Hello and welcome lovely readers! I am so, so happy you took a few minutes out of your busy day to connect with me here at Fertility Bridge! My name is Tia and I am a former IVF warrior that writes over at ForeverOrchard.
My path to motherhood closed in late 2017, after unsuccessfully going through four egg retrievals, three transfers, and suffering two miscarriages. We fought and failed for five years, and I spoke frankly about our lives and our decision moving forward in THISPOST.
We might criticize REI fellows for not wanting to take over existing IVF practices, but they are making the same decision that current practice owners have made for decades. They are deciding to be doctors and not CEOs. At the time, starting an independent practice didn’t mean launching a commercial enterprise. The difference is that new doctors know they can’t get away with that today.
It’s common to razz new subspecialists coming out of their Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility (REI) fellowship. I often hear from recruiting physicians, that new REIs are not entrepreneurial. That they have no desire to take over a retiring doctor’s fertility center and run their own practice. It is said that fellows and new specialists want to work for someone else, clock their hours, and go home.
There may be valid points in this general perspective, but I see a much more comprehensive picture. Would you like to see what I observe from my semi-outsider’s vantage point?
Fertility clinics help patients through one of the most difficult times of their lives: growing a family. Given the sensitivity and life altering nature of infertility, finding a high-quality fertility clinic is the number one priority for patients.
Today, most patients head online to find their fertility doctor. Even if they’ve received a referral from another doctor, friend, or family member, there’s little chance of them NOT checking you out online. What will they see?
That’s where online reputation management comes into play. Ensuring that the offline realities of the great care you provide are properly reflected online should be one of the main priorities of your marketing. In fact, your online reputation could be the main reason you get - or lose - a potential new patient to another fertility clinic.
Consider this a gentle "love tap" from a friend.
A direct warning from me is far milder than what the market has in store. If I don't speak up about this single issue now, then I am neglectful in my duty to help protect the field of reproductive health from cultural and technological shock, because the internet-led market has proven to be unforgiving.
That's what a board-certified reproductive endocrinologist (RE) told me over lunch at the 2016 American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) annual scientific congress. "The patient experience doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is if they get a baby or not." My efforts to show him all of the evidence to the contrary were fruitless. That was the end of the conversation. Why try to convince the inconvincible?
This is my third annual recap of the Midwest Reproductive Symposium international (MRSi) , so I'm going to have a little fun with this one. I don't feel like writing another list and I think there's a more valuable point I can convey to you. As of right now, MRSi holds the title for my favorite meeting in the field of reproductive health and I want to use it nudge other meetings to follow suit. I should be a fair judge, I go to almost all of them.
It certainly doesn't hurt that it's on Lake Michigan in Chicago in the summer time, and Dr. Angeline Beltsos knows how to incorporate an interesting theme. Those are pluses, but not enough to make a meeting my favorite. It's big enough to have a diverse range of programming and small enough to be very collaborative and social. People get to know each other and build meaningful relationships. I truly understand how important that is for the field. Louise Brown, the first baby ever born from IVF was a guest at the conference.
We didn't plan it this way...really. Yet still, there was a theme.
The Association for Reproductive Managers (ARM) is the practice managers' professional group within the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM). As a group, we meet in person twice per year: at ASRM in the fall, and at the ARM Annual Meeting in the spring. We just wrapped up our 2017 meeting on April 28 at the Hotel Chicago (guess which city).
Jackie Sharpe is Regional Marketing Director for HRC Fertility in Southern California. Once, at an Association for Reproductive Managers (ARM) marketing meeting, I asked Jackie, "Is it easier, or harder, to track the effectiveness of marketing today than it was several years ago?"
I could tell she had thought about it before. "It's harder," she replied.
Harder? We have every tool under the sun, from Google Analytics to every kind of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software and marketing dashboard. We can track every click, page view, Instagram like, Yelp review...everything down to how many minutes the average visitor spends on our website. How is it not easier than ever to track our ROI? Yet, you know what? She's absolutely right.
When a fertility doctor (or any business owner for that matter) hires a marketer, they very often want to know, to the dollar, what the results will be.
Imagine if I bragged, "My company will increase your new patient visits by 40%!" Would they know, even remotely to the number, what a 40% increase looks like? Would they know to what they could attribute the increase? I've found that the answer is almost always no, because in the fertility field, we rarely have the data we need to gauge the effectiveness of our marketing. Even less often is that data readily accessible. I called this The Biggest Marketing Challenge Facing Fertility Centers, back in 2016. Unfortunately, not much has changed.
