Branding Strategies in Today’s Market
Isn’t it fun to compare things now to things back in the day?
It’s always amusing to watch our kids roll their eyes when we tell them how we walked to school five miles through the snow (uphill both ways). Right? Or about using those “Rabbit Ears” to get one channel on TV (if the weather was good). And of course, who of us would forget the task of having to get out of the chair and walk all the way across the room to change the channel?
As we progress from one “new normal” to the next (have you noticed that pattern?), and as we’re told by supposed experts how that looks, it’s interesting to think and talk about what has changed and what is still the same, and nowhere do I find that more interesting today than in a conversation about marketing.
I went to marketing school at Dear Old Nebraska U. Our son, Dane, who is now Marketing Director here at THRIVE, recently completed the same degree from the same fine institution nearly four decades later (despite the won-loss records of late, the Husker blood runs deep here), and it’s been truly interesting to compare notes on what they taught in Marketing School back in the day, and what they teach now. And equally interesting to compare what they did NOT teach then and what they do NOT teach now.
I recall pondering a choice when I completed my degree: Do I take what I’ve leaned and go where everyone learned what I learned and knows what I know (i.e., a marketing firm, ad agency, etc.); or better that I take what I’ve learned and go where no one learned what I learned or knows what I know (i.e. private practice healthcare)? I’ve been thankful ever since for choosing the latter (as did Dane, it turns out), and that choice, of course, is what eventually led to our work together including this blog post.
So, colleagues, let’s talk a bit about solid marketing strategy then and now.
It seems appropriate early in this conversation to define marketing, and I’m happy to share the definition I’ve gathered after four decades doing it every day: Marketing is anything you do to cause and sustain value. Two verbs, one noun. That is a definition they did NOT teach in marketing school then, or now. Our textbook writers and professors were and are more inclined, I’ve observed, to define marketing as promotion. Certainly, promotion is a FORM of marketing, but overall most marketing is NOT promotion.
One thing they did teach us about in marketing school then and now was/is consumer behavior. Basically, how and why do customers make consumptive choices and what impacts that? What I quickly learned in a provider/patient application of consumer behavior is that the vast majority of marketing opportunity in a practice lies simply in teaching people (patients) who don’t know what you know (provider), to know what you know; and the more of what you know that they know, the more likely they are to behave correctly (i.e. comply, stay with you, refer others, preschedule, purchase from you and not the on-line place, etc.). The key to leading patients (and potential patients) to desired consumer behavior is using marketing to teach patients (and potential patients) rather than trick them (I’ve observed that to differ from much of the ‘marketing thinking’ of many so-called marketers). Simply teach them to know what you know, and amazing patronage will happen.
“What do you mean, amazing patronage?” you might ask? I’ve learned that patronage, then and now, is four simple things. Not four-hundred and not forty, just four. And it’s around these four things that we build our entire marketing program and plan in exactly this chronology:
1. Perception of Value (first and foremost – ALL patronage stems from this)
2. Customer (Patient) Retention
3. Revenue-Per-Customer (Patient)
4. New Customers (Patients)
That’s it. There are subcategories of these, of course, but then and now, when you impact these four things in this exact order with marketing initiatives to ‘teach people to know what you know,’ and we will have amazing patronage – enabling us to grow the practice to whatever level we desire. And to the dismay of some in the marketing industry, we don’t need expensive market research, market share analysis or a big marketing budget.
OK, after these early epiphanies, along came another one: Most colleagues in private practice health care at the time (talking 1980’s here) somehow understood marketing as an ethics issue. That one is not as prevalent now, but it certainly was then.
So we set about a crusade of sorts to help colleagues understand that marketing is not a consideration of good or evil. (I fondly remember that first lecture tour –The Competitive Edge –running around the country with pal Brad Williams). The message was that Marketing – then and now – is simply communication. Communication can certainly be good or evil (for example, the quality care message vs the two-for-one message so popular in the 90’s), but that’s because it’s communication, not because it’s marketing. And we best be realizing that – then and now – lest we be absent out there with the message of good.
