What is Health Literacy in Chiropractic and Natural Heath Care?

Posted on June 3, 2024 by Edward Petty

patients watching a presentation by a chiropractor

The more people know about health, the more they will help others be healthier.

I just ran across a “study” entitled “The Relationship Between Health Literacy and Medical Costs. *”

Their findings:

Patients with lower health literacy had higher hospitalization rates compared to those with higher health literacy.

What does this mean? Let’s look at how Health Literacy is defined:

“Health literacy is the ability to obtain, process, and understand basic health information and services to make appropriate health decisions.” (U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) (HHS)

So, how is this working out for us in the U.S.?

The U.S. ranks last in a comparison of 11 high-income countries in terms of general health. This is despite the U.S. spending the most on healthcare compared to these nations.*

health care system performance rankings comparison

So, it can be reasoned that Americans aren’t getting much information on health care. Our people are fatter, sicker, and more depressed. Our kid’s health is getting worse.*

IMPROVING HEALTH LITERACY IN CHIROPRACTIC AND NATURAL HEALTH CLINICS

However, as the above study illustrates, there is a direct connection between educated patients and better health.

We already know this from experience in practice. I just thought it was interesting that there was a study showing this fact: better educated patients are healthier. They also refer more people for care.

Here are 3 approaches to improved patient education, though there are many others:

Inform while you perform. Educate your patients each day about some aspect of health care. This is also called Table Talk.
Care Class. It used to be common procedure in practice building to have regular new classes for patients. Not only were they educational, but entertaining. They built community. They also increased patient referrals, patient retention, and improved the motivation of those giving the talks. They cost next to nothing, except for the doctor’s and staff member’s time. In some offices, refreshments were added. In one chiropractic clinic I worked with would award attendees with clinic t-shirts and provide great pizza and had a full class!
Newsletter with a case study. When your patients are not in the office, send them a short note. Maybe add a video. Doesn’t have to be professional, just authentic and describe a successful case or some health tip that they can use.

I think that because we work and live in a health profession that we take health knowledge for granted. And it can be easy to assume people know what you know.

They don’t.

There is a chasm between what you know about health and what your patients know.

How full would your schedule be if your patients, and their family and friends, knew what you knew about how to stay healthier?

Health literacy is a term from the medical world that has obviously failed to bring about health literacy.

No surprise there.

But in your corner of the world, you can change this and increase true health literacy with all your patients. And help more people.

Seize the future,

References:

* American Journal of Public Health, 1998. Baker, D.W., Parker, R.M., Williams, M.V., Clark, W.S.,

* U. S. Ranks last. https://www.commonwealthfund.org/press-release/2021/new-international-study-us-health-system-ranks-last-among-11-countries-many

* Kids getting sicker. https://childrenshealthdefense.org/follow-the-science/54-of-us-youth-are-chronically-ill/?itm_term=home

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If your practice building efforts aren’t taking you to your goals, there are reasons — many of which are hidden from you.

Find out what they are and how to sail to your next level by getting and implementing my book, The Goal Driven Business.

Chiropractic Patient Education Prompters – Table Talk Grows Your Flock

Posted on November 9, 2022 by Edward Petty

Imagine this scenario:

Written on a white board near the chiropractic patient adjusting area:

Last to show and the first to go.

Patient: Hey Doc, what does that mean, written on the white board there?

Doctor: Hi Sam, glad you asked. Just a reminder for me to explain that pain usually shows up after a health problem is present for a period of time, and usually goes away or lessens during the early part of our program of care. In other words, the pain can go away but the issue that caused it can still be present.

Patient: Oh, I got you! So, even though I am feeling much better, I better stick with the program, is that it?

Doc. Yep!

===

You know patient education is important. It improves outcomes. It improves retention. It improves referrals.

This is a simple procedure to improve your patient education: Assign a creative staff member the task of writing images or sayings that prompt the patient, or prompt you, to talk about a health subject. That’s it!

It prompts TABLE TALK.

Table talk is the BEST form of patient education and, for that matter, promotion. It comes from you, the doctor, during the most transformative time in your office.

Here are a few sample subjects you could post on a white board near your adjusting table:

How does chiropractic work?
Above Down Inside Out
Dr. You
Does chiropractic help with headaches?
Last to Show First to Go
Time, Repetition, Effort! [It takes time to restore your health, it has taken a long time for you to get into this condition. It takes repetitive work, like orthodontics. We will give you our best effort, you will have to do the same,]

Add a drawing now and then:

How is pain like an iceberg? (Draw an iceberg. [Iceberg Symptoms on top of the water, cause below in the water.]
How is spinal health like a rusty hinge? [This is when your vertebrae wears away when it becomes stuck.]
What happens to your tires when they are out of alignment? [Disks wear out faster like tires out of alignment.
Car Parked a garden hose. [When the hose is stepped on or kinked the water does not flow 100%. The same is true when you have a subluxation and your nerves are impinged. This affects everything your nerves are connected to.]
Safety Pin.
Orthodontics.

Just so you don’t get too serious, add a joke now and then:

I had to turn down the landscape company today…

****They wanted too mulch

The bartender says “Sorry, we don’t serve time travelers in here.”

****A time traveler walks into a bar.

===

This procedure doesn’t cost you. Like chiropractic (or our consulting!), it pays!

But only do it for two months at a time, otherwise it will lose its novelty for you, the staff, and patients. Run it 2- 3 times each year.

Once a month, meet with your team and come up with some new patient education prompters. This is also another way to educate your team in the process.

Keep the conversation going.

The more they know, the further they’ll go.

And seize the future.

The Mental Immune System

Posted on September 30, 2021 by Edward Petty

A healthy body has a well-functioning system to protect it or make it physically immune from disease. I am sure you have seen this occur with your patients as you adjust and treat them.

But there is no doubt that the mind also affects the body. In your practice, could you improve your patient’s mental immune system? Of course, and already do. I am sure you bolster your patient’s mental immune system even though you or your team may not have looked at it this way. Providing your patients with genuine positive feedback and showing them gratitude for their regular visits can go a long way in enhancing their mental well-being.

A mental immunity system would help individuals be protected, or immune, from negative influences or circumstances in the environment. This would be the ability to “roll with the punches” and keep one’s stress level low despite potentially stressful situations. You can’t be expected to help your patients achieve this in all areas of life, but you can help them with this regarding their health.

Your patients and clients are under a constant deluge of frightening and drug-related messages that can be demoralizing and lead them to less than optimum health choices. There is not much incentive for large corporations to promote exercise, eat organic food, take vitamins, and encourage people to be nice to their neighbors. Instead, there is more money in promoting drugs and fast food, and beer. It took a long time and great expense to stop cigarette advertising, but pharmaceutical advertising has now taken its place.

So, it is for this reason I recommend positive health advertising to your patients regularly. The more they know and understand how to maintain their physical health, the better prepared they will be to critically interpret the corporate advertising of products masquerading as “healthy.”

Here are some methods to improve your patient’s mental immune system regarding health:

Extraordinary customer service. Through empathic communication, get to know your patients so that they know you care about them and can trust you. You are in their corner and have their “back.”
Positive reinforcement. Genuinely recognize their good efforts to improve their health and any positive responses to your program of care.
Table Talk. Listen to their stories and provide quick positive educational tips about health related to their story.
Educational themes. Pick an educational them each week and have literature for patients.
Patient successes. You can include notable case successes with your education themes each week or each month. Spread the good news!
Lending Library. Stock your book shelves with books on subjects you would like your patients to read. Encourage your patients and staff to study. (See a sample list of books we selected a few years ago over at pmaworks.com.)
Workshops. These can be done virtually or in person.
Newsletters. These can be electronic as well as hard copies by snail mail. They help “keep the conversation going.”

You are the positive lighthouse of health in a storm of gloom and unhealthy corporate products. You can improve the physical immune system of your patients by also improving their mental immune system regarding health.

Image from: Kellogg, Yevgenia Nayberg

Selling the Invisible — Patient Education: An Inexpensive Marketing Procedure with a Big Return

Posted on November 10, 2020 by Edward Petty

[Link to a checklist of patient education procedures below.]

Educate your patients!

There are so many reasons why — let’s look at a few of them. Then, I will show you how your team can implement your patient education procedures.

1. Selling the Invisible. Unlike buying a refrigerator, your patients are purchasing something they can’t see.

They are receiving a service for which there are no concrete, tangible references for them to judge whether the services were excellent, complete, or long-lasting. Outside of immediate relief from their symptoms, they may wonder if you provided a great service, shortchanged them, or are recommending more than they need.

