Are Your Social Skills Fully Developed?

February 27, 2012 Leave a comment

By: Mike Milligan, President Legato Marketing & Communications

With all the buzz about incorporating social media into the marketing mix, many organizations believe they have left no stone unturned or Twitter un-tweeted. But take a closer look and you’ll find that many haven’t fully developed their ‘social skills’.

While most hospitals and clinics have developed a functional website and have dabbled in social networking, many have overlooked other ways to tap into the social web to reach business goals. Take training for example.

Including social media in healthcare training initiatives can provide:

  • Participants a forum to ask questions and engage in discussion before and after training.
  • Allow presenters to receive immediate feedback from participants (e.g., do trainees fully understand a subject or is more information needed?).
  • The opportunity to complement marketing efforts by sharing presentations or video from training sessions on Flickr and other social sites.

Another example: Using social media channels to get coverage from mainstream media and industry publications.

One way to do this is to share success stories from innovative treatments, surgeries or medical research via forums, blogs and microblogs. Roughly 70 percent of journalists say they use social networks to assist them when reporting. Take advantage of this fact.

Another example … While it may not happen often, a natural disaster such as flooding or a tornado can take its toll on a community within minutes. And hospitals are often at the center of it all. Healthcare providers can leverage social media networks to provide real-time updates both for those directly affected by the crisis and those watching from afar.

Long story short … Social media has many applications. Don’t get stuck in a web of doing what everyone else is doing. Constantly refine your social skills. Your efforts can pay off in many forms—from building trust and improving patient care—to gaining media coverage, and attracting new patients and staff.

Filed under Leadership, Management, Marketing, Organizational, PR/Social Media, Strategy, Uncategorized Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

Hitting Your Target Market Takes More Than Advertising

February 16, 2012 Leave a comment

By: Mike Milligan, President Legato Marketing and Communications

Marketing and advertising. It’s six of one, half-a-dozen of the other—or so many mistakenly think.

No matter how often the two terms are inadvertently interchanged, marketing is not the same as advertising. Advertising is, however, part of marketing—but only one part.

Sure, you can take a shot in the dark with your advertising and play a game of hit (barely) or miss (big time), but without marketing, you won’t even have a target to shoot at. Why?

Because marketing encompasses everything from identifying and understanding your target market to how you’ll reach those consumers (which is where advertising comes in) and how you’ll differentiate yourself from the competition to get consumers to use your services.

In addition to advertising, marketing includes other important elements like market research, media planning, PR, product and service pricing and distribution, brand development, community involvement … It encompasses every touch point; every experience consumers and prospects have with your organization.

That’s why it not only makes sense to have a solid marketing plan in place before you advertise, it’s also critical to your success. A comprehensive marketing plan can help you:

  • Identify new/potential consumers
  • Identify your strengths and areas for improvement
  • Identify consumers’ needs and wants
  • Determine the demand for specific services
  • Identify areas for growth
  • Keep your budget and initiatives on track
  • Respond to new opportunities
  • Get your entire organization on the same page
  • Evaluate your efforts and make adjustments

The list goes on, but I think you get the picture.

Yes, advertising is an important part of marketing. But it’s not a silver bullet. Before you take aim at developing a ‘great creative campaign,’ make sure you have a comprehensive marketing plan in your sights.

If you think it’s hard to hit a moving target, try hitting one you don’t even know exists!

Filed under Leadership, Management, Marketing, Organizational, PR/Social Media, Strategy, Uncategorized Tagged with , , , , , ,

Ladies and Gentlemen: Start Your SEO Engines!

February 13, 2012 Leave a comment

Have you ever done a web search for “healthcare marketing?” Ever look at how many results come up? I did: About 19,000,000 just today. Or how about “rural healthcare marketing?” Just a measly 11,000.

For both of these terms, I’m pleased to report that Legato consistently ranks in the top 5 of organic Google listing, and often is #1. I say this not to be boastful, but rather, to make the point that these results don’t just happen. They’re part of your marketing strategy, or, at least they should be.

Of course, I’m talking about Search Engine Optimization—or ‘SEO’ in techno-talk.

Put simply, SEO strategies use keywords to maximize the amount of traffic—relevant traffic—to your website. It’s a targeted way of driving people to your site who are specifically looking for the services you provide.

