Marketing Your Radiology Practice

Enhancing Your Imaging Image | December 2005: 2005 Readers’ Choice Awards | Medical Imaging

10/19/2007 06:13 PM

Issue: December 2005: 2005 Readers’ Choice Awards

Enhancing Your Imaging Image

Normal Version

by Wendy J. Meyeroff Looking for more patients at your imaging center? Want to attract a top radiologist to join your practice? Market yourself properly, and the opportunities will be yours.

It's amazing how much the attitude toward medical marketing has changed in the past 20 years. Initially, hospitals and manufacturers engaged in marketing, but the physicians themselves? Never. It was frowned upon by the American Medical Association (AMA of Chicago), the American College of Radiology (ACR of Reston, Va), and other professional organizations.

But, for about a decade now, medical marketing has exploded. Whether you're an individual radiologist, group practice, imaging center, or hospital, there's at least one marketing tool to suit your needs and budget. They include postcards, letters, and other direct mail (DM) options; public relations; Web sites; advertising (from daily and weekly newspapers to banners on said Web sites)—the list goes on and on.

What area of marketing is right for you? Whole books are dedicated to this topic, but we've pared them down to the best bets.

Structure Your Message Before you do any marketing, you must answer two questions. First, what exactly are you selling? The biggest mistake everyone makes—and that means everyone, even major ad agencies—is that they don't really figure out what they're selling. For those in radiology, the answer would seem simple: "We're selling radiology services."

Wrong! Everyone with whom you're competing for business is selling radiology services. If that's the only message you have, you'll never stand out. "Lots of radiology groups market the benefits of their equipment, but not why they are the ones to do this for you," says Renee Miller, president of The Miller Group (Los Angeles), an advertising/promotion company.

The message of what makes you stand out from the competition is what Steve Smith, VP of marketing for Practice Builders (Santa Ana, Calif), calls branding. "Are you the compassionate practice, the technology practice—what is it that makes you unique?" Smith asks. It's not an easy message to determine, he admits; in fact, he says that determining a brand can be "like trying to nail down Jell-O." Terri Langhans, president of the Healthcare Public Relations & Marketing Association of Southern California (HPRMA of Huntington Beach, Calif), helps clients find that message through four connection points. For example, let's say you're trying to garner referrals from http://www.medicalimagingmag.com/issues/articles/2005-12_03.asp?mode=print&

Page 1 of 5

Enhancing Your Imaging Image | December 2005: 2005 Readers’ Choice Awards | Medical Imaging

10/19/2007 06:13 PM

hospitals or fellow clinicians: "First, choose something you're trying to promote, like your new PET/CT scanner," Langhans explains. "Second, find an attribute that you think will resonate with your audience. Third, translate that feature into a benefit. And fourth, explain why that benefit is important, personally, to the physician.

"So, to a pulmonologist," she continues, "the benefit of your PET/CT is that as a whole-body scan, it can not only identify malignant versus benign solitary pulmonary nodules, but that it also can identify distant metastases and prevent unnecessary surgery. Why is that important, personally, to the doctor? They don't want to miss any cancers! That's your marketing message."

With a little tweaking, by the way, this message can be refocused toward enticing patients.

The second question you should ask before marketing yourself is: Who is your target audience? Barbara Bellman Lehman is president of 3LeggedStool (Phoenix), a marketing firm with radiologists and imaging centers in its clientele, including Arizona Breastnet (Scottsdale, Ariz). "The odds are, a hospital has its own technology," she says, noting that if the hospital is your target, don't brag about your PET/CT scanner. Instead, she says, "Market your ability to read film quickly and accurately." Again, this advice can be altered slightly for marketing to patients.

Kim Dupuis, marketing director for Red Rock Radiology (Las Vegas; www.redrockradiology.com), does just that. Dupuis says that her facility's physicians already have outstanding reputations regarding their skills, so her main message stresses turnaround time and convenience. "We can get you films and a report within 24 hours, plus we offer free delivery of the film," she notes. "We [are fully digital], so we can deliver the images to you on a CD to view at your computer. We can't send them via email yet because of HIPAA, but we're working with an IT person to offer that kind of security very soon."

If you're marketing to patients (or potential patients), the message must be personal. "When your patient is talking about your group to his tennis partner, he's raving about how fast he got in to see you, or how quickly you gave him his films to take to his doctor," Dupuis notes. "He's not saying, ‘Boy, they had the niftiest 64-slice CT scanner I've ever seen!'"