On the other hand, you know the length, breadth, and depth of what you provide. Virtually, you can see the outcomes, know the measurements, understand the symptoms and know what they point to. But to your patients… it’s all an illusion. They have to trust you and what you say.

Typically, once the symptoms are relieved, many patients believe that the condition is resolved. But through education, your patients can understand how your treatment recommendations are a pathway to fully resolving their condition.

2. Beyond Your Services – Your Patient’s Optimal Health. Beyond your services and the treatment program you suggest, your patients will benefit from general health knowledge. Health is a lifestyle, including exercise and nutrition, but the healthy way of living is distorted by unrelenting drug advertising and propaganda.

Low-fat diets, diet soda, statins and other drugs are still an accepted part of the conventional health model. Pharma is increasingly pouring billions into advertising — $328.6 billion in 2016 from $116 billion in 1997.(¹) In addition, there are untold sums spent on lobbying your elected officials and paying for their election expenses.

Health reality is being manufactured for corporate profits rather than for personal and family health and longevity. Your patients and neighbors in your community don’t have a chance without your calm teaching of the facts on how to achieve a healthy and long life.

3. Customer Education — From a strictly commercial point of view, other businesses are seeing the advantages of customer education. According to learning industry analyst John Leh, “In a world where customer success increasingly determines overall business success, customer education has become an imperative.”⁽²⁾

Studies support the idea that customer education pays off. According to studies by ThinkJar, a customer strategy consultancy, “Customers are thirsty for more information and knowledge.”⁽³⁾And a study by Eisingerich and Bell conclude that customer education improves the trust in the company.⁽⁴⁾

Major businesses are investing large sums in educating their customers, and a leading customer education platform, Skilljar announced it has raised $33 million in funding. That is a significant investment! Their goal is to provide tools to companies to better onboard, engage, and retain customers at a large scale.

So if you want healthier patients and a healthier community, and if you would like to generate more profit, simply spend more time educating your patients. It is not that expensive! But as with most value-added programs in a practice, projects rarely start, and when they do, they are abandoned almost as soon as they begin.

To avoid this, use a checklist!!

Download the Patient Education Checklist for some ideas on what you can do to educate your patients. Assign a team member this checklist and give them 1-3 hours per week to work on selected projects and report on them at your meetings. They can take on the role of Patient Education Coordinator and help everyone on your team up their game in patient education.

The more your patients know, the further they (and you) will go.

Ed Petty

1. Consumer Reports, January 14, 2019 
2. Avramescu, Adam. Customer Education: Why Smart Companies Profit by Making Customers Smarter.
3. Interview with Kolsky, Foundoer of ThinkJar. Huffpost, 10/15/2015
4. Andreas B. Eisingerich, Simon J. Bell, February 1, 2008 
Photo from UCLA

Selling the Invisible – a favorite book of mine by Harry Beckwith

How to Defeat COVID: Be A HEALTH OUTLAW!

Posted on July 16, 2020 by Edward Petty

“I will sell Chiropractic, serve Chiropractic, and save Chiropractic if it will take me twenty lifetimes to do it. I will promote it within the law, without the law, in keeping with the law or against the law in order to get sick people well and keep the well from getting sick.” — B. J. Palmer

What is it with all the bad news ALL the time?

Well, here is some good news: across the boards, practices are returning to their pre-COVID days. We monitor our clients’ numbers closely, and we see offices meeting, and in some cases, exceeding what they did at the same time last year! A few others are even hiring more doctors and staff.

What? Isn’t the world coming to an end?

Hell no! And here is why: people like you, and your patients, are, and always have been, rebellious. Health rebels! You question authority. (How dare you!)

What we are witnessing, for chiropractors and other non-conventional health offices, is nothing new. The good news and benefits of real health care are never promoted, and in fact, are suppressed. Got pain? Here, take some opioids. Back problem? We’ll just do surgery. Too much weight? We’ll suck the fat out. (yuck) Arthritis? Here, have some Vioxx.

You know what real health care is – and isn’t. And you know what? So do your patients. You can’t fool everyone all the time. And I would say that much of the world is with you, despite the massive media slant towards drugs and population crisis control. People are aware of organic food, for example, and so organic products and food stores have had explosive growth in the last 20 years. And supplements! The supplement industry has also seen mega growth and is expected to grow over 12% this year, according to Nutritional Business Journal*.

People know what side you are on – their side. They know what you stand for – health. You are the health doctors, coaches, and teams — curious, caring, and independent. You aren’t beholding to hospitals, a bureaucracy, or drug companies. This is what Dr. Zelenko cited as a factor to help him, and his colleagues come up with an inexpensive antidote for COVID that is 80-90% effective – so effective in fact, other countries are adopting it. I strongly recommend his YouTube videos, especially the one with Del Bigtree. (Link below.)

Here are some suggestions to Fight COVID:
How to Fight COVID: Steps for Health Outlaws

Goal: Get more people healthier.
Stay on the offense. Stay true to your goal. Think about how you can help three times more people.
Don’t let the negative few outweigh the positive many. Keep in mind, only a small percentage of bad things cause the majority of the bad news. (Pareto Principle – 80/20)
Don’t get distracted by politics, or “I am right — you are wrong.”
Be nice. Understand people are confused and frightened. Don’t call people sheeple, cowards, or selfish killers.
Protesting is fine. Just don’t get side-tracked. Stay GOAL DRIVEN.
Keep studying what is working. Mercola.com, Highwire with Del Big Tree, ChildrensHeathDefense.org, and others.
Use your voice and educate others.
a. Use Table Talk, your most powerful weapon when combined with excellent service and outcomes.
b. Use newsletters. Genuine communication keeps the relationship and conversation going with you, rather than with the media or distraught neighbors or family members.
c. Post on social media.
d. Zoom workshops.
e. Podcasts.
Stay Well in Winter campaign. Consider promoting a health and conditioning program, Stay Well in Winter, to strengthen people for the seasonal flu and possible “2nd Wave” of COVID.
Join or create a Health “Rebel” Alliance. Network with other providers in your area and form a health “conspiracy.” Chiropractors, acupuncturists, Holistic MD’s, Naturopathic Doctors, Biological Dentists, Exercise Trainers, Organic Food Co-ops, to name a few. Lead the way.

The chiropractic profession has been the largest and most active professional group standing up for true health for over 120 years. Absolute American and homegrown, your profession has been genuine guardians of health, and has withstood every attack imaginable. So, all this pandemic stuff is pretty routine for you guys and gals. And if this has made you Health Outlaws, I know that sits just fine with you.

Loads of sincere respect and thanks for crisis medical teams, as always. But keeping people out of crisis, out of hospitals is your goal, and ours as well. We share this goal with you and stand with you to help more people become healthier.

Thank you for all you do.

Ed and all of us at PM&A

Del Bigtree and Dr. Vladimir Zelenko 45 minutes
Deal Big Tree “Crimes Against Humanity” – with Dr. Zelenko and others, full presentation. 2:16

Nutritional Business Journal.

Fight the Nocebo Effect

Posted on March 21, 2020 by Edward Petty

I am sure that all of you are trying to stay up with unfolding events regarding the virus and the governmental recommendations – and enforcement — to deal with it.

We are, as well.

I am sending this email out to encourage you to watch an informative video by Del Bigtree, who reviews the facts and numbers of the virus pandemic. It is a bit long, so I am sending this out this weekend in case you have more time to watch it.

I have also included an article by Bruce Lipton. Dr. Lipton is a cellular biologist who taught medical students at the University of WI medical college and often speaks at chiropractic seminars.

Plus, an article that states 99% of those who died from the virus had other illnesses.

(Links below.)

We must watch out for the GENERALITY of the virus. For example: “COVID-19 could kill us all!” “Who says?” “They do.” “Who is “they.”” “The authorities.” “Who are the authorities?” “Those who are in charge.” You have to break it down and be as logical as you can.

I recommend that you review these sources, add to it what you are learning, and using your best judgment, continue educating your team members and patients/members/clients!

Be the lighthouse in your community.

Education and knowledge displace fear and uncertainty.

Let’s eradicate what Dr. Lipton calls the “nocebo” effect — the opposite of a placebo.

And let’s continue our fight to help people get healthier!

