How to Get More Patients

Part 2: The Rules for Working with Doctors

B2D Success:

Accelerate your business growth by marketing your products and services to doctors

by Vicki Rackner MD

Preface

Introduction

Part 1: What Makes Doctors Tick?

How doctors become doctors

How doctors are like and unlike your other clients

How groups of doctors are alike

How groups of doctors are different

Part 2: What Makes Doctors Tick?

Make the first sale-- to yourself

Give to get

Sneak in the back door.

Results, results, results

Ask for referrals

Build physician-friendly teams

Avoid land mines.

Part 3: Smart Marketing Campaigns to Engage, Influence and Persuade Doctors

Choose your approach

Choose your content

Choose your campaign

About Dr. Vicki Rackner

May I Help You?

Preface

When my son was a toddler he had a love affair with trucks. One day we passed by a huge construction site. He pointed his chubby little toddler finger at the dirt pile and said, “Touch trucks.” I said, “That would be great, Sweetie, but, look: there’s a fence all around the trucks. Plus do you see that sign on the gate? It says ‘Do not enter.’” He thought for a moment, and suggested, “Take down sign.”

Conducting business with doctors is like making your way into that locked construction site.

The goal of this book is to help you accelerate your business growth by gaining access to the medical turf and selling more of your products and services to doctors. You’ll learn how to take down “do not enter” signs.

Here’s the most important point of this entire book: doctors think differently than business people.

I learned this lesson the hard way.

You see, I’m a doctor myself. I ran my own private surgical practice for many years. I made a career shift about a decade ago, trading my scalpel for a pen and microphone as a full-time author, speaker and consultant.

I thought the transition would be easy. In my mind running a medical practice and running a small business was the same thing. Boy was I wrong!

My early years as an entrepreneur reminded me of traveling in China. I felt like a complete foreigner observing strange customs.

I studied the world of business intensively. I hired mentors who served as my guides. As I learned how things work, two things happened.

First, I gained tremendous respect and appreciation for people like you who have mastered the fine art of marketing and sales. You have a true gift.

Second, I enjoyed greater business success.

I wondered, “What if business people had the same experience traveling in the world of medicine as I had traveling in the world of business?”

I’m here as your personal tour guide showing you how to navigate inside the world of medicine. These ideas will help:

•Insurance Agents

•Real Estate Agents

•Financial Advisors

•Healthcare Attorneys

•Mortgage Providers

•Community Bankers

•Accounting Professionals

You’ll acquire knowledge and strategies to accelerate your business growth by:

•Dramatically improving your ability to reach physicians

•Leveraging the marketing power of existing physician clients

•Acquiring more physician leads and convert more leads to clients

•Securing your role as a trusted advisor

•Making more sales.

The Handshake

The handshake began as a ritual offering proof that both parties came unarmed. Begin your relationship with doctors with the “mental handshake” to put them at ease. Let them know that you are not there to assault them with a sales pitch. Replace the word “sales” with “service.” Replace “profits” with “results.”

Introduction

Imagine picking up your ringing phone, and hearing, “I was recruited to join the hospital staff, and a colleague tells me you like working with doctors like me. Could you tell me more?”

Here you’ll get tips and strategies to create physician-friendly business practices that result in more sales to more doctors.

The ideas in this book will help you whether you work with doctors all day long, or you want to expand into the physician niche. After all, doctors buy houses, drive cars and go out to dinner, just like anyone else.

The catch is that the process of influencing doctors’ purchasing choices is not like conducting business with any other group of clients. It’s neither quite B2B nor B2C. It’s not quite like marketing to the affluent. Conducting business with doctors is in a class of its own. I call it B2D.

Working with doctors…is it right for you?

While the rewards in working with physicians are great, it’s not for everybody.

Let’s begin with the positive. Doctors are an attractive market niche for these reasons:

•It’s a large group (700,000 physicians in the US)

•Physicians enjoy a high net worth

•You can identify them and market to them

•There’s little competition in this niche

•Simple physician-friendly business practices set you apart

•Physicians are interesting people

•Physicians can afford your services.

•Physicians have large spheres of influence.

•Physicians are loyal customers.

Here are the major challenges:

•The barrier to entry is very, very high.