So, good or evil was and is not about marketing itself, but rather, what is marketed. It took a while to make marketing believers then, but here we are today, practices having websites, social media presence and all the rest.
One final historical marketing epiphany, lest we digress. I realized then (still late 80’s) it would be really helpful if we reduced, for those that didn’t study marketing, all of marketing school into a few “basic truths.” These became our Six Fundamental Rules of Marketing, and then and now, I base all practice marketing initiatives, including the strategies we’ve been discussing in the last three Podlectures on vision plans; on these basic truths. Old news to many of us, but, then and now, the “true norths” for all of our marketing programs.
The Marketing True North we’ll feature for the balance of this post is what we called Marketing Rule #5 – Name It to Market It. This was so important then as the chains were gathering steam (today we still have the chains, but also big box stores, internet providers and all the rest), and we worked with so many colleagues (and do now as well) to use better branding strategies in differentiating from them. That was when we changed Optometry Clinic (which was not an effective brand then, and is not now) to something like VISIONHEALTH Eyecare Center (worked then, works now).
Well, let’s fast-forward. One of the conditions of today’s market is the many focuses in eye care that have become specialties. Medical optometry for example. Or dry eye. Or contact lenses. Or specialty contact lenses. Or vision therapy. Or myopia care. Or nutrition. It’s all very exciting, but what’s clear to us (providers) about these specialties is far from clear to those (consumers) who don’t know what we know.
Which brings yet another epiphany I think worth sharing. The purpose of branding (like all marketing) is simply to teach people who don’t know what you know, to know what you know, with a few deliberately chosen words.
We recently helped a client opening a new vision therapy practice with the branding endeavor. Their new registered name is inSITE Vision Performance Center. It’s not “The Vision Center.” It’s not “The Vision Therapy Center” (which is certainly better). Of themselves, those brands don’t teach people who don’t know what we know, to know what we know, which is the marketing mission – then and now.
That said, branding is not just a strategy for the practice. It’s also a strategy for the services (branding your exam, for example, is DEFINITELY a marketing strategy I highly recommend – then and now). And a strategy for the programs you offer your patients (branding your progressive eyeglass program or your private pay patient program, for example, is DEFINITELY a marketing strategy I recommend – then and now). And for your specialties (branding your dry eye or other specialty practice, for example, is DEFINITELY a marketing strategy I recommend – now, but for that one, likely not then).
This is another one of those things not taught in marketing school – then or now – but after working with thousands of practices around the world and seeing the impacts of solid branding (marketing) strategy (remember our definition – marketing is anything you do to cause and sustain value – two verbs, one noun), I can and absolutely do attest to the results of solid branding strategy, Colleagues. The simple accomplishment of teaching patients to know what you know with a few very deliberate words.
Perhaps this analogy will help. I think of branding strategy in relation to the current on a river. With the right branding strategy (practice, services, programs), we’re rowing with the current. With the wrong branding strategy (practice, services, programs), we’re rowing against the current. We can move the boat either way, but I’ll wager if Lewis and Clark were around to ask, they’d tell us it’s vastly easier (and requires far fewer resources) to row with the current on that Mighty Missouri rather than against it!
As we wrap up our Part 1 discussion about Marketing Then and Now (more to come in Part 2!), I encourage you to remember this. We (providers) think about eyes and eye care more in a week than your patients/potential patients (consumers) do in their lifetimes. We want to form all marketing strategy, certainly including modern branding strategy, to leverage what we know by teaching patrons to know those things. And when they do, I’ll say again, they behave. That’s when amazing patronage happens!
Let’s pick it up there next time, Colleagues!
As always, if it would be helpful to talk more about these and other strategies, shoot me a line (tbowen@mythrivecoaches.com). That’s exactly why we’re here, and we love the dialogue!