Keep educating,

By the way, no one is saying you must close your office. Even in California where San Francisco has a “Shelter in Place” or strict quarantine. For example, the California Chiropractic Board of Examiners, on their website, states:

Should My Practice Remain Open?
The Board does not have authority to close businesses or practices solely as a result of COVID-19.

YOUR SERVICES ARE VITAL!

The Exec. Director of the Kansas Chiropractic Association, in a letter to their state Governor (March 20, 2020), stated:

“We understand that with the severity of the current pandemic hospital emergency rooms may soon be filled with patients complaining of pulmonary symptoms. We offer our services in diagnosis and treatment of musculoskeletal complaints presenting to emergency rooms. Many Doctors of Chiropractic have arranged to be a referral point for their local emergency rooms on these conditions.

“We are prepared to see these patients in our offices that are already taking every precaution available to prevent the transmission of COVID-19.”

REFERENCES

Del Bigtree Coronavirus Quarantine March 19

Bruce Lipton Cornonvrus 2019-Covid-19 UPDATE

Bloomberg News March 18, 2020 99% of those who Died From Virus Had Other Illness, Italy Says

The Sickest Generation and Back to School Programs

Posted on August 1, 2019 by Edward Petty

In late summer, many offices sponsor a promotion for children and their health. This is often in the form of a backpack check-up, scoliosis and posture check, or a school supply drive. The idea is to link the new school year with children’s health to better promote clinic services, generate new patients, and of course, improve the health of the kids.

It’s been my experience that these events are usually only marginally effective. Still useful, I feel that the real opportunity is being missed.

You could be getting more families under care. How?

Educate your families and your community on:

1. The results you deliver. How the outcomes you generate with children’s health are extraordinary. Use written and video testimonials and endorsements.

2. What you stand for. Today’s children face more challenges to their health than their parents. In fact, our children today are sicker than earlier generations. Learn about this and make it your anthem, a flag you wave. Stand up for the kids in your community, and you will earn respect and allegiance of parents. Be their guardians in health.

3. Provide special promotions and events. These could be workshops, screenings, or a special day of services with donations going to a local charity.

4. Alliances and Partnerships. It would be a good idea to create alliances with midwives, doulas, biological dentists, acupuncturists, and other professionals who share a similar concern and goal for healthier children. Invite them to participate in your events. Have them contribute a short article in your newsletter – in exchange, you could do the same with them in their newsletters. Create partnerships.

5. Schedule an event every two months, or every month. Never stop.

Your leadership, based upon your awareness of the health crisis facing our youth, is the primary element that will drive the success of your kid’s programs.

Read the following from the ebook, The Sickest Generation and follow the link below to the entire article, and other resources to become even more acquainted with the challenges the next generation of children face.

American children have never been sicker. Over half (54%) are suffering from one or more chronic illnesses, with the late 1980s and early 1990s viewed as the gateway period that launched the decline.
Many chronic illnesses have doubled since that time. The “4-A” disorders—autism, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, asthma and allergies—have experienced meteoric growth, affecting children’s quality of life and contributing to premature mortality. The spike in autism prevalence has been particularly dramatic, with prevalence as high as 3% (one in 34 children) in some regions. Pediatric autoimmune conditions also are on the rise.
U.S. children are far more likely to die before their first birthday than infants in other wealthy countries and life expectancy is falling, driven largely by rising death rates in adolescents and younger adults. Suicide is the second leading cause of death in teens, half of whom are reported to have at least one mental, emotional or behavioral disorder.
The proportion of public school children using special education services is skyrocketing, with estimates ranging from 13% to 25% of school populations.

Sincerely,

Ed Petty

To the ebook, The Sickest Generation and other references.

Children’s Health Resources

Posted on August 1, 2019 by Edward Petty

The following are some sources of information regarding the health crisis affecting our children.

===

The Children’s Health Defense is a powerful organization that is on the front lines in fighting corporate propaganda promoting harmful drugs for kids. They have many lawyers, including Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., working on exposing false information and corruption regarding children’s health.eBook Sign-Up—The Sickest Generation
Free eBook: The Sickest Generation: The Facts Behind the Children’s Health Crisis and Why It Needs to End Children are the key to a successful future and a prosperous nation, yet American children have never been sicker with a vast array of chronic illnesses. (Also available in Spanish.)

The Pharmaceutical Industry’s Front Men
By the Children’s Health Defense Team

The Medical Journals’ Sell-Out—Getting Paid to Play
By the Children’s Health Defense Team

Science Library
This database contains hundreds of peer-reviewed, published articles on environmental contaminants that are implicated in the rise of the childhood epidemics we are currently experiencing in the U.S. and other industrialized nations.

===

Pathways is a long-standing publication with health articles that is free to members of the International Chiropractic Pediatric Association. Its website has links to many articles, a few of which are below:

Pathways to Family Wellness

Are We Making Our Children Sick?
http://pathwaystofamilywellness.org/Nutrition/are-we-making-our-children-sick.html

Natural Immunity
http://pathwaystofamilywellness.org/Informed-Choice/natural-immunity.html

Ear Infections in Kids: Natural Remedies to Ease Ear Pain and Enhance Function
http://pathwaystofamilywellness.org/Holistic-Healthcare/ear-infections-in-kids-natural-remedies-to-ease-ear-pain-and-enhance-function.html

===

There are many books on children’s health, and it is fascinating to search to find them. Commit to buying at least one per month, reading it, reporting on it to a team meeting, and placing it in your Lending Library. Have your team members do the same! Here are three:

Books

A Compromised Generation: The Epidemic of Chronic Illness in America’s Children Paperback – September 16, 2010 by Beth Lambert

The Vaccine-Friendly Plan: Dr. Paul’s Safe and Effective Approach to Immunity and Health-from Pregnancy Through Your Child’s Teen Years Paperback – August 23, 2016 Paul Thomas M.D.

How to Raise a Healthy Child in Spite of Your Doctor: One of America’s Leading Pediatricians Puts Parents Back in Control of Their Children’s Health Mass Market Paperback – May 12, 1987
by Robert S. Mendelsohn MD

November and December Marketing — and Your Higher Purpose

Posted on November 1, 2017 by Edward Petty

November and December are special times for patient marketing, whether you are promoting to prospective patients, active, or inactive patients.

Usually, we have found that internal marketing is better during this time of year as you don’t need to compete with commercial businesses as they slug it out in an advertising frenzy. You can prepare now and schedule your external promotions and community services for January and February. Of course, if you see an excellent opportunity for external marketing now, take it. But the primary focus should be internal for these two months.

November and December are “cozy” months. In North America — we have Thanksgiving. This is a time we give thanks for all our blessings and gifts and family and friends. It is a time when people feel grateful. Christmas is also a time of good cheer and giving, as is Hanukkah and other holidays.

And, for some of you, it is also the season of the yearly hunt — when you bring home the ring tail pheasants, the turkeys, and “da ‘tirty point buck.” (Wisconsin-ese for “the 30-point buck.”)

Your promotions should align with the spirit of the season to be most effective. Donation drives are often held. There are many churches and associations in your town that need help as they prepare to assist the less fortunate.

“Toys for Tots”, “Food for Families”, or “Coats for Kids”, are many popular promotions by local media stations. I don’t doubt that they are helpful, but I do sometimes question their sincerity.

Of course, you want more customers, that is the nature of business. But you must lead with your mission statement first.

Any promotions should stem from your higher purposes.

The Higher Purpose Company
In The High Purpose Company, (Arena, 2007) Christina Arena reports on her team’s study of 75 companies’ efforts at Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

She shows how corporations, by doing good, by providing better conditions for employees, more sustainable sourcing of raw materials, and contributing to beneficial causes in their communities, generate more income.

“The central findings of my research can be distilled in the following way: superficiality fails whereas authenticity prevails. Companies that falsely approach corporate responsibility as a form of marketing, public relations, or even philanthropy don’t produce the most meaningful results. In fact, they often waste their money and create additional liabilities. Conversely, companies that truly approach the practice of corporate responsibility as a fully integrated business strategy, wisely investing in profitable solutions to meet unmet social and environmental needs and problems find their performance greatly enhanced.”

According to the Harvard Business Review, business spent more than $15 billion in 2016 on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) programs. (Davidson, July 7, 2016) And according to, Linda Novick O’Keefe, founder of Common Threads, “that number is rising as businesses see signs that investments in CSR improve company performance, talent recruitment and retention. (O’Keefe, 2016) “Giving in Numbers”, a study published by the CECP that analyzes giving and corporate societal engagement trends, revealed companies that increased giving by at least 10 percent between 2013 and 2015 actually experienced upticks in revenue and pre-tax profit, while all other companies saw a decrease in both.”