SEO can help you:

  • Get targeted traffic to your site. If consumers or patients have entered your website’s keywords/phrases into a search engine, they’re already interested in what you have to offer.
  • Strengthen your brand. If your site gets a higher ranking than other hospitals, more people see your name and become aware of your services.
  • Stay ahead of your competition. Showing up on a page before your competition can help increase the perceived position of your hospital in the marketplace.
  • Build brand credibility. When consumers find you organically, they’re usually more likely to bookmark your site, spend more time on your site and return to your site and/or use your services.

SEO is a powerful tool. But maximizing search engine rank-and-return positioning can be complex. If you don’t have the internal staff to help you develop an effective SEO campaign, it’s worth the investment to seek some help.

Surveys indicate that up to 85% of Internet users find websites through search engines. However, the majority (some say up to 90%) of Internet users don’t go past the top 30 search engine results—at most. They simply type something else in if they can’t find a relevant site.

With statistics like these, there is no doubt that the battle for pole position on the search engine leader board will continue to heat up.

So I ask … “Ladies and gentlemen: Are you ready to start your SEO engines?”

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Is Your Website Out of Sight?

February 7, 2012 Leave a comment

OK, so you’ve invested a lot of time and money into developing a website that will WOW your customers. But building your website is only half of the battle. Marketing it is the conquest that follows.

I won’t get into the technical aspects of getting people to your site (at least not in this post). Instead, let’s focus on some basic marketing tactics to drive people to your landing page.

Think you’ve already thought of everything? Think again. It never hurts to check and cross-check to make sure you’re leveraging every opportunity to drive traffic to your site.

Sometimes, the most obvious avenues have been overlooked because, quite frankly, they’re blatantly obvious. Have you ever received an invitation to an event or run an ad that inadvertently left out a date, a time or a call to action? I rest my case.

Many organizations assume they have all of their marketing bases covered when it comes to promoting their website. They put their URL on business cards, letterhead, brochures, invoices—everything that’s fit to print.

Good start. But let’s not forget the other not-so-top-of-mind marketing opportunities, like:

  • Becoming an active member in, and contributor to, forums that are related to your site. Be sure to include your website link in your forum signature.
  • Submitting your site to healthcare industry-related directories.
  • Including your URL on videos you post on YouTube or other video-based sites.
  • Exchanging links with reputable and respected sites that are related to your business.
  • Putting your URL on employee uniforms under the logo.
  • Including the URL on employee nametags—at work, community events—wherever nametags might be worn.
  • Including your URL in your phone book ad.
  • Putting your URL on company vehicles.
  • Labeling your waiting room magazines, “Provided by …” with your URL listed.
  • Joining an industry chat group that allows your URL to be your login.

Don’t let an opportunity to promote your URL pass by. With an estimated 366, 848,000+ sites on the worldwide web, you can’t afford to have your site out of sight—anywhere—anytime.

Filed under Leadership, Management, Marketing, Organizational, Strategy, Uncategorized Tagged with , , , , , , , , ,

Are Your Employees on the Brandwagon?

February 2, 2012 8 Comments

By: Mike Milligan, President Legato Marketing & Communications

Ok, so you’ve invested time, energy and dollars into branding or rebranding your hospital. Now it’s time to get the word out, right? How about getting the word ‘in’—first?

Before you invest in marketing tactics to communicate with external audiences, it’s important to get internal buy-in from your employees. After all, who’s going to follow through on the brand promises you make to external audiences? You got it!  Your employees.

In the report, “Transforming Employees Into Brand Advocates,” five best practices were uncovered after interviewing experts from academia to healthcare. Here’s a brief summary.

  1. Share: We marketers have a tendency to keep activities brand-related activities within the confines of our own department. We need to start sharing. Marketing plans, campaigns, brand insights, customer information … Share it—across the organization.
  2.  Involve. How can we expect employees to take ownership of a brand promise if they don’t feel like they play an active role in driving the direction of the brand? Involved them. Let employees’ voices be heard. And listen to what they have to say.
  3. Personalize: Don’t let your ‘marketing’ title put you on a self-proclaimed pedestal. Create a personal connection with other employees. All of them. Help each employee understand what the brand promise means—every day—in every role they play.
  4. Enable: Don’t just tell employees what to do, show them. Train them. Create guidelines for behavior. Let them participate in hiring decisions for customer-facing employees. And empower them to do what’s right for the customer.
  5. Reinforce: Build off of the momentum employees are creating. Small and large-scale recognition practices can help employees stay energized about following through on brand promises.

