Questions? Comments? Story ideas? Anna Webster, Online Content Coordinator for HealthLeaders Media, can be reached at awebster@hcpro.com. Follow Anna Webster on Twitter
As marketers, sometimes we let the statistics tell the story. Healthcare messages often flaunt the Press Ganey scores, readmission rates, or patient satisfaction scores. The problem with statistical messages is that they are impermanent – just like their impression in viewers' minds.
What message will stick long after your TV ads and billboard campaigns stop running?
Here's a bit of homework I'm assigning to all the marketers out there – pick a person at your facility to shadow, then tell their story – the one that will resonate in patient's minds.
We know that one of the top patient fears is that doctors and nurses don't really care. You can personalize your system and humanize healthcare by showing that clinicians are people too.
I've completed the assignment myself, by interviewing Mark Tlumacki, an orthotic clinician who has worked for Massachusetts General Hospital for over 30 years. Perhaps his story will inspire you to find and share your stories of how your organization has changed over the years and how your staff has changed too.
Tlumacki, CO, is one part clinician, one part carpenter, one part social worker, and one part motorcycle enthusiast. He wears New Balance sneakers and khaki pants to work instead of a lab coat. Each day in the office is different. Some days he is down in the trauma center dealing with patients with threatening burns. Other days, he spends building contraptions that will help doctors isolate a patient’s tumor. Some days he will spend hours at the computer, pecking with his pointer fingers to file data.
His glasses rest slightly askew when he looks at you in the eye. Tlumacki grew up at Massachusetts General Hospital; the brown hair in the picture on his ID badge is a testament to that fact. He walked into the maze of a building a 20-year-old lab technician, unable to find the department where he was supposed to work. Over 35 years and three kids later, he is an orthotic clinician and head of the department. Nurses can hear his deep self-deprecating laughter from around the corner. He walks limberly down the hallways, towering at 6’ 2” over his often hunched-over patients.
“Look, your braces matches your shirt,” he says while kneeling eye level with a five- year-old patient named Ellie. He is holding a pair of plastic feet braces specially designed for her, like white Cinderella slippers with a pattern of purple butterflies. He turns to Ellie's parents, forcing her Dora the Explorer Velcro-tabbed shoes over the newly adjusted plastic, “You might want to get her a larger pair,” he suggests.
Mom and Dad agree with Tlumacki without a moment’s hesitation. They have been down these hallways before.
Patient Rhonda looks forward to her every visit. Her husband is upset when he can’t come along too. Rhonda, 64, cannot remember life without polio. She cannot walk on the beach. She cannot play any sports. She lives vicariously through her athletic children. She uses a cane and can only move slowly. Surrounded by the artificial world of plastics and prosthetics, Tlumacki is concerned with the real people like her. Rhonda has been seeing Tlumacki every three to six months for longer than she can remember.
Over time their meetings became more like chat sessions than check-ups. Rhonda first walked into MGH at 27 years old, pregnant, and wearing Forrest Gump-like metal braces. She became the poster child for the latest bracing techniques. At the time, Tlumacki was only 20 years old. Today, decades later, Rhonda won’t see anyone else. Tlumacki takes care of her, offering to rearrange his schedule to accommodate her visits.
“I cannot walk without the brace,” she says. “I still managed to raise two kids and they had a lot they had to do on their own. They couldn’t run because I couldn’t chase them, and they knew it.”
Tlumacki saved Rhonda's leg by referring her to a surgeon who said yes when all others said there was nothing they could do. “Every time I go in there, I try to bring him a bottle of wine,” she says. “He keeps threatening to retire, but he can’t. He just can’t. I couldn’t survive without him.”
In his office, Tlumacki appears to have all the free time in the world. He leans back, putting his feet up on his desk, and rests the back of his hand limply on the top of his head of thinning white hair. For anyone sitting in the chair across from him, it’s hard not to match his ease. He jokes that he’ll be staying in the office late tonight and will end up driving home at 90-miles-an hour to catch the end of the New England Patriots game.
A pile of Biomechanics magazines rests in the corner of the room. Patient records, boxed and bagged, are piled high on the file cabinets. Each patient room resembles an I-Spy picture filled with items to spot: brace designs here, X-rays, plaster, and models there. Tlumacki has the hands of the construction worker and the patience of a doctor. The proof is in his work room, outfitted withwith a Singer sewing machine, a few saws, and a stack of white plastic braces. He is putting to use the skills he acquired from model building model ships as a kid.
“I like people and I like to build on funky things, so [an orthotic clinician] was a good fit,” he says. “Then you get to take that creation and stick it on someone.”
Tlumacki braces his own life with the love of his wife, twin daughters, son, and the occasional ride on his Harley. He admits the difficulty of balancing family life with life in the hospital and knows the consequences of pressure and strain when applied to bodies and bonds.
