The healthcare marketing agency’s growth happens because of a positive and meaningful patient experience. Digital marketing and advertising help bring people in, but patient satisfaction develops after that first phone call.
Patients are real people who need effective communication during every stage of the patient journey. So when ethical marketing efforts convince potential customers to pick up the phone and call your practice, the staff on the other end of that call must be ready to guide the person on a positive path.
We’ve written a lot about staff training and call strategy here on our blog. But today, we’re focusing on marketing strategy, especially for enterprise and multi-location organizations.
Today’s top healthcare organizations are modernizing their marketing by moving from legacy, on-premises technologies to complete contact centers in the cloud. But the moving parts are complicated and can get confusing for larger organizations.
If you’re ready to glean the takeaways, I’ve listed the top tips for designing a successful healthcare Marketing with new patients in mind.
But before we get into strategy, here’s a primer on traditional marketing and why an upgrade should be in your 2021 budget:
The Modern Healthcare Marketing Agency
Marketing has changed over the years. Today, they’re mostly called contact centers and can be tailored to your organization’s needs.
What is a modern contact center? It’s usually in the cloud or connected to the internet. It’s also integrated with email, web chat, texting, video, and core telephony functions, such as marketing and scheduling. The goal is for agents to engage with new and existing patients via their preferred channel.
Some companies go for a web portal added to their on-premises contact center, while others fully transition from legacy to cloud.
What is your current technology? Is it working? What technology should you use, and how does it fit your desired features?
Getting Buy-In for Modern Technology
Most companies are still trying to get their ROI on their legacy systems, let alone move to modern technology. If your organization is still giving pushback to upgrading your marketing, we understand. This happens all the time.
Modernizing marketing in the healthcare marketing agency always comes with politics from stakeholders, including doctors, staff, and leadership. If you find yourself in this category, you’re not alone. Understanding the benefits and features of a modern contact center, along with the strategy tips below, will help you build a solid case for making the transition.
Features
- Cloud-based or single platform: Get rid of hardware installation and the costs of maintaining a legacy system.
- Healthcare marketing agency integrations: The best healthcare marketing today is online and integrated with CRMs, medical billing, EHRs, and other technology, all designed to exceed patient expectations.
- Omnichannel support: Communicate with patients via email, voice recording, text messages, and more. Omnichannel also indicates a contact center is integrated with your website and social media efforts.
- Industry-specific compliance: HIPPA, PCI, and GDPR, you name it, and you don’t have to worry about it.
- Precision call routing: Access smart call routing systems to quickly transfer calls to the right departments and agents.
- Advanced analytics: It’s essential to measure your patient experience with real data you can analyze and improve. Real-time analytics can also help you manage agent performance.
Benefits
- Scalable – Grows as your practice or organization grows.
- Cost savings
- Improved agent productivity
- Self-services for patients
- Better access to care for patients
- Improved patient satisfaction and retention
- Enhanced scheduling experience
Six Healthcare Marketing Best Practices for New Patients
The idea of improving your patient experience isn’t new. But moving to better and more cost-effective marketing might seem new and overwhelming. If the competition wasn’t enough, the global pandemic has added urgency to this transition, as hospitals and multi-location physician practices scramble to make the switch.
Here are six healthcare marketing best practices to consider:
Identify and document your goals
The beginning of any strategy is vital to understanding the project goals. How do you envision your operations going forward? What are you trying to achieve? For example, if you have an aging, on-premises system, you’ll need more help determining how to transfer from the older model to a modern solution. With these questions answered, you can start thinking about the challenges and barriers to those goals. With your goals defined and the obstacles identified, you can seek out technology and solutions that solve those problems and meet your goals.
Start the migration in small steps
If your organization refuses to upgrade your contact center, Kathy recommends introducing it via a stepped process. For example, if a multi-site company has five or six marketing, start with the first one and wait for successful results. It’s easier to migrate to a modern solution if you do it one piece at a time.
Provide proper onboarding
Proper onboarding is crucial when bringing in new staff. Kathy suggests training staff on all aspects of the legacy system and its protocols. For example, train staff on how to pronounce doctor names and on basic customer service protocols. They should know and access relevant information, such as location information or benefits coverage.
Next, develop an ongoing training program that keeps staff updated on what’s happening within the organization and the contact center system. Agents will stay engaged and excited about their jobs.
Separate your staff by Expertise
In the podcast, Kathy shares that one of the biggest mistakes people make with contact centers is having their agents handle all types of inbound calls. Instead, she recommends organizing and separating staff into pods of expertise.
This means having trained staff that only handles new patient inquiries and communications for new patients. You can also group staff based on their expertise in healthcare SEO services.
Monitor quality assurance
Quality management is very important for contact centers. Ideally, calls are recorded. And if they are, the manager or supervisor needs to listen in on calls and have a scorecard to rate the quality. Possible scorecard elements include how they answer the phone, address people, and follow established guidelines. Other examples of quality assurance include an agent’s ability to resolve problems or address requests.
Share performance reports and analytics
A contact center manager should communicate their successes and failures. It’s also important to share outcomes, such as the volume of calls, average speed to answer, abandonment rates, etc. This information is valuable to staff and helps managers identify and provide additional training opportunities.
Regardless of where your organization is on the spectrum, there are important contact center features that all patients expect today.