Your “WHY?”
Marketing must be honest, and it has to tell why you are doing the marketing. As Simon Sinek reminds us:

“Very few people or companies can clearly articulate WHY they do WHAT they do. By WHY I mean your purpose, cause or belief – WHY does your company exist? WHY do you get out of bed every morning? And WHY should anyone care?

People don’t buy WHAT you do, they buy WHY you do it.

All organizations start with WHY, but only the great ones keep their WHY clear year after year.” (Sinek, 2009)

I recommend finding charities or causes in your community that your patients care about. That you care about. Then, go talk to the head of the charity yourself – get involved – personally. Emotionally.

One office paid their staff for one hour for every two hours they went out of the office and worked on a community project.

And it doesn’t have to be charities. A Kid’s Day with “Saturday with Santa” can be a ball. One office holds a patient appreciation party with their patients each December with a Christmas Elvis impersonator singing Christmas carols. The one I attended was packed, and a little wild. But everyone talks about it for the rest of the year.

Your patients, and your neighbors, want what you want – a better and healthier community. Communicate that in all your promotions and you’ll get better results, and have more fun.

And, many thanks for you do from all of us at PM&A!

A list of sample promotions on our web site – see reference below.

References

Arena, C. (2007). The High Purpose Company. Harper Collins.

Davidson, R. H. (July 7, 2016). CEO Materialism and Corporate Social Responsibility. Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation. Retrieved from https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2016/07/07/ceo-materialism-and-corporate-social-responsibility/

O’Keefe, L. N. (2016, Decembr 15). CSR Grows in 2016 as Companies Embrace Employees’ Values. Huffington Post – The Blog. Retrieved from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-novick-okeefe/csr-grows-in-2016-as-comp_b_13657368.html

Sample Promotions. Chiropractic Practice Marketing Ideas For 2016. Retrieved from www.pmaworks.com: http://pmaworks.com/observations/2016/09/20/chiropractic-practice-marketing-ideas-for-fall-2016/

Sinek, S. (2009, September). Simon Sinek How Great Leaders Inspire Action. Retrieved from TED Ideas Worth Spreading: https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action

Patient Education: A Simple and Fun Method for Chiropractic Offices

Posted on June 20, 2017 by Edward Petty

Patient education is definitely a clinical function. But… it is also good marketing.

And note that your entire office IS the marketing department and each team member has a marketing role.

To help everyone on your team better participate in patient education, use this simple and fun method:

Get a whiteboard and place it where patients can see it. Assign someone to write something on it each day so that your patients, or you, can comment on it.

For example, you could write:

What does this mean?

“Pain is the last to show
… and the first to go.”

This will be a cue for the doctor or a team member to talk to your patients – and can also provoke your patients to talk to you.

Here are some other examples:

“What does a chiropractic ADJUSTMENT do?”
“How is pain like an iceberg to your health?”
What does A.D.I.O. mean?

At your morning team meetings, or weekly meetings, go over each subject so everyone has a better idea on how to educate patients on the topic.
For active PM&A members, go here for a more complete list: PMAmembers.com

Chiropractic Patient Reactivation Program and Sample Postcard

Posted on January 3, 2017 by Edward Petty

We recommend offering a special promotion to patients who have not been active for 6 months or more.

The links below will take you to a couple of articles describing procedures that can be used to encourage less active patients to come in to see you.

The Reactivation Program has a number of sample letters and a sample postcard and the Reactivation Card is a sample post card that can also be customized for your email newsletter.

Sample Reactivation Postcard – Sample postcard layout and instructions on how to customize your postcard. Information can also be used for email notification.

Reactivation Program An article on the importance of regular reactivation program.

Best Wishes for your New Year!

How To Make Your Chiropractic and Natural Health Lending Library Work

Posted on November 16, 2016 by Edward Petty

A natural health lending library is a very practical marketing tool – if used.

A lending library is a collection of books, DVD’s, and other information that you can loan your patients. It is part of an ongoing patient education program. The better your patients understand what you do and why you do it, the more likely they will be to stick to a long-term care program and to refer their family and friends for services. Patient education, compared to other marketing activities, is not that expensive. It has a good ROI!

Download a list of suggestions here for your chiropractic or natural health care library. [Ideas for your Lending Library] Please give us your suggestions as well.

This all is logical, right? We all know this.

So…why is it rarely done? Most of the offices that I have seen with lending libraries have them on the bottom shelf in some corner of their office filled with books from a garage sale and old VHS video cassettes.

Everyone knows patient education is important. Like the Spinal Care Class, or new patient education class, everyone knows this is good for the patient and helps the office grow. Right?

Funny story… I attended a small get-together of chiropractors one evening here in Southeast Wisconsin. The presentation was given by the lead doctor of a multiple doctor office. Great doctor, nice practice. He had been in practice for years and looked weathered and ready for retirement. The talk was how to give an effective Spinal Care Class for new patients. The presentation was full of practical content. The only thing… the doctor wasn’t that cheerful about his presentation.

After he finished, and as he left the front of the room looking down at the floor, he muttered, as if passing on a confidential apology to another spy… “But we don’t do the classes anymore.”

So, no need to fool ourselves here. It might be just easier to buy some nice posters and be done with it.

Ah, but there is a trick to making your lending library work… and patient education in general work!

The lending library is primarily for YOU — and each member of your professional team.

We have been looking at it all wrong. The lending library is a reflection of YOU!

If YOU study, and if your support team studies and learns, you all will be so enthusiastic about the information that you will insist that your patients learn this information as well.

Be curious and ask yourself some questions. For example:

Chiropractic adjustments have been shown to significantly lower blood pressure. Do your patients know this? How does it work?
Why do some intervertebral discs degenerate and others (in the same spine) do not?
Do your patients understand the myth of cholesterol, heart disease, and how statin drugs may be causing some of the symptoms they are coming in to see you for?
How is the adaptive immune response affected [during “cold and flu season”] by the adjustment?
Is the average time for a whiplash patient to achieve maximum improvement 7 months 1 week? If so, why? If not, what is it?
Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs for rheumatoid and/or osteoarthritis conservatively cause 16,500 Americans to bleed to death each year. Do your patients know this? Do their families?
Glutamate and aspartame can cause chronic pain sensitization, and removing them from the diet for 4 consecutive months can eliminate all chronic pain symptoms. Do your patients know this? Do their spouses? *

Read a book, watch a video, question authority, ask questions — seek the truth. Get excited about learning new things about your profession.

DON’T GET BORED. If you are bored, quit and go home!

Otherwise, be grateful for the opportunities we all have to learn and expand our knowledge and understanding of the services we provide and the world in which we provide them.

Be curious.

Ultimately, you sell yourself before you sell your services. How can you sell a care class or an extended treatment plan if you are not truly excited about them?

Learning new aspects of chiropractic, health care, wellness, sickness, the sickness industry, how your patients are being manipulated and exploited… all this should agitate you one way or another.

For example, I watch Vaxxed – the movie — and then listened to Dr. Andrew Wakefield and Brandy Vaughn (former Merck employee) talk on YouTube about the movie and how they are now being covertly and overtly intimidated to shut up. If this pharmaceutical company is trying to help members of your community get healthier, why are they now attempting to squash dissent and in such a sinister and yet powerful way? I can’t help but wonder: just how powerful are they at manipulating public opinion? How are they influencing my community and my family?

If you look further into the effects of pharmaceuticals, from Vioxx to statins to MMR and vaccines, and explore some of these questions, you can’t help but feel compelled to educate your patients on how to keep their children healthy and free from a toxic environment.

Some of the most successful offices I have seen have spent untold sums on going to seminars (and on coaches!). The verysuccessful can be reckless with book buying and webinar watching and seminar attending.

Continuing education isn’t just for re-licensing seminars. How dull!

If you are not impatiently curious about different aspects of your profession – its science, its philosophy, what it is up against in the market place, you are becoming part of the problem.

Stay curious. Question authority. Study.

Do this:

Assignment #1. You. Order a book – or video- from Barnes and Noble, your local books store, or Amazon. Read most of it on a weekend or weeknight evening rather than watching TV. Present what you learned at the next staff meeting and put the book in your Library.

Assignment #2. Your Team. Have your staff read a few chapters from a book, or watch a video from your lending library and then give a presentation about it at a staff meeting. Everyone learns and the staff member learns twice! Give bonuses for outside study.

