Guest guest Posted July 27, 2010 Report Share Posted July 27, 2010 People like freebies. Any give aways, and CANDY. They will stop in just for that piece of candy. We are in Florida. So bottled water is always a big hit, stick a label with your name on it. Last health fair, we did a drawing for a gardening basket, and everyone filled out their name/addresses to register. To those we sent thank-you's for attending. We supplied water bottles with our name/logo, but 200 bottles went fast. Also business cards stuck to magnet backing, which is easy to do, not too expensive. Make sure to have a hand out of in-network insurances for your business. Good luck. Lynda Geril, Office Manager Geril Therapy 4901 E. Silver Springs Blvd Suite 305 Ocala, FL 34470 -Phone -Fax lgeril@... email www.geriltherapy.com website The information contained in this message may be privileged, confidential, and protected from disclosure. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, or any employee or agent responsible for delivering this message to the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution, or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify us immediately by replying to the message and deleting it from your computer. _____ From: PTManager [mailto:PTManager ] On Behalf Of Alliance Physical Therapy Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 2010 7:18 PM To: PTManager Subject: Public Health Fairs Has anyone attended a Health Fair as a vendor? What exhibits do you find people respond to? How do you make your presentation interesting? The attendees are likely to be runners (and their families) aged from 3-78 years. Does anyone have any suggestions for this group profile please? Second, does anyone have experience providing free Gait and Functional screening at a Health Fair? What are the liability issues if someone falls over and hurts themselves while trying to squat for instance? What about unknown medical problems which might preclude doing an assessment in the first place? Do you screen people first and have them sign a waiver? Clara Office Manager, Eugene, OR Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 28, 2010 Report Share Posted July 28, 2010 The key to health fairs is getting the contact information from the people that come to your booth for information. Raffle off a prize or something but, in order to enter the raffle, the customer has to give you his or her email or home address. Once you have this information, you HAVE to follow up with consistent email newsletters or postcards, etc. 99.999% of the people that come up to your booth at a health fair will forget about you the second they leave your booth EVEN if they seem extremely interested in a particular service that you perform. The key is consistent follow up afterwards. Balan Solex Physical Therapy Naples, FL _abalan@..._ (mailto:abalan@...) In a message dated 7/28/2010 10:27:57 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, jnolder@... writes: We do our health fair every year, being a small CAH. I personally think that it is great PR, but we rarely get anything out in the terms of financial. We get our face out in the public and talk to old pts which is nice to catch up, but I am thinking about pulling out of it since we pay therapist to go, step-up and prep work without little return to the bottom line. We do not have direct access secondary to an internal policy of the hospital so we are still pretty much physician driven for pts. If we had direct access that could change my thoughts on the idea. Yes, I have attempted to change this policy in the past, by the way. CRMCw-ColSm Jeff Nolder, MSPT Director of Physical Medicine and Rehab Cherokee Regional Medical Center (fax) From: _PTManager _ (mailto:PTManager ) [mailto:_PTManager _ (mailto:PTManager ) ] On Behalf Of Alliance Physical Therapy Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 2010 6:18 PM To: _PTManager _ (mailto:PTManager ) Subject: Public Health Fairs Has anyone attended a Health Fair as a vendor? What exhibits do you find people respond to? How do you make your presentation interesting? The attendees are likely to be runners (and their families) aged from 3-78 years. Does anyone have any suggestions for this group profile please? Second, does anyone have experience providing free Gait and Functional screening at a Health Fair? What are the liability issues if someone falls over and hurts themselves while trying to squat for instance? What about unknown medical problems which might preclude doing an assessment in the first place? Do you screen people first and have them sign a waiver? Clara Office Manager, Eugene, OR [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 28, 2010 Report Share Posted July 28, 2010 We do our health fair every year, being a small CAH. I personally think that it is great PR, but we rarely get anything out in the terms of financial. We get our face out in the public and talk to old pts which is nice to catch up, but I am thinking about pulling out of it since we pay therapist to go, step-up and prep work without little return to the bottom line. We do not have direct access secondary to an internal policy of the hospital so we are still pretty much physician driven for pts. If we had