this case, set your search terms for mid to high technology buyers whose purchase was made four plus years ago. When you have your mail merge list, mail them a carefully thought out mailing. You’re doing that right?

To get the best results you need to be able to really define your targets, so lets try that mailing for mid to high technology buyers whose purchase was made four plus years ago and who expressed an interest in high technology. What do you think being able to define the search down to that target group would do for your return on investment. The key to the search return is the ability to search data that you have actually put into your CRM system. In order to define your target, in order to reach your target with maximum impact, in order to attain maximum return on investment, you need to enter all the relevant data in searchable fields in your CRM.

What about a campaign for a new entry level product, fantastic product at a great price. Who do you target for that campaign, what search terms do you undertake? Entry level buyers four plus, what about test no sales in the last year who voiced price as a major concern? Again, that targeted data is only available if you have entered it. You can see where I am going with this, mail marketing campaigns are only as good as your targeting permits. Your targeting is only as good as your data search permits, your data search is only as good as your search facility permits and finally it only matters if you have entered the data in the first place.

When you have all those parameters right, you can then plan out your mail marketing campaign on a six monthly or even yearly basis. Utilizing your mail marketing to increase foot fall and business levels during your traditionally slow times. Cash flow is king in any business, why not take every opportunity possible to harmonise it?

Regards

Geoff

Part Two, Applying Commercial Strategy To Your Hearing Healthcare Practice, Re-visiting The Ten Best Practices

2012-05-15T22:00:00.001+01:00

10 Best Practices For Patient Retention In A Modern Hearing Aid Practice

This is the second and last part of this article.

5. Employ a loyalty scheme for your Patients, whilst discount reductions on ancillary products such as batteries and cleaning care equipment should be a given, think about monetary thank you vouchers for referral of new Patients or even a scheme where every referral attracts a higher level of discount on the next product purchase.

A loyalty scheme can meet both strategic and tactical needs within your business. The strategic element is long term customer engagement and the encouragement of loyalty to your Practice. The tactical need that it serves is the generation of extra ancillary revenue. It also serves the purpose of keeping you fresh in a Patient’s mind consistently over the lifetime of the hearing instrument. The deployment of a loyalty scheme increases you Patient’s engagement with your Practice and with your staff. It also encourages referral by Patients because of the increased satisfaction with and buy in to your Practice.

6. At every appointment ensure your Patient leaves smiling, a nice chat, some kind words and a cheap giveaway. Spare tubes and tips for thin tube devices, pack of batteries, refill drying tablets, mould cleansing tablets, it does not have to be much, nor does it have to be costly, it just has to be consistent and given with a smile.

Set out a process or script for every standard recall appointment on your Patient journey. Don’t forget to ask about the family, revisit your last conversation based on the notes that you made on your CRM. Ensure that undertake actions that are perceived to give value. A typical recall visit should contain the following,

Take the instruments from the Patient, clean the instruments, clean and retube molds if necessary, change thin tubes and tips if necessary, change wax guards if necessary. Whilst undertaking the cleaning discuss on-going benefit and trouble areas. Connect to instruments, query the sound diary and discuss usage patterns and sound environments with Patient. Make any fine tuning changes needed and discuss on-going coping techniques. At the end of the appointment give the Patient a small free gift, a pack of batteries, some cleaning accessories etc.

This type of structured recall appointment allows you to give perceived on-going value to a Patient. It also fosters a perception of professional on-going care, this will again foster referrals and retention.

7. Try to build a community, ask your Patients would they be interested in talking to some people who are starting out on the journey of better hearing, if so put a buddy system in place. If it begins to take off, organize coffee mornings, you don’t necessarily have to pay for them but if you do it will not cost the earth.

We as human beings have an overwhelming urge to belong, it is in built in our genetic code. A community is a powerful entity, when you feel that you belong to a community it changes your outlook and perceptions. Hearing loss still has some stigma attached to it in the mind of our Patients. Introducing them to other people with hearing loss in a structured manner can reduce the psychological impact of newly discovered hearing loss.

If you can change the relationship of your Patients with your business to a community built around your business you will be rewarded with extreme loyalty. It will also encourage referral, people will want to tell their friends about your business and your community or Patient days.