As a dad and a doctor, his job duties overlap. He provides the cushion to lessen pain and suffering. Behind closed doors, his conversations drift from boating to school to music. Tlumacki does his best Dave Matthews voice impersonation. He’s the brace guy who can fix spines and spirits.
Perhaps the best doctors are the ones who can heal areas that don’t come up on an X Ray. When Ellie grows up, there’s a chance she’ll keep Tlumacki in her phone book like Rhonda did. No one knows for sure – until they’ve walked a mile in her plastic shoes.
How do you pick a restaurant to visit over the weekend? There are basically three options: try the place your friend recommended, browse online reviews for guidance, or wander into an eatery at random.
Following the wise words of a friend seems to make the most sense. Word of mouth has led me to my favorite hairdresser, nail salon, dentist, and yes, doctor. It is continually one of the most important ways to market your hospital or healthcare facility, health leaders say.
One popular way to measure free lip service is the cocktail party test. In my time covering the marketing beat, I've heard leaders sing the praises of this test -- when schmoozing at a party, or interacting with others, the best way to find out your hospital's reputation is to ask questions and then listen. The method isn't exactly scientific, but it works.
"Hospitals talk more than they listen," says Emerson Smith, PhD, Medical Sociologist for SC-based Metromark Market Research. "The only way we can know what people are saying is to talk less and listen more."
Measuring word of mouth is not as easy, but it is vital. The first step is defining what qualifies as word of mouth:
Transmission – One person communicating to another
Broadcast – One person communicating to an audience
Social media – All forms and methods of communication between two or more people. Social media doesn't just have to be online and includes TV, radio, and face to face interaction.
"Face-to-face transmission, including word of mouth is the most effective way of communicating," says Smith. "But before you mouth off, make sure the product is good."
Face-to-face interaction is one of the goals of the marketing department at HealthCare Express, a group medical practice based in Texarkana, Texas. Marketing Director Tina Baiter says the majority of the marketing budget is allotted for in-person marketing. Because HealthCare Express is small and up against higher marketing budgets within a rural community, the most effective way to connect is by spreading the word in person, Baiter says.
"Every single patient who comes in is asked how they found us – the number one [reply] is word of mouth," Baiter says. "The bulk of our budget is spent sending one person to each community to network, hand out cookies and snacks, and visit small businesses."
"People like to do business with their friends," she adds. "That has a much higher impact than an ad in the paper."
So, just how large of an impact can word of mouth make?
One example of the scope of a word of mouth campaign is at TX-based Baylor Health Care System. Since the launch of twenty-eight 30second television spots testimonials and videos on the BHCS website, there has been an increase of more than 250 patients. BHCS employees are encouraged to fuel the fire of the viral campaign using social media.
Jennifer Coleman, senior VP of consumer affairs of BHCS, was able to produce a video testimonial for under $500. She says Baylor does not spend as much on advertising as its local competitors and testimonials are an expensive option to garner positive attention.
"We went out and listened to what people were saying and what people told us was 'Baylor? I don't know if I want to go there. It's big and scary and downtown – you only go there if you're really sick,'" Coleman says. "So we tried to make Baylor seem more accessible and more [humane]."
To get the conversation started, Baylor offered an option where visitors can nominate themselves for a video testimonial. Just as word of mouth is centered on outcomes, so are the testimonials.
"That's what you tell people about when you go home," Coleman says.
What else will people talk about long after they leave your hospital doors? Will they talk about your valet service? Will they talk about your cafeteria food?
"It's outcomes," Smith answers. "Sure valet parking is nice, but that's not what patients are concerned about. Word of mouth is primarily based on outcomes as a result of care."
A hospital should create a list of words they would like for people to describe them, Smith says. If the words no not match up with the public perception the hospital can do one of two things: change or convince others to change their minds. A word of mouth audit (WOMA) can help the communications team understand more about what the community is saying.
"But, we need to listen and document good and bad things people say about us," Coleman says. "Seventy percent of our patients don't tell anybody [anything] – good or bad – about the hospital."
A suggestion for hospitals and health systems looking to make word of mouth work to their advantage: observe social media and what people are saying. Most hospitals and health systems rely on intuition for what people think about their reputation for care, Smith says.
Marketers should be on a quality team in order to understand and monitor both strengths and weaknesses of care. Also, a tool for marketers to build word of mouth trust is testimonials that do not need to be expensive to produce. Word of mouth is a powerful tool with powerful potential.
Money talks. In healthcare, it can say much about the value of marketing in a hospital or organization.
In my column last week, I described how the Chief Financial Officer and Chief Marketing Officer should be best friends. Many of their strategies align, including drawing patient volume and revenue to a hospital or healthcare organization. Marketers are always looking to prove their worth in the numbers – the number of patients, return on investment, cost per lead, the list goes on.
