Swine Flu and the Media Equals Opportunity

Okay, are the hospitals and health systems paying attention?

With the media creating a panic about swine flu and the chances of a worldwide pandemic, now is the time for the healthcare system to step forward.

Get those PR and Marketing departments off their chairs and into the media, on your web site and into community with health, prevention and treatment options on the swine flu. Leverage the opportunity to do some good for a change instead of waiting for things to happen.

Okay, free consulting follows:

• First, get your docs together in rapid order and get them on board.
• Second, link your web site to the CDC, WHO, etc., and make a big deal out of it.
• Third, prepare some material for distribution in the community. i.e., grammar schools, high schools, private grade schools, senior centers, community groups, local employers etc., and such with tips and ideas for prevention, health information etal. That is what you do!
• Four, write a series of press releases and get them out to the local media and position a doc or docs from your medical staff as the content experts. Arrange some media interviews.
• Five, establish your hospital or health system as the "go-to" information source.
• Six, run some informational public service newspaper ads.
• Seven, write and distribute some PSAs for newspapers and broadcast media, don't forget local cable.
• Eight, get your docs into the community and speaking.
• Nine, be transparent and explain how you will handle a swine flu outbreak in your community.
• Ten, start over repeating steps one to nine again and again and again.

CEOs repeat after me, I will take advantage of opportunities such as this for the greater good of my community.

>>> Swine Flu and the Media Equals Opportunity >>>

Heathcare is Bulit for a Tie

Score Tied and No Extra Innings
Ever think about it? Healthcare is built for a tie. Throughout the industry no one can ever get a competitive leg up. We all have the same managed care contracts, similar programs and services, even our docs go to a group of hospitals. So, in a commodity market environment, which healthcare is, and price is becoming king, how can anyone expect anything less than a tie? You can not be a clear winner, you can not dominate your market, you can not keep out new entrants. Okay, maybe for a short while but not indefinitely. Tie score, 7-7, "same ol same ol" across organizations and it may not change anytime soon. We all do the same things.

Breaking the tie
The only way you can break a tie is with your people. That's right, your employees. They make the difference and set you apart from the field. In a zero sum game where the truth be told, no one can really define service and quality, people make the difference. That is what doctors and patients will remember. That is how you can gain an advantage, that is part of the road to prosperity as an organization. Train them and get them into the community with presentations.

And oh by the way, there should not be a single presentation that anyone gives from the CEO on down that is over six slides. If you can't deliver a presentation in 4-6 slides, then you do not know what you are talking about. Stop the show up and throw up approach to information. People aren't stupid, they can read and that is exactly what they do when you put miles of information with 60 slides in a presentation. They read and don't listen, so why did you even bother giving a presentation? When you do that, then 80 percent of the presentation is about you, and only 20 percent about your audience. Think they really want to hear how great you think you are?

Employees satisfaction is one part of the puzzle to breaking the tie
Still think employee satisfaction isn't important or is only relegated to a bi-annual survey? Think again. The healthcare industry is built for a tie and if you want passionate committed employees and physicians, then you really need to treat them better. Otherwise, its a tie.

And ties aren't a lot of fun.

>>> Heathcare is Bulit for a Tie >>>

Strategy vs Tactical Marketing

Stewart vs. Cramer

First this message. If you did not see the Jon Stewart's interview of Mad Money Jim Cramer from CNBC on Comedy Central Daily Show, you really need to see what everyone is talking about. I actually felt sorry for Cramer, but hey, CNBC needs to get its act together and figure out what their responsibility is in financial reporting. Yea for the little guy! Thanks Jon.

http://blog.indecisionforever.com/2009/03/13/jon-stewart-and-jim-cramer-the-extended-daily-show-interview/

Now back to the regularly scheduled program........

Hospital Advertising, my favorite subject

Seeing an increase in hospital advertising. Once again, it’s not clear what people are attempting to accomplish. That's because the strategic essence of marketing is missing.

Look, anybody can create an ad.

Anybody can hear the CEO, run out, spend some money and throw it up against the wall to see what sticks. How is your advertising supporting the business objectives? What is your brand message? Is a billboard on a busy expressway where people zip along at 65 miles an hour really that memorable? How about a call to action? What does your brand stand for and how is that supported by advertising? Do you even know what your brand is?

Please stop insulting consumers with promises of "World Class Healthcare". Unless you are Mayo, The Cleveland Clinic, John Hopkins etc, you don't have a world class healthcare offering.

Maybe you have missed the headlines and stories, but the US has the most expensive healthcare in the world, with some pretty dismal outcomes. There is nothing about a community hospital that is world-class. Unless you have people coming from around the world for care; not a believable message for me. And that goes for a lot of consumers too.

