General Practice SA - Business Solution Seminar
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An overview of marketing, branding and communication tactics tailored for health businesses.
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General Practice SA - Business Solution Seminar
- 1. Health Business Solutions Communication, marketing and branding in General Practice Presented by Belinda MacLeod-Smith September, 2013
- 2. Welcome to the session Format for today: Housekeeping (Morning tea break @ 11.30) Brief introductions Overview of attendee priorities/expectations
- 4. And specifically? You asked about… Will we cover this? Increasing visibility in the market place ✓ Increasing „numbers‟ (patients/attendees/website hits) ✓ Encouraging member engagement ✓ Attracting funders ✓ Improving staff awareness of organisational direction ✓ Developing appropriate brand qualities This topic can be quite in depth, but we‟ll certainly touch on it. Logo/trademark registration http://www.ipaustralia.gov.au/get-the- right-ip/trade-marks/apply-for-a-trade- mark/ Stakeholder communication methods ✓
- 5. What we’ll cover today ① Basics of marketing and common terminology ② How to set marketing goals and objectives that are right for your business (and questions to ask yourself when writing a strategy) ③ Understanding the importance of targeting clients, positioning and branding ④ How to focus your resources and energy to meet marketing goals and objectives ⑤ An overview of communication and outreach options, and deciding on the best fit for your business ⑥ Evaluating and measuring the success of your marketing activities
- 6. Marketing mantra It‟s not about you (usually!) Marketing is a discipline that applies wherever there is a need to influence the behaviour of others. The first rule of Marketing Club is to KNOW THE OTHERS (your customers/clients/stakeholders) The second rule of Marketing Club is THERE MUST BE A BUSINESS PLAN. We‟ll cover this (which is covered by market research and segmentation) in a brief whirlwind tour of marketing terminology.
- 7. Before we begin… A quick word from the Medical Board of Australia You are probably all more than aware of this, but just in case: The Medical Board of Australia has strict guidelines for the advertising of regulated health services. The guidelines apply to: Registered practitioners Employers of practitioners Other persons who provide services through the agency of a registered health practitioner. The guidelines give a range of more specific details, but essentially advertising is deemed to comply if it is: “…information published in the public interest, and is factual, honest, accurate, clear, verifiable and not misleading.”
- 8. Common terminology Marketing – a wide range of strategically planned activities to meet the needs of the business. Activities include: Market research Competitor analysis Identification of niches Research into service and product pricing Promotion through targeted advertising, promotions, public relations and sales.
- 9. Common terminology Market profile : a summary of the characteristics of the market you most want to deliver services to. It usually includes information about typical clients and competitors. It can also include general information on the economy and retailing patterns of the area you serve.
- 10. Market Profile The Brown family moves from interstate to Grange, SA in search of an improved family lifestyle. Both parents are aged 40, work full-time in the CBD, and have two primary school aged boys (one aged 8, one aged 12). Their home is mortgaged to a credit union, and they have a combined gross income of $120,000 a year. ACTIVITY Based on this desktop information – what are some communication preference assumptions we could make about the Browns?
- 11. Market Profile
- 12. Brand Brand refers to the name, term, design, symbol or feature that identifies one type of product or services as distinct from another. The legal terms for a brand is „trademark‟ ™ A brand may identify one item, a family of items, or all items of a particular organisation.
- 13. Image Image is defined as the general perception of a product or service. Image marketing commonly distinguishes brands of similar products.
- 14. What did Mrs Brown do next? After a quick „Google‟, Mrs Brown clicked on the top search engine, called „healthengine‟ and clicked through to the website of a practice that had a lot of detail about the GPs on staff. The website looked clean, efficient, was well laid out and all the things she was interested in were easy to find.
- 15. More common terms Word of mouth advertising (WOM) unpaid (usually), unstructured advertising that happens when people share information about product or promotions with friends. Product life cycle A theory that products or brands follow a sequence of stages that generally include Introduction – Growth – Maturity – Decline Many organisations get sick of their marketing efforts without objectively analysing which stage their brand/product is at. You will get sick of colours/designs/messages much sooner than your customer will!
- 16. More common terms Pricing The consumer perception of a product/service price with its competition in the local market. Pricing (in the $ sense) is not a platform I would recommend as a leverage point for health services. Pricing in the sense of time and effort seem more appropriate levers for the industry. Can you think of some reasons why?
