How to promote your clinic/hospital for getting more patients?

How to promote your clinic/hospital for getting more patients?

Dr Mansoor Ali KR

For some doctors, promoting self-practice is unethical.

But it is important to attract a maximum number of patients to run a clinic cost -effectively.

As a new doctor, you need to attract patients.

A satisfied patient is a brand ambassador for promoting the service you give.

By using effective advertising methods, you can reach part of this clientele to help increase the number of new patients you have.

Maintaining a steady clientele of old and new patients can help you establish a steady income and develop respect in the community.

Market Research
Conduct market research. Before you start deciding how to market your clinic or hospital, you need to know what your competitors are doing and what people want. Think about what different and versatile you are going to offer.

Today, medical practitioners use a variety of media to market and advertise their services to attract patients and referrals.

Remember
Private practice is the best option than any other job – that give you more social reputation and  financial stability. Don’t wait for the Government job. You can continue your private practice along with Govt. job. For a Govt. servant second half of a months seems to be very difficult to manage.

Counter Point
Don’t  worry about the ever increasing number of doctors – India has 6000 births in a minute.

Professionalism
A patient’s first impression of his physician can be made within the first few minutes of entering the clinic. So incorporate “Air hostess philosophy” – attractive clinic.

Name board – hoardings

Single Name board inside clinic – it is better to avoid many sign boards in clinic – one board that displaying the name, qualification, consulting hours, holiday, contact number etc.

Hoardings in public places – Nowadays many homoeopathy doctors and hospitals placing hoardings in public places.

Create a Brand
Create simple and distinct ID/Reg. cards.

Always carry them with you and distribute them to the people you interact with.

Brochures or newsletters can be circulated to the patients with treatment details, significance and salient features.

Stock recent magazines and newspapers highlighting the importance of homeopathy in various disorders.

Inaugural function

• A good time for advertisement
• Invite friends, relatives, neighbours, doctors
• VIPs, political & religious leaders, media, merchant associations.
• There is one group we often ignore – people bring cases to us – auto and taxi drivers of your locality

Different methods of advertising and their benefits

1. All India Radio
2. FM radio – the most preferred and highly influential nowadays
3. Local TV Channels
4. Newspapers
5. Newspaper Boy (distributing notices)
6. Cinema theatres – as slides
7. Souvenirs of local religious or pubic functions
8. Local magazines – this gives you more publicity than advertising in a national daily – theses magazine may reach every house in your locality.
9. Public awareness programmes – take classes in schools, residential association meetings, health awareness classes by village, panchayat and local bodies.
10. Join as much social media groups – non homoeopathy groups especially

Write Articles & TV shows

Write articles in new papers and regional magazines

Talk in radio and Television

Advertisement on health days –  Cancer day, Women’s’ day, Mothers’ day, Diabetic day etc. Highlighting homeopathy treatment and your expertise – design beautiful posters and post in social medias and local dailies and magazines.

How do you get your name out there and get people to notice you?
Almost anything can be done online these days and that’s exactly where people go looking when they want information about something new.

Utilise

Youtube – upload small videos about your clinic, treatment offered and classes are taken by you

Google map – list your clinic in Google map – so that clients may spot and reach you easily

Social Medias – Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter etc.

Website

• Personal website – a simple mobile friendly website

In the past 5–10 years’ websites have become the dominant marketing and advertising medium for medical practitioners, resulting in a major change in the way many patients access information easily.

Web site should display: List information about each physician at your practice, a list of services, directions to the clinic and fees for common services.

Some doctors have created a website for their practice, and others have worked to acquire limited traffic to their website.  However, these limited efforts simply don’t produce results, and as a result, thousands of practices across the country struggle to fill their calendar.

SEO – Search Engine Optimisations has a major role.

Example: Just type or copy paste “ best homeopathy doctor Calicut” – you will get my name in at least four places on the first page of Google. There are so many senior and expert doctors in our city, but my name displaying higher in Google.

Doctors must understand that online strategy is by far the #1 method to grow patient volumes, and build their clinic’s profitability.

Spelling
Homeopathy is far better than homoeopathy – First one is more search engine friendly and spelled by the common man.

