Leverage your Intranet And Net The Benefits

March 7, 2012 Leave a comment

By: Mike Milligan, President Legato Marketing & Communications

How many of you view your hospital’s intranet as a communications tool?

No surprise there.

OK. Let’s take it one step further … How many of you use your intranet as a powerful marketing tool? If you do, are you squeezing every ounce of marketing opportunity out of it? You should, you know. Here’s why.

Your intranet is a top-down/bottom-up, horizontal/two-way, multi-faceted marketing vehicle. It can be powerful. Economical. And it can put you on the fast track to increasing employee satisfaction, improving efficiencies and building brand — if you leverage all of its strengths. I’ll give you a few examples to state my case.

Employee satisfaction: Your intranet allows management to get timely information to employees. But don’t make it a one-way street. Internal employee blogs, feedback forms and user-specific dashboards give you the opportunity to hear what’s on employees’ minds so you can respond. Open communication plays a big role in employee satisfaction. And your timely response to staff’s suggestions, concerns and questions ups the ‘satisfaction’ ante.

Improved service: Employees throughout the organization (and in multiple locations) can use the intranet to exchange information and best practices with one another. That can improve customer service by helping employees fulfill your organization’s brand promise.

Brand ambassadors: Your intranet can provide employees with updates they need and information they want, as well as other ‘perks.’ Examples:

  • Employee benefit information about insurance options, open enrollment – even free flu shots, health screenings and more.
  • Fitness and nutrition tips that promote a healthy lifestyle. (Healthier employees translate into a healthier organization all the way around.)
  • Local events, family activities and volunteer opportunities that connect employees to the communities you serve.

In other words, don’t just talk about life/work balance, promote it. Encourage it. Show your employees you care about them both professionally and personally, and your staff is more likely to speak positively about your organization and make referrals to family and friends.

The intranet is a powerful tool that is often taken for granted. Don’t overlook the obvious or underestimate its marketing potential. Log in now and see what opportunities are staring you straight in the eye. And one more word of advice: Before you jump in too deep, be sure you have an intranet governance model in place. You’ll want to have enough flexibility to allow individual departments to use the tool but not at the expense of your brand.

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

Marketing and Healthcare Reform: Proactive Beats Reactive Every Time

March 1, 2012 2 Comments

By: Mike Milligan, President Legato Marketing & Communications

Although many questions remain about healthcare reform legislation, one thing is certain: Healthcare reform—in some shape or form—is here to stay. And it’s going to affect every hospital, in every community, and their relationships with patients, physicians and payers.

That gives marketing professionals two choices: a) Wait for all of the legislative i’s to be dotted and t’s to be crossed—and react to the changes, or b) Take the lead in turning healthcare’s competitive and economic challenges into opportunities—starting now.

I’ll go out on a limb and assume you chose ‘b.’ Smart decision. This is an opportune time to examine what you can do to help prepare your organization for the transition. Start by looking at critical areas like these:

Brand development: One of the desired outcomes of healthcare reform is increased access to care. What role will your brand play in attracting new markets? How will you make yourself more accessible to all consumers? This may be the time to invest in research or conduct an audit to help you determine how well you’re delivering on your brand promise. You can then take steps to strengthen your brand and differentiate your organization from the competition.

Organizational structure: Virtually every level of your organization will be affected by reform. How will you communicate the changes to your employees? Put a system in place now to ensure all employees receive timely information and updates.

Patient communication: Reform looks at tying a hospital’s compensation to quality and satisfaction scores. That means building trusted patient relationships will be more important than ever. How are you communicating with your patients? Just as important, how easy is it for patients to communicate with you?

Now is the time to evaluate your database to find out how well you know your patients. Do you track their visits and the services they use? This type of information can help you target your marketing efforts and strengthen patient relationships.

Service line strategy: Healthcare reform focuses on significant changes in the way many healthcare organizations currently are structured and paid for their services. When was the last time you assessed performance and capabilities to determine each service line’s strengths and weaknesses? Market those strengths effectively and you become the expert in that field. Translation: Patients choose your hospital or clinic over the competition.

Social channels: While concerns about HIPAA regulations are legitimate, hospitals and clinics can’t afford to ignore social media. As the topic of healthcare reform continues to heat up, consumers are going to have questions. A lot of questions. Take steps now to position your organization as the ‘go to’ source for reliable and timely information.