Got the T-shirt, now what? Keep in mind that employee brand advocacy isn’t created overnight with a free T-shirt, a bumper sticker or an email from upper management. It takes a concerted, continuous effort from everyone from the top down—all the way down.

Once your employees are on the brandwagon, then—and only then—can you truly fulfill your brand promises to your customers.

Filed under Leadership, Management, Marketing, Organizational, Strategy, Uncategorized Tagged with , , , , , , ,

What’s All The Buzz About Blogging?

January 24, 2012 2 Comments

By: Mike Milligan, President Legato Marketing & Communications

To blog or not to blog, that is the question.

Whether ’tis nobler in the minds of marketers to suffer from the absence of a blog or to take arms against the competition and join in the posting revolution … Now, that’s another question in itself.

I can tell you from personal experience that blogging has it pros and its challenges. For one, it’s time-consuming. It also takes discipline to keep posts current and to provide content that people care about. So what’s the up side?

A blog provides an effective, low-cost alternative to conventional marketing. It can help rural hospitals level the playing field when competing with big-city hospitals with big-city budgets.

Blogs can also help community hospitals strengthen their connection with the community, enhance recruitment efforts, and position their medical professionals as experts in the field. For example:

Want to highlight a patient success story?

Put it on your blog. Localize it. And watch the news spread throughout your community—and beyond.

Looking for a specialist to fill an open position?

Ask one of your on-staff physicians or surgeons to be a guest blogger. He or she can highlight features and benefits of your hospital, and give a personal perspective of why it’s the right career move to join your organization and live in a rural community.

Want to leverage a health topic that’s getting national attention?

Start blogging about it. Have designated physicians, nurses, OTs and other professionals share their expertise. They’ll become recognized as local experts. It’s also a great way for community members to get to know the doctors and nurses on your staff.

So back to the question, “To blog or not to blog?”

While you don’t have to be Shakespeare to write a post, the content must be relevant and current. If you don’t have the time or talent internally to create and maintain a blog, consider outsourcing these services. If that’s not an option, err on the side of caution.

Remember, using a blog as a promotional tool is a great way to keep your website content fresh, and keep people coming back. But your site will only be as current as your last update, which ties back to the amount of time and effort that you invest in it.

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Proud to be a Healthcare Nerd

December 26, 2011 Leave a comment

My name is Mike Milligan, I’m 44, and I’m a healthcare nerd.

Ok, I’ve publicly declared what my teenage girls have said since they could speak.

But, being comfortable with my high geek level, I took the day after Christmas to finish up my self-study course on Competitive Strategy from the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE).

And yes, I enjoyed it.

I appreciated the reminder about how differentiation and service are so critical in healthcare.  But not as always glaringly obvious to me throughout the year, is that consumers need to value that differentiation.  Do consumers view the attributes of a service as unique or different?  In other words, why should they care?

And this, my friends, is where marketing strategy comes in to play.  We as marketers need to help consumers not only understand what makes our sleep center unique; they need to fully understand and appreciate how this differentiation benefits them.  In other words, branding and awareness have their roles, but so does good ol’ fashioned persuasion.

Another takeaway for me is to not become complacent.  I’ll encourage our clients to make sure we have our differentiation defined for the various services before we advertise – and that we don’t rely on advertising to cover for poorly defined strategies.  We need to ask the tough questions, and use the answers to define and refine our products and services into market-ready profit centers.

Wishing you and your family a safe and Happy New Year,

Mike

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Does anyone know what you do for a living?

September 21, 2011 2 Comments

By: Mike Milligan, President, Legato Marketing & Communications

I give up.

My Dad still doesn’t know how I earn a paycheck. But he is getting a little
closer.  I’ve recently heard him explain, “Michael does those ads for hospitals.”

Then last night, when editing my 15-year-old daughter’s Language Arts paper, I discovered that she, too, doesn’t understand “what Dad does.” Within parenthesis she had written, “Dad, write here what you do.”

It made me start thinking about what many of our healthcare marketing clients face. There seems to be a trend in which senior management isn’t necessarily knowledgeable about what marketing pros do. In their minds (not all), the marketing department develops clever advertising, period. It’s not the fault of upper management that they don’t always understand marketing’s role. While It might be hard to swallow, quite frankly, it’s the fault of marketing to not make its role clear—its ability to increase patient volumes and profit.

Your leadership team might know your job description: produce the external and internal communications. But, don’t let yourself be limited by that vague description. Your role is much broader than that. Marketing pros are the drivers behind understanding the marketplace, the organization’s culture, available opportunities, and what targeted audiences expect with the goal of increasing awareness, patient volumes, and profits.