•Relationship-building takes time.

•The “physician temperament” sets them apart from other clients.

•Physicians are very busy, and it can be hard to get their attention.

•Physicians demand excellence.

•Physicians don’t always know what they don’t know.

•Physicians’ decisiveness can manifest as arrogance.

•Physicians like being in control.

It takes a special person to work with doctors. Here is the profile of success:

•You truly care about your clients and put your client’s interest before yours.

•You have complete mastery of an excellent product or service.

•You are a hard-working, intelligent person.

•You are a person of integrity--you do what you say you will do.

•You network well.

•You’re optimistic and resilient.

•You believe in yourself and in your products.

•You have the courage to ask for referrals and testimonials.

•You are patient and graciously persistent.

•You can innovate and generate new marketing approaches.

•You can overcome the culturally instilled intimidation and address physicians as peers.

If you’re still interested, here’s how this book will help you:

I will help you understand what makes doctors tick. You may be surprised to learn how much differently your doctor’s mind works than yours. I know because I’m both a physician and an entrepreneur.

I’ll share with you the rules for engaging doctors. You’ll learn the strategies that work, and the land mines to avoid.

And finally I’ll share physician-friendly business practices.

The truth is that physicians really do need your help. With some focus, persistence and strategic marketing, you can enjoy the financial and professional rewards that come with establishing yourself as a trusted advisor to your physician clients.

The Secret for Success

My physician mentors shared that “the secret of patient care is caring for the patient.” As your B2D mentor I’ll share that “the secret of selling to the doctors is caring about the doctor.”

Part 1: What Makes Doctors Tick?

One day I ran over a garden soaker hose with a lawn mower. Twenty years earlier I would have simply gone to the hardware store and replaced it. However, at the time I was a practicing surgeon, and I had the confidence I could fix it. I worked for well over an hour, trying every technique I used in the operating room. I was frustrated as I drove to the hardware store to replace it. The sales person said, “Most people know you can’t repair a hose. What made you think you could fix it?”

The answer was obvious to me. I was a doctor! Standard rules simply did not apply to me. Over nine years of rigorous medical training shaped the way I thought about myself and about the world around me

In short, doctors think differently than most of your colleagues and clients.

The selection and training of doctors

Here is the academic path to becoming a practicing physician:

• Undergraduate degree (4 years of college--usually from age 18 to 22)

• Medical school (4 years --usually from age 23 to 27)

• Residency (3 to 5 years--usually from age 28 to early 30’s)

• Optional fellowship training (1 to 3 years)

The average physician completes residency training and takes on their first “real job” at age 30 to 35 with about $100,000.00 in medical school debt. Half will go to work for a private practice setting and half will become employees of clinics, hospitals or academic centers. The starting salary for a primary care physician averages around $100K, and the average specialist who performs invasive procedure begins at about $200K.

The training of a doctor is a labor-intensive, expensive and lengthy undertaking. Medical schools select the applicants who have the greatest chance of making it thought seven to ten plus years of training and becoming skilled doctors.

Here are some of the qualities that they look for:

• Intelligence.

• Pursuit of excellence

• Willingness to defer gratification

• Single-minded focus

• A commitment to life life-long learning

• Leadership skills

•. Self-confidence.

• Loyalty

Physicians must be temperamentally inclined to:

• Assume risk

• Be with people in pain

• Make life-altering decisions

• Focus attention on what’s most important and ignore distractions.

• Work long hours

• Put their patients first.

You will discover that most physicians are driven by their desire to:

• Alleviate pain and suffering

• Serve others

• Carve their legacy.

How Doctors are Different

Not all doctors are the same. A social conversation with a pediatrician fresh out of residency is qualitatively different than another with a retiring heart surgeon. Here are some ways doctors are different from each other.

Medical specialty

There is a pecking order of physicians. Doctors who perform high-risk invasive procedures enjoy greater social status and higher incomes; primary care practitioners are found on the lower rungs. I am not promoting my own views; I’m simply sharing commonly held general perceptions.

