BUSINESS ESSENTIALS CHERI L. CANON, MD, CYNTHIA S. SHERRY, MD
Marketing and Branding for a Radiologist Reginald F. Munden, MD, DMD, MBA In my former life as a young dentist in small-town North Carolina, I learned my first lesson in marketing. I joined a successful dental practice with limited money and a lot of debt. My wife and I were practical in buying a second car, a Volkswagen Jetta. After several months driving my “new” car around town, my receptionist discreetly pulled me aside to say that people in town questioned my “dental” abilities. Why were they worried? They were worried because I was driving a small VW, when the other “successful” dentists were driving Mercedes luxury cars! I am not advocating that everyone buy a Mercedes, but the point is that I learned a valuable lesson: we are always marketing ourselves, whether we know it or not, and that affects our brand. Ask yourself how you are currently marketing and branding yourself and your practice. Do you always present a confident and professional appearance? Do you look successful? Are you (the product) establishing your placement in the market and promoting yourself positively? For many physicians, marketing conveys a negative connotation, metonymic with Madison Avenue glitz and glamour, and is generally construed as an unappealing or unprofessional activity. Conversely, in the business world, effective marketing is viewed as an essential and crucial success factor. Marketing goes beyond Madison Avenue advertising and is a complex business process that is critical to the future success of the profession of radiology. Therefore, it is important for radiology professionals to have a broad understanding of the marketing field.
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To better understand the principles of marketing and branding, it is beneficial to review key definitions. In a simple Google search for “marketing” there were 8.4 million results, so there is no single or simple definition. For the purpose of this article, Wikipedia’s definition will suffice: “Marketing is the process of communicating the value of a product or service to customers, for the purpose of selling that product or service” [1]. Here, marketing is defined as a process and is not equated with simple advertising. On a related note, branding is the marketing practice of creating a name, term, symbol, or design that identifies and differentiates a product from other products [2]. A simplified approach to understanding the fundamentals of marketing can be found in the 5 P’s mnemonic: product, price, placement, promotion, and people [3]. In radiology, the product can be considered both the personnel and the imaging. This concept is more fully developed in the following discussion. Price (in terms of technical and professional components) may or may not be a relevant variable in all practices. For example, total charge per examination in a competitive outpatient imaging environment can certainly be an important competitive factor, whereas professional charges in a hospital practice may be less relevant from a competitive perspective. In most cases, total imaging costs are important to hospitals, and radiologists are more frequently coming under pressure to help hospitals reduce these costs. In this type of hospital environment, effectively marketing the value of imaging
and radiology professionals to the hospital system can be crucial. Placement refers to appropriately positioning the product in the market place; for example, a practice can aim to offer the cheapest MRI in town or to be known for having cutting-edge technology. Promotion refers to how information about a product or service is communicated. For example, are brochures targeted to referring physicians, are referring physicians routinely contacted to discuss cases to build rapport, is there direct advertising to the community, is the administration kept informed of the practice’s metrics and outcomes, and so on? People refers to everyone in the practice, starting with the receptionist and extending to the radiologists. Is the receptionist pleasant and accommodating? Similarly, are all the radiologists receptive and collegial? Even those who are not employed by the practice often represent the practice as a public face: how often is the practice contacted or criticized because a hospital-employed technologist or nurse didn’t perform as desired? Creating a strong brand can greatly enhance a practice’s marketing effort. Branding can outweigh and counteract efforts by the competition to supplant a practice or erode a practice’s market share. Why? Because successful branding can both influence product selection and also build product loyalty. Consider the powerful strength of the Starbucks Coffee brand: there are thousands of coffees available across the world, yet a large segment of the population prefers to drive down the road for a Starbucks
1546-1440/14/$36.00
n
ª 2015 American College of Radiology http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jacr.2014.10.015
beverage rather than accept the free coffee in the hotel lobby. Examples in medicine also exist, such as the local surgeon everyone prefers because he or she is branded as the best in town. Likewise, a radiology practice can build a strong and recognized brand for being the clinicians most sought for imaging consults. Without question, the product must be good in order to have a strong brand; at a minimum, Starbucks coffee must taste good, or the company could not build a desirable brand. Similarly, a surgeon or radiologist must be competent at a minimum in order to build a strong brand. However, they have gone beyond mere competence and differentiated themselves from the others and developed a strong brand. Marketing and developing a brand is a multifactorial process. Radiologists are continuously marketing themselves, whether they recognize it or not. We are at a critical crossroads in our profession, with health care reform and dramatic changes in the health care industry. Radiologic services are in the crosshairs because of the expenses to patients, hospitals, and third-party payers [3,4]. We are also perceived by some colleagues as having an easy job that pays too much. Perhaps we have done a poor job of marketing ourselves and our profession. Even so, regardless of whether these perceptions are real or not, we must market ourselves better for our profession to survive. We must understand that marketing is not just Madison Avenue advertising but a complex interaction of all of our actions, or lack of actions, and is critical to marketing effectiveness. We should always provide the best service, at the best possible price, with the best attitude. Additionally, radiology professionals must brand themselves as the profession of choice for delivering imaging services.
