Optimizing Patient Acquisition: Strategies from a Healthcare Fractional CMO
With so many clinics and hospitals, your healthcare organization needs to maintain an edge in this competitive industry. Strong, well-planned strategies help improve your overall performance: Optimizing patient acquisition is essential to boost any healthcare business.
Attracting more patients might require your company to plan and develop new initiatives to expand your reach. The leadership of a healthcare fractional CMO (healthcare fractional chief marketing officer) and their extensive experience in creating transformative strategies can make all the difference in improving patient acquisition.
How To Increase Patient Acquisition: 5 Tips
Like with all industries, healthcare marketing is slightly nuanced, especially when accounting for specific laws that apply (like HIPAA). However, it’s similar in that healthcare, like all other companies in all other fields, needs credibility and a positive brand image. Cultivating a great reputation and emphasizing your firm’s strength and specialty make a good focal point for successful marketing strategies. (We’ll get to how to do that in the next sections.)
Optimizing patient acquisitions involves reassessing your current operations. Your company is incredible, but do your advertising efforts match? What does your firm need to expand its clientele and maintain a steady flow of high-quality leads? Rolling out such initiatives can be a complex process, and it helps to acquire the services of an expert.
Here are five FCMO patient acquisition tips to help increase patronage for your healthcare firm:
1. Digitize Operations.
Healthcare is one of the industries that benefit most from digitization. It provides staff with the convenience and accessibility they need for their urgent day-to-day operations.
While many people often associate digital transformation with marketing, it goes much further than amplifying your company’s presence. A complete digital transformation for your healthcare company involves updating and recalibrating healthcare software and optimizing information portals. It’s also critical to reinforce the security of vital information like patient records and medical history.
Digitizing healthcare can significantly improve overall patient care and keep operations at an optimal performance. In addition to seeking out FCMO patient acquisition tips, leadership from a fractional CDO can be a great investment. Your firm can access their extensive experience in leveraging technology. From patient engagement to response times from insurance, a fractional CDO can offer wonderful ideas as well.
2. Work With a Healthcare Fractional CMO
A fractional CMO spearheads digital transformation from a marketing standpoint. They provide valuable guidance in creating and employing digital marketing strategies like increasing website traffic, boosting social media presence, and building brand awareness through SEO strategies designed to attract new patients or shareholders and maintain engagement with regulars.
One of the amazing things about a fractional CMO is their hourly rate: Unlike full-time chief marketing officers, a fractional CMO works for you on a contract basis (no benefits, no full-time salary). They have the same resumes as the in-house C-suite personnel, but they work for several companies at once, spreading their time (and their six-figure income) around. You only have to pay for what you need!
3. Use PPC Campaigns for Retargeting.
Increasing patient acquisition isn’t just about attracting new patients. Keeping past clients coming in regularly is huge. It’s cost to bring in new people entirely, but retaining them is far more affordable, particularly when looking at metrics like customer lifetime value.
One great FCMO patient acquisition tip is retargeting. Retargeting helps grow your healthcare firm’s patient base by reaching out and re-engaging with inactive patients.
Pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns are excellent for retargeting. These campaigns help reignite interest in your brand using well-placed ad campaigns that appear whenever your target audience searches using certain relevant keywords.
PPC campaigns help your healthcare firm nurture a relationship with prospective patients through communication and brand recall. Aside from catching lost and inactive patients, these campaigns extend your demographic to prospective patients located nearby or patients looking for a specific treatment or service that you offer or specialize in.
Maximize the benefits of PPC campaigns with a healthcare PPC agency that helps your company navigate data analytics, keyword bidding, segmentation, and other essential areas to help create campaigns that drive more traffic to your healthcare enterprise.
4. Apply SEO Strategies.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is an efficient way to increase your healthcare company’s online visibility. Now that everyone and everything is online, building a solid online presence is a must for businesses in every industry.
One effective FCMO patient acquisition tip is to create SEO blog content that cultivates patient engagement through informative, engaging articles. Creating high-quality content plays a big role in influencing your target patients’ healthcare decisions. It efficiently captures the interest of your intended patient base and helps your firm achieve industry expertise.
Health-related blogs can be part of your healthcare email marketing initiatives as well. Sending out topical, practical content encourages people to open your emails and see you as a trusted source for all things medical.
Executing an SEO strategy can be a complex, time-consuming process. A healthcare SEO agency can help lighten the load by handling all the keyword research, content writing, link building, and more. All of this is part of an SEO strategy that attracts more patients and nurtures their interest over time. Ten percent of all Google searches are health-related. As a result, there’s a lot of competition but also a lot of people to be reached.
5. Think About User Experience.
The company website is the frontline of every business. Now that almost all information is accessible in just a few clicks, doing due diligence on healthcare companies has become more convenient, especially with a digital marketing partner like an FCMO.
A well-structured, user-friendly website is key to inviting potential patrons, investors, and patients. It reflects your company’s values and message. An optimized website with well-written, informative landing page content gives the impression of professionalism and dedication.
Create and layout your website with your target audience in mind—strategize placement of content, patient portals, and other features. For example, people enjoy a variety of media. Adding photos, videos, and infographics varies the content, offers additional information, and improves on-page time.
Ensure your website is visible, easy to use, and contains all the relevant information your target audience needs, as well as helpful features like online appointment booking and links to health insurance information.
On a more technical level, aspects like page loading speed, responsive design, fixing broken links, and similar can create a better user experience. A healthcare website development can handle the nitty-gritty technical side while you focus on caring for your patients, creating new medical devices, and making the world a healthier place to live.
6. Remember Traditional Marketing Methods.
While online methods are fast and effective ways to reach your target audience, offline methods can also help grow and maintain a good relationship between your firm and your patients. For our next FCMO patient acquisition tip, we’re going to talk about how to make snail mail and paper advertisements feel as relevant as a solid SMS marketing campaign.
Phone calls, letters, and brochures maintain constant communication with patients who are less than familiar with online transactions. They also evoke a sense of nostalgia and thoughtfulness to even the most dedicated of internet users.
Consider sending cards on patients’ birthdays or inclusive holiday cards. Postcards reminding people of upcoming events or important services (like an annual flu shot) can be powerful. You may wish to send a handwritten thank-you note to new patients, including a gift card or branded merchandise like a magnet with your company’s logo. All of these can contribute to strengthening brand loyalty.
Get FCMO Patient Acquisition Tips Specific To Your Business
Healthcare is a top priority for everyone, and choosing the right healthcare provider is a big decision. Be the top choice for patients by boosting your firm’s patient acquisition (and the ROI for your healthcare company) through strong, well-planned strategies.
A fractional CMO provides exceptional leadership in pivoting marketing efforts and reporting on the data every step of the way. We took you through our list of FCMO patient acquisition tips—now talk to an FCMO yourself! Schedule a call with Digital Authority Partners, and one of our FCMOS will be excited to talk to you!
Sources:
Customer Lifetime Value: What It Is and Why It Matters | Wharton Online
Psychology Behind Developing Brand Loyalty in Marketing | USC MAPP Online
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