Smart marketing pays.

Some of the old ways won't work anymore. So, what's new and useful?

Long-term care facilities today face a volatile and highly competitive marketplace. They must market smarter and network better than ever before. Some do, others don't. Some are stuck in a time warp - they are marketing as they did 20 years ago, even though everything has changed. When confronted with the necessity for change, their response and mantra is "We've always done it this way!" That's not only dumb, but also dangerous. As the industry approaches the millennium, it needs a reality check and a wake-up call.

Reality Check

Some owners and operators believe that just because they have changed the name of their facility from nursing home to health and rehabilitation center, their marketing problems are over. Well not exactly. Changing the facility's name is a tactic, but a marketing and networking strategy must support it. Changing the facility's name, which may or may not be a good idea, is merely a first step.

Wake-Up Call

Some administrators need a loud wake-up call; especially those who used to manage what used to be called intermediate care facilities. They are so caught up with their "subacute units" (or should I say "post-acute"), they forget the need to market the rest of the facility. Although the certified unit is doing all right (at least until the full impact of Medicare's PPS sinks in), the rest of the facility is plagued by census and mix problems. While the marketing of the subacute unit has been "delegated" to the newly hired rehabilitation company, the marketing of the remaining beds has been left in the hands of "the social service designee" or "admissions coordinator." That, says the administrator, should be "good enough."

That is a disturbing attitude. "Good enough" is not good enough anymore, because today's competition is fierce and the industry is convulsed with changes. So what if your facility has finally graduated from "intermediate care" and set up a certified section. If the patients in those beds are all "Medicare simplex" patients, you are going to take a hit in reimbursement. With the early confusion surrounding the implementation of the PPS, your rates might actually go a little higher, but don't count on any bonanza. Slowly but surely, the noose will be tightened, and your reimbursement will decrease.

Remember, the federal budget has already been programmed for some $115 billion in Medicare cuts! The PPS is the mechanism for achieving long-term care's $9 billion share of those cuts.

Confronted by this, administrators would do well to consider developing a "super-subacute unit" - a specialty product - which would then be marketed to managed care executives looking for non-Medicare private insurance placements. To effectively market a specialty product such as this, one needs niche marketing skills. Ask your "marketing liaison nurse" for her understanding of the difference between mass marketing and niche marketing! Her answer will demonstrate how much your facility needs to learn about more sophisticated marketing techniques. (More on this later.)

More and more these days I hear administrators boast, "We're on the Net!" Okay, so your facility is on the Internet. You have a Web site - multiple pages, maybe. That's good, but still not good enough. To be effective on the Net, you must learn how to position your message so that it is motivational as well as educational. If you don't employ positioning skills, then you have simply created a message in the form of an electronic Yellow Page: same old vapid message but in a new medium. Thus, for example, your message must be more than a listing of all available therapies and quick references to your beautician and dental services. Make sure you target a specific customer and emphasize the offerings appropriate to that audience.

In long-term care marketing, you should decide whether you are targeting a consumer or a professional (i.e., case manager or discharge planner). Lay people haven't a clue what "Level One, Level Two and Level Three beds" are. What does JCAHO-accredited mean (and who is "Jacko," anyway)? This sort of information, though, might impress professionals.

Thus, in creating a Web site, take some time with the language and concepts you use. Note, too, that cyberspace is crowded these days. Don't confuse getting "hits" with actual requests for admission.

Visiting Discharge Planners

"Marketing Calls" or "Social Calls"

To be successful in the marketplace, a facility must get out into its marketing area and make personal contacts. Whether this is done by a single person, i.e., the marketing director, or by a team is not as important as having a networking strategy. Who is to be visited, and when and how? Cold calls? By appointment? Today's discharge planners, besieged by hordes of marketing people clamoring for appointments, usually resist giving them or delay making them months at a time. Sometimes the discharge planner gives an appointment for a specified day and hour, but when the marketing person shows up, turns out to be missing. An associate explains "... she was called to an urgent meeting." Whether true or not, the appointment was missed and empty beds remain. For these reasons, I advise making "cold calls."

One advantage of a cold call is that it enhances your chance of catching the discharge planner "in." Even if you don't make direct contact, try to speak with anyone you can who might pass the word along. But remember, successful cold calls require careful planning and preparation. Your marketing team must have a polished, practiced 10-minute drill. Don't wing it! Get to the point. Cover the essentials. Watch your time, and above all, always ask the three critical closing questions: Are you convinced our facility can meet your patients' needs? Do you have any questions? When might we expect our first admission?

