Partnerships are a great tool to help your hospital become more engaged in your community. They can be very helpful in driving new business, but partnerships need to be considered with some care. Though you cannot be held responsible for all of the actions of your partners, you need them to share your same standard of excellence. Also think about how a partnership with one business may cut you off from referrals from similar businesses.
How do you form a good relationship with an outside partner? The first is to create added value for your clients. Does the partner offer something that you believe is important that you do not provide (high quality pet food, or pet boarding?). Second, find a way to incorporate the other company's existing clients (remember you are trying to broaden your reach) in any activity that you may be having. Lastly, always remember who you are.
Check out this unique solution by an Arizona veterinary hospital where snake bites are common. They provided a service through someone else that they themselves recommended (snake aversion training). This event made the hospital no money (in fact they lost a bit because of staffing costs - we did fix that later), but it was a huge success. They gained several new clients and have since held four more snake aversion training events.
This event was brought about through relationships developed at several less successful events. There is a level of trial and error to these things, but ultimately, like this hospital, you will find a winning solution and a great partnership with another company or organization.
Events do not need to be extravagant. They could be as small as a hiking club for pet owners (with matching leashes and t-shirts?), hosting educational seminars, helping local charities, or hosting an adoption event.
Think of all the things that you recommend, and all of the things that you do not, yourself, provide. Don't have a trainer, but believe in puppy classes? Simple, invite a trainer to use your facility. If there is another company in town that you have an already existing relationship with brainstorm with them about ideas. Be creative, be engaged in your community, and be seen!
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
The little things matter
We do big things in veterinary medicine. We save lives, and we educate people so that their pets can live longer healthier lives. If that was all that mattered our lives would be so much easier, but, it's not. It's nowhere near enough. Here are 5 small things that may seem unimportant to you, but they can make or break the reputation and client satisfaction of your hospital.
1. Smells, yep, we work in a smelly environment, un-neutered cat urine, anal glands, the frightened mastiff that unloaded a steer-sized mess in the lobby, these all add up. We need to be constantly vigilant of the smells that permeate our hospital, and we also need to be vigilant of the other smells that we use to cover them up with. You hand an employee a spray bottle of Lavender Mist Stink-begone and the next thing you know, the hospital smells like a dog defecated in a bottle of purfume. Many clients are sensitive to strong odors, and our overeager efforts to mask one smell may cause an even more unholy alliance of stench.
2. Name tags. I know that no one likes them. I know that the ones with pins attack sensitive parts when they accidentally get unpinned. There are magnetic ones, ones on chains, there are other less aggressive options, but they are necessary to produce an excellent client experience.
Let me tell you why; I take one of my bikes to this great little bike shop in down town Tucson. The staff is wonderful, and to my vast embarrassment, they all know who I am. If I leave my bike there for repairs, I will receive a friendly message from one of the great mechanics and I will go down to pick it up. The mechanic said his name on the phone. However, no one in the shop wears name tags, and they all assume that I know them. I do not. I am always embarrassed, because I have a name but no face to put it to.
Do not embarrass your clients. Introduce yourself and wear a name tag - every time!
3. Respect your clients. Have you ever heard your CSC say, "Well, I guess we can squeeze him in." Hospitals are a scheduling nightmare. I get it. But our language needs to reflect the urgency that we feel. If someone thinks that something is important enough to call, then it is important enough to be seen, and our inability to control our schedule is not the client's fault.
Look up and greet every client. Not just the clients we like, or the pets we like, but every one. Nothing is more important than the client standing in front of you right now, and your demeanor and the demeanor of your staff needs to reflect that.
4. Immaculate pets. It is too easy to send pets out with a bleeding toenail, rear end that still reeks of anal glands, or a neck covered in alcohol. Enforce a zero tolerance policy on handing pets back in any condition that is not absolutely pristine. If you must send home a pet with an oozing drain or an incompletely evacuated colon after an enema, give the owners a towel for their car. Do everything in your power to make events like these as rare as possible.