Neil Baum, MD (www.neilbaum.com), is a New Orleans-based physician and marketing expert whose advice applies to any physician who interacts with patients. "When I opened my practice, I was one of seven urologists in my building," he says. "To attract patients, I developed this label: ‘The Doctor Who Sees Patients on Time.' I reinforced that message by letting the public know that if I didn't see them within 15 minutes of their appointment, they didn't pay their bill."

Belinda Barclay-White, MD, opened the Arizona Breastnet radiology center in 1998. Lehman helped Barclay-White develop the center's original marketing plan; one of its most critical messages was, "I'm going to do personal exams, sit down, and talk to patients face to face." It still is. Arizona Breastnet's Web site (www.breastnet.net) emphasizes this approach by including a PDF of every step the patient will take when she comes for her mammogram.

Are You Truly Prepared?

Before you start even a moderate campaign, you must analyze your business goals. "You'll want a needs assessment," Smith explains, "that asks questions like: How much do you want to increase gross revenues? How do patients currently find you—and do you feel that it's working?" About 3 years ago, Practice Builders added a survey to its Web site (www.practicebuilders.com/survey1/survey1.shtml) that directs potential clients through such questions.

Ed Schipul, president and CEO of Schipul—The Web Marketing Company (Houston; www.schipulmedical.com), suggests calling in from the outside and taking note of the response. Do you stay on hold forever? You just might need more personnel.

If you're hoping to be a media star, remember that news breaks at all hours. Baum makes it clear, even to his answering service, that if a reporter calls, they're to be transferred through to him immediately.

Targeting Colleagues Miller says that she goes for mammograms to the center that her gynecologist recommended. This kind of referral requires visibility. The marketing methods for such visibility are relatively simple, but they take time and effort, so most physicians don't implement them.

One step is to not only join professional associations, such as the ACR and the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA of Oak Brook, Ill), but to become actively involved. Volunteer to be treasurer; give a lecture—even if the topic is nonmedical; attend events. Having been transplanted from New Orleans to Texas by Hurricane Katrina, Baum could now easily speak at a professional seminar on how his EHR system saved both him and his patients numerous hours of stress—and even danger—after the Gulf evacuation.

For the up-and-coming radiologist, Lehman recommends, "Partner with a more credible colleague and develop a white paper, then present it to colleagues." That doesn't just mean at conferences. She says radiologists need to get out there and "press the http://www.medicalimagingmag.com/issues/articles/2005-12_03.asp?mode=print&

Page 2 of 5

Enhancing Your Imaging Image | December 2005: 2005 Readers’ Choice Awards | Medical Imaging

10/19/2007 06:13 PM

flesh if you really want your colleagues to make referrals to you. If you're not willing to make the effort for face-to-face time, forget it. Why should physicians change their referral pattern if they haven't talked to you or gained a sense of your expertise?" she asks.

Dupuis disagrees, slightly. "I go out and talk to physicians who might provide our referrals every month. Having spent 20 years in this area, I can talk to them about embolizations for uterine fibroids, and issues regarding 8- versus 64-slice CTs. But if someone has more medical questions, then absolutely, I set him up with one of our radiologists."

The Amazing 2% Return "One of your most effective marketing tools is your own patient base," says chiropractor Len Schwartz, DC (Ivyland, Pa; www.chiropracticemarketingsolutions.com), who, since 1999, has been providing the marketing expertise he originally learned to enhance his own practice to fellow physicians.

Miller adds, "One of the easiest marketing tools is simply sending your patients a card." To those in the marketing field, it's astounding how rarely physicians use this simple tool. HIPAA regulations mean you can't send a postcard with a reminder message (for example, "It's time for your next mammogram!"), but you can send one that announces something about your new franchise's opening.

Such mailings, called DM campaigns, are relatively easy to institute and fairly inexpensive to implement. Your current billing database and today's word-processing programs can develop letters and labels targeting patients or colleagues. To expand your mailing list, trade with a colleague whose services complement your own, or purchase lists from list brokers.

Once you get a DM campaign rolling, you can hope for at least a 2% return per mailing. You're probably asking, "Two percent is a decent return?" It is, which is why this aspect of marketing continues to grow by at least 5% each year. 1 After all, if you bought a list of 1,000 names for $300 (not an unreasonable fee), which led to six patients coming in for mammograms, you'd break even if you were receiving only $50 reimbursement for the test—and you probably charge more than that for the procedure.

Don't forget to save on mailing costs. Latest estimates show that postcards, flyers, and other "nonenvelopes" now compose 60% of DM approaches. 1 Postage is a major reason. As long as your mailer is 4 x 6 inches or smaller, it costs 24 cents versus the normal first-class 37 cents. 1

Advertising Versus Public Relations "There's still a mind-set among doctors that if you advertise, how good can you be?" says Lehman, who points out that DM is advertising. Still, most of the time, the word "advertising" refers to specific avenues, such as messages in newspapers or magazines and on television or radio.