This week, I'm sharing a list of golden rules for golden results on your bottom line. John Luginbill, CEO of The Heavyweights, an IN-based marketing communications firm, first presented these ideas to a group of communications professionals armed with laptops and notepads at the Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development (SHSMD) Annual conference.
1. Spend money to make money. Spend money wisely.
Of each dollar that comes into your facility, 65 cents has a government obligation attached to it. What this means is that healthcare is heavily reliant on government regulation and reimbursement. In order to make money, marketers must spend money; cheap platforms will get you what you paid for. Don't believe me? Track it and see.
One of the best ways to track progress is by recording cost per lead. "You need to know the cost per lead or you're fired in the consumer world," Luginbill said. "The same goes for healthcare."
Setting up a method for tracking cost-per-lead doesn't need to be complicated. It can be as simple as setting up a chart in Excel with the following categories:
Tactics
Audience size
Leads (with contact information)
Cost
Cost per lead
And while you're at it, spend wisely. Many health systems and hospitals make the mistake of promoting their "star" facilities or programs.
"It's a waste of money to promote something that is doing well," Luginbill said. "You can't begin to show ROI if something is already at capacity.
The better strategy is to focus on the programs that may need more help. These are likely to show bigger gains, too, if your campaign and tracking methods are effective.
2. Coordinate efforts vertically.
If you function like an air traffic controller with multiple campaigns to manage across your hospital, coordinating campaigns vertically will prevent any marketing messes. Think with the future in mind, in terms of what is coming down the pipeline. Timing is everything.
It is up to the communications department to be the hub of the hospital and know what emerging departments need promotion. Try keeping a calendar of campaigns that correspond to events happening at your organization. Having a calendar or a future plan will allow a communications team to be proactive instead of reactive in planning campaigns.
3. Target pre-episodic patients.
Does your hospital or health system have billboards centered on heart attacks? Chances are most (50%) people who have a heart attack didn't know they were going to have one – thus, your billboard didn't capture their attention. A better marketing approach is one that relates to the viewer's current condition or determines if they are at risk.
4. Master media mix, message, and movement.
As a marketing columnist, there is one message I see constantly, and chances are, patients see it constantly too. Nearly each hospital and healthcare organization flaunts a title with the words: best, top, excellence, or world class. Healthcare is a machine constantly churning out reviews, evaluations, and consequently, cliché claims to fame.
While identifiers (Example: "top ten percentile in patient satisfaction") do hold value, a marketing message needs to show instead of tell how that value affects the patient.
"If you're saying you're the best, it doesn't mean anything," Luginbill said. "It's narcissistic. If you want people to pay attention [the message] has to be about them."
Marketing without a call to action is like a cookie without milk. The audience is left craving something that is missing. Luginbill describes "awareness" a term thrown around the marketing world, as an empty calorie word. Sure, it sounds good, but what does awareness really mean? What does it get you? What's the return?
Stop focusing on awareness and focus more on action and measurable results.
5. Opt-in marketing is not optional.
The key to driving patient volume is engaging patients in the conversation about their health. Risk assessments and tear outs can be productive tools for engaging patients and leading them toward opt-in opportunities.
"Don't just show them the cute nurse or the cute baby," Luginbill said. "Show them what to do next."
Risk assessments breakdown in the following way: If 25,000 people take the assessment:
5,000 will be at risk
1,000 will be asked to be contacted
500 will need a procedure
On average, 2% of risk assessments result in a procedure
6. Capitalize on co-risk.
Only 5% of the U.S. population is responsible for 50% of healthcare cost, Luginbill said. With many hospital frequent flyers, marketing should target their needs.
The best way to do business is with existing clients, this same mantra rings true in healthcare. When a patient is at risk for one procedure, make sure your marketing gives the patient links to other resources they may need in the future.
In conclusion, these six strategies can help keep your marketing campaigns on track with dollar focus down the line. I wish you best of luck in befriending your CFO, and letting the money and the metrics do the talking.
If a healthcare organization were a dinner party, the marketing team would play the role of host.
Think about it – the host is the first person to make an impression by opening the door and welcoming you to their home. The host is also expected to greet everyone at the party. Plus, the host cleans up after any messes.
If you've ever hosted a dinner party, you know this role is easier said than done. Hosting involves more than just being charming, attentive, and generous with the goodies – the same goes for the role of a healthcare marketing and communications team.
The perception of the marketer is often the person in charge of funky swag, signage, and the silly gimmicks to grab patient attention. While part of this may be true, the role's reach and responsibility go beyond the ability to order promotional items bearing the hospital logo. The marketing and communications department is often the team most connected to all initiatives in a healthcare organization.
Despite marketers' importance, they are frequently left on the outside of the C-suite's strategic planningefforts.
Only 27% of 493 respondents in the 2011 HealthLeaders Media Industry Survey identified the chief marketing officer as a rolerepresented on the senior executive team (the inner circle that works together on strategic planning).
