Hard-Hearted Medical Care
*******************************************
A Special Bonus for You
“How To Build Your Soft Sell Marketing Platform”
1 hour audio download
Go to Bridging Heart and Marketing - Platform Bonus
*******************************************
We define Soft Sell Marketers as care givers and change agents, and ordinarily medical doctors should fall into that category. After all, they aren’t trying to sell you stocks or get you to refinance your house. And typically they’ve taken the Hippocratic Oath which, according to Wikipedia, confirms, “I will prescribe regimens for the good of my patients according to my ability and my judgment and never do harm to anyone.”
Yet, many people experience the medical profession as sadly lacking in heart, money-hungry rather than placing a sincere care for patients’ well-being at the top of their priorities.
Just the other day I ran into a vivid example of why MDs suffer the fallout of their unconsciously hard-sell approach.
I called a local medical office I was referred to by a friend and was shocked by the rude lack of care in the outgoing phone message.
Follow along with me and imagine how you would feel when you phone the doctor’s office and the phone message is, “If you are a physician or hospital press one. If you need our address or fax number press two. If you need medical records press three. If you have billing inquiries press four. If you are a patient and wish to make, change or cancel an appointment press five. If you need to speak with a medical practitioner press six.”
How do you feel when you realize that you, as a patient, rank at the very bottom of the doctor’s priorities?
Bad enough. But it gets worse. When I requested an appointment for Jim (who’d had a couple of peculiar fainting episodes), the woman at the appointment desk said, “We can’t make an appointment without a referral.” I said that we’d been referred by someone who worked for the medical school and was not an MD. “As I said, we can’t make an appointment without a referral.”
So I said, “Okay, I’m a psychologist. I have a PhD. Can I make the referral and describe the symptoms in my referral?” “Yes. The fax number is xxx-xxx-xxxx.”
So I wrote up the referral and faxed it in - not mentioning that the patient was my husband, of course.
When I called back to make the appointment I was struck by the blind bureaucracy running the place. Why? Because, even though I am not an MD, my referral counted. It was all about bureaucratic protocol.
And then for the next shock. We couldn’t get an appt for 2 ½ months. When I complained that having to wait that long was completely unacceptable, no one suggested the possibility of seeing any other of the MDs who worked in that office.
So we called our friend who’d made the referral, and through his influence, we were able to get an appointment just three days later.
Hard sell, buyer-beware business tactics don’t just belong to the realm of finance and real estate. It’s lurking all around us, ready to be brought to light and transformed for the benefit of all.
Because Its All in the Connection
Judith
PS — Be sure to downlaod “How to Build Your Soft Sell Platform” by going to
Bridging Heart and Marketing - Platform Bonus
August 22nd, 2008 at 7:49 pm
“Traffic” is indifferent. It’s headed somewhere. If you lease a store in a local mall, you want to be where the most traffic goes. Usually close to the anchor stores is best and most expensive. The traffic may have been headed to Nordsrom’s but your window, sale, product, etc., diverted some of that to your store. So, you marketed to the common denominator, traffic. You were able to divert some of it, creating a flow to you. The more traffic you are close to, the higher your chances are of a greater flow.
Online, you want to do the same thing. But, you need to insert your “store,” your website in many places and in many ways. You won’t get traffic, you’ll get flow.
So, (finally!) my vote is for . . . FLOW.
August 23rd, 2008 at 9:25 pm
I like the ideal client best. My vote goes to it. In my coaching program we were taught to make a list o ideal clients with all the little details about them since we best work with people who are compatible with us.
So if we are focused on this kind of client - the ideal one- we then have all chances to attract only those and that is precisely what I personally would like to do.
I resonate so much with your program and the conference you are organizing; unfortunately it is highly unlikely that I will be able to attend. Nevertheless I am open for last minute miracles, we never know. But I wish you a load of fun and heart to heart encounters. I will transport myself in thoughts to LA on those days.
The work you are doing is so much needed and when I heard your teleclasses I was sincerely and deeply moved as I felt understood and not so alone anymore, at least in that area. Not only that I could also feel your soft and gentle energy and at times it made me cry.
many blessings to all of you
marina