AOPA National Assembly attendees are tired—I know I am.

We just got home from a great show where we learned about refined microprocessor knee technology, critical information about reimbursement, pedorthic treatment options, and more. We networked, exchanged business cards, and are now armed with scanner notes, ready to get back to work. At my desk this morning, I came across this article and I gathered some key points from it that I thought would be salient to all of our businesses. Enjoy!

Build Social Capital

Social capital is the value behind your social contacts or the resources available through your personal and business networks—information, ideas, lead generation, new opportunities, support, and more. The core of social capital is trust, and it depends on who you know and how you interact with those contacts. So how do you gain social capital? Here are some helpful suggestions:

1. Follow up with customers. Some of your best referral sources are past clients. Don’t forget about them! Follow up on a project. Ask them if there’s anything else you can do to help. Be responsive, and take action if they have questions or complaints.
2. Make a list of people you want to stay in touch with. Yes, you’ve met people at tradeshows or through a networking group, but have you been in contact with them lately? It’s great to expand your network, but make sure you’re creating a quality one, sending promising contacts cards during holidays, making personal phone calls, meeting them for coffee, or participating in other activities to remain connected to them.
3. Contact people who referred your business. Thank people for referrals, and learn more about them so you can refer potential business to them.
4. Give referrals. Referrals are not only beneficial to the company or person you’re recommending, but they’re also helpful to you and the individual seeking your advice. It can foster reciprocity within your network, and hopefully encourage social contacts to return the favor in the future. Referrals also demonstrate to individuals that you’re a resource, and they will be grateful for quality recommendations. (Make sure you’re familiar with the person or organization you’re sending them to, though.)

To learn more, here is the full article from Entrepreneur Magazine, “Four Steps to Building Social Capital.”

Identifying the best ways to get your practice noticed by the community as a whole can be challenging. There are so many opport unities, all vying for your time and marketing funds. Before you begin, here are some marketing truths to consider:

1. With limited funds, be sure to target your efforts to the audience best suited for your message.
2. Work smarter, not harder is a great motto for all activities.
3. When you have a few extra dollars, consider ways you can participate in community activities to benefit a cause and give your firm visibility with audiences. That’s working smarter!

Sponsoring community events and activities will increase your company’s image and credibility. Your firm will be identified with the organization or cause you’re supporting, and you will be able to expand your public profile at a relatively inexpensive cost. Period.

I’m not advocating that you run out and sponsor every opportunity that comes your way, but careful targeting of these opportunities can yield a great reward. For example, if you are a practice that specializes in pediatrics, participating in events that support the Muscular Dystrophy Association or other local kids causes makes good sense. If diabetic footcare is one of your largest markets, consider supporting the American Diabetes Association, Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation activities, or events at your local senior center.

Networking through community organizations like the Rotary Club or Chamber of Commerce comes with great benefits, too. These groups often have opportunities for members to showcase their businesses either in person or in print in their newsletters. You’ll have the chance to meet a variety of people from all sorts of businesses who may need your services in the future or know someone who needs your services now.

Wellness initiatives like run/walks and disability sporting events are also opportunities to consideras are local high school career days, adult and children’s sporting leagues, fairs, festivals, and clean-up events at parks in your area.

Disabled athletics is another area where your dollars can do great things. Perhaps you have a patient who is an aspiring Paralympian, or you know of someone in your community who excels on the field despite a disability. Training facility costs, equipment, and travel charges are all items that you could underwrite. You could also consider working with them to develop news releases or reach out to the media to tell his or her story to the community.

Last spring I participated in a sponsorship event organized by Disabled Sports USA (DSUSA). I have seen firsthand how funds donated by companies and individuals truly have an impact on the lives of others. DSUSA plans many, many activities each year that make a difference to wounded military and their families. The importance of these activities is great and you can be a part of that positive influence at a local level with your sponsorship.

Activities like these do a lot to expand your reputation as a company that cares about the community. They show you are a company with heart.

You know you care. Now it’s time to prove how marketing can really matter!

Here’s a shocker for you. Over the last decade, the Internet has changed the way we Americans do business. Here’s a bigger shock. While 97 percent of all Americans state they look online for products and services, studies show that only 44 percent of small businesses have a website. 

You may think you don’t need a website, but you really do. A company website is a basic, must-have marketing tool for the 21st century. It’s an easy way for small businesses to market on a level playing field and look just as good as bigger competitors for very little money. It’s a way you can reach new customers, efficiently market your products or services, and grow in ways you never thought possible!