Eight titles were ranked higher than CMOs for inner circle representation.
If those stats aren't enough to convince you, maybe this is: When respondents were asked how often the marketing department is involved in the first stages of product or service line development:
22% said Always
58% said Sometimes
13% said Rarely
7% said Never
How is exclusion even possible when marketers are the ones who are in charge of branding, promoting, and cross-coordinating initiatives across the organization? The answer may reside in how healthcare organizations interpret the role of the marketing team.
At the Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development (SHSMD) Annual conference in September, marketing professionals were encouraged to share how their organization perceives the role of the marketer. Turns out, many organizations rely on stereotypes.
"My colleagues often ask me to script what to say to patients," one woman answered. "They say, 'I don't have a bed for this patient, how do I make that sound okay?'"
Other conference attendees mentioned how they are pegged as the people with the cool giveaways, games, or gadgets.
"The goals of marketing and the CFO are aligned. You are about to become the CFO's best friend if you learn how to contribute to their margin," said John Luginbill, CEO of The Heavyweights, an IN-based marketing communications firm.
Luginbill makes the point that marketers can improve an organization by trimming costs in creative ways. Though marketers can add substantial value to an organization, their level of recognition falls short.
Here are the percentages of C-suite Industry Survey respondents who rated their marketing team's efforts as high value:
37% of CEOs
24% of board directors
22% of CFOs
18% of physicians
10% of staff
10% of organization-wide
The remaining ratings of marketing efforts fell into the categories of valued, neutral, not very valued, or not at all valued. There is obvious room for improvement in the numbers. Marketing's inferiority complex should not limit communications professionals any longer.
A key to entering the C-suite's inner circle—and proof of marketers' worth—comes from the ability to deliver market intelligence.
Speaking on a panel at SHSMD, Thomas Sadvary, president and CEO of Scottsdale Healthcare, said: "Marketing intelligence is very important. We need to know what the doctors, patients, and employees are thinking. As a CEO, the more I know, the more I can drive a strategy. We have a long way to go, we think we know what docs and patients are thinking. Wrong."
Providing marketing intelligence to the C-suite can show how the marketing team is able to influence strategic outcomes. Since marketers are communicators by nature, use that skill to your advantage.
Don’t be the afterthought of the C-suite. Communication professionals need to self-advocate and push beyond stereotypical perceptions.
Not everyone feels the same way about the blue "H" sign indicating a hospital's proximity. For Colleen Sweeney, RN, the sign is a reminder to whip out her phone to go on hospitalcompare.com and see how the hospital stacks up next to Memorial Hospital and Health System in South Bend IN, where she works as director of innovation, ambassador and customer services.
"I love everything about hospitals – the smell, the bad art on the walls, everything. I've been in hospitals since I was 18," Sweeney says. "But not everyone feels that way."
In one form or another, everyone has some fear or anxiety surrounding hospitals and healthcare, she says. Sweeney recently completed a patient empathy project in which she interviewed patients on what they fear about hospitals and healthcare systems. Ninety six percent of patients suffer from "Clinicophobia", a term Sweeney coined meaning the fear of healthcare.
"If you don't address patient fear, it will work its way in," Sweeney says. "If we give you instructions and you are too busy thinking about how scared you are or who's going to take care of you – before you know it, you're back in the hospital."
Sweeney asked the audience at the Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development (SHSMD) Annual conference in Phoenix to guess the order of the top four patient fears. Some people shouted infections, others shouted death.
The most common patient fears are:
Infection
Incompetence
Death
Cost
Mix-Ups
Needles
Rude doctors and nurses
Germs
Prognosis
Communication issues
Loneliness
Surprised? Addressing patient fear is a huge component, if not the core component of the patient experience. Sweeney says she asked her staff, if you had known that the patient was fearful, would you have treated them differently? All heads nodded.
As a part of the patient empathy project, Sweeney received dozens of postcards with anonymous patient fears on them. Postcard messages included statements about fears of loneliness, how hospitals smell like death, and worries that the doctors and nurses do not really care.
Under Sweeney's leadership, Memorial began implementing practices to address patient fears. Starting in April, nurses in the childbirth unit were required to ask every patient if she had fear or anxiety about her hospitalization. Nurses were then able to check off the appropriate boxes on the electronic health record and follow up on the patient's specific fears by pointing the patient to the appropriate resource:
Worried about cost? We have someone who can help you with that. Worried about the procedure? Here is some extra information.
Adding a "fears" check box in the EMR was a quick solution, Sweeney says. Asking the patient about their fears has also contributed to Memorial's Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) scores.
Prior to the nurses asking, patients' 'likelihood to recommend' score was 81.5. After 90 days of asking 'what is your greatest fear or concern around your hospitalization?' the score increased to 83.5 and is currently 85.5.