Free listing of your clinic available at (Some of them provide appointment system also)

• Quikr.com
• OLX
• Google
• Linkedin
• Just Dial
• Practo
• Indiamart
• Indiaheartbeat.com
• medindia.net
• drriight.com/get-free-doctor-listing
• members.indianyellowpages.com/join-now.php
• doctor.lybrate.com/
• thelinkindia.com
• https://www.mydoczone.com
• https://adwords.google.co.in
• https://adwords.google.com 

NB: Their premium version is not costly, that offer more exposure to your clinic

Example: I have 12 apartments in Calicut Kerala. I had rent out all of them with a simple premium advertisement in Quikr worth Rs. 170 only.  Otherwise, I am supposed to pay one month rent to agents and brokers.

Not limit your career to local market

Spread Nationally and Internationally – through an online consultation

Accreditation

• Certification/accreditation is a recognition of the clinic
• National Accreditation Board for Hospitals & Healthcare Providers (NABH)
• Quality Council of India
• ISO

Use Social Media Marketing Strategy to its Full Advantage
Social media has become a pillar of clinic / hospital marketing – and its importance grows every year.

Through your social media pages, you can reach thousands of new potential patients. Ask patients who have had good experiences at your hospital to post referrals on your Facebook and Twitter pages. Social media is all about interaction, so the more you can focus on your patients, the better.

Twitter is great for following people with similar interests that you want to keep up with, and sometimes have conversations with.

Place a listing on the local search engines such as Google Local, Yahoo Local and Bing Local. They are free, but can be tricky to work with.

These pages can be a place to have your office location and hours, post links to your clinic’s website, links to your blog, share articles about news from the healthcare industry, and connect with potential or existing patients.

Once you have some blogs you want the public to read, you can share the links to followers and friends you have on your previously set up social media pages.

Newsletters or Emails or WhatsApp group of your clients
Keep existing patients informed of new information and services by sending them periodic newsletters or emails. These types of communications can include information such as common ailments and their symptoms.

Find ways to generate positive word-of-mouth referrals from both patients and colleagues is still recognised as the most effective medium for doctors who want to market themselves.

Going through these few suggestions will significantly boost your overall online presence

Central Council of Homoeopathy (CCH) Regulation on advertising
http://www.cchindia.com/code-of-ethics-regulations.htm

Advertising
Solicitation of patients directly or indirectly by a practitioner of Homoeopathy either personally or by advertisement in the newspapers, by placards or by the distribution of circular cards or handbills is unethical. A practitioner of Homoeopathy shall not make use of, or permit others to make use of, him or his name as a subject of any form or manner of advertising or publicity through lay channels which shall be of such a character as to invite attention to him or to his professional position or skill or as would ordinarily result in his self-aggrandisement provided that a practitioner of Homoeopathy is permitted formal announcement in press about the following matters, namely :-

• the starting of his practice;
• change of the type of practice;
• change of address;
• temporary absence from duty;.
• resumption of practice
• succeeding to another’s practice.

He shall further not advertise himself directly or indirectly through price lists or publicity materials of manufacturing firms or traders with whom he may be connected in any capacity, nor shall he publish cases, operations or letters of thanks from patients in non-professional newspapers or journals provided it shall be permissible for him to publish his name in connection with a prospectus or a director’s or a technical expert’s report

PROFESSIONAL MISCONDUCT as per CCH regulations

• if he claims to be a specialist without possessing a special qualification in the branch concerned;
• if he publishes the names or photographs of doctor running or attending the clinic or institution in the advertisement;
• if he advertises or notifies the name of the institution or clinic in which no facility is offered, names of the diseases not treated;

Above all & Most important :  Quality treatment.
Money, fame, publicity etc. will follow automatically once you achieve your “Mission” of curing the patients.

Best Wishes
Dr Mansoor Ali KR
Asso. Professor, Govt. Homoeopathy Medical College. Calicut
www.drmansoorali.com, www.homeobook.com
mail : homoeobook@gmail.com

More useful articles on clinic design
https://www.homeobook.com/category/clinic-setup/