direct access that could change my thoughts on the idea. Yes, I have attempted to change this policy in the past, by the way. CRMCw-ColSm Jeff Nolder, MSPT Director of Physical Medicine and Rehab Cherokee Regional Medical Center (fax) From: PTManager [mailto:PTManager ] On Behalf Of Alliance Physical Therapy Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 2010 6:18 PM To: PTManager Subject: Public Health Fairs Has anyone attended a Health Fair as a vendor? What exhibits do you find people respond to? How do you make your presentation interesting? The attendees are likely to be runners (and their families) aged from 3-78 years. Does anyone have any suggestions for this group profile please? Second, does anyone have experience providing free Gait and Functional screening at a Health Fair? What are the liability issues if someone falls over and hurts themselves while trying to squat for instance? What about unknown medical problems which might preclude doing an assessment in the first place? Do you screen people first and have them sign a waiver? Clara Office Manager, Eugene, OR Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 28, 2010 Report Share Posted July 28, 2010 I agree entirely with what said. Many of the clinics in my group have participated in local health fairs. Getting the contact information and actually using it to keep your name in front of these people is key but I would like to suggest a few other things. Make your booth fun so it is memorable. I have seen physical therapy providers do things like bone density screenings and chair massages to get people to come by and learn more about their services. If you have something to engage them in, you also have their attention to talk about your services. As a member of the public who enjoys a good health fair, I will tell you that the last one a friend of mine and I went to that my friend actually ended up needing a dentist and used one that she had met there that left an impression on her. Granted I was heavily marketed b a chiropractor that I stopped to see just because I was curious about a machine he had for evaluating patients. I can still tell you the name of his clinic. I think health fairs work. Sometimes it is hard to see the exact financial gain because patients don't come in going I came because I saw you at the Health Fair last year or said he saw you last month at the health fair and you did a great job. I think the more visible in your community you are the better for your business. Well that is my two cents anyway. Becky A. Sewell, MRC, CRC Rehab Net of AR/ArPTA P.O. Box 202 Conway, AR 72033 ph/fax _____ From: PTManager [mailto:PTManager ] On Behalf Of abpt25@... Sent: Wednesday, July 28, 2010 9:43 AM To: PTManager Subject: Re: Public Health Fairs The key to health fairs is getting the contact information from the people that come to your booth for information. Raffle off a prize or something but, in order to enter the raffle, the customer has to give you his or her email or home address. Once you have this information, you HAVE to follow up with consistent email newsletters or postcards, etc. 99.999% of the people that come up to your booth at a health fair will forget about you the second they leave your booth EVEN if they seem extremely interested in a particular service that you perform. The key is consistent follow up afterwards. Balan Solex Physical Therapy Naples, FL _abalan@... <mailto:_abalan%40solexcenters.com> _ (mailto:abalan@... <mailto:abalan%40solexcenters.com> ) In a message dated 7/28/2010 10:27:57 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, jnolder@... <mailto:jnolder%40cherokeermc.org> writes: We do our health fair every year, being a small CAH. I personally think that it is great PR, but we rarely get anything out in the terms of financial. We get our face out in the public and talk to old pts which is nice to catch up, but I am thinking about pulling out of it since we pay therapist to go, step-up and prep work without little return to the bottom line. We do not have direct access secondary to an internal policy of the hospital so we are still pretty much physician driven for pts. If we had direct access that could change my thoughts on the idea. Yes, I have attempted to change this policy in the past, by the way. CRMCw-ColSm Jeff Nolder, MSPT Director of Physical Medicine and Rehab Cherokee Regional Medical Center (fax) From: _PTManager <mailto:_PTManager%40yahoogroups.com> _ (mailto:PTManager <mailto:PTManager%40yahoogroups.com> ) [mailto:_PTManager <mailto:_PTManager%40yahoogroups.com> _ (mailto:PTManager <mailto:PTManager%40yahoogroups.com> ) ] On Behalf Of Alliance Physical Therapy Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 2010 6:18 PM To: _PTManager <mailto:_PTManager%40yahoogroups.com> _ (mailto:PTManager <mailto:PTManager%40yahoogroups.com> ) Subject: Public Health Fairs Has anyone attended a Health Fair as a vendor? What exhibits do you find people respond to? How do you make your presentation interesting? The attendees are likely to be runners (and their families) aged from 3-78 years. Does anyone have any suggestions for this group profile please? Second, does anyone have experience providing free Gait and Functional screening at a Health Fair? What