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While many of the business challenges associated with marketing and managing a plastic and reconstructive surgery practice during financially challenging times are fairly similar to other specialties with elective procedures, there are challenges that are unique to the practice of plastic and reconstructive surgery.

Today we will focus on marketing, particularly zooming in on the “access” to the practice. Physicians Let’s start with the digital patient experience. Physicians in this specialty usually already have a clear understanding of what constitutes the optimal patient experience in the office and surgical center. Don’t get me wrong, it is critical to insure that each patient’s office experience can check off all of the “top boxes.” However, a plastic surgery patient’s experience begins long before the patient arrives in his or her physician’s office.

While physicians and hospitals strive to implement the mandated EMR requirements, consumers investigating elective procedures have also changed the way in which they go about researching their plastic and reconstructive surgery options.

Social Media (SEO and SEM): Every business has been there – the website is visually appealing; our staff, friends and relatives love it, but they appear to be the only traffic on the site and analysis on patient referrals shows that few if any of patients arrive at the practice as a result of what they learned on the website: The conversion rate is not what we need it to be.

If your practice is in a large, urban area with a large number of established competing practices, then the first place to start is with the basics. Can consumers easily find you? Will your practice and or physicians be at the top of the list of search results when a patient is searching for a physician or researching a procedure? While we may be tempted to skip SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and SEM (Search Engine Marketing) activities, we do so at our peril as a prospective patient can only learn of the practice and about the practice if they first make it to the website.

Content Management and Access: cms-blogSimply having a website is no longer enough. Consumers, particularly younger ones. have specific expectations of healthcare websites regarding what they can do and what they can learn. While doctors are constantly innovating and advancing the clinical practice of plastic and reconstructive surgery, it is important that their websites reflect that innovation. If the website does not reflect the most current clinical practice, a consumer is only a mouse click away from a website that will spotlight that new procedures or technologies. So you have to promote your “shiny thing” promptly through your web presence.

It is also important to understand what consumers and patients expect to be able to do while on the practice’s surveywebsite. As most plastic surgery and some reconstructive surgery patients will be self-pay, can a visitor easily determine if financing options are available through your practice? Can the visitor to your website easily determine if the financing options are likely to meet their needs? Is there a patient portal to facilitate payment? Is there a way for a prospective patient to request more information on a procedure, a physician or your financing options?

While before and after pictures are a fairly standard part of a plastic surgery practices website, it may also be advisable to have patients act as “ambassadors.” A patient testimonial that speaks to the result as well as our next topic – the patient experience – can also help a prospective patient develop a deeper understanding of your practice.

Patient Experience and Retention: Once the patient has successfully navigated their way to your practice, does the experience match their expectations? Patients have fairly high expectations of every physician office experience, but they can be excruciatingly high when the patient is in a plastic surgeon’s office. If you haven’t done so already, take steps to evaluate your office experience from the patient’s perspective. Start with the phone experience and evaluate each encounter along the continuum of care.

Usually, physicians and staff are way too close to this process to be effective evaluators, so it may be advisable to use a “secret shopper” or a more quantitative process to survey patients by web, email, mail or phone. Any methodology can be effective as long as the response rate is sufficient to lend reliability to the results. Use each step along the continuum of care to learn about barriers to complete satisfaction and retention.

The crowded marketplace and our current economic times may represent significant barriers to profitability, but they don’t have to. In these times, a smart digital marketing plan that covers all of the bases can help your practice to survive and even thrive. If you feel that you are not making the most of your digital opportunities, contact www.medology360.com for a customized plan to up game your current digital marketing capabilities.