The most successful marketing is accomplished with a dedicated marketing plan based on a strategy using the 5 P’s as a guideline. Before developing this marketing plan, one must know and understand who the customer is. In a prior leadership position, it became necessary to “deal” with a referring physician with a reputation for being an “unpleasant” individual. The general consensus was that the institution would be better if he left. After a little investigation, it was found that this “undesirable” clinician was one of the largest users of imaging services. Obviously, the practice had not clearly identified its customers. It can be interesting to ask radiologists about who they perceive their customers to be. The majority say the obvious: first, patients, and second, referring physicians. Certainly these are important customers, but there are numerous others, including staff and personnel in referring physicians’ offices, patients’ relatives and friends, hospital administration, thirdparty payers, technologists, and ultimately everyone with whom they interact. A good marketing plan will identify the major customers and then focus strategies and tactics accordingly. The focus of a free-standing outpatient imaging center will likely be on referring physicians, their staff members, and their patients. If a receptionist is unaccommodating to a referring physician’s receptionist, the referral could easily be lost. For hospital-based practices, the most important customer may be the hospital administration. Although referring physicians and clinical colleagues may value radiologists’ services, they don’t manage the hospital’s contracts; the administration controls the contracts and funds. Keeping them happy is very important because in
today’s world, hospitals have many viable options for covering radiologic services [5,6]. Understand that these outside agencies are very good at marketing to administrators. As a radiologist, it is critical to know the customer and target marketing appropriately; otherwise, time is wasted and resources may be at risk. Marketing and branding are paramount to the success of a radiologist or group. Understanding the basics of marketing is necessary to develop a successful marketing plan; creating a strong brand will greatly add to the success of a marketing plan. Successful marketing in radiology is a valuable asset to be used advantageously in today’s changing and competitive health care environment.
SUMMARY POINTS n n
n
Marketing is crucial to the success of any radiology practice. A radiology practice is constantly marketing, whether its members are aware of it or not. Branding a practice can differentiate a group from the competition.
REFERENCES 1. Marketing. Available at: http://en.wikipedia. org/wiki/Marketing. Accessed November 7, 2014. 2. Brand. Available at http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Brand. Accessed November 7, 2014. 3. Hiam A. Marketing for dummies. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley; 2004. 4. Howell WLJ. Reimbursement under the ACA: hefty cuts on the horizon. Available at: http:// www.diagnosticimaging.com/healthcare-reform/ reimbursement-under-aca-hefty-cuts-horizon. Accessed November 7, 2014. 5. EmCare. Home page. Available at: http:// www.emcare.com/Index. Accessed November 7, 2014. 6. Kutscher B. California docs protest Tenet hospitals’ plan to use outside staffing firm to manage contracts. Available at: http://www. modernhealthcare.com/article/20140910/ NEWS/309109931. Accessed November 7, 2014.
Reginald F. Munden, MD, DMD, MBA: Houston Methodist Hospital, Department of Radiology, 6565 Fannin Street, Suite M204J, Houston, TX 77030; e-mail: [email protected].
