How To Be Known As The Go-To Specialist In Your Industry

4 Opportunities to Help You Become a Key Industry Leader in Your Area

Are you a leader in your field? Do referring doctors reach out to you for curbside consults? Or do referring doctors call the giant venture capital-based practice in town for everything? 

Being known as the go-to specialist in your area helps grow your practice by leaps and bounds. Not only does it get you more patients in the door, but it can really open doors for you professionally. 

So how can you become an industry leader? Here are some tips to get you started on your journey to becoming the go-to specialist.

1 | Your Practice Needs a Blog

Your blog is an opportunity for you to show your merits and knowledge in your field. Remember that when writing your blogs, you should write some geared toward patients and others geared toward potential referring doctors. Having a healthy mix will show that you not only know your stuff, but that you can educate patients about what they need to know as well! And because your blogs live permanently on your website, it can increase your SEO (search engine optimization) ranking. Having a higher ranking places your website and/or blog higher in search results, helping prospective referrers find you easier. To get a higher SEO score, make sure you fill your blog (especially the title, subtitle, and first paragraph) with key words and phrases that others are searching for. 

2 | Have a Big Presence on LinkedIn

Give your LinkedIn profile a makeover and spend more time networking and sharing content on the platform. Here are a few tips to help you have a better and bigger presence on LinkedIn:

• Use a professional looking headshot for your profile picture (people are more likely to connect with you if you have a profile picture).

• Join groups and be active by sharing your knowledge or adding comments on other posts, helping you engage with others in your broader industry.

• Post blogs or newsletters geared toward other professionals in your broader industry.

• Fill your own page with your knowledge and know-how to showcase what makes you and your services unique!

3 | Take Opportunities to Network at Events

Networking events can help you meet with and exchange information with others in your industry. If you have shown your chops online in your own blog and LinkedIn presence, you may be invited to be a speaker at an event! Becoming a speaker or panelist at a conference or industry event really gives you a chance to showcase your knowledge in real time. 

4 | Hire a Physician’s Liaison!

We understand that networking, writing blogs, and interacting with others on platforms such as LinkedIn can be time consuming. We also know it’s not enough to create the kind of long-term referral relationships you need to grow your practice sustainably. Your Physician’s Liaison takes the time to get to know your business and what makes your services unique. Then we tailor your message to the unique needs of your prospective referrers. We also have a keen ear, listening for competitive information that will give you an edge. Physician’s Liaison clients have benefited from referral marketing relationships that have lasted 10 years and counting! Learn more about our commission-free, dynamic approach to referral marketing solutions.

How to Leverage Relationships to Grow Your Practice

Referral Marketing for Sustainable Practice Growth

Good relationships are the foundation of your practice. Because of that, you probably spend a lot of time cultivating great relationships with your patients. But it’s not just about the relationships you have with your patients, it’s also about the relationships you have with referring practices. 

What is Referral Marketing and Why is it Important?

Referral marketing is the act of reaching out to prospective referrers in the hopes of building a relationship with them that will help grow your practice. Just like other types of marketing (such as advertising to prospective patients on Facebook), referral marketing is an essential part of any private practice business strategy. It can help grow your practice in a sustainable way. It can even help you weather economic downturns. 

Get a Physician’s Liaison

You know it’s important, but the idea of spending so much time tailoring your message and then taking the time to meet with different prospective referrers can be very time consuming. So much so that you may feel it eats into the time you spend cultivating relationships with your patients and running the day-to-day operations of your practice.

That is where a Physician’s Liaison can help! How do we help build relationships on your behalf? Think of us as your conduit.

How Physician’s Liaison Leverages Relationships for You!

Your Physician’s Liaison isn’t there to replace you, but rather to represent you. We take the time to learn about what makes your practice unique and what you have to offer. Then we use a dynamic approach by tailoring your message to prospective referrers. Once we have qualified the opportunity, we bring you in. 

