Ultimate Guide: Doctor Referral Marketing for Medical Practices
Doctor Referral Marketing
Doctor referral marketing is a great marketing idea for a practice that’s looking to bring in new patients. Medical practices deal with people’s lives which is why patients are very careful when it comes to visiting a medical practice. Medical practices have to gain the trust of patients to retain and attract new clients. One of the most effective ways a medical practice gets new clients is through referrals.
Referrals are essential for medical practices in that it helps generate new patients as well as build good relationships that promote patient retention.
Although doctor referral marketing is an effective marketing strategy, it’s still associated with challenges. The process is time intensive as you need to build great connections and relationships which can take years before yielding results. Even with this time-intensive relationship you’ve built, this marketing strategy may not yield the kind of results you expect most likely due to the poor hands-off process.
A physician may refer a patient to a specialist truly but the difficulty linked with self-scheduling an appointment may frustrate the patient resulting in a no-show referral patient. The poor referral tracking system is also another challenge linked to referral marketing for medical practices.
Understanding the Referral Process
Doctor referral marketing for medical practices is effective but for it to yield desired results you need to know the process. Understanding the processes involved in doctor referral marketing for clinical practices helps you get good results and make adjustments when needed.
1. The Role of the Referring Physician
The referring physician is the physician that directs a patient to another physician, directs the patient to make a referral, or controls the referral made by the patient or practice. The referring physician has an important role to play in the growth and stability of the medical practice.
Referring physicians direct a variety of patients and clinical cases to a medical practice to help build the clinic client base as well as provide clinical cases for research and teaching purposes.
2. The Role of The Receiving Physician
Receiving physician is the physician the patient is referred to. The role of the receiving physician ranges from offering the best quality treatment services to the referred patient. This will even motivate the referring physician to direct more patients to you when the need arises. A receiving physician also has a major role to play in building and maintaining strong relationships with the referring doctor or practice.
3. The Role of The Patient
The patient also has a role to play in the referral process. The patient’s role is to follow up with the referral made. Ensure you take your time to schedule an appointment with the specialist you’re referred to and show up for your appointment. If the referring physician has yet to refer you even after speaking with you about it, your role is to call the practice to check the status of your referral process.
List of strategies for doctor Referral Marketing
Strategy 1: Identify Top Referral Sources
Identifying the top referral sources for a medical practice will determine the relationship worth maintaining and the one taking your time away. One is by getting a referral tracking spreadsheet to record your referral program patients and the physician or practice that referred them.
You can also utilize a referral code such that the code represents a physician or practice that’s referring to the patient. With these methods, you can easily find out the number of patients each referring physician or practice is bringing in and rank your top referral sources. Once you know your top referral sources, you will also find out which of these strategies are effective and which aren’t.
Strategy 2: Build Relationships with Referral Sources
The only way you can make the most of referral marketing is to build strong relationships with your referral sources. This way you or your practice easily comes to their mind when a referral process is to be initiated.
There are different strategies for building strong relationships with your sources providing educational resources, doctors are always learning to improve the quality of care they give to patients. You can help a specialist or practice by providing educational resources for them.
In addition, you should also send personalized thank-you notes to them from time to time, appreciating your sources whenever you can help you develop a good relationship. Invite them to events where they can learn, teach and network and see how your relationship will greatly improve.
Strategy 3: Provide Excellent Patient Care
The quality of your treatment service plays a major role in the referrals you’re able to generate. When you provide excellent patient care, generating referrals won’t be so difficult because referring physicians know any patients directed to your practice will get the maximum care.
There are different strategies you can adopt to provide exceptional patient care. They include investing in staff training to boost their performance and the quality of services offered. You should also implement patient satisfaction surveys to know if the patients are satisfied with your services or not to make needed adjustments. Reviews and online reputation management are also essential for this strategy.
As you’re appreciating your positive reviews, you should also address negative reviews professionally.
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