What is your agency doing to ensure that you have strong referrals coming in for the rest of 2009?
Tell us what holiday promotions you’re planning for this year. How does it compare to past years?
Tell us what you/your agency are doing for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. We invite you to share with us your photos, campaign ideas, etc.
“Anything else?” Those are usually the last words we say at admission once the papers are done and the assessment is complete. They’re usually followed by: “The nurse will be calling to let you know when she’ll be out to see you. Let us know if you need anything in the meantime.”
Thank them for choosing you. Just once, wouldn’t it be nice if someone in healthcare thanked you for choosing them? How often have you personally been referred to a specialist or other provider and been thanked for choosing them? Never!
So here’s your chance to stand apart from the rest of the hospice (and healthcare) industry. At the end of the visit, thank the patient and family (and referral source!) for choosing your hospice. (Note: Regardless of who made the referral, in the end it’s the patient or family that selects you.)
“It’s our privilege.” After you’ve thanked them, tell them, “It will be a privilege to care for your (dad/mom/loved one).” Hospice nurses think they say it all the time, but we rarely hear it on admission. It’s not that they don’t purposely say it, it’s just that they forget.
Practice makes perfect. If you want to make sure it happens, incorporate those closing phrases in your admissions “cheat sheet” and staff performance reviews!
Excerpted from LEGENDARY RESULTS: Managing Referrals & Increasing Admissions Vol. 2: The Admissions Process by Michael Ferris and Polly Rehnwall.
Make sure you smile while talking on the phone. To help you maintain a smile throughout the phone call, buy a small mirror. Place this mirror near your telephone in your office. Check the mirror often to make sure you’re smiling. When you’re on the phone, you can tell whether the other person is smiling and so can the other person. That being said, if looking at yourself in the mirror makes you uncomfortable, then put something that makes you smile in front of you!
Excerpted from LEGENDARY RESULTS: Managing Referrals & Increasing Admissions Vol 1: Referral Management by Michael Ferris and Polly Rehnwall
Want to know why your best referral sources choose your agency?
Ask Them! This is something that you should do often and using different methods. You should send them referral source satisfaction surveys, have the sales representative ask and senior management should call and visit.
Ask “What do we do better than any of the other agencies?” or “What are the two things you like best about our agency’s services?”
Once you know why they love you, then you can use this to develop your message.
Do any of the following sound familiar? Do you see some definite trends?
~ We have a multilingual staff.
~ We accept most referrals and do not “cherry pick” the easier and most profitable referrals.
~ We process the referral quickly and easily.
~ They like the quality of care given to our patients.
~ Our nurses are kind and caring.
~ Our staff is reliable, often going beyond their responsibilities to offer suggestions to the patient’s family or physician.
~ Availability—24/7
~ Reliable—can count on us to do what we say we will do.
~ We are committed to providing professional, ethical, and quality service.
~ We follow-up with our clients on a regular basis to assess service effectiveness and to make revisions that reflect changing needs and wishes
Let us know what your referral sources love about your agency.
The key to successful long-term Web marketing is to start an ongoing dialogue with the prospective patients or clients. The goal for your electronic marketing and even traditional advertising should be to build a list of people interested in home health, hospice or private duty. Then you can keep value added information coming to them on a regular basis.
This is the best way to leverage your Web site. Make it easy for them to sign-up by putting the sign-up box on the first page in a prominent location. Offer some item of perceived value, such as a free report, that will entice them to sign-up. Make sure that they opt-in to your list and then keep building!
Tip: Put an e-mail address in your advertisements to enable interested people to contact you for information or the free report. This will result in a much higher conversion ratio than just listing your Web address.
Note: If you are part of an integrated health care system or hospital based, make sure it is easy to find your agency’s information on the Web. Too many times I find that these home health agencies and hospices are hidden on some hard to find page on the parent company’s Web site. Get your own domain name and set up your own pages—the results will be startling!