"The huge result of having nurses ask the question is that it has changed their view of caring for the patient and [made them] realize that they were neglecting the very thing that concerned the patient the most," Sweeney says. "And to ask the question is the only way to arrive at truly 'patient-centered care.'"
Memorial Health has refined its approach to patient-centered care based on feedback from Sweeney's patient empathy project. For example:
• Memorial volunteers have been recruited to bake cookies near the elevators during the day so the smell fills the building. Staff is then allowed to offer patients cookies.
• A dog has been known to greet patients upon arrival. It helps many patients relax. Even patients who do not care for dogs may benefit; the dog offers a distraction from distress about the visit, Sweeney says.
• Staff no longer assumes that a patient wants a private room. Instead, patients are asked if they would like a private or shared room. Having a roommate can help with patient fear #11: loneliness.
• The practice of saying "good luck" to patients upon admittance is banned at Memorial.
Not all clinical staff is happy about Sweeney's system of addressing patient fear. Eye-rolling nurses and complaints are not uncommon, she says. Most staff complaints center on the time factor –asking about and addressing fear adds a step to a busy nurse's day.
She argues, however, that addressing fear will actually save nurse's time. And if the staff is unwilling, they will not last at Memorial, Sweeney says. "If they don't really care about the patients then they will not last."
At the Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development (SHSMD) Annual conference in Phoenix last week, a panel of CEOs met to discuss culture – a term that is difficult to define.
Many healthcare organizations are struggling with forming a common culture, especially with the increasing emergence of accountable care organizations and multi-hospital systems.
Leading cultural change within an organization can also mean creating an atmosphere of disclosure where employees feel comfortable calling each other out on issues such as handwashing compliance.
Panelists Thomas Sadvary, president and CEO of Scottsdale Healthcare, Rebecca Kuhn, president of Arizona East Region Banner Health, and Tony Marinello, CEO of Mount Vista Medical Center, answered questions from the audience and moderator Burl Stamp, president of Stamp & Chase, about cultural changes starting in the C-suite.
Q. How do you measure culture?
Kuhn: We've looked at competencies our leaders will have. We also have an employee engagement survey where we ask, 'to what extent are you confident about your leaders? How well are they communicating to you?' Leaders are rewarded, or not, depending on how they are evaluated. It's fundamental to changing culture.
Marinello: It's about accountability; you have to be able to call people out. Coworkers have to feel comfortable and the best information comes from information on the frontline. Don't wait until you get a negative patient survey back saying that the hospital doesn't address my needs.
Sadvary: I really think the CEO defines culture. I once received an email from one of my staff about one my actions saying, 'Don't you care about employees anymore?' I appreciated she had the guts to tell me. If the nurses feel uncomfortable saying something, then it doesn't matter what types of tools and initiatives you have, it's not going to work. You have to establish a culture first.
Q. How does an organization change its culture?
Sadvary: In many ways, healthcare is more resistant to change than it should be. We'll see change on the technical side, that's easier received. The hard part is change for quality of care.
Kuhn: We tend to be on the risk-adverse side. We have to be focused on the leaders willing to change. Change management is going to be a key skill set going forward.
Marinello: We identify our stars and the tools that we give them to excel. You need to differentiate between who is truly engaged and who is there for the paycheck. Don't promote people just because they've worked their way up, that doesn't necessarily make them a good manager.
Q. How do you avoid 'flavor of the month' initiatives?
Marinello: You have to keep driving the strategy you are working to accomplish and reinforce that it's not going away. Keep bringing it up.
Sadvary: In our jobs as CEO, we are guilty of [flavor of the month initiatives]. We need to deliver the message in a consistent way.
Q. In an organization with multiple systems, how do you mix multiple cultures?
Kuhn: Banner Health recently acquired two new hospitals and there was a very structured integration program. A lot of it is having a common infrastructure; you need to have a common electronic medical record system, etc. It takes a tremendous amount of courage to get the groups and leadership buy-in from the top to make everything the same.
Q. What is the greatest value a marketing team brings to the C-suite?
Marinello: They are out there as the eyes and ears. Our regional marketing director understands ROI and what brings value to the organization.
Sadvary: Marketing intelligence is very important. We need to know what the doctors, patients, and employees are thinking. As a CEO, the more I know the more I can drive a strategy. We have a long way to go, we think we know what docs and patients are thinking. Wrong.
You've seen them everywhere: In glossy magazines, plastered on the walls of a subway car, even in unexpected places. Laura Lee Jones, CEO of Lion Share Marketing, says she spotted one covering the back of a golf cart.
QR or "quick response" codes are the little black and white patterned squares (a 2D bar code) which can be scanned by a smartphone and link to a web page. And lately, they are shooting into the marketing world like fireworks on the fourth of July.
QR codes are a way to connect a print campaign with an online campaign, while tracking the results. A URL-shortener can shrink hyperlinks used to create the code, and the unique URL can then be tracked using analytics. According to ScanLife's 2010 Trend Report, mobile bar code scanning grew 1,600% in 2010.