Just like we work on our patients, just like we work on our business, we must work ON our roles as professionals and we do this by studying.

Then, no doubt, you and your team will be dragging your patients over to the lending library to check out the latest editions to your collection.

And your patients will know that they came to the right place. They may think you are all a little nerdy, maybe even fanatical about better health, but they will know that you sincerely care about them and their wellbeing, not just in collecting some money for some fast or rushed service.

Assignment #3. Stay curious and learn – and provoke others to do the same.

Sincerely,

See our attached list of sample books and videos for your Lending Library Ideas for Your Lending Library

Please give us your suggestions for informative books or videos!

*Questions taken from Dan Murphy’s web site.www.danmurphydc.com

Health Independence and Freedom – For Chiropractors and Your Patients

Posted on July 3, 2015 by Edward Petty

Here in the good Ol’ USA, we are about to celebrate Independence Day, the date we commemorate the signing of the Declaration of Independence and declared our freedom from the yoke of the British Empire.

I think for those of us in health care this day bears special significance. In fact, I think of the chiropractic profession in particular.

Chiropractic has remained independent for 120 years. It has been fought by monopolist trade organizations, suppressed, and slandered, but it still stays outside of the clutches of Eli Lilly, Merck, or Monsanto.

To Chiropractors and those who work in the profession: You are brave, tough, and independent. You are living the American Way. You are a gritty bunch for sure and have maintained your integrity for putting care before profits.

The challenge you have is not only to remain free, but to help your patients and community also be free and independent.

Your patients are at the receiving end of billions and billions of dollars that are spent to manipulate them to purchase products that are known to be unhealthy. Through pervasive and clever marketing and massive efforts to influence government, Americans have become over fed, over medicated, and under nourished. Obesity rates have tripled (11% in 1960’s, 37% 2010)1, drug consumption has soared (average 7 per person in 1993 to 12.2 per person in 2014).2 Vaccination recommendations for our children from our government has increased from 64 in the 1950’s to over 1000 in 2013 (69 doses of 16 vaccines between day of birth and age 18).3

And the results? American’s health rates compared to other countries are abysmal. We are the worst or close to it in many categories. 4 Yet this is not what is advertised, so it would be shock for most Americans to hear that in the competition with other countries for the best health care, that they are losers.

The true American Way5 was and is to question authority, seek the truth and to stand up for justice.

But the truth can be obscured and the path of least resistance is easier, and it can seem more acceptable to simply follow convention and herd mentality. But the facts are there – provided by whistle blowers, mothers, and researchers, and we all need to look at the facts, do our research, and continue to educate ourselves and stay vigilant.

We can’t forget our patients… they too need to learn how their health choices have been manipulated, how they have been deceived, and what they should do to truly improve their health.

There is a price to pay for freedom. It takes work and is not always easy, but — it is the American thing to do. Stay brave, stay alert, and continue to help your patients achieve better health.

Happy Independence Day from Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin, USA

References.

Obesity.
http://seekingalpha.com/article/2419425-2-healthcare-stocks-that-appear-to-trade-below-fair-value-estimates
Drug Usage.
Generation Rx How Prescription Drugs Are Altering American Lives, Minds, and Bodies by Greg Critser (https://danmurphydc.com/Critser.pdf) , also http://kff.org/other/state-indicator/retail-rx-drugs-per-capita. www.imshealth.com/deployedfiles/imshealth/Global/Content/Corporate/IMS%20Health%20Institute/Reports/US_Use_of_Meds_2013/Percent_population_prescriptions_per_capita.pdf
Vaccinations.
http://www.nvic.org/CMSTemplates/NVIC/pdf/49-Doses-PosterB.pdf
Rating American Health Care.
http://www.nvic.org/CMSTemplates/NVIC/pdf/49-Doses-PosterB.pdf
http://www.oecd.org/unitedstates/Briefing-Note-UNITED-STATES-2014.pdf
The American Way.
“The American Way of life is individualistic, dynamic, and pragmatic.” (Wikipedia: The American Way)

10 Practice Development Strategies for Chiropractors in 2015

Posted on December 31, 2014 by Edward Petty

[If you think that you could make more money selling pharmaceuticals, injecting patients with vaccines and promoting flu shots in front of your office, these recommendations are not for you. For those matters, you might want to ask Palmer Chiropractic College or the Wisconsin Chiropractic Association for their opinions.]

What strategic moves should you be taking now to make sure that you have a better year in 2015 and in years to come?

After reviewing current literature and statistics, and based upon my observations and experience, I have put together a report which makes a number of recommendations that can be helpful to you. I have also included an extensive list of references for your further study.

The report contains a lot of information and so it is only for the serious practice executive. It will be a useful resource for you to refer to while you implement some of the suggestions I offer. Reading time is about 15 minutes. It offers new views on practice marketing, management, and leadership, with 25 specific recommendations. To go straight to the main course, go here:

Here is a shorter version:

Executive Summary – 10 Strategies to Prosper and Flourish in 2015 and Beyond

1. Know Your Environment. The Medical-Pharmaceutical industries are spending more to dominate the market place. Their efforts are becoming more pervasive in reach and more covert in manipulation. At the same time, wellness statistics continue to grow. More people are turning to organic foods and are focused on wellness.

2. Marketing Positioning. My recommendation is to embrace the popular movement towards natural health and own it. Be its champion. You are the Healthy Life Doctors. This is your niche.

3. Unique Selling Proposition. Stay committed to your core services, but articulate your Unique Selling Proposition to your specific market niche(s). Not everyone is your patient. Select certain markets that are already reaching for your type of services: people fed up with drugs, baby boomers who want to stay healthy, mothers who want to avoid drugs for their children, athletes, employers who want healthy employees, etc.

4. Get More For Less. Watch your economics but don’t get stuck in a scarcity mindset. Central to economics is a return on investment -ROI. Invest in yourself and especially in making your support team expert professionals. Learn and apply the Pareto Principle (how 80 percent of your results come from just 20% of your efforts).

5. Insurance or Cash? Yes! Take insurance but don’t kowtow to the Insurance Cartel. There are millions of people who want help and can pay for it and are just looking for a solution. You have to let them know that you have their solution.

6. Shift from Personality Driven Practice to Team Driven Business. The successful offices of the future will be team driven and systematized. Each team member has to be an expert as a specialist, as a team member, and as a marketer. And each should try to achieve this as well. The doctor will delegate most marketing and administrative details to others.

7. Shift from Solo Practice to Group Practice. For those of you who are ready, you should join forces with other doctors in a group practice. This has not had a lot of success in the chiropractic profession as it has in other professions, but the time is right now to band together synergistically as brothers and sisters. There are many good reasons to do this now. However, it has to be set up — and maintained — correctly.

8. New Role: CEO and Leader. Why do CEO’s get paid so much? Because they can make such a positive difference in the business. Up to now in your career you have taken on administrative and marketing projects mostly from the role of doctor, or perhaps owner. The CEO role probably has not been emphasized. Shifting to the role of CEO changes everything. Growing a business becomes easier, you have more time available, and you make more money.

9. Seek Out and Integrate Your Greater Purposes with Your Business. The power for your office, and you, comes from those things that mean the most. This would include your family and your spiritual pursuits. But our world is smaller and we live in a networked economy and culture. Your office, in its own right, has to be a leader in your community and environment and contribute in some way beyond its walls. This also includes having a voice in your professional organization. Your greater purposes also include your personal hobbies. Since you are not working on an assembly line, many of these purposes should be integrated into your work.

10. Get an Executive Coach. Why does corporate America spend over a billion dollars on executive coaching? Because the return of investment proves to be at least 7 times, and in some cases, 10-49 times cost. Executive coaching doesn’t cost – it pays.

An executive coach is different from a clinical coach. An executive coach will help you be a better CEO – a better leader, marketer and manager who builds a team driven business which allows you to delegate most non clinical duties. He or she will help you sort out what tasks will produce the greatest positive effects for your business, and help you get those tasks done. He or she will be your partner, counselor, confident, coach, teacher, drill instructor, and friend.

The future has never looked brighter, but the challenges are not slight. This makes your success all the more important – and sweeter.

Ed Petty

Swiss Army Knife of Chiropractic Practice Development

Posted on October 30, 2014 by Edward Petty

Ever see a one of those Swiss Army Knives?

I have one. It shows up now and then in one of my drawers. I always forget how many applications it has and I am always surprised when I keep pulling out more.