are the liability issues if someone falls over and hurts themselves while trying to squat for instance? What about unknown medical problems which might preclude doing an assessment in the first place? Do you screen people first and have them sign a waiver? Clara Office Manager, Eugene, OR Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 28, 2010 Report Share Posted July 28, 2010 I have found it helpful to be strategic in planning where your booth will be located. In other words, have an area where you could set up a table and do brief assessments for clients. Let's remember P.T. is still 'Voodoo' with most of our publics. Being able to privately assess a potential patient is important and at the same time having privacy to talk with them about their condition. Mike D. Moreau, M.S.P.T., Cert. MDT Physical Therapy Specialists 1344 N. Center St. Hickory, NC 28601 facsimile ptspecialists@... > The key to health fairs is getting the contact information from the > people > that come to your booth for information. Raffle off a prize or > something > but, in order to enter the raffle, the customer has to give you his > or her > email or home address. Once you have this information, you HAVE to > follow > up with consistent email newsletters or postcards, etc. 99.999% of the > people that come up to your booth at a health fair will forget about > you the > second they leave your booth EVEN if they seem extremely interested > in a > particular service that you perform. The key is consistent follow up > afterwards. > > Balan > Solex Physical Therapy > Naples, FL > _abalan@..._ (mailto:abalan@...) > > > In a message dated 7/28/2010 10:27:57 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time, > jnolder@... writes: > > We do our health fair every year, being a small CAH. I personally > think > that > it is great PR, but we rarely get anything out in the terms of > financial. > We > get our face out in the public and talk to old pts which is nice to > catch > up, but I am thinking about pulling out of it since we pay therapist > to go, > step-up and prep work without little return to the bottom line. We > do not > have direct access secondary to an internal policy of the hospital > so we > are > still pretty much physician driven for pts. If we had direct access > that > could change my thoughts on the idea. Yes, I have attempted to > change this > policy in the past, by the way. > > CRMCw-ColSm > > Jeff Nolder, MSPT > > Director of Physical Medicine and Rehab > > Cherokee Regional Medical Center > > > > (fax) > > From: _PTManager _ (mailto:PTManager ) > [mailto:_PTManager _ > (mailto:PTManager ) ] On > Behalf > Of Alliance Physical Therapy > Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 2010 6:18 PM > To: _PTManager _ (mailto:PTManager ) > Subject: Public Health Fairs > > Has anyone attended a Health Fair as a vendor? What exhibits do you > find > people respond to? How do you make your presentation interesting? The > attendees are likely to be runners (and their families) aged from 3-78 > years. Does anyone have any suggestions for this group profile please? > > Second, does anyone have experience providing free Gait and Functional > screening at a Health Fair? What are the liability issues if someone > falls over and hurts themselves while trying to squat for instance? > What > about unknown medical problems which might preclude doing an > assessment > in the first place? Do you screen people first and have them sign a > waiver? > > Clara > Office Manager, > Eugene, OR > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 29, 2010 Report Share Posted July 29, 2010 We usually do several a year, and get invited to participate in more but have become a bit selective. We've done them at Starbucks headquarters, Pepsi, Amgen, Fred Hutchinson institute, and several other smaller ones. Some we do year after year. There are some keys to making them successful. First I think, as someone else mentioned, direct access is important, otherwise I would not dedicate my resources in that direction. If there is a common employer among the attendees, I find out who their health insurance carrier is to make sure it is a population that I want to recruit clients/patients from. Therapists need to be staffing your booth, because they are the only ones that can engage in the type of dialogue that is needed to convince visitors to your booth that they will really benefit from coming to your clinic. We used to have some lackluster therapist participation, but after switching to an incentivized pay system they are more eager to not only participate in marketing events, they are also much more enthusiastic about doing it now. You need to be able convey a message that your services are valuable. It's easy to show someone that, but difficult to do it in just words. The first barrier is to get them talking to you. We bring banners like " Ask A Physical Therapist " , or " Free Injury Screenings " , among others. We also always give out something free, sometimes expensive things, sometimes just licorice, and we always have many handouts to give, free, on display (stretches, posture, all kinds of things), which we try to customize to the particular population we are in front of. More often than not I have