QR codes are undeniably quirky and can spark curiosity – but are they effective marketing tools? At the Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development Annual conference in Phoenix last week, I attended a round table luncheon addressing the topic. Not everyone expressed confidence about this emerging marketing tool.
"All my clients want me to slap a QR code on a campaign, like a logo" said Carson Kraig designer/production manager at Obrien Marketing. "I'm skeptical if this is really working."
The Positives
All six healthcare marketing professionals at my table were in the beginning stages of figuring out how to adapt QR codes to their needs. One of the features of QR codes is that they are easy to create. Websites such as Wasp Barcode Technologies allow users to generate unique QR codes for free. Yes, I said the "F" word. The codes can be had for free and can be printed on nearly any surface and location such as---
Newspapers
TV ads
Temporary tattoos
Product packaging
Clothing
Cake frosting
Sue-Ann M. Villano, Director CPMP Marketing, Communications & Practice Services, is testing out QR codes in a letter to 2,300 referring physicians this week. The letter includes a QR code linking to a website with a short survey.
"[The survey includes] referral guides which we have been producing for over 6 years in order to gather info about their likes, dislikes, and/or wants so that we can update them over the next year or consider just utilizing the online printable directory," Villano said in an email.
Villano has found positive results using QR codes for other communication engaging physicians, saying response rate was "through the roof." Though the codes are simple, the message needs to be well crafted. What will it link to? What's the message/end result? So what?
Another benefit of the codes is to provide cost savings relating to patient education. Instead of installing costly patient education kiosks, health leaders can provide QR codes in waiting rooms. Patients can then scan the codes to gain more information about a particular topic or procedure.
"Also, it's more private because you can view the information on your phone, without having to ask anyone," Jones says.
The Negatives
A potential downside to QR codes is usability. Knowing your demographic is important when deciding where and if to implement a QR code.
Not all people have smartphones and thus, do not have the ability to scan the code. Although 83% of Americans have a cell phone, only 35% of the population has a Smartphone, according to Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project.
Bernie Schultz, senior marketing specialist for WI-based Monroe Clinic, knows that his patient demographic is mostly elderly patients who would see the print ad but most likely would not have the right technology to access the online portion.
If a healthcare facility is looking to use the QR code, it also must make sure that the linked website will be compatible with the mobile platform. Example: Is your website in flash? Then it will not work on a tablet PC. The user must also have a mobile app with the ability to scan the code; many of these apps are available for free.
Also, in order to scan the code, the smartphone must be placed close to the code in order to work correctly. Unscannable codes can kill and delay the adoption rate for 2D bar code campaigns. QR codes for billboard or bus campaigns are not practical because users will have difficulty scanning.
Because the idea is relatively new in the U.S., no one at the table had hard and fast evidence about QR code return on investment. 2-D bar codes have been popular in Asia for over a decade, originally designed by a Japanese company to read at a quicker speed than conventional barcodes.
The U.S. healthcare system is working on QR code catch up.
At the end of the round table discussion we handed around business cards to keep in touch. On the back of mine is a QR code. Need I say what happened next? My peers each pulled out their smart phones to test it out.
The person to my left had trouble getting it to scan.
The person to my right had no problem scanning but the website took a while to load.
The person across from me scanned and could see the site without a problem.
That pretty much sums up the current state of QR codes. But stay abreast of these codes: they're here to stay.
As healthcare organizations propel headlong into healthcare reform, making a plan for the future can seem daunting. But why should they bother with a strategic plan if the future is uncertain?
David Kantor, president of OH-based Kantor Consulting Group, has an answer. He shared it before an audience at the Society for Healthcare Strategy and Market Development (SHSMD) conference on Wednesday.
"Understand the uncontrollables and how they will impact your organization going forward. If you plan, you'll be able to get a consensus on allocation of scarce resources," he said.
Kantor asked the audience: "What is the burning issue you have with strategic plans?"
Answers from around the room indicated much grappling with how to:
• Disseminate information all the way down to the front line
• Have operational leaders take ownership of the planning process
• Keep the strategic plan a living breathing document once it is finished
• Help bridge the C-suite's vision to the rest of the organization
Crafting a strategic plan starts from the top down, starting with C-suite leadership. It outlines what the organization as a whole wants to accomplish over a predetermined period of time, whether it be over three years, five years, or 10 years.
SHSMD speakers including Kantor, Diane Caslow, vice president of business and strategic planning at MD-based MedStar Health, and Susanna Krentz, president of Chicago-based Krentz Consulting LLC, shared 10 tips to help organizations craft a strategic plan. The ideal outcome is to produce a single document (around 35 pages. outlining an organization's goals and vision.
