The money is still in the list!
Notes for the Clubhouse room masterclass called “Email Marketing for Eye Care Providers”
Presented and moderated by Dr. Sandi Eveleth & Dr. Darryl Glover, Jr. on February 28th, 2021. The notes were created prior to the meeting.
It’s still true that “the money is in the list” when it comes to marketing online. Of course, the “list” means your patient and potential patient email lists.
The whole idea of collecting email addresses in the marketing world is to sell your products and services to a greater number of people.
In our eye care world, that typically means attracting new patients to our practice in the form of making an appointment (where the REAL sale takes place) and educating them about services and products that make sense specifically for them.
HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) compliance, BAA (business associate agreement), and PHI (personal health info), oh my…!
- The scary disclaimer: I’m not a lawyer and you DEFINITELY need to do your due diligence – you’ll want to consult a lawyer who is a HIPAA expert and understands the importance of having a BAA in place.
- Prospects vs. patients (PHI): If you’re not sure whether or not to consider a prospective patient the same as a patient, it’s always best to err on the side of caution and assume they need their information protected with the same care as a current patient.
- Email service providers (ESP) that are safe: There are very few ESPs that are both HIPAA compliant AND enter into a BAA. I discovered this email service provider that DOES comply with both requirements.
- BAA: When a company agrees to sign a BAA, then “the company agrees to assume responsibility for security and privacy of emails within their operations.”
- PHI: If you include any personal health information, you MUST use an approved ESP and they MUST agree to sign a BAA. Here’s the tricky part, sometimes just asking for a name and email address may be considered PHI, even if they are not yet a patient. Here’s an article that I highly recommend you read concerning the fact that a name may be considered PHI.
- How you collect data can be a violation (including your website forms): name, nickname, phone, address, and email address can all be considered PHI for the reasons stated above. Make sure your website vendor is also HIPAA compliant and enters into BAA with you!
- How long you keep patient data and who sees this data must also be compliant.
- One last side note about social media and HIPAA compliance – tagging on social media without obtaining patient authorization is a violation of HIPAA. Many doctors and healthcare providers are not aware of this.
The bottom line is this: Make sure your patients and prospective patients give authorization to market to them using emails, using their social media posts, and that you use approved ESPs and website forms that are HIPAA compliant and with companies that enter into a BAA with you.
Now that we have the scary legal stuff over with, let’s talk about the fun marketing stuff!
Understanding the patients’/patient prospects’ journey/life cycle
- Look at your Ideal Patient. You’ll want to understand them so well that they think you’re getting into their heads! That you understand their problem before they do, and possibly before they even know they have a problem!
- What are their personalities? Values? Likes and dislikes?
- Their awareness level?
- How do they see how their statuses are increased or decreased? What kinds of vacations do they take? What luxury items do they enjoy?
- How do they talk… about problems, solutions, common verbiage?
- What offers do they see/buy/try?
- What are their beliefs around their problems, solutions, products, selves, others, you, the market, society, etc?
- What do they read (books, trade magazines, blogs, etc), listen to (podcast, CH, etc), attend, hang out online and offline (social media, forums, groups, etc)?
- Where do they live – the usual demographic “stuff”?
- What’s the “temperature” of your prospective patients? Are they cold, warm, or hot? Are they unaware, problem-aware, solution-aware, product/service-aware of who you are and how you can help them?
- It’s important to understand all of the above so that you can tailor your content marketing, ad campaigns, appointment queries, and lead generating offers to make sense of where they are in their journey of knowing, liking, and trusting you.
- Understand that you absolutely can run organic and paid campaigns for all phases of their temperature and awareness level.
- You’ll want to be data-driven when running organic and ad campaigns to see what’s working, what’s not, and how to adjust to improve.
Attracting your ideal patients with the perfect lead generating offer once you determine who they are and which “aware” level you want to market to… AND, “getting personal…”
- Email marketing that works in 2021 and beyond involves “getting personal.” This means that you have COMPLETELY understood their journey – all of the things we listed above; and that you understand how to be relevant, relatable, remarkable, and timely.
- Always be thinking “what’s in it for them” (when you write your content for your website, your blog, your social media posts, your email content); and keep asking “so what?” as you answer the first question until you no longer have an answer!
- Content Ideas for your Email Campaigns
- Discuss your (Sub)specialties: Why you started offering them, if you have any certification credentials for them, how your staff is involved in providing them, what kinds of symptoms and problems they solve, etc.
- New technologies in the industry: Are there any ground-breaking diagnostic instruments you’ve added to the practice? Are there any new treatment products that alleviate problems or symptoms that are more cost-effective, more efficient, and/or more comfortable to increase the chance of patient compliance?
- Your USP (unique selling proposition): How are you different from the competition? Why would your “ideal patient” choose to make an appointment with you if you accept the same insurance as the doctor down the street? How is your practice different? Your staff?
- Showcase your team: Especially if they have a large online influence and understand how to encourage engagement from your patients and prospective “ideal patients.”
- Patient newsletters: Newsletters are making a HUGE comeback in the marketing world as well as in the medical/optometric field…
- Ask patients what they want to include in a newsletter.
- Ask staff what patients ask about most (FAQs).
- How are you marketing/driving traffic to your lead-generating offers?
- Are you utilizing “micro-influencers” as discussed last week?
- Are you running yourself or have you found a reputable marketing agency to help you run Google or Facebook ad campaigns?
- Are you posting organic content from your website (as your blog), your email newsletter, or on the social media platforms where your “ideal patients” are hanging out? Do you know where they are hanging out?