Having a website allows you to: 

• Differentiate yourself.
• Create authority and credibility with customers and within your industry.
• Share ideas and be social.
• Benefit from search engines bias to show local results.
• Save costs by answering frequently asked questions.
• Build an e-mail list.
• Get recommendations easily from your current customers.
• Obtain instant leads.

We tell our clients that websites are living and breathing. For us that means they can change and grow and expand without a lot of fuss as your company changes and grows. You’re never stuck with web content. Changes can be made easily!

Speaking of changes, perhaps you’re reading this and thinking, “We just did our website three years ago, so we’re all good.” Think again. Internet technology changes very quickly, and the best way to ensure your site is getting its due with search engines is to keep your content fresh. Adding posts about events you’re planning, updates to your staff or their credentials, or new technologies you’re certified to provide are easy ways to update.

Remember, though, that having a website is not enough. To be taken seriously, you need a professional-looking website. Mom always said you only get one chance to make the first impression. Make sure it’s a good one with a website that allows your potential patients to find you and one that represents you well. Working with professionals is essential. Try to avoid using your sister’s neighbor’s kid who took an HTML class once to create your website. Find a pro and tell them what you’re looking to create and what you can afford to spend.

Beware of template sites and special offers from firms that “will do it all for you.” We’ve had clients who’ve signed on with Yellow Pages or other similar services for their website and have had bad experiences with the process. Custom sites yield better results in the search engines, and oftentimes with Yellow Pages deals, the company takes over ownership of your practices’ domain name and holds it hostage only allowing you to utilize the templates they offer for your design. You want to maintain control of your sites design and content. 

There are plenty of ways to get your message up professionally and inexpensively while yielding the results you want. E-mail me if you’d like some ideas!

It’s important to think about what you can comfortably spend on this project—and all your marketing activities for that matter. A website is not a marketing plan, but it’s a key component. Planning your year of marketing up front is useful for budgeting and consistency. It’s not too late to work on that plan…stay tuned for more on this next time.

Blogs can be effective marketing tools for all kinds of businesses. Yet when I speak with O&P firms about blogging, many practitioners and managers look at me with surprise and ask, “Why?” I tell them there are a lot of “becauses,” especially for this industry.

Blogs are records of your personal opinion. They can come from the heart as well as the intellect. They reflect your experiences, insights, and observations, and tell stories.

A blog is a great way for O&P practitioners to explain what they do to the general public and as well as an informal means of sharing information with other healthcare professionals. When searching for something to blog about, consider writing about difficult cases and describe how you evaluated and solved a problem. Discuss what you learned through a continuing education class or share your thoughts on a scholarly article. Invite others to join you at an event you are hosting or attending.

Even though writing a blog is certainly less formal than writing for a peer-reviewed journal, remember that everything is a reflection on your professionalism. Follow rules of grammar and punctuation and check your spelling. Blogs also are promoting your business and your expertise, so try to get a post up at least once a month to keep your readers interested and engaged. Post a link to your blog on your e-mail signature, company website, your page on Facebook, and on Twitter. Consider including your blog’s URL on your printed materials, including your business cards.

To assist you in getting started, here are a few helpful online blogging resources:

• WordPress: One of the most popular free, open-source, versatile blogging platforms.
• Joomla: Free and open-source content management system (CMS) for publishing content on the web. Includes an extensive amount of free plug-ins (and several plug-ins that are pricey).
• Feedburner: Provides custom RSS feeds and management tools for bloggers.
• Netvibes.com: Personalized dashboard publishing platform for the web and is great for managing the RSS feeds that you read.
• Editorial Calendar: WordPress plug-in that makes it easy to schedule your posts and manage them with a drag and drop interface.
• WPTouch: Transforms your WordPress blog into an application-style theme when viewed from a mobile device, ensuring a fast, user-friendly display.

Let me know about your experience blogging. I’d love to hear from you!

Throughout the years I have been working in O&P, we have written some amazing and inspirational patient feat ures for our clients. We’ve created newsletters to tell their stories and promote new technologies for amputees and individuals with orthopedic conditions, and we have always provided a release form for patients to sign. Recently, I have started to think about the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) and how it relates to marketing our clients’ businesses. Are we following the rules when we write a patient feature? Are we taking the correct steps to ensure we are sharing the right information? I decided to dig a little deeper and find out how HIPAA and marketing correlate.

