Serious Lessons Learned from Occupational Medicine Leaders

Marketing of Urgent Care and Occupational Medicine: Survey Says…The Customer is Always Right

For the sake of clarity, in this article, corporate clients will refer to occupational companies, customers, and contacts. The absolute best thing you can do for your occupational medicine business is to survey your corporate clients. The absolute worse thing you can do when creating a survey is to ask questions you have no intention or resources to address. Stick to questions that provide meaningful feedback to improve your occupational medicine program.

We are all familiar with the saying: don’t ask any questions if you don’t want to hear the answers. Keep this in mind in preparing your survey for your corporate clients. It is far more damaging to ask questions and not pay attention to the feedback than to never ask the questions at all.

There are several different methods to survey your corporate clients. You can survey via e-mail, mail a hard copy survey with a stamped return envelop or survey via telephone. We have experience using all three methods, each with its benefits and drawbacks.

A high response rate is the key to legitimizing a survey’s results. Per the University of Texas at Austin; acceptable response rates will vary by how the survey is administered:

• Email: 40% average, 50% good, 60% very good

• Mail: 50% adequate, 60% good, 70% very good

• Telephone: 80% good

E-mail is the least costly and provides quick feedback. We do caution you not to send too many e-mails to the same corporate client or run the risk as being viewed as a bother. You may want to consider survey monkey (www.surveymonkey.com) which is a web based survey tool.

Direct mail is more costly but provides an opportunity to include an incentive, which is the most effective method to ensure participation. Experience has shown that including a small gift card – perhaps a $5.00 gift card to a coffee shop – increase the chance of response.

Telephone surveys can occur at any time which allows you or your staff to call during down times at the clinic. A drawback is due to the incredible growth of the telemarketing industry many people tend to screen their calls.

People are much more likely to respond if the format of your survey is explicit and consistent. Question formats should also remain uniform and not jump randomly from type to type (i.e. multiple choice to short answer and back again). Instructions should be as clear as possible.

Recommended components of a brief cover letter or telephone introduction include:

• The purpose of the survey – feedback on critical areas of your occupational medicine program allowing you to provide the best services

• Why you are asking that corporate client – because you value their opinion and you want to meet or exceed their expectations

• Most important - thank the corporate client for sharing their time, input and perception

Just a few key questions will provide a view of your occupational medicine program allowing you to develop a plan of action to improve your practice. Ask corporate clients to respond on a scale of 5 (strongly agree) to 1 (strongly disagree). It is a good idea to leave a few lines after every question for comments. Here are a few recommended survey items:

• The Doctor/Physician Assistant spend the appropriate amount of time with the employee.

• Paperwork and results are received in a timely manner.

• Phone calls are returned promptly by our physicians and staff.

• The overall occupational medicine services meet our expectations.

Once you receive feedback and implement action on these key factors you will be well on your way to a productive business relationship with your corporate clients.

Wishing you great success.
January 2009