1. Keep the momentum
The normal process of developing a strategic plan will take 5 – 8 months. Half the time is used for interviewing people for data and analysis. The other half of the time is for leadership group meetings. Typically there should be five to seven meetings, Kantor says.
Homework in between meetings can include using online survey tools to have middle management evaluate their strategic goals. Using existing meetings to address strategic questions saves time.
2. Don't develop analysis in a vacuum
Anticipate who will be your competitors in the future. Also, do not assume you know the priorities of your organization.
3. Don't succumb to analysis paralysis
When gathering strategic data, less is more. In order to make a strategic decision what are the top three things the organization needs to know? If the data is not clear, the decision will not be clear, the speakers said.
4. Don't take the path of least resistance
In order to keep the momentum going with strategic planning, leaders are often hesitant to include the physician who tends to complain or speak out against policies. This is the person who needs to be in the room for the strategic planning process.
"It is really important to bring all the stakeholders into the mix," Kantor says. "Even the big jerk has to be in the room."
5. Don't allow key individuals to opt out of the process
Who should be involved in strategic plan meetings? It's a balancing act two few versus too many, Kantor says. Too many people there are time delays and it's difficult to build consensus the conundrum of over-inclusiveness.
"Meeting after meeting people melted always like an iceberg at the equator in July," says Kantor about his experience with larger strategic planning groups. "Stay at a size where if anybody is not there, you notice. Rule of thumb, keep the participation to 12 -15 at most."
6. Lay a foundation of objective information
Add the "so what" to all charts and graphs. People should understand about the information. Use symbols to make the data approachable and to tell a story.
7. Identify assumptions and address uncertainties
"I love asking people right upfront – what information do you want to know in order to feel comfortable talking about this?" Krentz says. "People are remarkably reasonable, when you ask at the start of the process.
Krentz also makes the point to ask leaders to differentiate between what they need to know and what they are curious about.
"You don't want to spend three weeks trying to find out something a manager was only slightly interested in," Krentz says. "Knowing the statistic to the second decimal isn't that important."
8. Define strategic intent and strategic choices
The strategic intent of an organization should be limited to 3-5 goals instead of a longer laundry list, SHSMD speakers say. Ask the questions: How much change are people looking to do? Incremental change or revolutionary change? For example, a mission statement does not need to change over three years, but strategic goals to achieve that mission might.
9. Understand your organization's culture
How does your CEO like to look at information? Are they comfortable looking at Excel spreadsheets? How involved does he or she like to be?
10. Lead from the top
Ultimately, one person needs to be held accountable for the implementation plan, Caslow says. Most of the time, this is the CEO.
Caslow makes the point that strategic planning should not be seen as an additional chore or an additional task on one's job description. Strategic planning is a way for an organization be optimistic about the future.
"This is a way to have some fun and take people out of their day-to-day to think about the future," Caslow says. "Engage people and help them be excited."
The Centers for Disease Control estimates that hand washing adherence among healthcare personnel is less than 50%, meaning that the level of hand hygiene among doctors, nurses, and other clinicians is dismal..
Each year in the U.S., two million patients become infected with a hospital acquired infection and the annual costs range from $4.5 billion to $11 billion. But an infection is not simply a monetary issue, it's a safety compliance issue that puts patients at extreme risk.
The problem doesn't stem from hospitals lack of infection control supplies, but rather from individual medical professional's compliance with tasks as simple as hand washing.
Hungarian physician Ignaz Semmelweis first corelated infection rates from childbed fever with hand washing in 1847. It took the medical community some time to accept the importance of the task. But it's been164 years and hospitals and health systems are still having problems with hand washing compliance.
Parkland Memorial Hospital's recent failure to "dispose of soiled gloves and gowns and wash hands after treating patients" shows how even reputable hospitals can slip up on standard practices. The Dallas hospital has agreed to bring in an outside consultant to craft a plan of improvement to protect its $417 million in Medicare and Medicaid funds at risk because of immediate jeopardy deficiencies.
Yikes. Even my five-year-old cousin remembers to scrub her hands with soap and water after getting dirty. What will it take to make physicians and other hospital staff remember wash their hands and change soiled bed sheets? A solution to the non-compliance problem may lay in hospital signage that appeals to human behavior.
Hand hygiene compliance rises significantly when hospital signage encourages healthcare professionals to consider the safety of their patients rather than themselves, according to a study in Psychological Science.
The It's Not All About Me: Motivating Hospital Hand Hygiene by Focusing on Patients, study involved posting one of three signs at 66 hand-washing stations at several hospitals:
"Hand hygiene prevents you from catching diseases"
"Hand hygiene prevents patients from catching diseases"
"Gel in, wash out."
Of the three messages, the one that put the focus on patient safety was found to be most effective. The study measured soap dispenser volumes over two weeks and found that staff used 33% more soap when the signage emphasized patient safety.