Finally, generate a networking report after each visit indicating what was discussed and what everyone's expectations are as a result of the meeting.

6 Steps to Better Marketing

Based on years of consulting with facilities throughout the U.S. in need of marketing assistance, I would offer six guidelines to bolster marketing success:

One: Top management should be sure it is operating on the same wavelength.

There must be a common definition among top managers of what marketing is before a facility can formulate a plan or strategy. If the owner has one idea about what marketing is and the administrator has another, how can the facility be marketed with any sort of precision or clarity?

Two: Marketing is not a solitary game, it's a team endeavor.

And I don't mean just the marketing team. The facility's administrative team, sales team, service delivery team and operations management team must all contribute to and validate the marketing campaign. It is hard enough to get new admissions; it would be a shame if poor care and substandard service lead to premature discharges. All employees must be trained in how to provide friendly, attentive, responsive service.

By the way, customer service training requires a program, consciously designed and applied to improve performance, not posters or slogans plastered around the employees' locker room. The program must be periodically repeated until the message sinks in and good service becomes a part of the job, not something "extra."

Three: Understand your products.

Some administrators and even marketing directors have trouble making the conceptual transition from "beds" to "products." Though they offer space, they provide (and market) health care. Also, some admissions coordinators and facility sales personnel still confuse "services" for "products." They think that "food service," "social service," "housekeeping services," etc., are a facility's products! They are not. Services come with or accompany the facility's "products." The products are the types of care that people need and require, whether it is subacute, skilled or custodial; the services come with the products. If the facility's representatives have difficulty identifying their own products, then how can their products possibly be positioned or marketed effectively?

Four: Specialty products require niche-marketing skills.

Earlier we mentioned the crucial difference between niche marketing and mass marketing.

"Niche" comes from a French verb meaning "to nest" or "to occupy a small place - a nest." A niche is a small part of a larger whole, a tiny slice of a larger piece. Niche marketing therefore differs from mass marketing in four ways:

1. It focuses on one specific product, not many.

2. It targets a specific customer, not everybody.

3. The targeted customer has a particular need for that product.

4. The product usually sells for a higher price than does a mass marketed one.

All of long-term care's "specialty products" - subacute care, Alzheimer's care, adult day care - require niche marketing techniques, particularly in advertising. They must be seen to be addressing very specific problems and concerns. Unfortunately, long-term care facilities engage more typically in what I call "lump marketing" - i.e., their marketing mentions every single product the facility offers, leaving the customer bewildered, confused and overwhelmed. That's dumb. Look at it this way - Coca-Cola has Regular Coke, Cherry Coke, Diet Coke and caffeine-free Coke. When was the last time you saw an ad advertising all four products at once?

Different products require different ads (to explain the specific strengths, benefits and advantages of the particular product) directed at specific customers (who have different needs to be satisfied).

Five: Concentrate on attracting the best payers.

In long-term care, the best payers would be:

* private insurance, non-Medicare managed care

* any Medicare patient with private-pay as secondary payment

* private-pay patients with liquid assets for 12-16 months

* Medicare patients with Medicaid as secondary payment

* Veterans Administration patients

* Straight Medicaid (last and least)

In my 20-year consulting career, I tried always to focus clients' attention on trying to attract the best payers, and not always successfully. I begged owners and operators to establish a private pay marketing strategy. Some did. Others didn't, claiming "there are no private paying patients out there." They proceeded to watch the assisted living market grow exponentially. Where did all those private-pay residents come from? Obviously, the private-pay market always existed, but long-term care facilities Racked a "best-payer" strategy to develop it.

Six: Sharpen selling skills.

Selling is a four-step process of educating, motivating, qualifying, and closing. Customers must not only know what a product is and does - i.e., be educated - but must be motivated to purchase it. Qualifying means finding the appropriate customers. Closing does not mean "getting the check;" closing is the process that causes the check to be written. You cannot put pressure on people to force them to buy. You ask them a series of questions that motivates them to buy! The trouble is most admissions coordinators cannot define what a closing is, let alone know what the closing questions are or when to ask them.

If you want to market smarter, follow these six guidelines. I guarantee that your marketing will be better and will pay off. Smart marketing always does.

George E. Molloy, president of M & M Associates (Fort Pierce, FL), a leading consulting firm for long-term care providers, is author of Marketing Success, Selling Success and the recently published Smart Marketing. For further information, [phone].