8. Ask your Patients for referrals and favourable reviews, don’t be afraid, don’t think its cheap, don’t be embarrassed. If you are as good as you think you are they will be happy to help out by referring the people they know or writing a few lines for your webpage or a letter for display in your practice.

Your Patients, if satisfied, will have no issue with referring people to you, so ask them. When they say, I can’t thank you enough, I wish I could do something for you. Say you can, if you would I would appreciate if you would refer anybody you think I can assist to me. They will also be only too happy to write testimonials that they will stand by, testimonials are probably the best way you can enforce your on-going efficacy.

9. Ensure you connect with associated medical professionals in your area, be they MDs, Opticians or Pharmacists. If the relationship becomes strong enough consider how you both may leverage that relationship to improve both your practices.

Ensure that you connect with any and all associated medical professionals in your area. This can be a difficult process particularly with M.D.s, but it is a worthwhile process. A relationship with any associated professional can enforce your professional image and also drive a referral route. Opticians in particular can be an excellent source of cross referral, the trick is that you must also refer back. You can even formalise and leverage the relationship to drive both businesses. Perhaps part of your next campaign could be a voucher for optical services with every instrument purchase. They could offer a voucher for hearing care services with every set of spectacles.

10. Finally and I think the most important, offer good instruments at fair prices, fit them well, and work real hard to deliver on your Patient's expectations. This is what gave me the most satisfaction in practice and also the most referrals.

I think this one speaks for itself really.

Take a look at your Practice with new eyes, identify the processes and procedures that work and leverage them for benefit. Introduce new processes and procedures that will enforce your Patient retention and referral strategy and dump any processes and procedures that threaten your success.

The key to your success is amazing your customer, wowing them, never forget that and you will be on the right track.

Regards

Geoff

Applying Commercial Strategy To Your Hearing Healthcare Practice, Re-visiting The Ten Best Practices

2012-05-10T22:56:00.001+01:00

10 Best Practices For Patient Retention In A Modern Hearing Aid Practice

I undertook a post a good while ago and it has proved to be one of the most popular on the blog. It was in relation to ten tips or best practices for Patient retention. I always meant to revisit it in order to expand on the points that were raised. So here goes, I shall expand on the first four points here. I shall finish the rest over the next week.

So in essence, what can you do to retain those Patients and in fact hopefully increase your referrals through them?

1. Mark out your brand strategy, remember that everything and I mean everything about your business is your brand. From the standard of the decor of your practice right through to how somebody interacts on a phone call, all of these elements make your perceived brand. Ensure that every point of contact with your Patient is fully versed and on Brand.

I can not emphasise this enough, I have said before that your brand is what your Patient says about you. This is a truism, but you can shape the things that your Patient say about you. I was today in two different modern Practices, one that was deployed on the consultative destination model and the other which was deployed on the modern High Street concept model. They were both radically different premises, but in both, you immediately got the sense that you were going to be looked after. The decor in both contributed to this, the small touches in comfort and service also contributed, but the biggest contributor to the sense of well being was the welcome of the staff.

In both places you are dealt with quickly and consistently in a friendly and courteous manner. Even though you are being handled in a well designed process, there is no sense of rush or loss of individualised care. The decor and layout immediately set the tone and the staff round it out. They are well turned out, friendly, efficient and never give the feeling of rush or loss of control. In essence, you feel cared for, that is a powerful feeling, it is a feeling that will bring you back time after time. These Practices completely understand the need to shape the perceptions of their Patients, in both case they have set out to deploy a brand that impacts their Patient in the manner which they have chosen. This brand strategy covers everything in their branch and in their dealings with their Patients.

You need to carefully consider this and then you need to carefully assess your Practice for impact. The assessment should cover decor, staff, communications and point of sales. You should ensure that all facets of your Practice are on brand, that they are consistent with the perception you want to shape.

2. Deliver service levels that consistently amaze your Patients. Always display that can do, nothing is too much attitude; ensure every person within the organisation displays it just as effectively.

This again speaks to your brand perception among your Patients, when you amaze your Patients with your levels of service they will become ambassadors for your brand. They will speak about you to anyone who is interested, they may even speak about you to people who aren't interested. I read a lot and research a lot in relation to customer service. There is a guy named Shep Hyken in the states and he pretty much is the guru of customer service. He is worth a read, his ideas are not industry specific and can be applied to ours easily.