Though the compliance study was only monitored over two weeks, just two weeks of increased adherence can be meaningful, the study authors say. Just how meaningful? The annual impact of successful signage can have a six-digit payoff.
"We estimated the number of infections prevented in the experimental conditions to be between two and nine, at a cost savings in the range of $9,000 to $30,000 [during the two weeks]," the study says. "This is a substantial return on investment considering the minimal costs of printing and posting signs."
If the increased adherence were sustained for a year across the hospital, the potential benefits include preventing over 100 infections and saving over $300,000, according to the study. Signage savings can add up for hospitals looking to lower bottom lines.
Hand washing can seem like a no-brainer. As it turns out, the answer to this simple problem is a simple solution---a message that hits physicians over the head: Do it for the patients!
The payoff amounts to saved lives, saved dollars, and saving-face.
Marketers are always looking for ways to boost patient engagement. With many audiences trained to block out traditional healthcare marketing messages it's time to turn up the creativity.
"Funware" also known as "gamification" is a marketing method that applies gaming techniques to non-game settings. Adding a little fun to healthcare through games or contests can boost patient engagement, brand loyalty, and employee satisfaction.
WEBCAST: Quantify and Cultivate Patient Engagement When: September 22, 2011 Register today for this live webcast
A few months ago, I wrote about how Children’s Hospital LA enlisted LA Lakers forward-center player Pau Gasol to promote its expansion. The idea originally started as a marketing campaign, but then transformed into an interactive video game, which uses images of Pau hiding in different spots of the hospital’s new wing. Patients can guess where Gasol is hiding and submit their scores when the game ends.
“We had a brainstorming session about it and at first it was going to be a campaign, but it turned into a game,” said Amanda Hedlund, marketing specialist for Children’s Hospital LA. "This way patients can interact and play with others while learning about the new wing of the hospital."
The idea at Children's Hospital LA was to boost patient engagement and familiarity with the new facility. The concept links adolescent interests such as video games and star athletes to the context of the hospital.
Though there was a base cost involved in creating the "Where's Pau Now" video game, the visit and participation from Gasol was voluntary. Since the game's launch on the Children's Hospital LA website, it has received 196 likes from Facebook. Staff also have received positive responses from patients, Hedlund added.
But children aren't the only demographic for hospital marketing games. Gaming techniques can also appeal to adult patients and even healthcare staff while keeping costs at a minimum.
The University of North Carolina Hospitals, a not-for-profit integrated healthcare system, is setting up a 2011 photography contest for employees. The two purposes of the annual photography contest are to promote photography as a hobby and beautify UNC Hospitals with quality artwork in public areas.
The top 10 photographs for each contest—one for the UC Memorial Hospital and one for the Hedrick Building -- will be enlarged, framed and displayed by Employee Recreation & Wellness at each building for 1-2 years. A judging panel will select the top 10 based on technical merit, artistic interpretation, and visual impact. After the top 10 are selected, UNC Hospital employees can vote for their favorites by submitting a nomination ballot.
WEBCAST: Quantify and Cultivate Patient Engagement When: September 22, 2011 Register today for this live webcast
The benefits for photography contest are two-fold--Free art and a means to increase employee engagement. UNC Hospitals could have hired artists to decorate the space, but this contest alternative combines cost-saving marketing with wall-worthy aesthetics. The idea is clever because it covers multiple goals of employee interaction.
The funware marketing technique can also encourage people to perform more tedious tasks that they would otherwise consider boring, such as completing surveys, shopping, or reading websites.
For example, to lure more patients to its website, Mills-Peninsula’s Family Birth Center in San Mateo, CA has posted a baby picture contest online. Moms are invited to enter a candid photo of their healthy, breastfed baby when they were age 18 months or less. Winners will be announced at their Children’s Halloween Party later in the fall.
The online contest draws the audience of moms back to the website not only to view the pictures of their children, but also receive information about the Family Birth Center.
Gaming techniques such as contests can play to our natural competitive drive.
WEBCAST: Quantify and Cultivate Patient Engagement When: September 22, 2011 Register today for this live webcast
Gabe Zichermann, CEO of the iPhone apps development firm beamME and a marketing author who coined the term gamification, compares the technique to the operations of a casino. A casino operator, for example, knows the yield of a slot machine to a high degree of certainty, he says.
A marketer placing a static billboard can't be as certain about what that ad will inspire consumers to do. "Where possible, I would, as a marketer, prefer to put a game in front of my users, because I'll get more predictability, more engagement, more time spent," Zichermann said.
"Games are a powerful mechanism for manipulating user behavior."
Gamification should be on the minds of marketers as a cost-saving way to include employees and patients in the activities of a facility. Online games have a competitive quality that can keep patients coming back for more. Contests can be as simple as posting rules and a sign-up sheet around the building and can payoff in employee engagement and patient education.
Marketers, it's time to play – you have nothing to lose.