- 17. A final few terms Advertising: takes many forms – signs, brochures, commercials, direct mail, and emails to name a few. We‟ve already covered guidelines that apply to advertising in this this industry. Promotion: advertising provides a reason to act, promotion provides an incentive. Public Relations: activities or programs designed to influence an organisations image. PR activities help audiences understand the business, its services and products. Promoting staff to speak at conferences and events Writing newsletters, producing brochures, sending focused emails Writing and distributing press releases Offering special events or training Often – but not always, PR can be handled through the media
- 18. Targeting clients, positioning and branding Who is your market? We can‟t target market/markets unless we know who they are and what makes them tick. Medical practices hold an enormous amount of data on current patients. There are other ways to find out useful „demographic‟ information.
- 19. Demographics – the holy grail of marketing and communication Socioeconomic characteristics of a population expressed statistically, such as age, sex, education level, income level, marital status, occupation, religion, birth rate, death rate, average size of a family, average age at marriage. A census is a collection of the demographic factors associated with every member of a population. City snapshot (City of Playford)
- 20. Demographics And if your business goals specifically want to target a niche market that features audiences with languages other than English? Don‟t make assumptions about ANY market. Again, if you service an area recognised to have high levels of cultural diversity, look to your local council. A list of councils can be seen on the Multicultural SA website.
- 21. Positioning To position your brand/business, you need to be able to show customers what you do differently from your competitors. This is why you need to know who your competitors are, and how they do business. Simply put, you need to be able to answer the customer/audience question: “Why should I choose YOU?”
- 22. Brand Brand refers to the name, term, design, symbol or feature that identifies one type of product or services as distinct from another. The legal terms for a brand is „trademark‟ ™ A brand may identify one item, a family of items, or all items of a particular organisation.
- 23. Question things like this… Lets be logical. Do we all have the same personal experiences/idea s when it comes to colour? Colour is better matched to the appropriateness of the brand.
- 24. Brand personality I‟m not even going to dare you to Google this. It‟s a huge field. However, I do recommend common sense supported by research. I will tell you to go back to your business plan, your mission, your vision and make sure everything you do is „on song‟. Still not sure? Do a comparison shop – think about companies/organisations who do it well. Analyse the elements of their brand. Alternatively, look at companies who get it all wrong!
- 25. Focus your resources and energy Marketing activities don‟t always require specialist knowledge or training – mostly it takes some dedicated time and thinking to set up a program, then discipline and consistency to implement that program. If nothing else, remember that marketing is ANY activity that moves your practice in the right direction: Strategic planning Patient relations Recall systems Practice hours Office location Ancillary products and services
- 26. Focus your resources and energy Five fast tips ① Have a written plan ② Demonstrate availability, affability and ability ③ Keep your name in front of patients and referrals ④ Have an appropriate web page ⑤ Maintain a commitment to quality
- 27. Promotion and communication outreach options In case I haven‟t mentioned it enough already: The best fit for your business means the best match to your target customers AND your resources. Before you commit to something new – ask yourself are you already doing the basics to the highest standard possible?
- 28. Evaluation You need to know your plan is working, or if it needs to be adjusted (it will). If you have followed the „rules‟ for setting sound marketing goals, evaluation will be a simple an elegant process.
- 29. Evaluation – questions to ask For what purpose are you doing the evaluation? What decisions will be made as a result? Who are the audiences for the evaluation? What kinds of information do you need to make the decision/s or enlighten the audience?(information about the marketing activity, customers/clients targeted by the activity, client benefit etc) What sources should information be collected from? (employees, clients, partners?) How can that information be collected in a reasonable way? (questionnaires, interviews, document review, focus groups) When is the information needed, and by when must it be collected? What resources (time, treasure and talent) are available to collect the information?
- 30. FIN Thank-you for your time, input and attention. Any follow-up questions can be sent to me via email: Belinda.macleod-smith@generalpracticesa.org.au If you enjoyed this seminar, make sure you take a look at General Practice SA‟s other Business Solutions Seminars on their website at www.gpsa.org.au
Editor's Notes
- Good morning.Breaks, bathrooms, facilities.Notes – you have a full set of the slides, so feel free to scribble on them as we go.Introduction – your first name, business name, business location and role within the business [Heather/scribe to note locations on white board/butcher’s paper] if possible.
- I know why I’m here – I simply love the process of influencing behaviour change. I love that it takes very little for people who truly know their business and their customers to improve what they’re doing.In the pre-workshop survey, the highest priorities were to learn general information about marketing and branding, and to develop practical actions.Good news!