So how do you put this idea into Practice, with consistent customer centric service delivery. A Patient returns an aid for repair, supply them with a loaner to get them through. A Patient needs service quickly, ensure that they get that service same day if necessary. A Patient rings to speak to you, return that call within a set time period every time. Ensure that all your staff take responsibility for actioning and following up on any issue. This is imperative, customer service fails when people don’t take responsibility for the rectifying of an issue. Ensure every member of your organisation takes responsibility, make it part of your company ethos.

3. Engage your Patients regularly at a human level, with compassion, interest and empathy.

This is one of the most powerful things that you and your staff can do. It is simple human engagement, ask them how they are, remember their name. Converse with them in a simple human manner, discuss family, the weather, holidays, hobbies, last weekend, this weekend, all of the things that you would discuss with somebody you knew.

Give of yourself in conversation, they will reciprocate, it is how these things work. Engage people, not in a commercial sense, but in a simple human sense. Your Patients will respect you, dare I say, like you and your staff. This helps to build your Patients into a community, part of an extended group. It is nice, it will enrich your life, it will make your working life easier, it will also by chance make your bottom line healthier.

4. In order to engage your Patients at this consistent level ensure that you acquire really good CRM software, customise it to your needs and make sure every person in your organisation uses it to record all contacts with and details of your Patients.

This is imperative, a CRM will allow your business to function at its optimum. It will ensure that all your communications are managed and recorded. It will allow you to automate a lot of the processes and reminders in your Practice. It will allow you to record information pertaining to your Patients that will allow you and your staff engage them in a more in depth manner. A CRM gives you massive power to manage your Practice and your Patients.

The data that you enter into a CRM will also allow you to define your searches for your mail marketing. Defined and targeted mail marketing still gives some of the best returns on investment. But results are only as good as the power of your defined search. So ensure you enter the data in the first place, the more data you enter, the more defined your search results are. The more refined your search results are, the better your returns.

Regards

Geoff

Are You Missing The Cues? Open Questions And Understanding The Patient.

2012-04-23T09:56:00.001+01:00

I was in a shop recently and witnessed a really angry customer giving it socks. The shop assistant in fairness wasn't helping matters. This girl had probably never heard of customer service, let alone have a deep understanding of the concept. It was not pretty to watch so I did what any red blooded Irish male would, run away, run away!

It, however, made me think back a bit to a situation where I found myself on the end of a similar diatribe from an angry customer. My customer arrived with her daughter in tow, she had been a difficult rehab and what she was reporting to me was not supported by her daughter. When she arrived for rehab there was always an issue, she reported little or no benefit but her daughter was consistently contradicting her.

I was finding it really difficult to deal with, I was practically driving myself crazy fine tuning these problems. In anyway, my Patient had arrived and wanted to return the instruments. Her daughter did not, I asked the daughter to wait in the waiting room while I had a private word with her mother.

I spoke to the Patient in my office, discussing the instruments and her experience with her. As we spoke I realised something, I had been narrowly concentrating on what the Patient was telling me and not really listening. By that I mean actively listening and watching the cues. Not just that but I also failed to ask open and defined questions.

I spoke to her about her experiences with the instruments, I quickly found out that she was receiving benefit, always had been. So I asked her, what or how did she feel we could give her more benefit? She said that her friend had a set of in the ear instruments that she thought were great. My Patient was wearing a set of BTEs, the light dawned.

So I asked her did she feel she may get more benefit from in the ear instruments, she said that she felt she might. I had just wasted quite a bit of time and stress fine tuning a cosmetic issue. We took impressions and got her a set of customs, she was ecstatic and continued to be until I left Practice. She in fact actually sent me a lot of referral Patients over that period, but I had nearly lost her.

So the moral of this story is simple, continuously ask open questions and listen, really listen. Because if you don't you will miss those cues, you may like me end up spending a lot of time on a problem that does not exist. Or worse you may lose a Patient for no good reason.

Regards

Geoff

Fear Of The Unknown, Do You Help Overcome It

2012-04-21T21:25:00.001+01:00

Communication with your Patients

During a recent training session within the company we were going over a consultative form that we will be using in the future. I pointed out that during any consultative session that in order to remove the stress of the session and indeed the fear of the unknown you can undertake it in a certain way. Firstly break it down into sections, then introduce each section as you reach it explaining what you will do and then ask permission to move forward.