First, let’s look at the definition of marketing, according to HIPAA:

• Marketing is any communication about a product or service that encourages recipients to purchase or use the product or service. 
• It is an arrangement between a covered entity¹ and any other entity where the covered entity discloses protected health information² in exchange for direct or indirect compensation. With this information, the other entity makes a communication about its own product or service that encourages recipients to purchase or use that product or service. 

For example, it is considered marketing when a health plan sells a list of its members to a company that sells blood glucose monitors, which, in turn, intends to send the plan’s members brochures on the benefits of purchasing and using the monitors.

Authorization 

If information is to be used for marketing, the covered entity must obtain authorization. Orthotists and prosthetists are considered covered entities (healthcare providers), and it’s vital to follow the correct steps when it comes to obtaining authorization, or permission, to communicate marketing messages. 

Authorization is more than a signature. It is a detailed document that gives covered entities permission to use protected health information for specified purposes. These purposes do not generally include treatment, payment, or healthcare operations. The authorization must specify:

• Description of the protected health information to be used.
• The person authorized to make the use or disclosure.
• The person to whom the covered entity may make the disclosure.
• An expiration date or event.
• Purpose for which the information will be used.

Authorization is not required when the communication occurs face-to-face such as talking about treatment options, products, and other health-related services or involves a promotional gift of nominal value, such as calendars, pens, coffee cups, etc. Authorization also is not required for treatment reminder postcards; however, they should avoid information about the patient’s condition. If your practice sends out “Happy Birthday” cards, the year of the birth should not be included. The patient has the right to be taken off any such mailing list.

Newsletters

Now, the big question: Can you still use names, pictures, and personal information in your newsletters for patient feature stories? You can include this content in your newsletters, but you must give the patient advance notice and an opportunity to limit any identifiable information used in the story. If a person requests that information be withheld or refuses to give you permission, the information cannot be used. The patient also has the right to retract previous authorizations; if the patient does this, he or she must be removed from the newsletter and/or other marketing materials. 

I also wondered about the product updates that are sometimes included in a newsletter. Is it violating HIPAA rules when we feature a new product? That information can be shared if your company, the covered entity, is informing patients about a new service or product that the company provides.

This may be a dry topic, but it is an important one. The main message is to be honest with your patients, respect their privacy, and make sure follow the correct steps when marketing.  

To learn more about HIPAA and marketing, visit www.hhs.gov/ocr/privacy/hipaa/understanding/coveredentities/marketing.html

Notes

1. A healthcare provider that conducts certain transactions in electronic form, a healthcare clearinghouse, a health plan.
2. Individually identifiable health information held or transmitted by a covered entity, in any form or media, whether electronic, paper, or oral.

You know that expression, “Timing is everything”? It applies to marketing as well. Consider my recent personal experience: I have worked with a certain vendor for years. They get all my business, and I rarely asked for a quote—we just sent the business over. Last week, after placing an order, there was a situation. A new sales rep handled my order, and there was a problem with it. That same week, another company in the same business as my preferred vendor called me. It was not the first time, but this time I decided to give them a chance to bid on my project. Their timing was great.

In marketing and sales, it may seem like you call on people over and over again with no results. Perhaps they have a preferred vendor—a company they have bought from for years. They are polite but clearly not interested. So why do you keep mailing to these prospects? Calling on them? Advertising to them? There are many reasons why you should continue:

• The staff or decision-maker may change at a company. The person with the connection may get promoted or leave the company. Circumstances can change.
• The preferred vendor may screw up. An order is placed, and it never shows up. The prices start to increase. Maybe a fuel surcharge starts to be added to the bill. The favorite vendor’s new sales rep is not measuring up!
• New technology is on the horizon, and that same old sales rep is not keeping current with the information. There are new feet and new technologies, but no one knows about them.

These reasons are the “why” you keep marketing to your prospects because you never know when they will be looking for you. Therefore, it’s important for you to be prepared for the time when they may take your call or take your meeting. Think about what you can do for your customer. If you provide similar services as a competitor, think about how you can differentiate your company. Then market that difference in a variety of ways. Consider this advice:

• Referral sources may have favorite practitioners, but if you have a specialty be sure to highlight that every time you meet with them. 
• Stay in touch with doctor’s offices. If the physician has a difficult case, they may need you. 
• Maybe the P&O firm that the biggest orthopedic practice in town is sending all their amputees to has not been in touch or there’s some poor feedback from a patient.
• Consider ways your successes can highlight another firm’s inefficiencies: creating a newsletter with success stories and new products is one medium to consider. You need to be there—in their mail or on their doorstep.