Really now. No awards like The Top 100 Hospitals, US News and World Reports ranking, Malcolm Baldridge Quality Award or even a JD Powers Patient Satisfaction award, how can you say with a straight face that your healthcare is world-class?

With that kind of marketing coming from agencies and marketing departments, this is what makes it so difficult to get people to understand the true nature of marketing. It is all about the marketing strategy. And there is a great gaping hole lacking some serious marketing strategy.

Figure out the right strategy first, then the rest comes easy.

>>> Strategy vs Tactical Marketing >>>

Billions and Billions and Billions......

$150 billion dollars for healthcare in the stimulus bill, $19 billion of which is for IT. Think everyone is trying to figure out how they get theirs? And I don't mean the hospitals and IDNs. I figure McKesson and Cerner are well on their way, including a host of other niche players (small and large) healthcare IT providers trying to figure out (as if they haven't already) what's in it for them.


With all the different systems and no common standards will this turn into a really more expensive version of the Betamax vs VHS video tape format wars from the mid 1980s with that ancient technology of VCR?


Now the budget contains another $600 billion plus for healthcare reform. All told, this totals in excess of $700 billion. Just the first down payment for fixing the system folks. I bet the AHA and AMA are busy figuring out how much they can get without having to change anything.


Like I said in previous blogs, its all about politics. Obama being a veteran of Chicago politics, knows that when he figured out how everybody gets theirs, reform happens. It has to happen. It is going to be expensive.


Now for all you CEOs out there who think they can hold on for a couple more years and things will go back to the way they were, hold on for the ride. If we can come up with a European style healthcare system- maybe. If we have the Great Britain Universal Healthcare System- here comes rationing and long waits.


To all those hospital marketing departments out there, here is a clue for future activity regardless of the system. Americans hate to wait in lines. So, your job is to figure out who can pay privately to not wait in queues for service. That's the nugget.

Why? Think about what happens when you suddenly increase demand and all those hospital beds that have been taken out of service. Combine that with a primary care physician shortage and lack of RNs, you get the idea.


Anything else and you have to hire me as a consultant.


Cheers........

>>> Billions and Billions and Billions...... >>>

Have you looked at your CGM lately?

CGM, sounds like a disease. Well, it can be. It can be unknown. It can be helpful. It can be harmful. It can be your best friend or your worse enemy. Do you even know what it is?

Is your marketing department aware of CGM? Can they even tell you what this means?

Simply put if you do not know what CGM means you and your hospital, physician practices, or any healthcare setting is at risk.

CGM means Consumer Generated Media. It means that in the age of the Internet, disgruntled patients, unhappy employees, media, anybody- can write about their experiences, post photos, interview and show to the world how good or bad you are.

Anyone with a computer and Internet connection can create CGM. Won't matter if what is written is true or false. The world does not care. But those who read it will believe it.

Scroll through this blog and you will find plenty of examples of CGM: Silver Cross Hospital; Agfa Healthcare; Adventist; State of Illinois; etc.

Look at: Comcastmustdie.com; Ihatedell.net; Technorati.com; Youtube.com; MrConsumer.com, all examples of CGM. And it could be you tomorrow.

If you don’t know what your consumers are saying about you, or what your competition is saying for that matter, you are losing control of your brand.

You operate in a virtual marketplace.
Consumers know more than about you than you realize.

You lose in a CGM fast-break. Disgruntled patient or discharged employee creates Consumer Generated Media. CGM is picked up by media- print and electronic. You won’t even know what hit you. You lose control of your brand and message.

Welcome to the age where customers are the new paparazzi.

>>> Have you looked at your CGM lately? >>>

Employee Satisfaction + Service Excellence = Customer Evangelists

The Crisis

Faced with a well documented financial meltdown, the global consequences and a deep national recession, how can a hospital or system CEO keep the doors open and the lights on?

The answer is simple, yet complex and difficult to carry out. Few try and most of those that do fail.

Think about this for a moment, there is little if any differentiation in the healthcare marketplace. Hospitals on average look the same. They provide the same services, have the same managed contracts contract and even have similar medical staffs. Patient satisfaction runs in the 80th – 90th percentile satisfied. Looks like an industry that is very close to becoming a commodity which will eventually compete on price alone.

The hospital CEO, medical business leader, managing partner, vice president, director or manger needs to be creating customer evangelists to not just survive, but grow and thrive in this and any future environment.

The answer: Customer Evangelists!

A customer evangelist is an individual, who has such an outstanding service experience that they freely become your positive spokesperson in the community. They are not paid. They have no financial sake in your survival, but have come to believe so completely in what you do, they drive business to you. This happens because you have highly satisfied employees that provide exemplary, detailed, person-focused service.

