Entice Docs with Digital Communication Tactics

With all of the physician sales methods out there—from glossy recruitment books to gift baskets to real estate assistance—it's easy to forget the one that can't be thumbed-through, eaten, or lived in. But digital communications is a must-have for today's successful healthcare marketer.

Currently, 99% of physicians use the Internet and 64% use a smartphone—a number projected to jump to 81% in 2012—according to Manhattan Research's 2009 "Taking the Pulse" study. And as physicians' means of communicating change, healthcare marketers' methods must evolve along with them.

I spoke with two hospital marketers that have seen significant results from their digital physician sales and referral efforts for the March issue of HealthLeaders magazine.

Digital recruitment methods
Sandra Dilts, administrative director of business development and physician relations at Memorial Healthcare System in Hollywood, FL, amped up the organization's online presence when she realized the growing importance of the Internet among physicians. They now advertise on medical journal Web sites, subscribe to an online physician-only job search network, and post employment opportunities on the seven-hospital health system Web site.

"Technology has become pervasive in the industry and most physicians, just like other walks of life, have some technical prowess," she told me. "Whether it be responding by e-mail or text messaging, I think that it's not entirely segmented. However, five years ago I would say that those that responded to online sourcing were the physicians that were newer in their careers."

Just a few years ago, Memorial recruiters received most resumes by fax or mail. Now, they receive about one fax every three months and receive no job inquiries by mail.

"We have an opportunity to be able to reach more people at a faster speed than ever and for them to respond just as quickly," Dilts says. "It's made it a 24-hour-a-day industry."

Smartphone referral aides
Digital tools can increase physician referrals, too. Mary Thomson, vice president of marketing and public relations at Abington, PA, Memorial Hospital, got all of her physician leaders smartphones after she realized they could create an application that would allow them to better communicate with referring docs. The app provides a list of the referring physicians' back-office phone numbers and lets Abington doctors place a call with just a few clicks.

"The hardest to do was getting all of the numbers, but building the app is apparently pretty easy," she says. "That is an easy way for the docs to have a phone number to call right at their fingertips if they just operated on another doctor's patient."

So now, Abington doctors are happy because the app saved them time, referring physicians are happy because they know the status of their patient, and the patient is happy because both of their doctors are completely on top of their care.

The social media conundrum
The use of social media to communicate with and attract physicians can be controversial. It's not always easy to track, could cause legal problems, and no one is sure if doctors even want to be contacted in that way.

In the October issue of Healthcare Marketing Advisor, I wrote about how Geisinger Health System in Danville, PA, set up a Facebook page to recruit gastroenterologists.

"When recruiting gastroenterologists we traditionally would do print ads in different medical journals and direct mail," says Cathy Connolley, Geisinger's associate vice president of marketing. "But this time we weren't getting the types of responses that we were looking for."

So the Geisinger marketing team created a Facebook page in that includes photos, recruitment event information, and links to the system's site. The highly-targeted "Geisinger Health System Professional Staffing" page now has 52 fans, but it's hard to directly link any of those fans to new hires.

Neither Memorial nor Abington have used social media to communicate with physicians, but Dilts says she wouldn't rule it out.

"The outreach that we do for candidates has to be multipronged," she says. "We've not gotten into the social networking as yet. It's creating buzz throughout the healthcare industry just like any other industry, but it's not something that we've exercised yet."

Wherever you fall in the social media debate, having a digital communication strategy is crucial to recruiting new doctors, increasing referrals, and keeping current physicians happy. (Now e-mail this column around to your docs to see what they think.)