Using this strategy removes the stress from the situation and also allows you to gain permission to move forward. It was a system that I was thought to use in my consultation practice way back in the day when I began to practice. It is a system that has value for many situations that we come across in business. I thought about this and I realised something, a Patient generally arrives at your clinic not really knowing what is to occur. This must be quite a stressful situation for the un-initiated, but I never really considered it up until then.

I was thinking that in order to alleviate the fear of the unknown, we should communicate a brief run down of what to expect during the appointment. We could do this in an automated letter to the Patient or possibly leverage this opportunity to engage and wow the prospective Patient by designing and implementing a Practice brochure which includes a section about the test, what to expect and why they should bring a significant other.

Independent Practices really need to take every opportunity to set themselves apart from the pack. This type of small touch can set the tone for your consultation and assist in increasing the perception of authority and trust in you and your Practice. It also removes the factor of the unknown to a certain extent. I think if I was in still in Practice that is what I would do, what do you think? What if anything do you currently do?

Regards

Geoff

The Thousand Yard View

2012-04-16T22:44:00.001+01:00

How Is Your Business Doing?

I attended a sales conference last week with a large element of training. The guy who designed and run the training is quite exceptional at what he does. This may not be always the case as I am sure both you and I can probably attest. The setting was quite idyllic in a beautiful if relatively remote part of north west Wales. During our time there we had little or no phone coverage or internet access. I found it really restful and relaxing, it also allowed me to focus on the work at hand but also my current state of mind and efficacy at work.

I asked our trainer a question about an issue I was having with one of my accounts because I respect his opinion. He gave me a direct and honest answer, a simple one, I am afraid it was a Doh! moment. Me and Homer could be blood relatives! I realised pretty quickly a couple of things, he was dead right and I had been too close to the question. This was also compounded by my state of mind over the last few months. I have not been thinking on a day to day basis with real clarity. The underlying problem that has caused this has not been removed, but I am now clearly aware of the fact and can take action to deal with it.

This really got me thinking, stop sniggering at the back Miller, the people that share my written adventures with me, when was the last time that you had an opportunity to step back and take stock? If you can stop and take stock, are you too close to the question? You are all busy people, busy practices with a lot of day to day work to do and get done. This level of involvement does not really allow you to address your businesses strategic needs or direction. But it is this level of involvement that allows you to feed the family.

Independent hearing health Practices are under more intense pressure than ever before. It is at this time that you all need strategic direction and commercial strategy applied to your Practice. The questions that should be clear to you should be

Do I have the time to consider the strategic direction of my Practice?

Do I have time to consider proper application of commercial strategy in my

Practice?

Do I have the expertise?

If you answer no to any of the above questions, you have just realised a powerful moment of self awareness. Just like I did, this is where we come to the crux of this post,

do not stick your head in the sand at this point, you now have powerful information, take action to deal with it.

So consider how you can address this issue, business development experts are available to you. They tend to cost money, but it can be money well invested. Alternatively, reach out to your friends, your network, possibly even your suppliers for input. It is important that you find someone impartial and honest, if your business systems are rubbish you need to be told that they are absolute pants. Only then can you begin to change, when you have the honest unvarnished truth.

So, maybe its time for the thousand yard view of your business, if you can not reasonably and honestly undertake it, get someone who will. Invest some cash in your business if needs be in order that you can continue in your business.

Regards

Geoff

The Key To A Successful Practice, Your Staff?

2012-04-08T15:01:00.001+01:00

Commercial Strategy Should Cover All Elements Of Your Practice To Succeed.

One of the most important elements of your Practice are the staff that work there.Your staff are in contact with your customers and your prospective customers on a daily basis. Their manner and deportment when dealing with your customers is obviously important. The manner in which they undertake their duties is important, but have you really explained to them the objective of their duties and how they impact on the Patient Practice relationship?

When we hire somebody we generally set out their duties, we explain the processes and procedures within our business. We then expect them to follow those processes and procedures and deal with our customers. But in order to undertake their duties with real efficiency and please your customers, they need to understand the strategy that you are applying. They also need to understand what the objective is and why you are applying that strategy. This is an important factor that we often forget, it is a failing that I suffer myself.