Notice I did not say patient or customer satisfaction. Anyone can have good and even high patient satisfaction scores, and that my friend is the fix you are in- high satisfaction scores do not for one minute translate into customer evangelists. Don’t stop measuring satisfaction; you have to for a variety of reasons. I say focus on creating customer evangelists and the scores will be fine.

The tile of the post says it all Employee Satisfaction + Service Excellence = Customer Evangelists. From now on, my posts are going to focus on this topic. I will be talking about creating an environment that results in highly satisfied employees and putting processes and systems in place to be able to provide outstanding customer service to create customer evangelists. It is an unassailable position in the market. Do you want to be a market leader in healthcare? Do you want to grow and not merely hang on? Do you want the best doctors on your medical staff? Then create customer evangelists.

Some notes and comments:

RSNA starts in Chicago this week. Stop by the Agfa Healthcare booth. They do have the finest PACS I have ever seen and had the privilege to market. Agfa has had a tough couple of years with the never ending restructuring and global leadership changes, but if you are going to RSNA at McCormick Place, take the time to learn about their IMPAX PACS, you won’t be sorry.

Retail Clinics:

I would like to clarify a couple of things about my blog on retail clinics. I do understand them very well. Yes, it is a model that has the potential to lessen some of the waiting and service problems experienced in healthcare delivery, but they are not the answer.

I go to a physician who does not have a NP or PA. My kid’s did see a PA but that was under direct supervision of a physician. The retail clinics popping up are not and let me be very clear about this, not under the direct supervision of a physician. And yes there is a quality of care difference between those PAs and NPs under direct supervision of a doctor and those not. Most of these companies creating these clinics do not even have a medical director, so please, let us not place them on par with physician treatment when they have trouble keeping up with changing standards of care and all that counts is the bottom-line.

As to the accreditation argument, accreditation means that the organization has meet the minimum acceptable standards of the organization that is conferring accreditation. You don’t get points or any other kind of awards for going above and beyond those standards. You paid your fee. Maybe there was an on-site survey. If you passed and few fail, you received a certificate and can say you’re accredited. It is a piece of paper that does not guarantee anything.

>>> Employee Satisfaction + Service Excellence = Customer Evangelists >>>

Financial meltdown, recession, mergers, affiliations, uninsured and retail clinics

With the financial market meltdown, worldwide recession I say look for new mergers and closings in the hospital industry. Even though many are profitable, well at least slightly, that will go by the way side with investment income losses, higher numbers of uninsured, rising bad debt and lengthening delays in Medicaid payments from the states, the picture is bleak. Declining utilization and tighter reimbursement from managed care doesn’t help either. Oh yea, those pesky retail clinics won’t help either. I am surprised more hospitals don’t go that route, partner with their doctors and drive those babies out of their markets.

Insuring the 45 million and growing uninsured is not in the cards fore the foreseeable future, not till 2010 at the earliest. President-elect Obama has his hands full. First priority is fixing the financial system, second is the economy, and third is healthcare. Without the first two, the third never happens.

Hospitals are cutting back, but it is in marketing as always. CEOs never did understand the value of marketing and what it can do, but then why do we need to be customer focused? Part of that blame goes to marketers who are unable to prove value; focus on the fluff stuff; and not holding themselves accountable for a bottom-line result. Could be too many newsletters, ads touting services people don’t need or want and not positioning on a quality and service perspective.

Answer this…. if you can’t say in 25 words or less about how you are different from everyone else, then you are adrift in your marketplace and your key customers can’t either. But then your competitors are in the same boat and they just may be as clueless as you are. Define and differentiate before someone else does it for you...

The hospital industry is undifferentiated and it’s becoming a commodity. Focus on satisfaction- employee and patient. You won’t have satisfied patients without satisfied employees. More to follow latter on that one

By the way I am hearing some not so flattering reports about the quality of primary care in those retail clinic settings. Wrong diagnoses, medication errors and faulty in site quick tests make we wonder how soon before the government step in and regulates. More direct physician oversight, certification and training are needed to prevent someone from dying. Hasn’t happened yet but it will. It’s just a matter of time. If you have a good or bad story about the retail clinics post it up.

The company I work for is going through a major reengineering. Look for big and I mean big reductions at the coporate staff level first quarter 09. Lots of uncessary layers and they could really benefit from a dose of lean management. Probably means I will be out of a job. Oh well, here we go again, that will be the seventh time in eight years. I have the nack for finding those companies.

>>> Financial meltdown, recession, mergers, affiliations, uninsured and retail clinics >>>