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The
Legendary Sales Leadership Letter |
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Mike's Top Picks
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Dear Friend, As you receive this, any Valentine's Day promotions you are doing for your referral partners is in the final stages. This is the time to determine effectiveness of the promotion and refine your process for next year.
Ask your sales people to provide market survey data:
Make sure that your sales people have a good follow-up plan to maximize return on investment.
Monitor your incoming referrals to see if you can detect increases in referrals from accounts included in the campaign. Watch to see if an account has an increase over their average production and February of 2007. How many new accounts were opened in the two weeks following Valentine's Day?
Here's a personal story from when I was on the operational side: One year, my sales people wanted to take roses to some of their accounts and as anyone knows, this is the most expensive time of year to buy roses. The team was generating great referrals and beating their goals, so I went along with them on the idea. (After all, leadership cannot always know better than the team!) But wanting to make this work from a budgetary perspective, I got creative. I found a wholesale provider of beautiful roses imported from Colombia. I pre-ordered in quantity and got a really good deal on them. We went to the floral supply and bought the vases, greenery, ribbon, etc. We were ready and because the price was so good, we would be able to take them to a lot of accounts.
When we picked up the roses, we discovered where the florists really earn their money. The roses still had thorns -- lots of thorns! We had limited time to get them ready for delivery. We converted our conference room into a floral shop and de-thorned and arranged the roses over a weekend and during the evenings the week of Valentine's Day. Happy ending; the referral partners loved the roses and they loved that we brought one to each of the players in the office and not just to the doctors.
When we were planning for Valentine's Day that fall, the sales team did not mention roses and came up with another idea. Florists really earn their money!
Note: Those that know me well know that I am not a big proponent of using goodies to generate business. That being said, if you are going to do something, make sure it is effective.
Happy Selling! Best,
Mike Ferris |
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The Power of Vanity Phone
Numbers
by Gregg Hamerschlag, CEO
It's no secret that the public has embraced easy-to-remember telephone numbers like "1-800-FLOWERS" and "1-800-DENTIST" -- to the extent that their owners virtually dominate their industry. Few people realize, however, that it's now possible for local practitioners in North America to share usage of memorable toll-free numbers, getting Fortune 500-sized branding and visibility for Main Street prices.
For example, a home health care agency in rural western Virginia can use "1-800-HomeCare" to market their small agency locally at the same time that a metropolitan New York company uses the number to build its multi-branch practice in the New York City area, northern New Jersey and southern Connecticut. Any consumer who dials one of these toll-free shared vanity numbers automatically gets routed to the practitioner or company that has licensed usage of the number in their area code. See how it works here.
Why do we need a vanity number? They work. A great vanity number differentiates your company and builds brand awareness that your competitors cannot match. Through word of mouth and retention, if you receive one more customer order per month using one of our numbers, the number would pay for itself. Just ask our customers:
"1-800-HOMECARE
has enabled us to compete with the larger agencies in our market.
With so much competition, we are able to give our prospective clients a
number they never forget. It's been great for recruitment as
well."
How is Primary Wave able to offer such an expensive marketing tool for such a reasonable cost? Through the power of shared use. Although 1-800-FLOWERS was purchased for $9,000,000 and major companies have spent millions of dollars investing in great industry defining phone numbers, Primary Wave is able to share the use of 1800HOMECARE in multiple markets, thereby drastically reducing the cost to its licensees.
The memorability of the number also multiplies the impact of newspaper, radio or TV ads, billboards, postcards, branded refrigerator magnets -- or just about any other kind of marketing. Especially with home care, patients might not remember your name, but they'll never forget a number like 1-800-HOMECARE.
Note: I was amazed to find out how many areas of the country are still available to license the 1800HOMECARE phone number! Is your phone number memorable? Check with them to find out if your area is still available, before your competitor does!