I sometimes give bare bones explanations or instructions and expect everybody to follow what I mean. But when you step back and look at this, you realise that your understanding of concepts are based on your life experiences and knowledge. On a day to day basis we deal with people that share neither, that is why it is imperative that when we communicate with people we do so in some detail. This is no different for your staff, you need to fully communicate to them your concepts, objectives and strategies. You also may need to explain the underlying thought processes that drive those strategies.

If you do this, do it clearly, your staff can be a valuable partner in your business. They can excel at their duties because they have an understanding of the aim and impact of their duties.If you want buy in from your staff, you have to give them something to buy in to.

Commercial strategy is all encompassing, it covers or can cover all elements of your business. In order to have the best opportunity for your business to succeed you need to asses all elements of your business through this prism. From your Patient journey, mail marketing and loyalty scheme to the communications policy and staff duties.

Regards

Geoff

The Six Principles of Influence, Cialdini Concepts For Compliance Professionals

2012-04-04T22:47:00.001+01:00

A Sound Commercial Strategy That Can Be Applied To Your Health Practice

I recently read an excellent article on a concept or set of principles that can be relatively easily applied to our industry. The article was a synopsis of “The Six Principles of Influence” created by Robert Cialdini, Regents' Professor Emeritus of Psychology and Marketing at Arizona State University. Cialdini identified the six principles through experimental studies into the world of what he called "compliance professionals". This term was the term he coined to cover salespeople, fund raisers, recruiters, advertisers, marketers, and so on. He identified Compliance Professionals as people skilled in the art of convincing and influencing others.

The six principles are as follows:

Reciprocity

We innately tend to return favours, pay back debts, and treat others in the same manner as they treat us. This concept is in accordance with the idea of reciprocity. This innate tendency can lead us to feel obliged to offer concessions or discounts to others if they have offered them to us. The underlying agent is our lack of comfort with the feeling of being indebted.

Commitment (and Consistency)

Cialdini says that we also have a deep innate desire to be consistent. For this reason, once we've committed to something, we're tend to be much more inclined to go follow through.

Social Proof

This concept is connected to people's sense of "safety in numbers."

Some examples are, our tendency to work late if others in our workplace are doing the same, put a tip in a jar if it already contains money, or eat in a restaurant if it's busy. Here, we're assuming that if lots of other people are doing something, then it must be OK.

We're particularly susceptible to this principle when we're feeling uncertain about a product or activity. We are also more likely to be influenced if the people we see, seem to be similar to our perception of us. A typical example of this can be found in the advertising of household products. The people who are used in these adverts are normal John and Jane Does. This is because we are more likely to identify with them as opposed to celebrities.

Liking

Cialdini says that we're more likely to be influenced by people we like. Likability comes in many forms – people might be similar or familiar to us, they might give us compliments, or we may just simply trust them. This concept really does play to the adage that sales is a people game.

Authority

We feel a sense of duty or obligation to people in positions of authority. This is why advertisers of pharmaceutical products employ doctors to front their campaigns, and why most of us will do most things that our manager requests. This is a concept that has been utilised within our profession for many years.

Scarcity

This principle says that things are more attractive when their availability is limited, or when we stand to lose the opportunity to acquire them on favourable terms.

So how can we use these principles in our Profession? Application of them in our consultation process and our Practice marketing is not necessarily difficult. The key is the understanding of each Patient and more importantly, why you want to influence them. Think about the ultimate objective of your consultation, during that consultation decide which principles will be most useful in that particular situation.

So how can we apply these principles to our Practices and within our consultation structure?

Reciprocity

Reciprocity is simply the art of give and take, you are well aware of what your objective is. But do you really know what your prospective Patient’s objective is? Identifying exactly what their objective is allows you to measure up the concessions you can make in order to acquire concessions from them.

Commitment

It is important to get Patient’s commitment early on in the process. My old trainer spoke often of mini closes, the art of getting people to say yes or agree to small pieces of the consultation. This manner of consultation allows there to be only one question to be answered at the end of the consultation, to move forward or not.

Social Proof

I discussed this with one of my customers today, it is about creating a buzz around your Practice and services. Use plenty of relevant testimonials in your Practice, encourage people to talk about your Practice and your services. Keep your Practice constantly busy with call backs and service work. A busy Practice enforces the perception that it is a good Practice.