- Offline tactics
- Are you networking by adopting leadership roles (as discussed previously)? Are you using your time wisely to join the right networking organizations (eg. Chambers of Commerce, BNIs (Business Networking International), Rotaries, other local networking organizations)?
- Are you buying advertising spots in local magazines (which often have an online presence, as well), TV, radio, billboards, park benches, etc. in locations or publications where your “ideal patients” are hanging out, watching, or paying attention to?
- Are you sending direct mail pieces to your most active zip codes (along with networking, this was still our biggest marketing tactic, even in the age of online marketing)? You’d be surprised how far this will go now, especially where prospective and current patients get excited to receive a hand-written card!
- Are you taking advantage of speaking engagements (offline or online as webinars) that become available or that you schedule?
- How are you capturing the email addresses of prospects?
- Is the offer “above the fold” on your website? In other words, do your website visitors see the offer right away or do they have to scroll to find it?
- Do you have separate funnel/landing pages to make it less distracting and easier to make a decision to take action on your offer? (Make sure you work with funnel/landing page software companies that are HIPAA and BAA compliant)
- Is it easy to find and clear what you’re offering? There’s a difference between just mentioning a product (you become a commodity) and having an offer they can’t refuse (more on this later).
- Does your offer make sense – does match the ideal patient’s journey? (we call this “message to market match”)
- What’s the user experience (hint, design DOES matter)? Is it easy to click on the call-to-action button (eg. a mobile button that’s easy to click with your thumb)? Does the website visitor even know what you’re offering and why they should choose you?
- Try to minimize the questions you ask in the form of the lead-generating offer (eg. just use their first name and email address)
- The legal
- You MUST HAVE (for CAN-SPAM & HIPAA/BAA) these: get consent to send marketing emails, an unsubscribe link, your company address where mail can be sent, the reason for being on list (to remind them why they signed up so they don’t list you as spam), etc.
- Make sure the software you’re using for the funnel(s)/landing page(s), email service provider, and direct-messaging software (eg. chatbots, texting apps, etc.) are HIPAA compliant and will enter into a BAA if PHI is used.
- Getting personal: are you segmenting/“tagging” them for future targeting along their journey?
- For expressed interests, eye care conditions, customized product & service updates
- “Getting Personal” means being conversational and contextual – this type of marketing is the name of the game now! Patients want to know that you care because… “people only care what you know, only when they know that you care”
- Personalizing can be automated: but it IS considered PHI, so you must be compliant.
- “Selling” in the email
- HIPAA & BAA compliant (generic vs. PHI)
- Make it simple – 1 topic, 1 offer (unless it’s your patient/prospect newsletter)
- Speak to their awareness level once you discover it; Be relevant, relatable, remarkable, and timely
- Social media
- Remember to market your email content on social media as appropriate and, conversely, point your email recipients to your social media platforms.
- All of the same compliance issues relate to how you post on your platforms. Always obtain written consent from your patients to post about them (including reviews) in your posts. Also remember this: just because your patients may tag you in a post, this action doesn’t imply permission.
Sample welcome email for newsletter sign-up
Of course, you always want to inject your voice into your emails. If you hire a marketing agency or copywriter for your email campaigns, make sure to audit them and make suggestions so that they have your voice and personalization in each and every email.
When to Send: Immediately after your prospective patient opts-in to receive your newsletter
Subject: 👋🏻 Hello and welcome to the [plug in the name of your newsletter] newsletter.
Body of the email: note that this is a generic email without any PHI included IN the email
Hi, Dr. [your name] here! I just wanted to say hello and welcome… and thank you personally for subscribing to the [plug in the name of your newsletter] newsletter.
I understand how important it is to protect your vision and keep you informed of all the latest technologies and procedures in eye care, from diagnostic instruments to advanced treatment options. You’ll learn how to maintain clear, comfortable vision even under the most extreme circumstances.
[tell your recipients a little bit about your background in story form – eg. why you became an eye doctor, the history of your practice, etc. but keep it brief – you want them to get to know you and keep them intrigued!]
OK, so enough about me, let’s talk about you…
You’ll discover so much more than just the boring, old newsletter topics! You’ll also read about… [include topics that you know will capture the attention of your readers every week/month, etc.]
- [add fun local topics]
- [add local happenings]
- [include (with permission) testimonials – don’t just leave it at that… if they thank you for helping their child excel at school from your VT practice, take this opportunity to discuss some benefits of VT]
- [have a section where patients/prospective patients can send you local images (with permission from any venues, if appropriate)]
- [run contests]
- etc – I’ll post more ideas to use in a newsletter in a later post
>> Mention 2-3 teasers of what’s coming up in your next newsletter; Also mention a link to archived newsletters you have on your blog.
Best wishes [or however you sign-off],
-[your name & signature tag line, etc.]
Welcome Back! Attracting your inactive patients back to the fold!
- Remember to adhere to HIPAA compliance laws, have BAAs in place with any recall software you may use, and be aware of laws when using PHI in your recalls.
- Do some research – pull a sampling of inactive patients and reach out and ask (can do with anonymous survey software): why did they leave? Would they come back if they knew your special offerings and how they would benefit?
- Have a plan
- Strategize with your staff what they think might work as an offer to attract them back to your practice
- Map out a plan for sending a short series of email blasts
- Educate them
- Let them know about your patient newsletter
- Highlight what’s new since they left your practice (advanced technologies, products and services they may have asked for, but that you didn’t provide and now do, insurance plans you now accept, etc.)… explain the benefits
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Email Marketing for Eye Care Providers
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