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As you read this, we are wrapping up the February Square One Bootcamp. We have a great group of sales people here representing both home care and hospice. They are from across the country from Washington, Florida, Michigan, Oklahoma, Ohio, Iowa, Illinois and North Carolina. The final two Square One Bootcamps for the spring are now scheduled and available for registration. The dates are March 17 - 19 and May 5 - 7 here in Chapel Hill at the Courtyard by Marriott.
For more information or to register,
click here. |
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Listening
We spend a lot of time teaching our sales people to ask great questions, and making sure that they are practicing their listening skills. Without cultivating great listening skills, they will waste a lot of great questions. The two go hand-in-hand. The ratio of the sales person talking (including their questions) to the prospect or account talking should be about 1:4. Some use the saying, "God gave us two ears and one mouth; use them in that proportion!" Whichever you like, keep in mind that sales people can't listen themselves out of a sale!
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The Sales Management Process
Sales is work. Work is a process. Therefore, selling can be structured into systematic processes. Similarly, sales management is a systematic process which allows the sales manager to maximize team performance.
The sales manager's primary goal must be to get home care sales people to think like sales people. Historically, sales people in the home health and hospice industries have not been adequately trained to perform sales functions. The sales management process is critical whether you have one sales person or one hundred. Its value to the organization cannot be overstated. Without consistent and continuous management, the sales team will never perform anywhere near its potential. Businesses cannot have a lackadaisical approach to sales in home care.
Good sales management includes:
The agency's overall strategy drives its sales tactics. The strategy must be consistent with the overall goals and mission of the agency. It must also reflect the market that the agency serves.
The dynamics involved in sales management are the same as in other industries. Learn all that you can from other sales people in your life. Read books on the subject of sales and sales management. Use my book, Managing Home Care Sales Teams for Legendary Results to guide your sales management planning.
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In each Legendary Sales Leadership Letter, Mike answers your questions. Send them to us or call (800) 293-5471 and we'll make sure that yours are answered in a future issue. Question: We are getting ready to redesign our brochure. Do you have any tips for us? Answer: Wow, that is a question that has an answer that would be book-length! Let me see if I can give you some quick advice: Use Bullets and Benefits When designing any printed materials, there are two key concepts to keep in mind. First, be brief and make it easy for the reader to immediately grasp the message. Bulleted elements are the easiest to see and absorb. Do not try to cram every known fact into a brochure. Most people do not read the entire brochure and will scan it at best. Make the message clear for someone scanning the brochure or other printed marketing material. Get some professional help. Don't have your brochures look home made (unless, of course, that is the look you are going for). Graphic design, messaging, layout and execution are too important to cut corners on. There are many ways to produce great looking pieces less expensively. Two-color printing can many times be more impactful than full color. It is unfortunate that many agencies find it necessary to have tri-fold general purpose brochures. If you have to have one, make sure that it compares very favorably to your competitors. Know what is out there as part of your competitive market survey. Sell benefits to the intended market. Print each brochure with a specific customer in mind. If it is intended for the referral sources, then word it to spell out the benefits to them of using the agency's services. Be sure to get as specific as possible. Print one brochure for family practitioners, another for cardiologists and a different one for discharge planners. They all have different needs. These may take the form of an insert into the agency's complete service brochure. Short run color printing is getting less expensive and better quality all the time. You may be better served with a sales sheet than a tri-fold brochure for some purposes. Whatever you do, do not print too many of any piece. Print no more than what you will use in the next six months. Changes are happening fast in home care; you will want to be able to react and compete.
Create your campaign at the same time as
the brochure. How will the sales person use the printed material?