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Marketing and Branding for a Radiologist Reginald F. Munden, MD, DMD, MBA In my former life as a young dentist in small-town North Carolina, I learned my first lesson in marketing. I joined a successful dental practice with limited money and a lot of debt. My wife and I were practical in buying a second car, a Volkswagen Jetta. After several months driving my “new” car around town, my receptionist discreetly pulled me aside to say that people in town questioned my “dental” abilities. Why were they worried? They were worried because I was driving a small VW, when the other “successful” dentists were driving Mercedes luxury cars! I am not advocating that everyone buy a Mercedes, but the point is that I learned a valuable lesson: we are always marketing ourselves, whether we know it or not, and that affects our brand. Ask yourself how you are currently marketing and branding yourself and your practice. Do you always present a confident and professional appearance? Do you look successful? Are you (the product) establishing your placement in the market and promoting yourself positively? For many physicians, marketing conveys a negative connotation, metonymic with Madison Avenue glitz and glamour, and is generally construed as an unappealing or unprofessional activity. Conversely, in the business world, effective marketing is viewed as an essential and crucial success factor. Marketing goes beyond Madison Avenue advertising and is a complex business process that is critical to the future success of the profession of radiology. Therefore, it is important for radiology professionals to have a broad understanding of the marketing field.
130
To better understand the principles of marketing and branding, it is beneficial to review key definitions. In a simple Google search for “marketing” there were 8.4 million results, so there is no single or simple definition. For the purpose of this article, Wikipedia’s definition will suffice: “Marketing is the process of communicating the value of a product or service to customers, for the purpose of selling that product or service” [1]. Here, marketing is defined as a process and is not equated with simple advertising. On a related note, branding is the marketing practice of creating a name, term, symbol, or design that identifies and differentiates a product from other products [2]. A simplified approach to understanding the fundamentals of marketing can be found in the 5 P’s mnemonic: product, price, placement, promotion, and people [3]. In radiology, the product can be considered both the personnel and the imaging. This concept is more fully developed in the following discussion. Price (in terms of technical and professional components) may or may not be a relevant variable in all practices. For example, total charge per examination in a competitive outpatient imaging environment can certainly be an important competitive factor, whereas professional charges in a hospital practice may be less relevant from a competitive perspective. In most cases, total imaging costs are important to hospitals, and radiologists are more frequently coming under pressure to help hospitals reduce these costs. In this type of hospital environment, effectively marketing the value of imaging
and radiology professionals to the hospital system can be crucial. Placement refers to appropriately positioning the product in the market place; for example, a practice can aim to offer the cheapest MRI in town or to be known for having cutting-edge technology. Promotion refers to how information about a product or service is communicated. For example, are brochures targeted to referring physicians, are referring physicians routinely contacted to discuss cases to build rapport, is there direct advertising to the community, is the administration kept informed of the practice’s metrics and outcomes, and so on? People refers to everyone in the practice, starting with the receptionist and extending to the radiologists. Is the receptionist pleasant and accommodating? Similarly, are all the radiologists receptive and collegial? Even those who are not employed by the practice often represent the practice as a public face: how often is the practice contacted or criticized because a hospital-employed technologist or nurse didn’t perform as desired? Creating a strong brand can greatly enhance a practice’s marketing effort. Branding can outweigh and counteract efforts by the competition to supplant a practice or erode a practice’s market share. Why? Because successful branding can both influence product selection and also build product loyalty. Consider the powerful strength of the Starbucks Coffee brand: there are thousands of coffees available across the world, yet a large segment of the population prefers to drive down the road for a Starbucks
1546-1440/14/$36.00
n
ª 2015 American College of Radiology http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jacr.2014.10.015
beverage rather than accept the free coffee in the hotel lobby. Examples in medicine also exist, such as the local surgeon everyone prefers because he or she is branded as the best in town. Likewise, a radiology practice can build a strong and recognized brand for being the clinicians most sought for imaging consults. Without question, the product must be good in order to have a strong brand; at a minimum, Starbucks coffee must taste good, or the company could not build a desirable brand. Similarly, a surgeon or radiologist must be competent at a minimum in order to build a strong brand. However, they have gone beyond mere competence and differentiated themselves from the others and developed a strong brand. Marketing and developing a brand is a multifactorial process. Radiologists are continuously marketing themselves, whether they recognize it or not. We are at a critical crossroads in our profession, with health care reform and dramatic changes in the health care industry. Radiologic services are in the crosshairs because of the expenses to patients, hospitals, and third-party payers [3,4]. We are also perceived by some colleagues as having an easy job that pays too much. Perhaps we have done a poor job of marketing ourselves and our profession. Even so, regardless of whether these perceptions are real or not, we must market ourselves better for our profession to survive. We must understand that marketing is not just Madison Avenue advertising but a complex interaction of all of our actions, or lack of actions, and is critical to marketing effectiveness. We should always provide the best service, at the best possible price, with the best attitude. Additionally, radiology professionals must brand themselves as the profession of choice for delivering imaging services.