- Much of what we do in this three hour session is a START. While we have a nice size group, each of your businesses has a different profile – while we may not have the time to specifically address your situation, I intend to give you the tools and the curiosity to get you on the pathway.We’ll may revisit this page a few times, particularly when discussing “quantitative’ vs. ‘qualitative’ measures.
- Depending on our conversations and questions that may arise, some of these topics will be covered more in-depth than others.We have three hours, with a little break, and there are six key areas. If we average around half an hour on each topic, we should be okay.I’ll be checking in with you along the way, and if by some chance we miss something that’s key, simply ‘car-park’ your query on a post-it-noteI’ve also put together a few resources for you to take with you.The reality is while we can’t write a marketing strategy for each of your organisations today, we can get the thought processes going.
- If we take a quick trip back in time, we’ll see that all the reasons we have for marketing involve getting other people to stop what they’re currently doing, and do something else. And usually give us their money or time in the process.
- The guidelines are available from the Medical Board of Australia website, or General Practice SA can provide a copy by request after this session.There’s really nothing scary in them, and the guidelines are written very well and in plain English.If you are considering paid advertising of any sort, it is crucial that you, and the practitioners you may represent understand the obligations.IF THE GROUP FEELS IT WORTHWHILE – WE CAN SPEND SOME TIME ON THIS.
- Let’s brainstorm this as a group, thinking about this family from the perspective of their general practice needs:(Questions on whiteboard/butcher’s paper)What would their preferred communication methods be?Who is most likely to be the decision maker about their GP?How could the known elements of their lifestyle influence a GP service offering?
- Now, if we make the assumption that Mrs Brown is the decision maker and driver behind GP choice, and that she’s busy, we could assume that (like a significant proportion of Australians in that demographic) she Googled for a doctor.There are, of course, a range of standard other search options she could have used – the thing to note can be where those options appear in Google results.Have you tried Googling your own practice/business?It is said that the best place to hide a dead body is page two of Google search results, because no-one ever looks there…
- We are so surrounded by brands, each of us would be exposed to hundreds, if not thousands every day. Each brand is imbued with qualities that arise from both our personal experiences, and the experiences that marketers attempt to convince us of.
- Every element of your business should have a consistent image. What do you think patients want to see when they walk into their doctors office?Cleanliness, efficiency, professionalism?Friendliness, comfort, warmth?It all depends on your primary target market.What Mrs Brown looks for will be very different to what MrVinh Ngo looks for. And where they look for it will be as different. You need to know your target market or markets.Everything you do stems from this knowledge.
- Quick recap – we have covered:MarketingMarket profileBrandImage
- Advertising of pricing in regulated health services must be clear and not misleading.In addition, the MBA guidelines state that the use of discounts/gifts in advertising is inappropriate, due to the potential for such inducements to encourage unnecessary use.
- DISCUSS – each attendee to nominate a specific target market – at least three (current or future)
- What are some of the ways you already have or could collect data about your target markets?Population health dataABS dataProfile ID suburb data as presented by the majority of South Australian CouncilsThink about Mrs Brown – we are able to make some very reasonable assumptions about how best to reach that demographic without BEING Mrs Brown.Look at the methods your local council uses to target the population as a whole, then subsets of the population. Chances are that significant time, money and expertise has been put into establishing the most successful methods. There is rarely a need to reinvent the wheel.EXAMPLE – grocery shopper aged 18-45 (media placement example from Water for Good campaign).
- Why should I listen to you? Why should I interact/engage with you? Why should I give you my money and/or time?It must be a compelling answer.
- ... but the truth of the matter is that color is too dependent on personal experiences to be universally translated to specific feelings.And in regards to the role that color plays in branding, results from studies such as The Interactive Effects of Colors show that the relationship between brands and color hinges on the perceived appropriateness of the color being used for the particular brand (in other words, does the color "fit" what is being sold).
- I bet you’re already doing more marketing than you thought.I’ve got a great little resource here which I’ve tailored to a general practice setting – Five Fast Tips.
- Group/small group activity:Brainstorm target audiencesExample – Vietnamese family groups in the Playford region (give personal example)Select twoSplit into two small groupsDiscuss different ways you could reach these markets – (brainstorming rules apply – there is no wrong!)Report back to the group with at least five options to ‘connect’