It is important to recognize that dealing with doctors requires us to consider that doctors are different. They are typically direct and to the point, in a hurry, and interested in benefits. The first 60 seconds are important to make an impression and deliver a benefit in listening to you further. Be prepared! Anytime you schedule a meeting with a physician, have your plan for what you want to communicate and your goal for the outcome for this meeting. Also be ready for those chance meetings.
The physician is many times not the person to determine where a particular patient will be referred for home care services. In most cases, the physician is going to “bless” the choice of agency and then someone else will actually make the referrals. For hospitalized patients, the doctor writing the discharge orders will either specify your agency or just discharge to home care and allow the discharge planner or social work to choose the agency. A few pointers in dealing with doctors:
~ No small talk please
~ Do not bombard them with copies of the same orders to sign
~ Service, service service when dealing with doctors
~ Make it easy to do business your agency
~ Always thank the doctors for referrals, especially the non-admits
~ Make your thank you’s personal and special
~ Always be professional
~ Be a good listener
~ Always follow-up quickly
~ Address any problems immediately
~ Build your custom service plan and deliver on it
Excerpted from Field Guide to Selling Hospice Services with Legendary Results by Michael Ferris
There are always lots of reasons “why not.” You have got to help people just get over them. Things like, “they probably won’t meet criteria” or “they might not be ready” or any other reason thrown out there that would support why we should sit on our hands. Don’t let people try to figure out why things won’t work and just move to get it done. If it doesn’t work out, and sometimes things don’t, at least we know that no one went without hospice care because we “thought” it might not work out!
Right now there is no shortage of bad news, problems, gossip, etc. to go around. You cannot allow this to get in your way of providing Legendary Service. Whatever is negative and potentially distracting, shrug it off. That’s right; dismiss the bad news or it will eventually consume and overwhelm you.
If the bad news or problems get you down, do something that picks you back up. As a referral center, admission team or sales team professional, you can’t afford to be down and negative when you’re working with your prospects and customers. Do whatever it takes, change your routine, exercise more, read motivational books, whatever it takes!
And stay away from negative people because it’s amazing how contagious negativity can be.
Excerpted from LEGENDARY RESULTS: Managing Referrals & Increasing Admissions Vol 1: Referral Management by Michael Ferris and Polly Rehnwall
Investment in sales training will pay for itself many times over. The best sales organizations in the world have regular and frequent sales training. Those agencies that invest in sales training today will see impressive results tomorrow.
There are many opportunities for sales training, including, but not limited to:
~ Home care- or hospice-specific sales workshops and conferences
~ Sales and motivational workshops and conferences that are not industry specific
~ State and national association meetings and conferences (a recent NAHC Annual Meeting had sales and marketing programs during every one of the educational sessions)
~ Teleconferences that are provided by home care- and hospice-related groups
~ On-site training and coaching
~ Books and books on tape or CD
Any sales training opportunities like those listed above will pay big dividends; a relatively small investment today will result in sustained long-term results. Furthermore, the retention rate of your sales team may also increase as productivity increases and salespeople see continued results.
It is increasingly important for home care and hospice agencies to provide support for ongoing education for all of their professional staff. Combine training for professional staff with that for your sales team when appropriate. This support can be an important strategic advantage when recruiting and retaining existing staff. It’s a win-win situation.
Excerpted from 101 Home Care Promotional Strategies that Deliver Legendary Results Without Busting Your Budget! by Michael Ferris
The most successful home health and hospice sales professionals are those that are the combination of:
* Passion
* People skills
* Knowledge
* Service
The only one that you can truly train is product knowledge! People either have a passion for home health or hospice or they don’t. They are good with and enjoy people, or not. They either get service, or they don’t. Nordstrom’s (famous for customer service) hires people that were raised to say please and thank you. Then they train their sales people everything possible to know about the product they will be selling. The same formula works in home health and hospice.