Well, there is a particular practice building tool that works like a Swiss Army Knife for your office.

It is inexpensive, almost free, yet this one tool serves many purposes more effectively than most anything else you can do in your office.

You could call it the Swiss Army Knife of Practice Development.

Once you, and your team, and especially your patients watch Bought, you will understand the power of the Swiss Army Knife of Practice Development.

This one tool can be your most effective marketing procedure. It can be your best therapeutic modality or ancillary service. It can also serve as your best tool to boost team productivity.

But like with my Swiss Army Knife, it can easily get taken for granted and NOT USED.

I can guarantee that IF you energetically use the Swiss Army Knife of Practice Development, your patients will stay with you longer, they will get healthier, your team will be more productive, you will generate more patients, and, yes, you’ll see your collections increase.

What is the Swiss Army Knife of Practice Development?

Education.

Education brings about an increase of awareness and results in a motivation to make a change. It does this for your patients in terms of improving their health, in motivating them to get others to use your services, and in helping to make your team even more purposeful.

You know chiropractic and what it does for people. Each day, miracles occur. It gets almost routine. You know how chiropractic works and you know why it works. Your patients do not. And most of your staff only have a general, and perhaps forgotten understanding.

By educating your patients you are fortifying them with knowledge that makes them aware of the power of your services and the importance of continuing care. It counteracts the propaganda they receive in the form of hundreds of ad impressions we all receive each day for drugs and bad food. It increases their awareness and will motivate them to not only continue with their care, but to benefit more from it.

This will, in turn, encourage them to bring in their family and friends to see you. They may even encourage you to speak to their work place or organizations.

Education can motivate your staff. I have seen numbers go up 25% quickly once the rest of the team was educated more on chiropractic and natural health care.

Lastly, education motivates you.

Education is your least expensive modality or ancillary service, it is the most cost effective marketing tool you have, and costs nothing to educate your staff.

Here are some sample actions to take to improve your educational activities.

Look at your office as an educational facility even more than a care facility. You increase people’s knowledge so that they can take more responsibilty for their health, and for those they care about.
Spend a hour or more each week studying. Read, listen to audios, go to seminars, have lunch with a colleague. Call your coach!
Watch a movie with your staff such as Bought, Doctored, Food Inc., and then have a discussion period afterwards.
Staff Meetings. Go over a case history or two.
Patient Care Class.
Start a Lending Library and position your office as an educational facility. Even if you lose a few books or DVD’s each month, it is worth it as your patients will see that you are serious about health and health education. Give each staff member a bonus for a book report presentation at a staff meeting.

There are many ways to educate yourself, your team, and your patients. Done right, education turns into enlightenment and this will produce a greater return than many other activities you do.

Like a Swiss Army knife, health education serves many purposes. But also like a Swiss Army knife, it has to be kept out, used, not hidden away in the back of a drawer or on a bookcase.

The Most Cost Effective Tool You Have to Build Your Chiropractic Practice and Help Your Patients – and you probably are barely using it!

Posted on October 22, 2014 by Edward Petty

what if I told you copy

Forget about the roller tables, stretching bands, balance boards, traction devises, taping, decompression, protein powder, vibrating platforms, laser, lipo body sculpting, ultrasound, stim, tens, supplements, orthotics, etc.

Any or all of these may or may not be appropriate for your practice, but they should not be your first choice in providing a modality or ancillary service to your patients.

Think about this: what could you do for your patients, in addition to your adjustments, that would help them improve their health the most?

EDUCATE THEM

The more the patient knows about how chiropractic works – and how your services help them – the more motivated they will be in following through with their health care plan.

People don’t know about subluxations just like they really didn’t know about asbestos or cigarettes. It was a while ago but advertising was rampant on television and in print promoting cigarettes. MD’s were often used to legitimize the use of cigarettes.

Today, your patients are also being inundated with propaganda about food, drugs, and basic lifestyle choices that are not healthy, let alone not true. They are told that drugs are safe solutions for headaches, back pain, and other ailments when in many cases they are found to be poisonous. (Vioxx, Accutane, Cylert, Darvon & Darvocet, for example.) Nearly all the food they eat has various toxins, from aspartame in diet food to herbicides that linger (glyphosate, used in “Roundup” and sprayed on your kid’s schools playgrounds).

Educated patients are better equipped to keep to their treatment program and continue improving their health. Isn’t this what you want?

This is your #1 ancillary service.

#1 Marketing Tool
Educated patients are more motivated to refer those they know to you and to help you set up external events. They can become your ambassadors, field representatives and sales force. They know that someone with headaches, low back pain, or other odd symptoms may be helped by chiropractic and your services. They may be able to refer them directly, or you can help them by providing special workshops, special events, and opportunities for external programs at their place of work.

#1 Team Management Tool
All of this also applies to each of your team members as well.

We are all “numbed down” by a conventional lifestyle and a culture that is greatly manufactured by just a few large industries such as Big Pharma and Big Food that use media and government to achieve its ends.

And, frankly, we tend to take what we do for granted. Imagine a patient who had a headache for years and after your care is now pain free and can get a full night’s sleep and her relationships with her family have improved., etc. Amazing, right? But for us, pretty routine. We can end up being more concerned about billing her secondary or supplement insurance or keeping her scheduling than in just celebrating with her.

Almost anything you know about health care will be “new news” to your patients and probably many of your staff. Plus, we all tend to forget what we once knew.

What is the big difference with you from when you started chiropractic college and after you graduated (Besides debt) . THE difference was and is that you were motivated. And you were motivated because… you were educated and even more, you were enlightened. You were able to see things in people’s health conditions that you never saw before. And with all this understanding, you were now more motivated.

But in time, awareness can dim and so can motivation. New patients start dropping off, treatment plans get shorter, and the quality of staff performance erodes. The solution is to keep educating patients and team members so that they stay awake and motivated.

In other words, WAKE THE FLOCK UP!

Patient and staff education provide the best ROI of any activity you have. Modalities and extra services have many overlooked costs such as staff time to account and bill for the therapies, extra staff to apply the services, someone to take inventory of the products and to sell them, etc. Patient education is pretty much a no cost proposition. How much does a care class cost? Watching “Doctored” or “Food Inc. ” or “Bought” with your staff and then discussing it afterwards (that is very important), it is much cheaper than flying to Las Vegas.

And if you do it often and effectively, you will be able to afford that next seminar in Hawaii.

As the doctor, you are the CEO, the Chief Evangelizing Officer. I first heard this term from Guy Kawasaki, who was called this when he worked for Apple when the Macintosh was first launched in the early 80’s. Macintosh was trying to win over users from IBM computers to the Apple Macintosh.

You are creating converts to a chiropractic and natural health lifestyle.

Remember that education, both staff, patients, and your own education as well should cover not only what your services do, and how they do it, but WHY you provide these services. In fact, your emotional connection to the reason you do your services communicates the strongest.

WHAT TO DO
1. First, keep yourself aware and amazed at the innate healing power of the body and the great affects your services provide. Provide an hour or two of study for yourself each week. Just like you work IN your office, you have to work ON your office – and that includes yourself.

2. Let yourself get emotional about what the FLOCK is going on! Don’t be “correct”, well heeled and a good little domesticated “provider.” It is natural that you become somewhat “riled up” about the injustice that your patients and their family and friends experience in receiving “health care” or at the misinformation “fed” to people about healthy living.

3. Educate your team. Watch a movie with them and then have a discussion period afterwards. (The discussion is very important as it helps get everyone engaged in the process.)

4. Staff Meetings. Go over a case history or two.

5. Patient Care Class. There are many different names for this, but all patients get better, faster, and stay healthier longer if they know more about chiropractic and health. Make it a part of their treatment plan and bribe them with food!

6. Start a Lending Library and position your office as an educational facility. Even if you lose a few books or DVD’s each month, it is worth it as your patients will see that you are serious about health and health education. Give each staff member a bonus for a book report presentation at a staff meeting.

There are many ways to educate yourself, your team, and your patients. Done right, education turns into enlightenment and this will produce a greater return than many other activities you do.

# # #

Marketing Plans for Your Chiropractic Office This Fall

Posted on September 18, 2014 by Edward Petty

As we move from the summer months into fall, I thought that it might be helpful to preview some marketing ideas for the rest of the year.

Below is a link to several articles on our web site referencing marketing procedures and programs for the autumn and the early winter months.

Marketing is basically physics: for energy to come in, energy has to go out.

