There's a shift under way in how healthcare leaders view marketing in tough financial times. Rather than cut marketing when money is tight, as has been standard in the past, the 2007 HealthLeaders Media Annual Marketing Professionals survey suggests hospitals are starting to view marketing as a way to expand market share or at least hold on to what they've already got.
In my last column, I wrote that 2007 was the year of the consumer, as hospital and health system marketers increasingly referred to patients as customers and focused much of their attention on improving service, engendering patient loyalty, and creating a positive brand experience. So, what will 2008 bring for healthcare marketing? I have a few ideas (and some of them might even come true). Also, make sure to keep reading for a link to the 2007 HealthLeaders Media Annual Marketing Professionals Survey--I think you'll find the results quite helpful in formulating your own predictions.
1. A growing emphasis on internal communications: As the trend toward consumerism grows, healthcare organizations will expand their definition of "customer" to include internal stakeholders--from employees and staff physicians and board members to referring physicians. Why? Because patient satisfaction cannot improve without strong employee satisfaction. Is there any industry where every single employee--volunteers, admissions staff, cafeteria workers, nurses, hospitalists, anesthesiologists, physicians, surgeons, and anyone else you can think of--has such a profound impact on the patient experience?
2. The death of customer-written review Websites: Sites where patients rank physicians, nurses, or hospitals in general? They just don't work. They hold absolutely no value other than for the person who wants to let off a little steam about a bad experience. The reviewer is extraordinarily biased and the reader knows that. Sure, word of mouth referrals are key to hospitals' survival. But potential patients want that word to come from a mouth they know and trust.
3. The rise of hospital-specific bash fests: On the other hand, blogs and other sites that are created to target a specific hospital are on the rise. And because they tend to be created by a small community of people with first-hand knowledge of the organization, they carry much more weight than one of those large, impersonal rankings sites. Current and past hospital employees often contribute to these sites (see prediction #1), lending them even more credence. You should regularly use search engines to find out what folks are saying about your organization and crafting an appropriate response to any sites that are dedicated to bashing it. In particular, look for sites with your hospital's name and the word "sucks" in the URL. You'd be surprised how many exist.
4. More innovative use of new media: OK, I'm still not willing to say that in the future all marketing will be done via cell phone. But considering how quickly technology advances, it is entirely possible that in 12 months I'll be writing about a new media that isn't even on the radar yet. It's more likely I'll be writing that hospital marketers are using "old" new media in new ways, however. Either that or there will be a backlash against all forms of new media, everyone will abandon their cell phones and trash their PDAs, and marketers will go back to putting ads in the yellow pages again.
5. Nuevo-niche marketing: Hospitals do know how to reach out to audiences with targeted messages. They send direct mail pieces to new movers introducing their docs and their services. They don't send OB/GYN marketing to single men and they don't remind women to get a prostate cancer screening when they turn 50. But when it comes time to really drill down, they don't do as well. If you have a large Spanish-speaking population in your community, is it enough to publish your patient newsletter in two languages or add subtitles to an existing TV ad for a run on the local Spanish cable station? Or do you need to go further with a campaign that's designed to speak exclusively to a specific community and its unique culture? To stay competitive, it's the latter that makes the difference.
You'll note that I left out a lot of looming trends, but these are my fave five and I'm sticking to them.
Of course, I'd also like to hear your predictions. Is this the year that transparency truly rears its ugly head? Will retail clinics and medical tourism force a change in your market strategy? Will every hospital hire a chief experience officer in the next 12 months? Will marketing managers completely re-jigger their budgets so that 98 percent of their ad buys are online? Let me know what you think. You can e-mail me or click the link below to leave a comment right on this page.
The results of the 2007 HealthLeaders Media Marketing Professionals Survey are in and available to view or download in PDF format on our Web site. The marketing survey offers a snapshot of where hospital and health system marketers stand when it comes to trends, from the increase in consumerism to the rise of new media.
Gienna Shaw is an editor with HealthLeaders magazine. She can be reached at gshaw@healthleadersmedia.com.
Traditionally, hospital quality and patient safety have been left in the hands of the clinical staff--board members and senior executives focused more on the strategic and financial goals of the organization. However, that dynamic is no longer the case. Hospital executives and community board members are taking an increasingly larger role in defining and monitoring the hospital's quality goals. So how can senior leaders and trustees ensure that physicians are on board with their quality agenda?
Ask physicians how the hospital can improve quality, says Melissa Coleman, a board member at Delnor-Community Health System in Geneva, IL. The 128-staffed-bed hospital has several physicians on the hospital board as well as the quality committee. The physicians help the quality committee set agendas based on their daily interactions and observations, she says. "They are out there on the frontlines. They know what will improve quality. . .If you are initiating or implementing a quality initiative, get doctors involved and let them drive it."
Have a sincere and intensive discussion with the medical staff at least once a year on what they are doing to improve quality, advises James A. Rice, PhD, vice chairman of The Governance Institute. For instance, physician leaders should inform the board what processes they are establishing to guard against medical errors, enforce hand washing, and handle credentialing and privileging issues.
Align the quality goals of the physicians and the hospital. Rather than asking, "Why can't we get doctors engaged in our quality agenda?" senior leaders and board members should ask themselves, "How can we get engaged in the physicians' quality agenda?" says James L. Reinertsen, MD, president of the Reinertsen Group and a senior fellow at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Physicians' focus on quality usually relates to their patients' outcomes and wasted time. So if the hospital's quality goal is to look good on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' core measures for evidence-based medicine, that probably won't engage docs. But framing the organization's goals around improving patient outcomes for specific disease states and basing the clinical indicators to monitor the organization's progress on evidence-based medicine and CMS guidelines will more than likely get physicians on board, says Reinertsen. "Now you have a plan that is exactly the same plan, but it has been framed in a way that engages physicians."
Establishing medical conference committees can also help align the quality agenda of the medical staff, board members and senior leadership. These committees are usually composed of three or four key physician leaders and three or four board members who come together two or three times a year to look at the quality agenda, monitor performance, and brainstorm on strategic initiatives, says Rice.
Include the medical staff in strategic discussions on technology trends that have the potential to improve clinical outcomes and patient safety. Board members, senior executives and medical staff leaders should look at the efficacy of the technology--both clinical and IT--as well as the capital consequences for the hospital, says Rice, adding that the discussion can take place two to three years in advance of those capital decisions. "That is another partnership or culture of respect that is important to build between the board, management and physician leaders," he says.
To read more about board members' role in hospital quality, see HealthLeaders December cover story, "Board on the Floor". Carrie Vaughan is editor of HealthLeaders Media Community and Rural Hospital Weekly. She can be reached at cvaughan@healthleadersmedia.com
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