So if you are questioning your sales and marketing, plan remember your next customer could be a mailer or phone call away.

Make your timing matter.

Hopefully you read our feature on social media in the March issue of The O&P EDGE. Perhaps you thought, “Great ideas! I’ll have to start a Facebook page for my company.” Have you done it yet? Good for you if you did… If not, here is how Facebook works.

One of the easiest ways to get involved in social media is to create a Facebook page for your business. A business page on Facebook will get your name out there for users, customers, and interested parties who are searching for it on the Internet. A photo of the building’s façade, your logo, and other business-relevant images can be uploaded and will be seen as a thumbnail in the Facebook “news feed.”

Here’s how Facebook works: Users sign up for a free account and then make connections with other users on the service by “liking” them. Liking a Facebook page is not too different from subscribing to a company’s newsletter. Users will “like” a page to stay updated on that user’s events, promotions, and news or to show their appreciation or endorsement. When someone “likes” your page, anything you post to it will show up in his or her news feed. The Facebook news feed drives “word-of-mouth” marketing so that your message is shared across your Facebook network. 

There are many ways you can use Facebook to promote your firm. The key to Facebook success is giving visitors a reason to come back to your page frequently by adding fresh content regularly. Post information about new prosthetic and orthotic services and upload images from your office or from manufacturers. Let your visitors know when you have attended a conference or seminar by uploading a video or photos from the event. Upload a photo of a new practitioner you’ve added to your team or let people know when you’ve opened a new office. Include staff birthdays or anniversaries. Patient success stories (with their written permission, use first name, last initial) are inspirational to read. Post links about people with amputations in the news or sporting world. Your focus should be on providing valuable content so that customers seek you out. When you post interesting content, your visitors will share or “like” your message with their friends. This can create an incredible network to drive more followers, e-mail subscribers, and ultimately business.  It also increases search engine optimization (SEO) for your company on the Internet.

When someone “likes” your page, he or she can also post comments to your business’ “wall” on Facebook . You would naturally expect that all comments are going to be about the wonderful services and products you provide, but if there is a valid negative comment posted, you can quickly address the situation and answer it right there on your wall. Your other Facebook visitors will appreciate how quickly you resolved the issue. In the case of undeserved negative comments, you can remove them from the wall at any time or change your privacy settings.

Facebook pages also can get picked up by web search engines and give you, your company, and your website even more exposure. Include the Facebook logo on your website and in your e-mail signature, post a sign in your waiting area or at your reception desk, and promote your Facebook page in all of your marketing.

Facebook’s Help Center for Business Accounts can help you create a presence on Facebook. For more information, visit http://www.facebook.com/help/?page=721

To read the full article, click here.

At our agency, many clients are starting pages on Facebook and becoming more active in social media, so I am happy to report that we’ll have a feature about social media published in the March issue of the The O&P EDGE.

In the meantime, I thought I’d publish a teaser with some ideas to “post” on Facebook or “tweet” about on Twitter.

These are the basic content models you want to include in your mix:

• Status updates. What are you working on? What has your attention at the moment? For example, are you fitting a particularly interesting case? Take some photos in fabrication and talk about the custom work you do. Will you be going to the Academy Meeting? Post some photos of you with new products or talk about what new things you are learning.
• Share links. Whether it’s breaking news or valuable resources, share links that would be of interest to the people who have an interest in your business. Look for new products to showcase or stories in the news on your field.
• Have an opinion. Add your own commentary to links and help people get to know you as you share information.
• Ask and answer questions. Google doesn’t have the answer to everything. Sometimes there’s just no substitute for a human being.  Show your expertise to patients and referral sources.
• Retweet or post a link. Did someone you follow share something interesting? You can repost it to your own network. It’s simple and quick, and it acknowledges the person who originally sent it by giving them a little extra exposure.
• Make business announcements. Yes, you can directly make announcements about your business events, deals, new products, etc. Have a new CPO starting? Moving an office? It is a great way to share good news. Just don’t overdo it.

Stay tuned for more info in March!  In the meantime, have fun and make your day matter! 

facebook.com/pattyhavenjohnson

It’s November, and the holiday season is already here! It feels like it arrives earlier and earlier each year, doesn’t it? Last year, I blogged about the many and varied holiday gift ideas for referral sources. Now is a great time to check it out or read it again. Its ideas are timeless, and I’m sure you will find some opportunities over the next several weeks to reach out to that important audience. 