Involve your sales people in the creative process as they know their
accounts. Invite some of your better accounts to give you their
input on the piece(s) you are creating. You will be surprised at
some input you receive from good accounts! The other bonus is that
people like to be asked for their opinion; it just underscores the
importance of their account standing. |
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You've reached that point where you just can't take it anymore -- you have to do something about your website. You could hand off the duties to someone in the office with a copy of FrontPage or Dreamweaver and some spare time, but would you give your car keys to the kid down the street because he has a wrench and a screwdriver? Today, websites consist of a lot more than putting text on a page with some flashing graphics. They encompass marketing, branding, usability, information architecture, specialized coding, and a lot more work than most imagine. This is why it's generally best to hire a professional to help you. But how do you choose the best developer for your needs? There are plenty of people hanging shingles outside that proclaim themselves to be a "web developer." How do you differentiate between them all? First, you should feel comfortable working with the company. The process of designing a website can last between a few weeks to months, and if you don't have a comfortable working relationship with the company, the process will be painful. The company should be honest with you, telling you not only what you need, but what you don't. A good web developer will not tell you to do something just because there's money in it for them. They need to have your best interests at heart. Do not decide on price alone, though. While there are exceptions to the rule, quality and cost are generally tied together. Think of your website as an investment, not an expense. A well-designed site will bring in more revenue and cost less in the long run than one that was built to be nothing but as cheap as possible. Establish an upper limit on what you can afford, and try to work with the best company that you can in that range. Remember, a good company will be honest with you on what your budget can accomplish. Finally, look at the company's credentials. While they don't necessarily need to have experience in the home health care field, they need to have an established and varied portfolio of work that you find attractive. They should have experience working with companies of your size -- whether that is large or small. Look for the services that they offer above and beyond the initial design and development. Do they offer content management programs that would allow you to do some of the work internally after the site is developed? Do they do search engine optimization? Do they offer online marketing and advertising service to help promote your website? These services will help you establish both a successful website and a long running and effective relationship with the development company.
Donovan Cronkhite is a web developer with
RJ Michaels, Inc., a
leading marketing and communications firm specializing in integrating
new technologies and traditional media. |
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Meatball Sundae: Is Your Marketing Out of
Sync?
Seth's newest book is out and a great read. If you are familiar with Seth's other books (such as Purple Cow, Free Prize Inside, All Marketers are Liars, Permission Marketing, The Dip, Unleashing the Idea Virus, etc.), then you know that he has great, thought provoking, inspiring ideas that are adaptable to any type of business. I am a huge Seth Godin fan and have had the good fortune to spend a couple of days with him to learn and absorb.
"Gotta get me some of that New Marketing. Bring me blogs, e-mail, YouTube videos, MySpace pages, Google AdWords . . . I don't care, as long as it's shiny and new."
Wait. According to bestselling author Seth Godin, all these tactics are like the toppings at an ice cream parlor. If you start with ice cream, adding cherries and hot fudge and whipped cream will make it taste great. But if you start with a bowl of meatballs . . . yuck!
As traditional marketing fades away, the new tools seem irresistible. But they don't work as well for boring brands ("meatballs") that might still be profitable but don't attract word of mouth, such as Cheerios, Ford trucks, Barbie dolls, or Budweiser. When Anheuser-Busch spends $40 million on an online network called BudTV, that's a meatball sundae. It leads to no new Bud drinkers, just a bad case of indigestion.
Meatball Sundae is the definitive guide to the fourteen trends no marketer can afford to ignore. It explains what to do about the increasing power of stories, not facts; about shorter and shorter attention spans; and about the new math that says five thousand people who want to hear your message are more valuable than five million who don't.
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Home Care and Hospice Marketing Solutions is the leading industry-specific resource for home care professionals. Founded by Michael Ferris, we specialize in Sales, Marketing and Customer Service Coaching, Training, and Consulting for home health and hospice agencies.
We have expertise in Private Pay Home Care, Medicare Home Health, and Hospice including not-for-profit and for profit organizations. Our services enable home care agencies to understand and capitalize on the opportunities in their market.
The strategic and tactical services offered by Home Care and Hospice Marketing Solutions include:
Call (800) 293-5471 or
write us and see how
we can improve your home care and hospice sales skills! |
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If you have been tied up with the transition to the refined PPS, etc. it is a good idea to make sure you are not shortchanging your sales and marketing programs. Leadership is directly related to performance. To force yourself, enter a standing item on your agenda or to-do list to keep sales and marketing on your plate every week. Let me know how we can help you with the process.
Good Luck and Happy Selling! |
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