Rest assured that we don’t just spend our time promoting you, but also listen attentively to what the prospective referrer has to share. Our representatives pay special attention for competitive information on existing referral patterns, strengths, weaknesses, or barriers that may exist. 

Our experts have taken on the role of Physician’s Liaison for nearly 20 years, helping to build lasting referral relationships one handshake at a time. Our unique referral marketing model expands a provider’s and practice’s referral relationships while drastically reducing wasted time. We take pride in representing you and your distinguished treatments, specializations, products, and services! 

But don’t just take it from us that leveraging relationships can help grow your practice. Many of our clients have benefited from referral marketing relationships that we made for them. We understand what the perfect formula is to build, maintain, and multiply referral relationships. 

FAQs

We know you probably still have questions. Here are some answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about our referral marketing services.

Q: Do doctors or practices become upset that they are meeting with a Physician’s Liaison rather than meeting with another doctor?

A: That has not been our experience. We qualify the prospective referrer, rather than pull our client from their normal routine. Because we take the time to get to know your practice, we are able to answer key questions to assess whether or not the prospective doctor or practice is genuinely interested in meeting with our client. 

Q: How often do you make referrals?

A: Our representatives only manage a handful of clients at once. They are trained to have a plan for promoting only one client per visit in a single office. We also try to space out our visits so as not to upset or confuse an office. 

Q: Where do you refer currently; are you in my city or state?

A: While our corporate headquarters are in Denver, Colorado and our regional office is based in Dallas, Texas, we have representatives throughout the United States. Inquire with us to see if we are able to represent you. 

Q: Do you spend your time only promoting, or learning what could be better for referring patients?

A: Your Physician’s Liaison understands that in order to tailor your message to a prospective referrer’s needs, we need to listen attentively to the prospective referrer as well. We have a keen ear and are on the lookout for any information that will help us improve our marketing tactics and build better relationships. 

Let’s Talk!

Physician’s Liaison is proud to offer commission-free referrals and is committed to non-competing representation. Our goal is to help you succeed through leveraging referral relationships. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help your practice grow. 

Patient Reviews and Your Star Rating

How Important is it to Get a Good Online Business Review?

In today’s online world, people search healthcare practices online before making a decision to become a patient there. One of the most looked-up pieces of information potential patients search for is online reviews of a practice.

How Important are Star Ratings?

This means your online star reviews are very important. With that said, you shouldn’t lose sleep over it. Rather, you should gradually work to:

• Take control of your review profiles

• Capture and update your profiles

What makes these profiles so important is that they actually serve as “backlinks” to your website. Backlinks are links on third party sites that link to your business website or blog. These links help you build a stronger overall digital presence. The more backlinks you have, the higher your SEO (search engine optimization) score is, which places you higher in online searches!

By taking control of your profiles on review sites, you will be able to update information as needed. You will be alerted to not only positive reviews that you can promote on your socials and website, but negative reviews as well.

Stop the Bleeding

If you are getting a bunch of negative reviews, it is important to identify why your patients are upset. Once you have identified the problems, set up a procedure to correct it. For example, if your appointments are always running behind, advise patients that there could be a wait. This can give patients the heads up that they will have an opportunity to get some work done while waiting in the lobby. (Make sure you have free WiFi for those who need to use it.) Alternatively, you could give a better estimate of the actual time a patient will be seen leading up to the appointment or you could adjust your scheduling blocks to add in some padding between appointments. 

Set Up a Program to Capture Positive Reviews

The other thing you can do to take care of negative reviews is to flood them out with positive ones! Set up a way to capture positive reviews from your patients. This is as simple as providing happy patients with a QR code to share their feedback. Or if you do follow-up emails after an appointment, send your happy patients a link to submit an online review in an email or newsletter. Ultimately, the more elaborate a strategy is, the better chance you have to maximize opportunities for patients to provide a positive review, and capture unhappy patients before they post a negative review.

Here to Stay

In a perfect world, patients would treat providers fairly and practices would treat all patients with VIP service. This expectation is here to stay and that means you have to step up your efforts!