Hospital/Physician alignment: Changing reimbursement models and other factors will create new challenges in this arena. Are your PCP relationships as strong as they should be? Do physicians want to practice or refer to your hospital? Start strengthening those relationships now and your marketing efforts will pay off—regardless of where healthcare reform leads us.

These are just some of the areas that deserve your marketing attention sooner rather than later. Even though many questions remain, it’s clear that healthcare as we know it is undergoing a huge shift. That poses a question that only you can answer: Will your healthcare organization be proactive or reactive?

As a 20-year veteran in healthcare marketing, I can tell you one thing for certain: Proactive beats reactive—every time.

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

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 , , , , , , , , , , ,

Is It Time For a Brand Check-Up?

February 21, 2012 Leave a comment

By: Mike Milligan, President Legato Marketing & Communications

Your brand is what differentiates your hospital or clinic from the competition. It’s the veritable DNA of your organization. That’s why it’s critical to conduct periodic audits to diagnose the overall health of your brand.

A brand audit can provide a qualitative snapshot of how consumers and stakeholders perceive your organization, its professionals and its services. While branding research normally looks at one audience (i.e., consumers), a complete brand audit assesses relationships with all of the important stakeholders of your brand, including both internal and external audiences.

For example, an audit can help you:

  • Test for name recognition and guide strategic decisions in market segmentation and messaging
  • Determine how your brand is being managed, marketed and audited internally
  • Assess your brand’s strengths, weaknesses and inconsistencies, as well as potential threats
  • Identify growth opportunities including those achieved by brand repositioning and brand extension
  • Build greater efficiencies in your brand’s communications strategy
  • Assess the consistency of your brand with consumer expectations
  • Define niche markets and related messaging

Brand audits can provide a roadmap you can follow to ensure consistency in the way your organization is promoted and perceived, which can ultimately strengthen your brand. And you know what that means …

A strong brand translates into customer loyalty. Customer loyalty translates into increased revenue. And increased revenue keeps your organization growing at a healthy rate.

Today, consumers define brands based on their emotional, experiential and economic interactions. They will ultimately choose the best-branded healthcare organization; an organization they trust. Make sure it’s yours.

Filed under Leadership, Management, Marketing, Organizational, 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 , , , , , ,

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.

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

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

Filed under Strategy Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

What Gives?

October 19, 2011 Leave a comment

By: Kris Whitton, Account Executive, Legato Marketing & Communications

There’s no question the economy is suffering. Charitable organizations are especially feeling the pinch. So is a downturned economy the time to cut back on community giving? Absolutely not. It’s more important than ever to give support.

This is your time to shine. Separate yourself from the pack with noticeable support to your community. As a healthcare organization, you have ample opportunities to show your long-term investment in your community’s health and wellbeing—without putting great strain on your budget.

How? There are numerous charitable ways you can show dedication to the welfare of your community. You can’t be involved in every charitable activity; be selective. Look at your mission and vision statements. What actions can you take in the community to help achieve them?

Choose a cause. If your organization is committed to providing the best possible orthopedic care, sponsor a run/walk event, offer a free one-day sports assessment clinic, discuss preventive measures to avoid injuries (it can get them in to see your hospital at the same time), encourage employees to join charity boards and/or associations, where they can help through their healthcare knowledge. And don’t just sponsor an event, get employees out there to help. Think about activities that not only help your community, but will draw media attention as well. If a local food shelter holds an annual fundraiser, your organization should not only be a main sponsor of the event, it should also encourage employees to get involved.

Cross-sell. Take these opportunities to also talk our about other service lines you offer. If supporting orthopedics, talk about your rehab department, urgent care, and surgery offerings—service lines that complement orthopedic care.

Educate. Offer a series of free health-specific educational programs.  Focus on preventive measures and have service line promotions versus only selling your treatment capabilities. You’re not only providing a free service to your community, you are getting them in the door to see your organization. Plus, when people need the care you’ve addressed, your healthcare organization will not only be top-of-mind, but also
will be seen as a healthcare authority.

Take advantage of the fact that other companies and organizations are cutting back. Show you won’t turn your back on your community even during tough times. Remember, giving doesn’t always mean funding. Giving your time also is a gift that can bring great rewards to the community and to yourself.

Filed under Uncategorized Tagged with , , , , , , , , , , ,

← Older posts

Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 220 other followers