That means looking at all of the elements of what brand is. It’s everything from how employees answer the phones, what the signage looks like, how patients are treated at the front desk, how long it takes to get an appointment—every action, every experience a patient has is your brand.

And here’s the kicker. Don’t just talk about it, show the connection between all of these factors and the results they can have—or have had—on the organization. And don’t just identify problems, bring solutions. Show you are a problem solver—and a strategist—by thinking about what questions your senior leaders will have, and have answers ready. Show your leadership skills. By doing so, you educate others on the value of marketing—not by preaching—by doing.

My years of healthcare management experience have shown that as time goes on, your CEO and other leaders will have a completely new perspective on marketing.  Sure, advertising still will play a clear role.  But more important, marketing is so much broader.  It’s strategic.  It examines all the components of the sales process.  It identifies barriers and overcomes them. It produces results. And that’s something your leadership team will understand clearly.

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How your marketing team can boost employee recruitment and retention

August 4, 2011 4 Comments

By: Barbara Vo, Account Executive, Legato Marketing & Communications

Do you really know what attracts a job candidate—or keeps an employee happy? Salary and benefits. Right? Not necessarily. Of course they matter. But recruiting and retaining good employees is more complex—and perhaps surprising.

As a Gen X/Millennial, I know what’s most important to me in my job—and why I recently joined Legato. I want to be engaged, knowing I’m being heard and that I’m contributing to the success of the company. The environment here is open and encouraging to new ideas and fresh approaches.

This is the kind of message potential employees want to hear—and how current employees want to feel. Marketing can help deliver that message. After all, its role is to unify a company’s brand message and deliver it to the targeted audience so they will be motivated to “buy” your brand. Historically, your marketing department has been successful doing this for external customers; why not allow them to do it for your internal customers (employees), too?

As a marketing professional, my job is to find out what motivates people so I can deliver a relevant message. Understanding the motivators for different generations and backgrounds is the first step in successful recruitment and retention. The second, is delivering an attention-getting story about the advantages of working for your company—above and beyond compensation.

After all, your employees are your brand. Their actions and behaviors directly reflect the characteristics and personality of your company. Give them an environment that will make them flourish, and they will want to talk about the great place they work. The underlying message to external audiences? A great place to work, must be a great place to buy service.

We no longer work in silos where departments work independently of each other. It’s a more deliberate and integrated culture involving everyone in the company from the CEO to the facilities manager to the mail room clerk to the IT director. How to unify and present that integrated process is the challenge. Your marketing team members are the creatives who can help you achieve your retention and recruitment goals by delivering your compelling story.

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Don’t out-spend the competition; out-creative them

July 13, 2011 1 Comment

Creative DirectorBy: Lisa Schneider, Creative Director, Legato Marketing & Communications

It makes me crazy when I hear a creative team say, “It would be a great ad if we had a bigger budget.” This is an excuse to be lazy. Budget does not determine creativity. In fact, the smaller the budget, the more creative you have to be.

As a college student (a long time ago), I saw a television ad that I still hold today as one of the most clever I’ve seen. The ad was for BOLLA wine. It opened with just the name “BOLLA” on a white background. Then, as voice-over began, one grape rolled to center screen and stopped. The Ls in BOLLA came down and stomped the grape. It was amusing, simply done, and memorable.

It’s this ad that compelled me to buy BOLLA wine. I did, and still do. And I see those stomping Ls every time I pour a glass. It still makes me smile.

That’s powerful creative. It’s what you should expect from your agency and what your agency should expect from itself.

Can’t hire a big star to endorse your product or service? Find someone who is trusted, believable, and influential for your target audience. Often people are likely to try a product or service if it’s recommended by someone they know and whose opinion is believable and honest. Who would you believe—the star of the week or your doctor?

Don’t have the budget to incorporate big special effects? Do the opposite. Use inability to your advantage. For instance, you are creating a TV spot for a hospital and you want to use cool animation that will take the viewer on a journey through the heart, but it isn’t feasible. Instead, use voice-over to do something like this: “We could distract you with a sci-fi journey through your heart or animated talking germs, but we want you to hear the facts. Simply. Honestly.”

As creatives, we aren’t going to say “no thank you” to a big budget. But that isn’t what should drive the idea. It’s not about the money; it’s about the idea. So find it. Then figure out how to successfully execute it within the budget you have. Be creative.

 

 

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