This practice can be somewhat unfair to healthcare providers due to HIPAA limitations that medical professionals must adhere to. However, showing that a practice is listening to feedback is key. Many times, patients just want to know their concerns are being heard and addressed. So at a minimum, you should respond to negative reviews and feedback. 

More Strategies to Bury Negative Reviews

Once you have addressed the unhappy patient and have reached a compromise or solution, ask the patient if they would consider updating their review to a higher rating, or deleting the negative review altogether. Remember, you don’t get what you don’t ask for!

Further, you can contact the review platform (Google, Facebook, Yelp, HealthGrades, Vitals, etc.) to see if any reviews that are considered obscene, abusive, or dangerous can be removed. Oftentimes, the platform will remove reviews that conflict with their standards of use.

In the end, if an unhappy patient refuses to update or delete a negative review, or the platform will not remove a negative review, you’ll need to work to get your happy patients to flood the platform. Again, simply request that they take a moment to share their feedback, giving you plenty of genuine, highly rated reviews. 

Customer Service Tools

Finally, customer service tools exist to assist you in capturing potential negative reviews internally. These tools allow individuals to share their feedback directly with the practice. While these tools do not prevent an unhappy individual from circumventing your tools by visiting platforms directly, it can help you resolve issues and flood your reviews with high ratings. 

Looking for Assistance?

Need help getting your online star ratings in order? Our team is well versed on the intricacies and strategies of improving your online reviews! Contact your Physician’s Liaison representative to discuss a strategy designed for your unique needs.

New Year Goals For Your Practice

How Networking Can Help You Achieve Those Goals

A new year has begun and that probably means you have been thinking about the goals you want to set for your practice this year. Just like for yourself, setting goals for your business is key to success.

1 | Knowing Which Goals to Set

Before setting goals, it’s important to know where your business is at as this will inform where you can go. In other words, check all the data from last year and see what areas of your practice need improvement and what is doing well. 

Take a deeper look at those issues that need improvement. Ask yourself what could be causing a lack of success in those areas. Once you nail that down, you’ll have a better understanding of how to improve that issue, plus the goal(s) you should set to find better success. 

2 | Be Specific

It’s important to understand that the more specific you are with your goal, the better chance you have of reaching that goal. So the more time you spend organizing and working out the details now, the better it will be later on. For example, if you want to increase your profit margin, don’t be vague about it. Rather, identify the percentage increase you are aiming for. 

3 | Plan for Setbacks and Promote Accountability

Being overly optimistic and not planning for setbacks can leave you spinning in the wind. Remember, there will almost always be some circumstance you have no control over or your own missteps that can hold you back. Make a list of all the things that went wrong in the past and possible future pitfalls so you can prepare for them. 

Then be sure to keep you and your team accountable by setting deadlines for each step along the way to meeting your goals. Not only can it help you keep track of how close you are to attaining your goals, but it can also create a sense of urgency that compels you to complete the individual steps that help you reach your ultimate goal. 

4 | Reassess Regularly

Make sure that you are continually reassessing and keeping track of your progress. This will help you pinpoint actions that might not be working as well as you hoped and allow you to course correct. Consider having monthly meetings with your team to reassess, exchange feedback, and brainstorm ideas for next steps or adjustments. And don’t forget to celebrate the small victories along the way to help keep you motivated! 

5 | Your Top Goal Should be Networking!

Finally, no matter what your other goals are, the goal you should set every year is to network with your representatives, area practices, and even your chamber of commerce. Networking with others can improve every area of your practice and help you reach any other goal you set. Think about it–growing your network literally provides you access to deeper resources, a safety net, and even more new patients. It can also help you stay on top of the latest trends in your industry so you can be ready for whatever is around the corner. 

