1. John Maese, MACP, FACEP, FHMISS Based on a presentation at Internal Medicine 2011 Hanging Out Your E-Shingle: How to Market Your Practice in a Digital Age 1

2. Shingle 2

3. 3

4. Outline Why this is an important topic? Marketing Concepts Traditional Content Development Web site Development Basic Web Based Marketing Social Media Conclusions 4

5. Why Just because you build it does not mean they will come. Market share is important whether you are employed by a hospital or in solo practice. 5

6. Why Competition. Other Physicians Hospital Networks Nurse Practioners Pharmacists PAs Comparisons. Consumerism. 6

7. Original Chat Room 7

8. Factors that Have Changed the Game The rise of the internet. The move towards digital age. The consumer movement in health care. The need to protect your image. Deceptive Medical Advertising. Change in advertising dollars spent on paper vs. digital media. Number of patients online. 8

9. Internet Statistics Number of people using the internet in North America 266,244,500 - or about 77% of the population. Eight in ten internet users look online for health information. Health information is the third most popular online search. 44% of internet users look online for information about doctors or other health professionals. 9

10. Web Sites that Compare Physicians Commercial sites. Data and Patient reviews. Government sites. Data. Insurance Company sites. Data and Cost. 10

11. Commercial Sites http://www.healthgrades.com http://www.vitals.com http://www.ucomparehealthcare.com http://www.lifescript.com http://www.qualityhealth.com http://www.angieslist.com http://www.healthline.com 11

12. HealthGrades 12

13. HealthGrades 13

14. Government The “Physician Compare” Web site, fashioned after CMS’s existing “Hospital Compare” site that enables consumers to shop for hospitals against several price and quality factors. Initially, information about physicians enrolled in the Medicare program and those participating in the Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS), through which CMS pays incentives for providers who meet various quality marks. CMS will add in January 2013 physician performance information based on 2012 quality reporting it receives. 14

15. CMS Site 15

16. State Site 16

17. Consumer Movement The new word of mouth “peer-influence” marketing. On Feb 25, 2010 in the Wall Street Journal an article titled “Trusting Other Patients' Drug Advice Peer- Influence Advertising Takes Off, as Companies Seek Effective Marketing Tools” was published. “Market research shows that the sick are relying more on the recommendations of fellow patients, and less on the reputations of companies and endorsers, in deciding whether to seek treatment and what drugs to ask for,” say pharmaceutical companies and their consultants. 17

18. Traditional Marketing Word of mouth Paper Telephone book Radio TV 18

19. Marketing Basics A brand is the identity of a specific product, service, or business - it affects the personality of a product, company or service. A legally protected brand name is called a trademark. The Brand is the image and personality you want to project. 19

20. Marketing Basics You stand for something! You are a brand! You want to brand yourself positively! You and your practice have a unique look and feel! 20

21. Brand The emotional expression of the brand is the brand personality. Who you are? How do you want patients to feel about you? How you want your practice to look on the web? 21

22. Brand Personality Brand Personality is the guide for the taste, tone, and style of ALL brand communications. A Brand is formed by the Branding elements. 22

23. Branding Elements Name who you are Logo your signature Color how you’re seen from a distance Symbol what you stand for Typography how you speak Illustrative style how you dress 23

24. Branding McDonald’s Red is associated with energy, passion, desire, love Yellow is associated with Joy Happiness Intellect Energy. Yellow is often associated with food. Bright, pure yellow is an attention getter, 24

25. Getting Started You need to spend time with staff and decide what you and your practice represent. An Internist’s Practice will have a different look and feel from a OB/GYN or a pediatric office. What is the goal of the web site? What services do you provide? 25

26. Getting Started Collect the correct information: Practice demographics: Physician(s) Full Name Practice Name Practice Full Address Practice Phone Number Hours of operation Description of Services. Description of Practice. Biographies of MDs and key personnel. 26

27. Bios Must be accurate and relevant to the practice. Who you are in a narrative. Highlights about the physician or the practice. Touch on Experience and Education. Comment on special interests of the physician if relevant to medicine. 27

28. Biography Donna Seminara, MD co-founded Island Internists in August of 1991, and is proud to have served thousands of families in Staten Island, sometimes over multiple generations, as their Primary Care Physician. Although involved in many academic and advocacy positions, she identifies herself first and foremost as a Practicing Clinician. She is Board Certified in Internal Medicine and Geriatrics, and has re-certified each of these credentials. 28