Liking

We do not have a lot of time to build a solid relationship with someone during a consultation. But we can plant the seeds of a long term relationship at this time. The initial consultation is the most important meeting you have with any Patient. It is imperative that you put in the time and effort to build trust during your consultation. It is then your job to continue to build trust and rapport during your on-going relationship. One of the keys to that is acting with consistency.

It is extremely important to endeavour to develop your emotional intelligence and active listening skills. It is also of great import to remember that there is no "one-size-fits-all" approach when it comes to relating to others. It is always good to remember the old adage, “There is nothing queerer than folk”.

Authority

Again, Authority is something that has always been leveraged in our profession. We are the professionals, we own the skills and learning to do our job. The medical connotations of our profession have always been leveraged to give us authority. Back to my old trainer, you don’t take health advice from your friend, you take health advice from your Doctor. You are not their friend and don’t attempt to be. More than a few giggles at that, but again, he was right.

You aren’t a G.P. or M.D., but that is the type of authority that you aim for, but with a better bedside manner. The perception of you as an authority builds an instant level of trust. Something that you need if you are to plant the early seeds of what you hope is a long and mutually productive commercial relationship. Within your Practice Things like well-produced Practice brochures, professional and sophisticated presentation of decor and design, impressive offices and that old favourite, smart clothing, will also lend authority.

Scarcity

Scarcity is a difficult one to apply within our profession, perhaps urgency is a better concept. By that I mean urgency that is built through offers or campaigns. You run a campaign with a deadline, the deadline builds the urgency. The deployment of this concept has to be well thought out and it is imperative that it is perceived as a natural occurrence as opposed to a pressure sales tactic.

All of these principles fall into the sphere of sales tactics or strategy, I know some feel that this is a dirty concept. But, what would you prefer? A Patient purchase product and service from you, or from some other bloke who is obviously neither as talented, empathetic, caring and as attractive as you?

With that in mind, why would you not endeavour to deploy all tools at your disposal in order to ensure they do business with you?

Regards

Geoff

Keyword	Searches	Keyword	Searches
hearing	6,120,000	cost hearing aids	40,500
aids aid	4,090,000	hearing aids cost	40,500
aids hearing	823,000	cost of hearing aid	40,500
which hearing aids	823,000	hearing aid cost	40,500
about hearing aids	823,000	cost of a hearing aid	40,500
aids for hearing	823,000	cost hearing aid	40,500
where to get hearing aids	823,000	aid batteries	40,500
what is hearing aids	823,000	price hearing aids	40,500
what is a hearing aids	823,000	hearing aids price	40,500
hearing aids hearing aids	823,000	price of hearing aids	40,500
for hearing aids	823,000	prices of hearing aids	40,500
hearing aids	823,000	prices for hearing aids	40,500
what are hearing aids	823,000	prices hearing aids	40,500
aid hearing	823,000	hearing aids prices	40,500
which hearing aid	823,000	prices on hearing aids	40,500
the hearing aid	823,000	hearing batteries	40,500
what is hearing aid	823,000	best hearing	40,500
hearing aid in	823,000	beltone	40,500
hearing aid	823,000	hearing aid batteries	33,100
what is an hearing aid	823,000	aids reviews	33,100
what is a hearing aid	823,000	hearing aid battery	33,100
a hearing aid	823,000	hearing aid costs	33,100
compare prices	673,000	hearing aids costs	33,100
hearing loss	450,000	digital hearing	27,100
hearing impaired	368,000	hearing aid reviews	27,100
hearing devices	368,000	hearing aid review	27,100
hearingaids	368,000	reviews on hearing aids	27,100
hearing aid devices	301,000	reviews hearing aids	27,100
hearingaid	246,000	reviews of hearing aids	27,100
phonak	165,000	hearing aids reviews	27,100
oticon	165,000	review of hearing aids	22,200
hearing device	135,000	hearing aids review	22,200
re sound	135,000	in ear hearing aids	22,200
hearing aid device	110,000	in the ear hearing aids	22,200
test hearing	110,000	ear hearing aids	22,200
where can i get a hearing test	110,000	ear hearing aid	22,200
how to test hearing	110,000	phonak hearing	22,200
where to get a hearing test	110,000	phonak aids	18,100
www hearing test	110,000	phonak hearing aids	18,100
hearing test	110,000	hearing aids phonak	18,100
the hearing test	110,000	digital aids	18,100
what is a hearing test	110,000	hearing aid center	18,100
hearing problems	74,000	all about hearing	18,100
hearing store	60,500	hearing health	18,100
price of hearing aid	40,500	digital hearing aids	18,100
price hearing aid	40,500	hearing aids digital	18,100
hearing aid price	40,500	test hearing online	18,100
cost of hearing aids	40,500	online hearing test	18,100
phonak hearing aid	18,100	hearing test online	18,100
hearing test on line	14,800	hearing aid phonak	18,100