At Physician’s Liaison, we’ve been helping practices grow one handshake at a time since 2005. Our proven healthcare referral marketing methods can help promote your practice and introduce you to vetted prospective referrers. We take a dynamic approach, taking the time to understand your practice and tailor your message to the unique needs of your prospective referrers. Our unique methods expand your referral relationships while drastically reducing wasted time. But most importantly, we believe in building relationships that last! Visit our website to learn more or to contact us today to get started! 

Recession-Proof Your Practice

3 Things to Do Now to Help Your Health Care Practice Weather the Storm of a Bad Economy

Life has its ups and downs, and so does the economy. Small swings in the economy are normal, but when there are big drops in the economy coupled with high inflation, it can be very stressful for businesses. 

Despite how stressful it can be, you’ll need to put those nightmarish thoughts of losing your practice on the back burner. With these steps you can help recession-proof your healthcare practice and weather the storm

1 | Increase Patient Outreach

Now is not the time to cut back on marketing and patient outreach. Patient outreach through marketing is a critical component of your business. It provides lead generation as well as cultivating a loyal patient base. When you strip that out of your business plan, it’s like cutting the oxygen off to your practice. 

However, you will need to change how you reach out to your patients. First, remind your patients that life does continue on. Critical healthcare needs are not going to go on pause just because a recession or economic downturn is happening. People still need health care no matter what is going on with the economy. Waiting to care for needs until the economy is better could have some negative results; health problems or conditions could worsen and care will end up costing more in the end. A proactive approach to care should still be a top priority, even in a bad economy. 

When you remind your patients that life continues, you still need to speak to them from a place of understanding. Speak to your demographic based on what is happening in society. Let them know that you understand that times are tough for so many right now. Showing that you understand and care about your patients builds trust and long-term patient loyalty, helping you make it through a recession. 

To help keep appointments filling the books, continue to send out follow-up reminders automatically, send out newsletters, and if you haven’t already, set up a page on your website where patients can book an appointment. Today’s patients expect convenience and the younger generations especially look for online appointment forms. 

2 | Streamline

Streamline what you can! Focus on what is generating revenue and streamline your workflow to match that. This can include limiting administrative time. While some administrative processes are necessary for patient care, such as locating patient data or collecting insurance claims, this can suck up your time, which could otherwise be spent seeing more patients. Find a system that works for you and your team, keeping you organized and on top of it. This will help cut down on wasted time and allow you to provide better patient care, further improving long-term patient loyalty. 

3 | Plan Ahead with a Budget

Having a budget is a normal part of business as it helps you allocate resources and manage your expenses, but you should always have a plan B for an economic downturn or recession. When you see a recession or major downturn looming, check in with your budget and take some remedial measures before things get out of control.

Start by estimating your monthly and annual income and expenses. This will help you know where you are currently and can help you develop a plan of action. Next, figure out what expenses you can cut or eliminate. It’s also a good idea to know what upcoming life events are happening that might affect your ability or your team’s ability to work (such as a wedding or baby). It’s also a good idea to start saving money now where you can. You never know when the price of rent will go up or when you might not have enough income in a month. Starting that extra padding now can really be a lifesaver. 

Key Takeaways

Recession can be scary, but when you plan ahead, it can make it less stressful. Streamlining your process, budgeting, and saving money ahead of time can all be important, but the most crucial aspect to recession-proofing your practice is continuing patient outreach. Speaking to your patients from a place of understanding, and reminding them that healthcare needs don’t stop during a bad economy can help keep them coming in the door even when times are tough. It is these relationships built on trust and understanding that can help your practice deal with whatever comes your way. 

Building a Long Game AND a Short Game Approach to Your Practice Marketing

Which Form of Marketing is Best for Your Medical Practice? 

Growing your practice is probably one of your top priorities. In order to have sustained growth, marketing your practice is essential for success. 

Whether you are looking to begin your marketing journey for a new practice or revamp your current strategies, you are probably wondering what is the best and most effective option. 

Why Marketing is Necessary for Medical Professionals

In today’s world, the reality is that no business can expect to succeed without marketing. For medical practices, a large part of this is thanks to the shift in focus to patient-centered care, rather than a focus on the physician or practice. 