The main benefit to advertising is that once you pay for your ad, its appearance is guaranteed: You'll get your 30-second radio spot on the XYZ show at a certain time of day or night, or your 3- x 5-inch ad in the Daily News science section on Tuesday.

Still, advertising is one of the most expensive marketing options. A one-time, 3- x 5-inch ad in a large daily, such as The Plain Dealer in Cleveland, costs $2,606.25 if it runs Monday–Saturday. 2 Rates decrease with how often the ad runs, of course—$2,151 if that ad runs twice and $2,035.50 if it runs weekly for 1 year.

Another marketing tool is public relations (PR), which can work well for health professionals. An overall campaign crosses a much broader marketing spectrum. One press release can be distributed to every media outlet: newspapers, magazines, television, and more.

"The credibility factor in PR is very important," says Joseph M. Eskridge, MD, a neuroradiologist with the Seattle Neuroscience Institute who recently hired a PR expert. Eskridge is trying to accomplish two things with his new campaign: promote a book he's writing and build his business. "I spent 18 years at the University of Washington. Now, I'm at this group, trying to rebuild my practice and attract specialized clients," he says.

Susan Lewis, CEO of Public and Investor Relations LLC (PAIRelations of Centennial, Colo), is Eskridge's PR expert. "I tell clients that PR is exposure without expenditure, when compared to the price of advertising placement," she says. Of course, there's the cost of her services, but a good PR campaign can give you far more mileage beyond the press release or other documents for which you've paid. "It's knowing how to leverage the resulting coverage once it appears," she says, "like producing reprints and knowing how to use them as marketing tools."

Lehman of 3LeggedStool says that Barclay-White's PR approach was very innovative. She co-founded (along with a radiation oncologist) the Arizona Institute for Breast Health (AIBH of Scottsdale, Ariz; www.aibh.org). The AIBH not only brings in clients http://www.medicalimagingmag.com/issues/articles/2005-12_03.asp?mode=print&

Page 3 of 5

Enhancing Your Imaging Image | December 2005: 2005 Readers’ Choice Awards | Medical Imaging

10/19/2007 06:13 PM

to Breastnet, it also adds immeasurably to Barclay-White's reputation because of its nonprofit work, especially since press releases go out regularly promoting the Institute.

Announcements are a vital part of any PR campaign—but you don't need to establish an institute to spur them. Anything can be a cause for announcement to the local media: you've added a new partner or associate, you have a new piece of equipment, you're appearing at a conference, you've expanded your services, you're now accepting another insurance plan—the list continues. Don't forget: Just because something isn't new to you doesn't mean it isn't new to your audience. If that audience has no idea that you've been doing bone-density scans since last year, you have an announcement to make.

Other PR options: sponsor a local little league team; host a seminar at your office for PTA members on valuable topics, such as "10 Things Every Woman Should Know Before Her Next Mammogram"; submit a short article to the local newspaper; and speak on a local radio station.

Especially for the latter three, hundreds of health-related holidays out there can provide subjects for articles, speeches, and media appearances. Check out the Health Observances section on Pam Pohly's Net Guide (www.pohly.com/dates) for ideas.

The main negative in PR: You're not paying for the release to appear, so you can't guarantee placement. Thus, a PR program requires more patience and persistence for results.

Internet Essentials You're dealing with a more computer-savvy audience nowadays. Now even senior citizens are surfing the 'Net regularly, so a Web site is essential to any good marketing campaign. Among the tips that Schipul and Lauren Hall, his director of search-engine marketing, offer: Make sure your site is updated regularly. If not, it's not worth bothering, especially if you're trying to present yourself as someone on the cutting edge. Remember, the same "announcements" you're making in your press releases can (and should) go on your Web site.

Do keyword research. Keywords are words or phrases you have determined are most likely to be typed into the search engine by your target market. Schipul found that "rhinoplasty" actually would glean a higher number of hits than "nose job" for a plastic surgery client, indicating that patients are highly educated. Enlist the services of an outside firm or bring in an Internet specialist of your own to tackle the research.

Offer lots of information on your home page. Among the information, Hall suggests, are testimonials, case histories, office hours, and upcoming special events. Bear in mind that your site must offer a clean visual while presenting all of this information.

Test your Web work. Use the "A/B" test. Run one headline or picture on your Web site (or in an ad) for the first 2 weeks, then a different one the next 2 weeks, and see which garners the most hits. Just make sure to change only one variable each time.