Ideally the energy is well directed and of a high quality, but mainly, it has to get out. Quantity first, then gradually, improve the quality.

But everything is done twice: first in your mind and then in the world. First comes the meta-physics, then comes the physics

This is why the most important and first step starts with you – your faith, confidence, and belief in what you are doing and especially, why you are doing it.

Organizational system failures or personal situations can often get in the way that distract us and cause us to lose sight of our purpose or of the great results we have achieved for others in the past.

And, there will always be the negative few that seem to outweigh the positive many.

Sometimes we focus on the “barking dogs” that come out to chase us for a while rather than concentrating on the fire we are racing towards to put out.

Marketing is about communication. It is an “outflow” that sooner or later, directly or indirectly, generates an “inflow.” It is your creative voice that is either filled with mission and purpose, or is forced and desperate. Stymied by failures or disappointments, our “voice” can recede to a whimper or a mumble.

But the fear that can grip us is mostly an invention because too often, we take things too seriously.

The fact is, as Ben and Rosa Zander point out in their book, The Art of Possibility, most of life is just “invented.” I listened to Ben Zander, the conductor of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, give an inspirational presentation at the chiropractic seminar called the WAVE in San Francisco in August.

He advised that when we slip and make a mistake, we should just throw out our arms, lean back slightly and exuberantly and say: “Fascinating.” We just can’t take things too seriously and instead we should move on passionately expressing ourselves. Not bad advice from a maestro whose goal is to get musicians to play better.

You could also go out to a field or park and just yell: “I am the greatest and the world loves me and wants to come to my office.”

Don’t be surprised if the universe cooperates.

Marketing your services, like helping people get better, should be enjoyable. It should be fun. You should be smiling and laughing.

And you know, as the song goes:

♪ When you’re smiling, ♫When you’re smiling,♪
♫The whole world smiles with you,♫
♫When you’re laughing, ♫When you’re laughing,♪
♪The sun comes shining through,♫
♫Wishing you plenty of smiles and all the best,♪

Click Link for more Marketing Articles

Here is a great rendition of the song by Frank Sinatra

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=351l62Yx0oI

Finding the Right Mix for Your Chiropractic Promotions

Posted on April 9, 2013 by Edward Petty

THE PROMOTIONAL RIVER

I sometimes receive emails and calls from chiropractors requesting a quick fix for their lack of new patients. I often wonder if they ever got the idea of symptomatic care versus corrective and wellness care.

Effective marketing requires more than just a killer advertisement or long copy reactivation letter or a spinal screening. It has been said that good marketing doesn’t depend on one promotion to get 50 new patients, but rather 50 promotions each generating one new patient.

Generating a high volume of new patients in your chiropractic office requires multiple channels of communication. Consider how a river grows – through lots of tributaries. The Mississippi starts out like a creek, but then other creeks run into it and it grows and grows.

We call this the promotional mix – the blend of different approaches you use to communicate the benefits of your services.

On the following page, we have listed just a few important categories of effective promotions for your office. Of course, there are others, but we have found that these work well and can act as a good foundation.

FOUNDATIONS OF PROMOTION

Effective promotion starts with individual and team motivation. It then should be entwined with all of your basic routines each day, from the way the phone is answered to the consultation and patient examination.

Beyond this, you can schedule specific health topics months in advance and offer them as workshops or “Awareness Weeks” where you provide a free screening exam and info.

Occasional special promotions should be scheduled, such as “Kid’s Day”, and community services should also be scheduled, such as screenings, relationship building with external referrals sources, and workshops.

Your presence on the Internet has to be constantly added to.

These are some of the main categories of your promotions, though advertising and public relations events can also occur now and then.

(larger image)

KEY PROMOTIONS

1. Motivation. You and your team’s desire to promote the benefits of your services create the energy to make your marketing work. Constantly nurture this. Start with WHY?

2. Basic Service and Chiropractic Care Procedures. This is your foundation. Marketing is embedded in the heart of all the basic duties you do every day. You should constantly review and try to improve on the marketing aspect of your procedures. Be ever more cheerful, more genuine, more caring, and giving of extra-ordinary care and service. Have “Present Time Consciousness.” It is helpful to have a checklist of these procedures to review. Little things can slip aside and go unnoticed and a checklist helps flush everything out for inspection. Work on a procedure or two every month so that you are constantly improving.

3. Special Promotions. These are promotional events that can be internal, external, or both. For example, flowers to women on Mother’s Day, a Kid’s Day, Community Appreciation Day, Anniversary Day, etc. They can be tied in with holidays, community days, parades, donation drives, etc. Most have an offer for a free service, but not all. These are IN ADDITION to the monthly education themes. Schedule these every other month or so. Promote these on the Internet and in newsletters.

4. Community Education Program (Monthly Health Themes) We have found that this program gradually builds momentum and if managed well, brings in more patient referrals, external new patients, and returning patients directly and indirectly. Here are some steps to make it successful.

a.    Select monthly themes around a condition or healthful topic. Can include headaches, kid’s health, motherhood, nutrition, cooking class, exercise, golf clinic, etc.
b.    Schedule a workshop time or “Awareness Week” (free screening exam last week of the month) at the end of each month.
c.    Customize a poster. Samples on our Members site or make up your own.
d.    Do a YouTube video on the subject the month before. Post on Facebook, web site, YouTube channel and embed in your email
e.    Send out an email notice promoting the event, with a link to the video Health Tip, testimonial, etc.
f.    Send a hard copy newsletter with testimonials mailed to some of your patient files now and then (3 months) and all files every 6 months.
g.    Posters distributed locally and as statement stuffers.
h.    Press releases can be sent to local papers/electronic calendars.
i.    Ads are an option.

5. Community Services. These are scheduled each month and include screenings, workshops and external referrals source development (MDs, businesses, DDS, auto body shops, etc.)

6. Keep The Conversation Going: Internet And Newsletter. Update your Internet presence and post new info regularly. Set a goal of how many hours it gets worked on each month, eg. 1 hr a week. You could also use a checklist (we have one on our PM&A Members site). This would include Facebook postings, YouTube, directory sites (Yelp, Healthgrades.com. etc.), and search engines (Google, Bing, etc.). And, of course, your website/blog. Add patient testimonials, photos, and health tips. Keep posting – but keep most of the info local and “newsy,” just short of gossipy. Also, send out electronic and hard copy newsletters with similar newsy content and notices for upcoming promotions, talks.

7. Public Relations and Advertising. Radio ads and print ads promoting specials events can be helpful now and then. Public relations such as press releases and donation drives can add long term good will and should be done a few times a year

3 Month Marketing Planner [Link]

Chiropractic Practice Management, Marketing, and Leadership Recorded Training Webinars

Posted on January 31, 2013 by Edward Petty

This is a list of our practice development recorded webinars.

Each is a recording of a slide show driven lecture, each filled with an abundance of practice information derived from in the field work – and plenty of slides!

Currently, you have to be active on a PM&A program. By this summer, these will be available on and individual basis for a small fee.

Chiropractic CEO Webinars

Creating your Dream Team Summary and VideoA virtual “live” interview with the doctor and staff of a true chiropractic dream team. Find out what they do to achieve high numbers, profit, and fun.

The Fast Flow Practice CEO -55 minutes webinar video and summary.
One of the biggest challenges in running and growing your business is the time it takes you away from seeing patients and from your family. We have solved this with what we call the Fast Flow Practice CEO System. A new system derived from old principles.
Management by the Numbers: 44 minutes – Summary and Video
Management is a subject that has techniques to help you go from where you are to where you want to be. Management By the Numbers (MBN) can be faster and more accurate than other forms of management, and help build staff morale and make it more self directed.

Capacity Constraints : 33 minutes – Summary and Video
Do you work hard but you just don’t get as far as you should? The reason may be that you are running into unseen bottlenecks that are choking off your production and suffocating your growth. This is the subject of Capacity Constraints.

How to Be an Effective Practice CEO Video
If you are struggling with the ups and downs of a stressful practice, or have finally “settled” into a comfort zone producing much lower than you know you are capable of, this program is for you.

Chiropractic Office Manager Webinars

Chiropractic Manager Webinar – Roles and Goals Summary, Video and Study Guide
What Are The Key Roles In Your Office? A hidden barrier in many offices has to do with confusing roles and job duties. Clear these up and see how much smoother patients and paper flow, and happier the team becomes. Small office or big health business, clarify these 8 roles and the numbers will go up.