Thinking about what marketing strategy will work best can seem overwhelming with all of the other things you need to focus on in order to run a successful practice. In fact, you probably would rather just focus on providing top-quality care instead of marketing. And we get it! That’s why we are taking a look at some of the more traditional options of marketing, such as SEO and digital ads, and how they stack up to referral relationships. 

SEO - Invest in the Long Game

As Bill Gates has said, “content is king.” This is especially true for SEO. Search engine optimization, or SEO, is the process of improving your site to increase its organic visibility in online searches. In other words, you are doing work on the back end to make your website more relevant and discoverable based on popular keywords or phrases that people search for in regards to your industry. 

The more you optimize your site through SEO practices, the higher your page’s ranking will be in online searches on sites such as Google or Yahoo search engines.

The practice of SEO is using keywords or phrases in parts of your site such as:

• Meta descriptions

• Headlines

• The first paragraph of a blog

• Descriptive custom URLs

• File names of images

• Internal links

• External links

What makes SEO difficult is that it is time-consuming and requires an understanding of the user’s intent. It takes time to research keywords and phrases that are relevant to your content and practice, and then insert them into your site and blogs. It also takes time to build rapport with Google and other search engines. However, once you get this rapport, it lasts a long time. 

Digital Ads - When You Need a Quicker Win

Another common marketing practice is the use of digital ads. Digital is much more cost-effective than traditional forms of marketing, such as print or TV ads. Digital ads have expanded beyond the banner ads of decades past. Now you can run ads on social media platforms, run in-app mobile marketing ads, and use pay-per-click (PPC). 

In order to effectively run a digital ad campaign, you have to:

• Do your keyword research

• Write up copy

• Create eye-catching images or graphics

• Optimize each ad for the different platform

• And then run your ads

The great thing about digital ads is that they typically start to perform quickly, helping you get leads to your practice. However, you pay for each of those, and when you stop paying, they stop delivering. Not to mention that you have to constantly pay for ad runs and over time, that can really add up in cost. 

Referral Marketing

There’s a nice blend of both the long game (like SEO) and the short game (like paid digital ads): referral marketing. Referral marketing can offer some great quick wins to help you bring patients in the door, but the relationships with referring doctors also build a pipeline for your practice’s long-term growth. 

If you are thinking that doing the work to build your network can be time-consuming, there is a better way–by hiring a Physician’s Liaison!

Your liaison already has a built-in network of medical professionals and specialists they can connect you with that you need in your network. For over 13 years, our experts have helped practices and providers build up their network one handshake at a time. Our unique model is a dynamic approach that tailors your message to the unique needs of your prospective referrers. 

What makes referral marketing the most effective option is that it is based on building relationships that last! This means longevity and permanence for your practice that isn’t based on the whims of today’s fickle consumers. So while you focus on running the day-to-day of your practice and providing high-quality, patient-centered care, we’ll be your champion for building relationships outside of your practice, helping you build a network that leads to referrals. 

A beautiful result of solid referral relationships is that our clients learn the genuine hot buttons of not just patients, but also their referring providers.  Unlike SEO & Digital Ads, a patient referred by their provider will often share praise or criticism with their referring provider.  Additionally, patients often share praise or criticism with specialists about their referring provider as well.  The end result is a valuable feedback loop based largely on authenticity.  

Referrals are testimonials of your professionalism.  Referrals also immediately build familiarity centered around your practice.  Ultimately, a referral is also a reflection of the professional judgment of the person making the referral. The best possible outcomes and overall optimal patient experiences, despite being health and aging-related or illness and injury related, will naturally lead to lasting professional referral relationships based on quality of care and professionalism.  Best of all, referral relationships are not tied to a monthly budget that delivers patients, which means that the referrals keep flowing even after your liaison is focusing on other areas on your behalf.

Contact us today to learn more about how we can help effectively market your practice through building your referral network. 