Internet activities (all)
According to our February 2012 survey, 80% of American adults use the internet. Here are some of the things they do online:

	% internet users who do this	Survey Month
Use a search engine to find information	91	February 2012
Send or read e-mail	91	August 2011
Look for info on a hobby or interest	84	August 2011
Search for a map or driving directions	84	August 2011
Check the weather	81	May 2010
Look for health/medical info~	80	September 2010
Look for information online about a service or product you are thinking of buying*	78	September 2010
Get news	76	May 2011
Go online just for fun or to pass the time	74	August 2011
Buy a product	71	May 2011
Watch a video on a video-sharing site like YouTube or Vimeo	71	May 2011
Search for info about someone you know or might meet*	69	September 2009
Look for "how-to," "do-it-yourself" or repair information	68	August 2011
Visit a local, state or federal government website*	67	May 2011
Use an online social networking site like MySpace, Facebook or LinkedIn.com*	66	February 2012
Buy or make a reservation for travel	65	May 2011
Do any banking online	61	May 2011
Look online for news or information about politics*	61	August 2011
Look online for info about a job*	56	May 2011
Look for information on Wikipedia	53	May 2010
Use online classified ads or sites like Craigslist	53	May 2010
Get news or information about sports*	52	January 2010
Take a virtual tour of a location online	52	August 2011
Do any type of research for your job	51	March 2007
Upload photos to a website so you can share them with others online	46	November 2010
Send instant messages	46	December 2010
Pay to access or download digital content online*	43	August 2008
Look for info about a place to live*	39	August 2006
Download music files to your computer	37	December 2007
Get financial info online, such as stock quotes or mortgage interest rates	37	May 2010
Rate a product, service or person using an online rating system	37	May 2011
Play online games*	36	September 2010
Categorize or tag online content like a photo, news story or blog post	33	December 2008
Read someone else’s online journal or blog^*	32	May 2010
Look for religious/spiritual info	32	September 2010
Post a comment or review online about a product you bought or a service you received	32	September 2009
Post comments to an online news group, website, blog or photo site	32	September 2010
Share something online that you created yourself	30	September 2010
Research your family’s history or genealogy online*	27	September 2009
Download video files to your computer	27	December 2007
Participate in an online auction	26	September 2010
Make a donation to a charity online	25	May 2011
Make a phone call online, using a service such as Skype or Vonage	25	August 2011
Participate in an online discussion, a listserv, or other online group forum that helps people with personal issues or health problems*	22	December 2006
Download a podcast so you can listen to it or view it later*	21	September 2010
View live images online of a remote location or person, using a webcam	17	September 2009
Use Twitter	15	February 2012
Create or work on web pages or blogs for others, including friends, groups you belong to, or for work	15	September 2009
Take material you find online—like songs, text or images—and remix it into your own artistic creation	15	May 2008
Download or share files using peer-to-peer file-sharing networks, such as BitTorrent or LimeWire	15	August 2006
Sell something online	15	September 2009
Create or work on your own webpage	15	January 2010
Create or work on your own online journal or blog*	14	May 2011
Buy or sell stocks, bonds, or mutual funds	11	September 2009
Use an online dating website*	8	September 2009
Visit virtual worlds such as Second Life	4	September 2009
Source: Pew Internet & American Life Project Tracking surveys (March 2000 – February 2012). Please note that the wording for some items has been abbreviated. For full question wording, please refer to the questionnaire. While this list contains many of the activities the Pew Internet Project has asked about, it is not a comprehensive list. For a complete list of our activity tracking since 2000 please refer to the Usage Over Time spread sheet. * Item wording has changed slightly over time for the items marked with a single asterisk. Please see questionnaires for question wording. ~Based on a series of questions about specific health topics. Last updated: February 2012 Ireland data sourced at internetworldstats.com