Is This DIY? Two main issues cross all aspects of marketing development. The first is simply making the time to do it, which might mean adding personnel. The computer can print out a postcard, letter, or press release, but the material still needs to be written and distributed in a timely manner and to the right audience.

The second issue that most often defeats an imaging expert's marketing message is the actual message and/or its design.

Especially now with computers, physicians and/or administrators tend to think that they're both writers and artists. Yes, your computer can give you a gorgeous choice of templates, but do you really know which one is most likely to appeal to your audience? Should it be the same design if it's going to professionals versus patients? Should you use the same design every time so that your audience immediately can tell who it's from, or should you vary it? What font(s) should you use in choosing your design?

Similarly, a word-processing program doesn't automatically make you a writer. You can't even rely on your spell-check feature; by itself, the program won't find mistakes like using "their" for "there" as long as each is spelled correctly. And the grammar checker in Microsoft Word is incorrect many times. You'll need a medical spell-checker, like Stedman's Medical Dictionary, for words like "venography."

Besides, effective copywriting is skilled, hard work. Chiropractor Schwartz says, "I've found that 99 percent of doctors' ads fail http://www.medicalimagingmag.com/issues/articles/2005-12_03.asp?mode=print&

Page 4 of 5

Enhancing Your Imaging Image | December 2005: 2005 Readers’ Choice Awards | Medical Imaging

10/19/2007 06:13 PM

because the copy is not compelling." That's true of all copy, not just ads. Among the biggest mistakes is telling your audience what you want them to hear—not what they're interested in knowing. (All of which goes back to the beginning—know your audience!)

Many marketing firms will redo each ad or postcard a minimum of three times before it goes to press. And that doesn't count the work put into the headlines—the most critical part of the copy. (Some marketing professionals admit to writing as many as 40 headlines for just one ad, before the creative team finds one they agree works.) Remember, your ad is going to be swimming in a morass of copy, and the DM postcard will be glanced at for a fraction of a second in that night's mail. The headline must catch your audience's eye, or they'll probably never read the rest.

Final Thoughts Whatever marketing method you choose, be committed to funding the effort. Estimates vary, but they range from 3% to 12% of your gross income. Whatever money you allocate, be serious about its use. "Everyone in the practice has to agree to stick with that expenditure every year. You can't think that if you're a little short somewhere else that you can borrow from the marketing fund," Smith says.

Be honest, and don't try to do the work yourself if you—or someone in your office—can't or won't take the time to support the effort. If you go outside, find experts who understand your field. Some people recommend specialists; others feel that a marketer with a broad spectrum of clients (as long as they're in the healthcare field) is more likely to bring a fresh perspective to your message than one who's done nothing but promote radiology for the past 5 years.

To find your experts, ask for referrals from colleagues (which is how Eskridge found Lewis). Remember to look outside your specialty. Dupuis was offered her position by physicians who'd admired her work when she was affiliated with a local hospital.

Ask the marketers for their marketing materials. If you're seeking a Webmaster, search the Web for sites you like. You might find they've been designed by someone in business only 2 years, but so what? They still could be worth a phone call.

Once you hire experts, trust them. Speaking engagements and seminars sound great, but maybe you and/or your office isn't set up to handle them. Lewis has just started with Eskridge, so she says that right now, "Our initial focus is developing basics, like key messages, his bio, and a fact sheet."

Schipul uses this rule regarding clients: "If the physician thinks he or she is the creative director, that's the number-one reason I turn them down. We'll yield to radiologists for healthcare, so they have to trust us for our expertise, too."

Wendy Meyeroff is a contributing writer for Medical Imaging. In her 20 years of healthcare marketing to professionals and consumers, Meyeroff's array of clients have included Astra-Zeneca, NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, The New York Times, and Erickson Retirement Communities.

Wendy Meyeroff is a contributing writer for Medical Imaging. In her 20 years of healthcare marketing to professionals and consumers, Meyeroff's array of clients have included Astra-Zeneca, NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital, The New York Times, and Erickson Retirement Communities.

References 1 . Acquisitions leads direct mail increase: study. DIRECT magazine. October 6, 2005. Available at: www.directmag.com/news/ acquisition-100805/. Accessed November 4, 2005.

2 . Advertising Rates and Pricing for 2005. Plain Dealer. Available at: www.plaindealer.com/advertising/rates/index.php.

Accessed November 4, 2005.

Normal Version

http://www.medicalimagingmag.com/issues/articles/2005-12_03.asp?mode=print&

Page 5 of 5