Here are the top-earners:

1.Neurosurgeons

2.Orthopedic Surgeons

3.Cardiac Surgeons/ Cardiologists

4.Radiologists

5.Urologists

6.Dermatologists/Plastic Surgeons

Here are the bottom- earning fields:

1.Pediatrics

2.Family Medicine

3.Geriatrics

4.Internal Medicine

5.Hospitalist

6.Urgent Care

Boomer vs. Millennial

Different generations are like different breeds of doctor.

Boomer physicians tend to be the “lone wolf” type; they expected to run their own private practice. For most of their careers, they called the shots and enjoyed tremendous autonomy. They treated their patients according to their best judgment, set their own fees and policed themselves. Doctors ruled the roost, and even unruly behavior largely went unchallenged. When I went to medical school in the 1980‘s, I actually witnessed a frustrated surgeon throw a temper tantrum--and a scalpel!

The turbulent 90’s changed the landscape of medicine. Insurance companies reigned in soaring health care costs by taking the financial helm announcing they--not the treating physicians--would set the fees. Since larger organizations could negotiate better managed care contracts, smaller medical practices allowed themselves to be purchased by hospitals and clinics.

By 2000, about 50% of physicians were self-employed, and the rest were employed by hospitals and clinics.

The Millennials entered their medical careers knowing the rules had changed. Their expectations were different than the generations before them. They tend to be team players. They have a higher emotional intelligence and have more awareness about social boundaries. Their clinical choices are guided by evidence-based standards and treatment protocols.

Life stage

Groups of physicians in similar life stages share experiences that could impact your marketing:

•Caring for children who live at home.

•Caring for aging parents

•Caring for both children at home and aging parents

•Newly married

•Newly divorced

•New practice setting

•New financial challenges

Gender

When I began my surgical residency, the dressing room doors were labeled, “Doctor’s Lounge” and “Nurse’s Lounge.” Now half of medical students are female; and women tend to make career choices guided by lifestyle considerations far more commonly than men do. Gender could shape your offerings. I imagine a high-end clothing store creating a special service for divorced male doctors; a financial planner might target female physicians.

Business Acumen

Doctors of my generation were offered no formal business training. Some groups of doctors have better business sense than others. Here are the medical professionals who seem to have the best business savvy:

•Dermatologists

•Plastic surgeons

•Dentists

•Orthodontists

•Chiropractors

If your services help medical practices become more profitable, physicians in these medical specialties would be a good place to start.

What Do Physicians Want?

Physicians want many of the same things you want. They want to go to bed at night saying, “I made a positive difference today.” Doctors measure their success through their ability to wage war on disease and get good patient outcomes. It’s hard to feel good about the day when patients cannot be cured, or they have a disappointing response to treatment.

Here are some intangibles to ponder:

•Doctors want to be appreciated.

•Doctors need a listening ear

•Doctors hope to avoid burnout

•Doctors long to get back to the dream

•Doctors appreciate knowing that someone has their back

Part 2: The Rules for Engaging Physicians

My insurance agent Fred Green will always have a special place in my heart. For years he helped me choose the best health care plans for my employees and my family. Right before I got pregnant I changed plans to one in which my OB was a preferred provider.

On October 23, three weeks before my due date, my OB’s scheduler pointed out that the hospital where I planned to give birth was not a participating facility in my insurance plan. That meant I was responsible for half of the total hospital bill.

I called Fred in a state of panic. He calmed me down and offered a solution. He could switch my insurance policy to kick in Nov 1. He drove to my office with the papers for me to sign so they would be filed in time. My son was born in November, and we averted the crisis.

Fred made a big difference in my life. Despite the fact that I was running my own surgical practice and billing insurance companies for my services at the time, Fred knew the ins and outs of insurance policies.

How often do you think I told this story? How many doctors do you think I sent to Fred?

Here are some rules for becoming a trusted advisor to your physician clients as Fred Green is to me.

Make the first sale--to yourself

Do you know -- with certainty-- that you improve your client’s condition? Can you help clients achieve their desired results? Do you and your clients treat each other as trusted peers?

Even business people who answer with an emphatic YES aren’t quite as certain when it comes to physician clients. Here are a few reasons.

1. Most people are intimidated by physicians. I know what it’s like to get intimidated by powerful people. When I work with celebrity patients and clients, I can easily psyche myself out. Do I really have what it takes to help them?