Top 10 Way to Grow Your Marketing Practice as a Medical Professional

Why Medical Professionals Need Marketing 

Whether you are a physician or medical specialist, the ability to reach your consumer audience and patients through intentional, consistent and impactful marketing is critical. It has become increasingly so in a post-COVID-19 era, where consumer values shifted by both necessity and nature. “What used to be a volume-based industry centered around the physician, has become a quality-based industry centered around the patient” (Levo Health). Moreover, consumers are using digital platforms to research, engage with, and purchase products and services more than ever. So what does this mean for you, the physician?

Where to Start In Your Marketing Journey

It is the perfect time to start investing intentional energy in your marketing strategy. The reality is that with our large world made small on the internet, your service or specialty can become replaceable if you aren’t putting yourself in the right place, at the right time, in front of the right person. 

Thinking about a marketing strategy might seem overwhelming. After all, you should be busy providing care with the hopes of pleasing your patients! However, there are simple ways that you can consistently devote energy to your marketing strategies that will engage your current and future patients. 

1. Establish yourself as a thought leader in your field by writing articles and blog posts

You need to stand out and educate your audience about what makes your practice different. Sharable content from your practice is a great way to teach your audience about your values, methods, and patient/customer journey. Best case scenario is that your audience loves your content and helps share it for you! 

2. Develop relationships with local media outlets and offer to be a source for their stories

Never turn down a good shoutout from a local news outlet. Sometimes we are so busy worrying about the customer or the day-to-day, that we forget to share what is going on in the business! When great things happen, let your local radio or news know! Things such as charity events, patient appreciation, sponsorships for good causes are all news worthy events. 

3. Host or attend local events related to your field and network with other professionals

 “Everyone should build their network before they need it.” Don’t sleep on opportunities to get connected with other community businesses/organizations and of course healthcare professionals throughout your greater medical community. Many providers are stuck referring to the same destinations simply because they haven’t learned about better alternatives. You never know when these relationships will lead to a referral or a lengthy referral relationship. 

4. Give presentations at community organizations, hospitals, or other medical facilities

Just as sharing your own content is valuable and a great tool to build awareness, visiting other medical practices and giving presentations about your speciality or niche is a great way to extend your network and set you apart from others in your field. 

5. Get involved with social media platforms like Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook to share relevant content

In this day and age, social media is a no brainer. If it seems intimidating to be on all of them, choose one that appeals to your audience the most, and do it WELL. Create and reshare an array of content that is engaging for your consumers. Make sure to include a healthy amount of calls-to-action to help new patients or customers learn more about you! 

6. Collaborate with other medical professionals to create content or offer services jointly! Write guest posts for other medical professionals' blogs

Putting two (or more) great minds together can be a great way to build connections in your field and create shareable content on social platforms. 

7. Connect with other medical professionals on social media

Just as you need to connect with your target market on social media, you should also be connecting with other professionals in your field. This way, you can keep up on trends and also see new content opportunities as they arise that could spark interest in your consumers. 

8. Attend medical conferences and networking events

Local events are great, and so are larger scale professional events. Not only can you expand your own knowledge, but these events often evolve into new opportunities to grow and expand your practice through acknowledging marketing and consumer trends. 

9. Create marketing materials like e-books, whitepapers, and infographics

A great way to build trust with consumers is through the publication of your own materials showcasing your knowledge. From a marketing perspective, these materials can also serve as lead magnets (an online subscription/email signup/or similar) that can build your consumer network. 

10. Hire a Physician’s Liaison

If you are looking at the 9 tips above this thinking: “I don’t have the bandwidth to do these consistently or at all”, then maybe a great place to start is by hiring a liaison. Physician Liaisons serve as the bridge between your practice and the medical professional or specialist that you need in your network. While you are running the operations and managing the relationships within your practice, a physician liaison can be the tool you need to champion those relationships outside, building your network and leading to referrals. 

For more tips and best practices on growing your marketing in your medical practice, visit: https://www.physiciansliaison.com/