Bleeding toenails, post expression anal gland stench, and bloody post dental mouths are all controllable. They should never happen. There has to be a zero tolerance for these events. Quik Stop, H2O2 and Foo Foo Spray are all far cheaper than losing a client over a stinky butt or bloody car trip home.
5. Respect your profession. You woud be shocked at the things that some hospitals allow to occur in their lobby. This is another area for zero tolerance. No medicine in the lobby. No vaccines, no post dental checks, no quick chats, no treatment plans. Exam rooms are for medicine, the lobby is for waiting and paying. There should be no blurring of the lines here.
Doing a quick bordetella in the lobby may seem innocuous and convenient, but it diminishes our professsion. No doctor will ever vaccinate a kid in the lobby, your dentist won't ever ask you to 'open up' in the lobby. You are a professional. Every one of your actions should reflect your professionalism.
Details matter. They certainly matter in medicine, and they matter just as much in the running of your medical practice.
1. Smells, yep, we work in a smelly environment, un-neutered cat urine, anal glands, the frightened mastiff that unloaded a steer-sized mess in the lobby, these all add up. We need to be constantly vigilant of the smells that permeate our hospital, and we also need to be vigilant of the other smells that we use to cover them up with. You hand an employee a spray bottle of Lavender Mist Stink-begone and the next thing you know, the hospital smells like a dog defecated in a bottle of purfume. Many clients are sensitive to strong odors, and our overeager efforts to mask one smell may cause an even more unholy alliance of stench.
2. Name tags. I know that no one likes them. I know that the ones with pins attack sensitive parts when they accidentally get unpinned. There are magnetic ones, ones on chains, there are other less aggressive options, but they are necessary to produce an excellent client experience.
Let me tell you why; I take one of my bikes to this great little bike shop in down town Tucson. The staff is wonderful, and to my vast embarrassment, they all know who I am. If I leave my bike there for repairs, I will receive a friendly message from one of the great mechanics and I will go down to pick it up. The mechanic said his name on the phone. However, no one in the shop wears name tags, and they all assume that I know them. I do not. I am always embarrassed, because I have a name but no face to put it to.
Do not embarrass your clients. Introduce yourself and wear a name tag - every time!
3. Respect your clients. Have you ever heard your CSC say, "Well, I guess we can squeeze him in." Hospitals are a scheduling nightmare. I get it. But our language needs to reflect the urgency that we feel. If someone thinks that something is important enough to call, then it is important enough to be seen, and our inability to control our schedule is not the client's fault.
Look up and greet every client. Not just the clients we like, or the pets we like, but every one. Nothing is more important than the client standing in front of you right now, and your demeanor and the demeanor of your staff needs to reflect that.
4. Immaculate pets. It is too easy to send pets out with a bleeding toenail, rear end that still reeks of anal glands, or a neck covered in alcohol. Enforce a zero tolerance policy on handing pets back in any condition that is not absolutely pristine. If you must send home a pet with an oozing drain or an incompletely evacuated colon after an enema, give the owners a towel for their car. Do everything in your power to make events like these as rare as possible.
Bleeding toenails, post expression anal gland stench, and bloody post dental mouths are all controllable. They should never happen. There has to be a zero tolerance for these events. Quik Stop, H2O2 and Foo Foo Spray are all far cheaper than losing a client over a stinky butt or bloody car trip home.
5. Respect your profession. You woud be shocked at the things that some hospitals allow to occur in their lobby. This is another area for zero tolerance. No medicine in the lobby. No vaccines, no post dental checks, no quick chats, no treatment plans. Exam rooms are for medicine, the lobby is for waiting and paying. There should be no blurring of the lines here.
Doing a quick bordetella in the lobby may seem innocuous and convenient, but it diminishes our professsion. No doctor will ever vaccinate a kid in the lobby, your dentist won't ever ask you to 'open up' in the lobby. You are a professional. Every one of your actions should reflect your professionalism.
Details matter. They certainly matter in medicine, and they matter just as much in the running of your medical practice.
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