It's November and it's time to look forward to 2017 to put your plans and budgets in place to ensure your practice is prepared to grow and thrive in 2017 and beyond. Marketing is the engine that drives practice activity and growth. It consists of everything you do to communicate who you are (your brand), what you do, when you do it, and all other aspects of your value proposition to your customers.
In deciding what your marketing will look like in 2017, first assess what you've done this year and the results of those efforts and investments. Identify what objectives were accomplished and which ones failed. Ideally, your marketing investments were structured to be easily monitored, with identifiable measures of success by which you can determine whether they were successful or not. In marketing, this is not always possible, but it should be a goal.
Next, assess your financial commitments to marketing this year. To standardize them, express them as a percent of revenue. For example, if you spent funds that equaled 2.5% of revenue this year on marketing, you will have a similar measure next year, or even monthly, with which to measure your investment, relative to the size of your practice, based upon total revenue. In most practices, investments might include some promotional items to dissemenate your brand, such as branded coffee cups, wearables such as t-shirts, polo shirts, or other items. It is important to get visibility for your brand in this manner. Secondly, investment in marketing programs such as data mining and reminder software is absolutely crucial to drive marketing activities with existing clients. These programs identify potential medical and transactional opportunities that related to best care and optimal revenue.
Assemble a list of proposed financial commitments and associated marketing programs that will help accomplish your objectives. Try to establish measures of success that you can monitor at least monthly to measure results. And then stick to your plan. When confronted with the latest and greatest opportunities during the year to do additional marketing, assesss them relative to what you've planned and budgeted. And as long as you are meeting or exceeding your goals, then stick to your plan, and consider the new programs when you're planning next year's marketing plan and budget.
Plan your marketing for 2017!