But there is another audience that you may not have thought about in a while—your employees.

Let’s face it—it has been a stressful couple of years with the economy and probably at your workplace, too. With more competition, people are working more hours, and you may have added responsibilities to their duties to help keep your firm afloat and profitable. As a business owner, your life has its stress, too. This is the time of year when we all are reminded to be grateful. Personally, I am thankful for my clients and for the hard-working people I work with.

Marketing begins from within a company by having a great staff representing you to the public. From the front-office staff greeting patients and maintaining a positive attitude, to technicians behind the scenes using their expertise and care to create high-quality devices, to practitioners representing you on the front lines changing lives with their skill, you have a lot to be thankful for!

But have you thanked them lately? Here, at RSPR, we have some employee morale boosters that keep spirits high and help us to thank our employees in fun and creative ways. They don’t necessarily cost a lot of money, but the rewards are endless. Some of them include:

• Celebrating each staff person’s birthday with cake, ice cream, a card, and a rousing chorus of “Happy Birthday.”
• Monthly lunches, just because.
• Outings to sporting events, like the Milwaukee Brewers.
• Outings to the movies, bowling, or restaurants.
• Our Christmas pot luck event, complete with a competitive game of Catch Phrase.
• Drawings for gift cards to area restaurants, stores, and movie theaters.
• Company sponsored American Idol contest, where the staff member drawing the Idol winner’s name from the hat is the lucky winner of a cash prize.
• CEO-made chocolate shakes and malts or other ice cream treats on the hottest day of the summer.
• Turkey day gift cards.
• Wedding and baby showers, when one of us is celebrating a special event.

We all like to feel appreciated, and recognizing your employees’ hard work, above and beyond their paychecks and benefits, goes a long way in creating a positive working environment. It doesn’t have to be a budget-breaking endeavor, just thoughtful and understanding.

Let me know about some of your employee recognition activities. I’d love to post them for others to read and employ.

Thanksgiving Blessings to You!

Patty

Now that you’ve committed to hiring that professional to photograph your practice, you need to find the right pro for the job. Just as with your firm, word-of-mouth recommendation can help you find exactly what you need. Ask your staff if they know of anyone who does commercial photography. You can also contact your local Chamber of Commerce for a recommendation. Sometimes photographers at newspapers do freelance work as well, so consider a call to your local paper, too. Of course, Google or the Yellow Pages can help you find a commercial photographer in your town.

Once you’ve discovered a few, review websites, samples, and references to make an informed choice on whom to hire. And when you’re ready to go, provide the pro with these helpful guidelines to ensure you will get what you’re looking for and to keep overall costs down:

1. The more photos the better. It is great to have lots to choose from, and often you will find multiple uses like the power point, a trade-show display, and printed materials. 
2. Present variety in your practice by photographing amputees based on age, sex, ethnicity, activity level, device—upper and lower. 
3. Show varying stages of prosthetic care, concentrating on the patient more than the device—keeping in mind that your firm doesn’t just fit devices—it is a service company. Also, remember that the office needs to be clean and free of distracting backgrounds. Invite patients to wear colorful clothing, jogging shorts (avoid showing underwear), short sleeves for upper-extremity wearers. Have kids bring toys to hold, balls to kick, etc.
4. Provide a shot list to keep the photo shoot moving. This will expedite the taking of the photos and get the job done more quickly. Some ideas include:

Patient filling out paperwork or meeting with a practitioner before the actual fitting process begins—this shows that you don’t rush the patient in and start taking measurements—that you care to explain the process!

• Initial measuring, casting—show some of the process of how the device is made, that it is custom created to the patient’s residual limb.
• Highlight technology—show a C-Leg, Harmony, or custom orthotics.
• Fabrication—be sure to include employees and again show custom work.
• Fittings—lower extremity—patients walking in parallel bars, sitting, standing, smiling. Upper extremity—holding a glass, picking something up, using scissors.
• People—it would be great to have a photo of a patient hugging a practitioner or shaking hands. Stage a patient “at work” like a receptionist, or maybe outside rollerblading or running. Consider a group shot of your team and headshots of individual practitioners. Headshots of the management team are good for accompanying news releases, newsletters, Chamber of Commerce needs, and other uses. Consider updating these photos biannually.

The marketing of your firm is so important and needs to be done correctly and with high quality. Hire professionals when you need them and make your photos matter. You won’t be sorry!