29. Bios She is Director of the Geriatrics Department and the Fellowship Program at SIUH. She has been elected to represent fellow Physicians on the Hospital’s Medical Executive Committee, and starting in the summer of 2011, will begin a two year term as the first female President of the Medical and Dental Staff at Staten Island University Hospital. Three to five times weekly Dr. Seminara can be found rounding on her patients admitted to Staten University Hospital’s North Campus. 29

30. Professional The Brand Dr. Seminara Caring Qualified Patient Advocate THE Doctor Compassionate 30

31. Other information Pictures (physicians, nurses, facilities) We are in a YouTube world- pictures and video are helpful. Testimonials ( Optional ) Patient testimonials are the single most powerful endorsement you can have! You must get permission to attribute it to an individual. Awards & Achievements (Optional) If you have done good things impress your patients. 31

32. Other information Logo Most practices do not have one. You can go without it. Can be developed for about $400. Desired colors Color has meaning and should be considered carefully. Any material that you may already have (optional) For example: Patient Education. 32

33. Website A website is a collection of related web pages containing digital documents/photographs. A web page is written in plan text interspersed with formatting instructions of Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML, XHTML). A website is hosted on web server, accessible via a network such as the Internet. World Wide Web is made up of Web pages. The Internet is the connection between the web pages It is relatively static compared to Twitter and Facebook. 33

34. Website Website Address or Domain name or URL. Are easy to obtain. Costs about $10 -$39 a year for registration Different Extension have different costs..com – Commercial Web site.net- Network Internet infrastructure activities, such as Internet Service Providers.edu- Education.ws - Web site 34

35. Website The Domain name may come as a package with web hosting. Who hosts the web site is the Internet Service Provider (ISP) address or physical address on the web. 35

36. Domain Names Services www.godaddy.com www.networksolutions.com www.max.md Others Domain Name Should be easy for patients to remember and spell. Should reflect the practice name. You might purchase more than one name. 36

37. Domain Names The practice name and spelling variations. Islandinternists.com Islandinternist.com The individual Physician names Johnmaese.com Johnmaesemd.com Johnmaese.md If the name is already taken then be creative Islandinternistsonline.com IslandinternistSI.com 37

38. How To Get a Domain Name? 38

39. How To get a Domain Name? 39

40. How To get a Domain Name? Do you want a private registration? This is like an unlisted phone number. Do you want it certified? Do you want an email package? Cost is about $3 to $7 a month not secure. Secure encrypted email is about $7 a month purchased by another company. 40

41. Hosting Services Hosting services Internet Service Provider (ISP) Can be bought as a separate service Deluxe vs. basic Service Basic is about 10 GB or about five pages of content for $ 4 / month Deluxe is about 150 GB or about twenty pages of content $7 / month. Security $ 49 a year for encryption Search Engine Optimization (SEO) $ 39 year Total cost simple five page website with SEO about $119/ year 41

42. Building a Web Site The Web site should be simple easy to navigate for your target audience Consistent with your Brand. Content optimized for Search Engines. Keep eye candy to a minimum unless you do cosmetic procedures. This helps keep expenses to a minimum. The more content, the more memory, the more cost. Clear! Readable! Understandable! 42

43. Building a Web Site You are going to build it to optimize its detection by search engines. This is called Search Engine Optimization(SEO) Consider a Blog with your web site. Track traffic - called ‘hits’ or ‘eyeballs’ i.e. Web Site Analytics 43

44. Prefabricated Website 44

45. Prefabricated Website 45

46. Prefabricated Website 46

47. Website 47

48. Web Shingle 48

49. Search Engines Search engines use an algorithm or formula that ranks web pages based on a variety of criteria. For example, the quality and number of web sites your site is linked to. 49

50. Web Marketing An overall strategy to use all elements of the Web to increase the ability to be found on the Web. Use the idiosyncrasies of Search Engine algorithms. 50

51. Web Marketing Strategies Web Marketing Strategies Search Engine Optimization Pay Per Click Local Search Visibility Email Facebook Twitter 51

52. Search Engine Optimization Enhancing your website rankings in search engines is important because most people do not go beyond page 2. SEO tries to get your website ranked high in a natural or "organic“ way. Search Engine rankings are earned and not paid. Natural search ranking is a sign of credibility to consumers. 52

53. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) There are about 36 elements that search engines look for when visiting a site. How you would search for yourself? Test key words in your search for practices like yours and see what happens. SEO is constantly changing. It is an art as well as a science. There are no guarantees. 53

54. SEO Key Factors How long your domain has been in existence. With respect to renewal terms of the domain name, the longer the better. Number of external Links. Word Density Key words Meta Tags Key Word Volume 54

55. Keywords Keywords are the words or phrases in the content of your website that someone is most likely to use when searching for your online business or website. For Example: Web site name, company name, or other related terms. (Keywords should be separated by a comma. ) You should limit keywords to 10-15 terms. 55

56. Keyword list Should be unique for each Web page and include words or phrases found throughout the page content, title tag, headings, attributes, and link text. If you have words and phrases that occur often, rearrange the order on each page helps to keep each tag unique. 56

57. Keyword Test 57

58. Pay Per Click Getting your website to appear in the paid ad spots is accomplished by developing a Pay Per Click advertising campaign Only important if you do cosmetic procedures. 58

59. Local Search Visibility Is a quick and easy way to get your business listed in local directories such as Google® Maps and Yahoo!® Local. You submit your web to local directories like: CitySearch.com Island Internists is located in Staten Island Have a physical address and phone number within an tag at least on your contact page and one other page; the best option would be the homepage. By far the best option is to have your address on all pages of your site. 59

60. Email The use of email for marketing is different than Email for communicating results. A recent poll showed that 52% of patients would be willing to communicate with their physician via e-mail regarding their care (Healthcare IT News, 3/24). Interactive Need consent by patient for the physician to initiate contact. 60

61. Caveats Communication with individual patients about their healthcare is different than marketing to large groups on the internet. Social media is not secure and should never be used to speak to individual patients about their health care. 61

62. Social Media Very Powerful As evidenced by the events in Egypt and around the world. Blogging Facebook Twitter YouTube 62

63. Blogging A blog is a blend of the word ‘web’ and ‘log’. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary. A dynamic Blog helps SEO ranking. You can correct or give out good medical information. Interactive As of February 16, 2011, there were over 156 million public blogs in existence. Worldpress.com Google blogger.com, blogspot.com Can be part of the web site or on its own. 63

64. Blog 64

65. Facebook 50% of active users log on to Facebook in any given day. The average user has 130 friends. People spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook. Average user is connected to 80 community pages, groups and events. CBS new reported that 51% of all Americans are on Facebook. 65

66. Facebook “Facebook helps you connect and share with the people in your life.” Dynamic. A “Back and Forth” conversation. Add stuff you like for your patients. Add photos. Do not allow people to write on your wall. 66

67. Twitter Twitter is an information network made up of 140-character messages called Tweets. It's a way to discover the latest news (“what’s happening”) related to subjects you care about. 67

68. Twitter 68

69. Twitter Instantaneous Very dynamic Limited to 140 characters per message - an average sentence. Good to get quick notices out. CHANGES IN OFFICE HOURS THE FLU VACCINE IS IN Engage patients and colleagues in the malpractice debate. 69

70. Twitter Twitter’s best-known ad format, called Promoted Tweets, looks like a regular tweet. The ads appear in some users’ individual accounts, tailored to what Twitter knows about their personal interests, and when users type specific keywords into the heavily-used search box on Twitter.com. Twitter advertisers pay a fee every time a user selects an ad, including clicking on a link or “retweeting” the message to the followers of his or her own Twitter account. http://twitter.com/johnmaese 70

71. Twitter facts As of Sept 14, 2010 Twitter has 175 million registered users. 95 Million tweets are written per day. 71

72. YouTube Founded in February 2005 YouTube allows billions of people to discover, watch and share originally-created videos. 72

73. YouTube A picture is worth a 1000 words Uptake can be incredible and info can go viral. “Charlie Bit My Finger” is the number one amateur video on YouTube today. 73

74. Measuring success! Hits or Eyeballs Local Global Periodically Google yourself. 74

75. Summary Brand your practice. Understand and respect the power of the internet. There is no one strategy. Do what you are comfortable with. Listen to feedback. Monitor the web. Synergies from interconnectivity. 75

76. SEO Information WWW.SEOAUDITS.COM WWW.BESTSEOLAB.COM Books - Dummy Series Contact: john@johnmaese.md johnmaese@gmail.com 76