to start the conversation. If they obviously have a question on their mind, then I say " you look like you have a question. " Sounds stupid, but many folks pause, look at you quizzically, and move on. If you start by letting them know that you are interested in what they have to say, and are ready to listen, it sets a good precedence for how will be treated in your clinic. If someone looks like they have no interest in our services, but they pause to look at our booth, I'll start a conversation that has nothing to do with PT; talk about the weather, the book in their hand, whatever. The person will usually eventually start asking questions about our services or about an issue they have. We are in a very big and competitive market in Seattle, so I try to take every opportunity to showcase our services, and make people aware that we are better than our competition. Which also means that we actually do need to be better than our competition. The attendee needs to have in their mind when they walk away from your booth that your services are valuable, applicable to them, and better than your competitors. Another thing to keep in mind at such fairs is that they are great opportunities to network with the other vendors. There will almost always be someone there that is worth adding to your network, so chat it up with all of them. Sometimes you learn things too. I 've been to events that were an utter failure as far as generating new patients, but turned out to be very valuable because of the contacts I made among the vendors or event organizers. We've created a kit of items, including a standard checklist, to take to events. We have everything we need to create a good presence no matter what the facility is or what they have available. Some events we spend thousands of dollars on, some we spend nothing on. We track our success with these events by creating an expense report (including paid therapist time and lost billable time) right down to how many sheets of paper we hand out. We compare it with how many new people come in our door from that event, and we monitor that for a minimum of a year. We review the cost vs. benefit and use that to help determine if we should do that event again. These things take a lot of work to do successfully. If you don't go into it well prepared, or with good staff, then don't bother. Don't expect to get a flood of new people in right away. You might get a few in the short term, but it can be surprising how it can generate clients over following years. Bruk Ballenger, PT CSCS, USAT Level I Coach Real Rehab Physical Therapy Clinic phone Clinic fax Email Bruk@... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted July 29, 2010 Report Share Posted July 29, 2010 Bruk- How do you know that you are better than your competition? What can you objectively compare to that of your competition and present to the consumer? I realize you are in Washington but I ask because our IL State Practice Act (Rules) notes on Advertising:  Information which may be untruthful, fraudulent, deceptive or misleading includes, but is not limited to, that which:  3)Guarantees favorable results or creates false or unjustified expectations of favorable results; 5) Contains testimonials and/or exaggerations pertaining to the quality of physical therapy care (abbrev and bold mine) Specifically, how do you demonstrate that you are better? Thanks, Jasker PT, DPT Accelerated Rehabilitation Centers Bloomington,IL   ________________________________ To: PTManager Sent: Thu, July 29, 2010 12:42:15 PM Subject: Re: Public Health Fairs  We usually do several a year, and get invited to participate in more but have become a bit selective. We've done them at Starbucks headquarters, Pepsi, Amgen, Fred Hutchinson institute, and several other smaller ones. Some we do year after year. There are some keys to making them successful. First I think, as someone else mentioned, direct access is important, otherwise I would not dedicate my resources in that direction. If there is a common employer among the attendees, I find out who their health insurance carrier is to make sure it is a population that I want to recruit clients/patients from. Therapists need to be staffing your booth, because they are the only ones that can engage in the type of dialogue that is needed to convince visitors to your booth that they will really benefit from coming to your clinic. We used to have some lackluster therapist participation, but after switching to an incentivized pay system they are more eager to not only participate in marketing events, they are also much more enthusiastic about doing it now. You need to be able convey a message that your services are valuable. It's easy to show someone that, but difficult to do it in just words. The first barrier is to get them talking to you. We bring banners like " Ask A Physical Therapist " , or " Free Injury Screenings " , among others. We also always give out something free, sometimes expensive things, sometimes just licorice, and we always have many handouts to give, free, on display (stretches, posture, all kinds of things), which we try to customize to the particular population we are in front of. More often than not I have to start the conversation. If they obviously have