In our after-hours discussions, one of my esteemed colleagues and I have a recurring debate about the power of word of mouth versus effective advertising in driving decision making among healthcare consumers, and in turn, strategy development for healthcare marketers. Our discussions remind me of the old beer commercials that had a room full of sports icons yelling back and forth at each other, “Tastes Great” vs. “Less Filling.” I apologize to those readers who are too young to remember these ads and or those who could care less about the sports icons that made these commercials so successful with us vintage-simple-minded-sports-crazed-beer-drinkers.
My argument is that word of mouth is the key differentiator. Thus, because word of mouth is driven by the patient/visitor experience, satisfaction (especially less than stellar satisfaction) has to be a primary concern for healthcare marketers. In our consulting experience, we find that most healthcare marketers agree, but feel hamstrung by lack of control, and even influence, over the patient experience. So they concentrate their effort and dollars into traditional advertising, community relations and outreach. Which is great if the experience is where it needs to be.
Can advertising drive the numbers? You bet. But there are some conditions that lead to success. One is great creative, with on target messaging. Another is reach and frequency; you have to deliver the message(s) to the right audience(s) at the right time(s) with meaningful frequency. Last but not least, it had better be backed up with an exceptional experience, or your short term advertising gains could easily be erased by negative word of mouth. Our experience is, once you’ve you pulled them in with great advertising but then pushed them away with a bad experience, getting them back is exponentially harder.
Recently we created and promoted an orthopedic brand for Munroe Regional Medical Center in Ocala, Florida. Needless to say, our creative and messaging was (how do I say this with appropriate humility) spot on. Just as important, Munroe Regional invested in the multimedia reach and frequency necessary to drive the message home. And in my book, most importantly, they backed it up with an exceptional patient and physician experience. The result? Munroe’s orthopedic surgery caseload went up 55% in less than a year, and all indications are that they are just getting started and that the caseload will see another significant increase in year two.
So what do you do if your patient satisfaction scores aren’t where they need to be, and you’re a marketer who lacks control over the experience? Unfortunately, there are no quick fixes or turnkey solutions, but you can start by looking close to home. Historically, opportunity drill downs in patient satisfaction survey results consistently point to communication and information as having the biggest impact on the one survey question that tells the story “Would you recommend this provider to family and friends?”
Hmmm, communications… Isn’t that something over which we marketers have at least some control? At tomsheehan worldwide, we think you do. If you are interested in learning more about our Best Informed Patient™ approach to patient satisfaction and positive word of mouth, check it out on our web site http://www.tomsheehan.com or give us a call 610-478-8448. One thing is for sure: doing nothing and expecting things to change isn’t the answer.
-Scott Boie is Chief Healthcare Strategist at tomsheehan worldwide. He can be reached at scottboie@tomsheehan.com.
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