The most successful marketing is accomplished with a dedicated marketing plan based on a strategy using the 5 P’s as a guideline. Before developing this marketing plan, one must know and understand who the customer is. In a prior leadership position, it became necessary to “deal” with a referring physician with a reputation for being an “unpleasant” individual. The general consensus was that the institution would be better if he left. After a little investigation, it was found that this “undesirable” clinician was one of the largest users of imaging services. Obviously, the practice had not clearly identified its customers. It can be interesting to ask radiologists about who they perceive their customers to be. The majority say the obvious: first, patients, and second, referring physicians. Certainly these are important customers, but there are numerous others, including staff and personnel in referring physicians’ offices, patients’ relatives and friends, hospital administration, thirdparty payers, technologists, and ultimately everyone with whom they interact. A good marketing plan will identify the major customers and then focus strategies and tactics accordingly. The focus of a free-standing outpatient imaging center will likely be on referring physicians, their staff members, and their patients. If a receptionist is unaccommodating to a referring physician’s receptionist, the referral could easily be lost. For hospital-based practices, the most important customer may be the hospital administration. Although referring physicians and clinical colleagues may value radiologists’ services, they don’t manage the hospital’s contracts; the administration controls the contracts and funds. Keeping them happy is very important because in
today’s world, hospitals have many viable options for covering radiologic services [5,6]. Understand that these outside agencies are very good at marketing to administrators. As a radiologist, it is critical to know the customer and target marketing appropriately; otherwise, time is wasted and resources may be at risk. Marketing and branding are paramount to the success of a radiologist or group. Understanding the basics of marketing is necessary to develop a successful marketing plan; creating a strong brand will greatly add to the success of a marketing plan. Successful marketing in radiology is a valuable asset to be used advantageously in today’s changing and competitive health care environment.
SUMMARY POINTS n n
n
Marketing is crucial to the success of any radiology practice. A radiology practice is constantly marketing, whether its members are aware of it or not. Branding a practice can differentiate a group from the competition.
REFERENCES 1. Marketing. Available at: http://en.wikipedia. org/wiki/Marketing. Accessed November 7, 2014. 2. Brand. Available at http://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Brand. Accessed November 7, 2014. 3. Hiam A. Marketing for dummies. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley; 2004. 4. Howell WLJ. Reimbursement under the ACA: hefty cuts on the horizon. Available at: http:// www.diagnosticimaging.com/healthcare-reform/ reimbursement-under-aca-hefty-cuts-horizon. Accessed November 7, 2014. 5. EmCare. Home page. Available at: http:// www.emcare.com/Index. Accessed November 7, 2014. 6. Kutscher B. California docs protest Tenet hospitals’ plan to use outside staffing firm to manage contracts. Available at: http://www. modernhealthcare.com/article/20140910/ NEWS/309109931. Accessed November 7, 2014.
Reginald F. Munden, MD, DMD, MBA: Houston Methodist Hospital, Department of Radiology, 6565 Fannin Street, Suite M204J, Houston, TX 77030; e-mail: [email protected].
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