a question on their mind, then I say " you look like you have a question. " Sounds stupid, but many folks pause, look at you quizzically, and move on. If you start by letting them know that you are interested in what they have to say, and are ready to listen, it sets a good precedence for how will be treated in your clinic. If someone looks like they have no interest in our services, but they pause to look at our booth, I'll start a conversation that has nothing to do with PT; talk about the weather, the book in their hand, whatever. The person will usually eventually start asking questions about our services or about an issue they have. We are in a very big and competitive market in Seattle, so I try to take every opportunity to showcase our services, and make people aware that we are better than our competition. Which also means that we actually do need to be better than our competition. The attendee needs to have in their mind when they walk away from your booth that your services are valuable, applicable to them, and better than your competitors. Another thing to keep in mind at such fairs is that they are great opportunities to network with the other vendors. There will almost always be someone there that is worth adding to your network, so chat it up with all of them. Sometimes you learn things too. I 've been to events that were an utter failure as far as generating new patients, but turned out to be very valuable because of the contacts I made among the vendors or event organizers. We've created a kit of items, including a standard checklist, to take to events. We have everything we need to create a good presence no matter what the facility is or what they have available. Some events we spend thousands of dollars on, some we spend nothing on. We track our success with these events by creating an expense report (including paid therapist time and lost billable time) right down to how many sheets of paper we hand out. We compare it with how many new people come in our door from that event, and we monitor that for a minimum of a year. We review the cost vs. benefit and use that to help determine if we should do that event again. These things take a lot of work to do successfully. If you don't go into it well prepared, or with good staff, then don't bother. Don't expect to get a flood of new people in right away. You might get a few in the short term, but it can be surprising how it can generate clients over following years. Bruk Ballenger, PT CSCS, USAT Level I Coach Real Rehab Physical Therapy Clinic phone Clinic fax Email Bruk@... 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Guest guest Posted July 30, 2010 Report Share Posted July 30, 2010 Well that is a can of worms to open up. There is no objective measure that proves who the provides the best services. The closest " objective " measure for that is an outcomes tool, but those tend to be heavily flawed, and I've never seen them used by a clinic that made sure to include all of the patients that stopped their treatment because they were unhappy with it. I don't tell people " we are the best " or " we are better than clinic X, Y, and Z. " Talk is cheap. What I said in my post is that I make them aware that we are the best. Now, the idea that " we are the best " is entirely subjective, and admittedly only supported by how I view our delivery of service, but more importantly how our extremely loyal and rapidly growing clientele view our services. I can also say that when we were preparing to open our clinic 8 years ago, I did a lot of temp work in this region. I worked in at least 40 different outpatient clinics like ours, and got a very good idea of how other businesses operate, how they deliver their service, and how they prioritize maximizing patient results and satisfaction versus maximizing profit. I never say anything negative about other clinics or therapists. I know where we stand against our competition, and the truth is, I don't need to bad mouth anyone. Our reputation is well proven wouldn't benefit from negativity. Very often I talk with someone who has had a bad experience with PT, or other healthcare provider. I ask them about their issue and how they were treated. I talk to them about how we would do it differently, how our service delivery model is different, how I would approach their particular problem differently than what they experienced. We have had countless patients come to our clinic after going to a competitor and say, " wow, I didn't know physical therapy was supposed to be like that " . My therapists want to be the best that they can and continually work to that end. Not all of our past therapists were like that, and none of those that just " punched the clock " are here anymore. I can only make them aware that we are better at a health fair, and I can only demonstrate it by having them come in to our clinic. We have a long list of testimonials on our website, and another stack that we have yet to add to the list. I believe my patients when they tell us we are the best around. Bruk Ballenger, PT CSCS, USAT Level I Coach Real Rehab Physical Therapy Clinic phone Clinic fax Email Bruk@... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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