Chiropractic Manager Webinar – Job and Performance Reviews Video
Employee reviews are often neglected, or are dreaded by employee and doctor. This webinar covers the basic steps to make them effective and positive for both doctor and employee. Approx 37 minutes.

Chiropractic Manager Webinar – Motivating Your Staff – Video Ms. Phyllis Frase shares 5 secrets to keeping yourself and your staff motivated.

Chiropractic Manager Webinar – Team Meetings Summary, Video and Study Guide. This is an overview of 8 essential actions to help you improve your meetings and make them faster, more fun, and more effective. Plus, different types of short meetings that your team can grow.

Chiropractic Manager Webinar – The Office Manager Job Description Summary, Video and Study Guide. This class covers 17 essential duties of the office manager. Both the doctor and the office manager should watch and discuss these duties.

Chiropractic Manager Webinar- How to Best to Train Your Staff Summary, Video and Study Guide This webinar covers eight tips to improve the performance of your team. Training plays a big part in team building.

Chiropractic Manager Webinar– How to Hire the Right Team Member Summary, Video and Study Guide.
This webinar covers eight priniciples for hiring the right team member from knowing when to hire, who to hire and how to hire.

Office Manager Webinar – It’s All About the Patient, the Doctor and the MISSION [Summary, Video and Study Guide]
There are procedures to help the patients and procedures that help the doctor help the patient and then there is Everything Else. Tips on how to deal with Everything Else. (30 minutes)

Office Manager Webinar- Part II – Tips and Tricks to make the office more efficient[Summary, Video]
Part II reveals tips and tricks of what an office manager can actually do in the office on a day to day basis to make things run smoother and significantly improve the volume and quality of services. (55 minutes)

Office Manager Webinar- Part I – Fundamentals of Practice Management [Summary, Video]
Part I covers the fundamentals of Practice Management (55 minutes)

Chiropractic Marketing Webinars

Innate Marketing (55 minutes) – Webinar plus Summary.
There are stories that float around every now and then about how some offices can simply “think” “New Patients” and they come in.
Are these stories an urban legend? A myth, or a fact? Can staff or doctors “concept” new patients in the door. Is this true? If so, how can you do this? 10 steps to help you generate more patient visits through “concepting.”

Chiropractic Special Promotions (55 minutes) – Webinar plus Summary.
This webinar covers different promotions by month. You will learn 2-4 different practical promotions for each month of the year. More importantly, you will learn how to organize them so that they are time effective and productive.

Patient Retention – Summary and Video
If you understand the underlying basics of patient retention your appointment book should always be full. Covered in this webinar is: Patient retention should be based on Principles – not gimmicks. Where are we you taking your patients? Why they quit? The cost of not getting them there.

Chiropractic Patient Education – Summary and Video (45 min)
We go over 7 basic strategies that cover the entire horizon of patient education and explain why it is so necessary to educate your patients if you want them to be healthier.

Infomercials. – Summary and Video .
Whatever happened to Infomercials? They’re still around and they still work. And you can do them very inexpensively. You just need to know how. This webinar will give you practical examples and include forms for you to use in producing your own amateur and informational marketing that can help you create more new patients and keep the ones you have.

Internet Marketing and Social Media. – Summary and Video . This webinar covers some fundamentals regarding social media, Facebook, and general Internet marketing. (35 minutes) (not yet posted)

The Art of Spinal Screenings. – Summary and Video . Spinal Screenings – The Queen of External Marketing. Everyone has done at least a few spinal screenings. You have probably had some success with them. But how much better could you do if you knew the fundamentals of this time tested external marketing activity? This is a three part series on spinal screenings. This session we will review the most fundamental principles of screenings. Get these, and all else will follow.(45 minutes)

Scheduling Screenings and other External Events – Summary and Video . How to Schedule External Events And Create External Referral Sources. Types of events, Outcomes, Purpose. How to plan the events and get them scheduled.(30 minutes)

Marketing Tips: Earth Day, Spring Promotions, and other Tips – Summary and Video This webinar covers: Powerful internal marketing script, Report of findings referral procedure, upcoming spring promotions, with special attention to utilizing Earth Day as an opportunity to promote your services.

Short Overview of Chiropractic Marketing Management with Some Marketing Tips – Summary and Video This is a short version of marketing management and some tips for the upcoming months. What are the three levels of marketing? What part does communication have in your marketing? How to engage your patients in your marketing efforts. Upcoming special promotions. (30 minutes)

Marketing Management, Part I and Part II – This is the longer version of how to manage your marketing, and why.

Chiropractic Marketing Management – Session I – Summary and Video The Why, What and How of Marketing. Getting your Marketing off the Ground. (55 minutes)

Chiropractic Marketing Management – Session II – Summary and Video Specific Marketing Manager Duties – Your Job Description. General Overview of the Most Effective Marketing Procedures in Each of the 11 Marketing Categories (55 minutes)

Marketing the movie DOCTORED for your practice and community

Posted on November 2, 2012 by Edward Petty

There has never been a movie like this for chiropractors. Now with this professionally produced documentary on DVD, you have an extraordinary tool to help you educate your staff, patients and community.

It really is historic.

You can learn more about it on the trailer and of course, by watching the movie. I am not going to give it a review here other than to give it two thumbs up.

I recommend that you use it to educate your office team, patients and your community. Here are some tips on doing so:

It is intended to be shown as a movie and not as a reception room video clip.
Set aside two and a half hours with your team during some down time. Watch it uninterrupted. No phones, patients, etc.
Afterwards, eat. Have the food brought it.
Now, discuss the movie. What did everyone think?
Then discuss how best to use it – for patients and non patients. Put together some tentative plans.
Set up two or three special private screenings for 8-10 patients.
Watch the movie with them, feed them and then ask them what they thought and then how they recommend we use this movie.
This now becomes a focus group. You will find that you get good ideas from them that might also appeal to other patients. Plus, they will now be very motivated to bring in more of their family and friends.
Rent a space outside of your office and show the movie for non patients. This requires LOTS of promotion and preparation. Dr. Anthony Ebel has a description with examples of what he is doing this year. See links below.
Over November and December, use the movie internally to generate excitement with your patients. With Holiday and Christmas and New Year retail promotions, we recommend to keep the promotion directed internally. Then, in Jan and Feb., promote your special screenings to the community.

In the end, I think DOCTORED shows how courageous and committed all of you are who work in and with the great profession of chiropractic.

New ideas and methods that work are often opposed at first before they are generally accepted by the public. This movie will help get your services more accepted and in fact, desired.

RESOURCE LINKS:

Order the movie and trailer

Movie Trailer trailer of movie, originally entitled: “Medical, Inc.”

Dr. Ebel promotional program

Dr. Ebel’s flier and tickets Front Back of flier

Interview with one of the executive producers of the movie, Dr. Paul Riegleman from WI (5 minutes) Link

Doctored image you can download for your posters

Dr. Mercola and comments.

Doctored Flier-2_0001

Doctored Flier-1

Observations

observations from our travels in the world of chiropractic

Category Archives: Patient Education

What is Health Literacy in Chiropractic and Natural Heath Care?

The more people know about health, the more they will help others be healthier.

IMPROVING HEALTH LITERACY IN CHIROPRACTIC AND NATURAL HEALTH CLINICS

Chiropractic Patient Education Prompters – Table Talk Grows Your Flock

The Mental Immune System

Selling the Invisible — Patient Education: An Inexpensive Marketing Procedure with a Big Return

How to Defeat COVID: Be A HEALTH OUTLAW!

Here are some suggestions to Fight COVID:
How to Fight COVID: Steps for Health Outlaws

Fight the Nocebo Effect

The Sickest Generation and Back to School Programs

Children’s Health Resources

Books

November and December Marketing — and Your Higher Purpose

Patient Education: A Simple and Fun Method for Chiropractic Offices

Chiropractic Patient Reactivation Program and Sample Postcard

How To Make Your Chiropractic and Natural Health Lending Library Work

Health Independence and Freedom – For Chiropractors and Your Patients

10 Practice Development Strategies for Chiropractors in 2015

Executive Summary – 10 Strategies to Prosper and Flourish in 2015 and Beyond

Swiss Army Knife of Chiropractic Practice Development

The Most Cost Effective Tool You Have to Build Your Chiropractic Practice and Help Your Patients – and you probably are barely using it!

Marketing Plans for Your Chiropractic Office This Fall

Finding the Right Mix for Your Chiropractic Promotions

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