Hire the right people and then train them to be the most professional home health and hospice sales people. Sales training is a lifelong learning process; the best sales people in all industries seek to improve themselves every day—no matter how many sales awards they have won!
Set Goals and Seek Training
Anyone can set a goal, but training is what makes them possible to achieve. Learning the skills necessary to execute on your plan makes the difference. You can become great at anything, but not without practice. The key then to greatness is practice.
If you think about it, most people never practice. They don’t train and don’t seek coaching. If you invest 30 minutes a day in something, you can become good at it, no matter who you are. If you spend more time than that and really focus your efforts, you can become truly great. Tiger Woods hits thousands of practice shots every week. Piano virtuosos practice for hours every day of the year. How serious are you and your sales team?
Simione Consultants’ fall Square One and AdmitRight Boot Camp sales training dates just announced! Click here for more information and to register!
What can we do with that awful part of the registration visit where you have to ask an 85-year-old man when his retirement date was and if this is work-related or due to black lung disease or an accidental injury! You feel almost apologetic as you ask questions that seem either out of place or meaningless to everyone.
So, don’t ask the questions! Medicare requires that you bill properly, but that doesn’t mean you have to ask questions. You can use “the assume approach” instead.
Example: ”Mrs. Brown, there is some information Medicare needs to make sure that they will be the primary payor for your hospice care.
I assume you retired at age 65 (then you figure out what year that was). I also assume that this isn’t related to an accident or work injury. And you’ve never claimed benefits for black lung disease, right?” (And so forth). By using the assume approach, you don’t ask people strange questions but you get the right information!
Excerpted from LEGENDARY RESULTS: Managing Referrals & Increasing Admissions Vol. 2: The Admissions Process by Michael Ferris and Polly Rehnwall.
If you believe that service is a commodity, something that can be mandated and learned from outside sources, then you are not committed to service excellence. A commitment to service excellence means you attempt to delight your customers in everything your agency does. You cannot achieve remarkable service by simply installing new policies and procedures. You cannot adopt best practices from others and simply expect consistent service as a result. You should look at the outcomes achieved by best practice companies and then analyze how you can achieve the same outcomes. You must act to serve in everything your agency does and closely watch the results. Then you must act to resolve any service breakdowns. Those breakdowns are any that your customers declare. Service is only truly effective when it is meaningful to your customers and they are aware of it.
Leaders in your organization must demonstrate their commitment to service by always acting first to serve the customer and then taking care of anything else. A committed service leader cannot walk past an unanswered ringing phone or an unresolved customer need. They, by their commitment and very nature, must ensure that the customer is served and the staff are supported and empowered to serve. Their commitment, and that of all of their staff, emanates from the knowledge that the customer is the reason for their agency.
Excerpted from LEGENDARY RESULTS: Managing Referrals & Increasing Admissions Vol 1: Referral Management by Michael Ferris and Polly Rehnwall
All sales people should have good phone sales skills. They must be able to make good calls to both existing accounts and prospective accounts. In hospice sales there is much less phone work than in other fields of sales; nonetheless, always be as effective as possible. Many of the skills that you have learned to be effective in person are also effective when used on the phone.
Some other dimensions to understand when using the phone include:
- Leaving voice messages
- Getting through the screener
- Creating a bond by phone
- Capturing attention
Use the telephone as an extension of your time and to leverage it. Most of the time you will not want to call ahead for appointments as this is not usually the best approach. That being said, there are times when this is the only way to get in front of the right people at a specific account.
The most common use of phones in the sales process is to follow-up with contacts to make sure that they received information that was dropped off, that things are going well, to deliver promised information, etc. These calls should be planned before dialing the phone and are an integral part of the process. Planning is paramount.
Finally, you will want to use the phone to thank referral sources from time to time. This enables you to leverage your time and vary the method of thanking the referral source.
Excerpted from Field Guide to Selling Hospice Services with Legendary Results by Michael Ferris