As the first to many blogs I intend to write, I wanted to first address a simple way to attract new patients to your refractive surgery practice – that will cost nothing to institute, and you practically already have it in place.
Your patient intake form provides a depth of information that can lead to great marketing opportunities. For example, the age of your patient can easily tell you whether your patient is presbyopic or if they are in cataract range. This may help you discuss monovision treatments if they are considering LASIK, or begin the discussion about the premium lens options you have available. Any decent surgery counselor would find this to be one of the first things they look at before meeting a refractive patient for the first time.
But did you ever take a look at their job title, or more importantly, who their employer is? Sure, their job title is one we look at. “Engineer” for example, is certainly a big one to pay attention to. But the actual employer is often overlooked, and it’s a great marketing opportunity.
We all agree that word-of-mouth referrals are one of the best, and cheapest, lead opportunities. A LASIK patient returning to work the day after surgery is more than happy to tell his/her coworkers about their amazing vision, and co-workers who wear corrective lenses are just dying to find out how their procedure went. Why not capture those referrals for years to come by offering a Corporate Vision Program?
Here’s how it works:
1. Offer a discount for ALL employees within an organization. Say, 20% for example.
2. The discount should be applied regardless of the individuals position within the company, whether they are full or part-time, or whether they participate in the employers health benefit package.
3. The employer must have at least 25 employees (or pick a number of your choice).
4. The HR Manager or Benefit Manager should be the one to sign off on the agreement.
I find the prime person to extend this offer to is an HR or Benefit Manager who is looking at LASIK surgery, but any candidate working at a large organization who’s considering LASIK is a good target, particularly if they are balking at the price. What candidate wouldn’t march into their HR department demanding they sign up the company to take advantage of a discount off their procedure?
How it benefits the Corporate Charter Company
1. It’s free. It costs the company nothing to sign up.
2. It’s not benefit or hourly specific, so they can tell EVERY employee that they get this GREAT benefit that’s not available through any vision or medical plan. (What a great company to work for!)
3. It encourages employees to sign up for FSA and/or HSA plans to pay for refractive procedures. This saves the employer money in payroll taxes!
How it benefits the ophthalmic practice:
1. You’re almost guaranteed to sign that candidate up for surgery. Super discount!
2. You will incorporate a small stipulation within the Corporate Charter agreement. Organizations that are part of the corporate vision program must offer the refractive praces a table at their next employee benefit fair, and/or add the benefit information in new employee packets (yes, future leads!), and/or provide the practice to host a lunch an learn at the organization (can you say HUGE seminar?). Chances are none of these things will be consider obtrusive by the HR Department. It’s what they do anyway.
So not only will you be making the balking patient happy and gaining a free flow of potential leads for years to come, but you will immediately see the results. After the patient has his/her refractive procedure and goes back to work he/she is going to not only tell everyone how wonderful it is to be glasses free-but that everyone should call your practice because their employer is part of the corporate vision plan.
For more information about setting up a Corporate Vision Program, OD Comanagement program or other exciting lead generating opportunities, contact me at Holly@ComanagementConsultants.com or at 603-828-4714.
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