Fertility doctors frequently ask me, “Is it better to have an in-house marketing person or contract an outside marketing firm?” You might expect me to favor the choice of hiring the firm. I don’t. The two are not mutually exclusive; each role is critically important to the other. In fact, across the board, your staff are paramount to your fertility practice's efforts to recruit new patients. There are assignments that your in-practice marketer should and should NOT be tasked with to maximize effectiveness and cost-efficiency. The same is true of your agency. Depending on the size of your practice, it may seem redundant to have both an internal marketing person and an agency on retainer. When used correctly, they will each pay for themselves and then some.
Who knew this hyperbole, coined by Harry Selfridge in 1909, declaring his department store's commitment to customer service, would go on to become a thorn in the side of employees everywhere? It's a terrific internal mantra to aspire toward, but it can be very harmful when interpreted as a universal rule. Customers, or in our case, patients, may sometimes project their frustrations on to you or your staff and no one has the right to be abusive to your team members. Maintaining the notion that a single patient's point of view is infallible can put unfair stress on our employees. Gordon Bethune, former CEO of Continental Airlines, says that when companies don't support their employees when a customer is out of line, resentment results and service deteriorates. If we don't care for and support our staff members, how can they in turn care for and support our patients?
I don't know if I ever had a conversation with anyone struggling with infertility (about the topic) before a few years ago. If I had, I probably would have said something silly like the above. I would have said it with the best of intentions, and hopefully, I would have kept an open mind. I knew nothing about infertility. I had barely heard of IVF. I had no idea what a reproductive endocrinologist (RE) was. I am a young male with zero medical background and no personal connection to infertility. On paper, I was the least likely person to become an ally of the infertility community. And that's the very reason it seemed so important to become one.
Recently, someone who is very involved in the field of infertility reinforced what hundreds of patients have told me for two years; there's an astounding gap between the way many fertility practices deliver their services and what patients want and expect. That's exactly why our company has the word "Bridge" in its name. According to a study conducted in 2012 by Forrester, 80% of companies say they deliver superior service to their customers. Meanwhile, only 8% of those companies received a superior customer rating. If you're seeking treatment for infertility, the delivery of the services you receive should be nothing less than superior. No clinic is entitled to your selection. Even in states and countries where some rounds of IVF are covered, there are still many circumstances in which you could pay tens of thousands of dollars of your own money. If you live in a large enough area, or are able to travel, you have a choice. Your choice isn't an easy one to make, given how much is at stake. I don't own any fertility centers (...yet), but because we direct their marketing based on what you tell us, I'll speak about them in the first person voice.
You could put summer-time Chicago against just about any city in the world, so we're all glad that Dr. Angeline Beltsos, MD doesn't hold the Midwest Reproductive Symposium international (MRSi) in February. From June 15-18, without a cloud in the sky and an oceanic view of Lake Michigan, we met at MRSi 2016 at the historic Drake Hotel in Gold Coast. The event boasted a Business Minds Meeting, a Nurses' Practicum, and a Scientific Program. I went back to Chicago this year for my second MRSi because it's just the right size. It's a great place to connect with colleagues who share your practice role and also for physicians, nurses, and practice managers to share programming and meaningful conversation with one another. If you haven't been, add MRSi to the list for next year. You'll be able to talk to people and listen to topics that you won't always be able to get to at ASRM.
Panel discussion at MRSi Business Minds Meeting
While I did attend some of Friday's Scientific Program, I'll use this post to run down Thursday's Business Minds Meeting for some of the things that you really need to know about utilizing different aspects of your clinic operations to grow your practice.
Janet Fraser, Board President of Fertility Matters and the COO of Atlantic Assisted Reproductive Therapies (AART), co-chaired the meeting with Derek Larkin, CEO of Boston IVF.
“Improving our patients’ experience makes our patients happier and it’s better for our business”, Fraser mentioned of the day's theme. The thought was reinforced by all of the speakers; fine-tuning our operations so that our patients are more satisfied is measurably beneficial to the top line of the practice. Larkin emphasized the importance of continually adjusting to patient needs. "Patient expectations are continually evolving, and so must the experience that we provide to them. It's an unending process."
Dr. Alice Domar, PhD of the Domar Center for Mind/Body Health at Boston IVF talked about the importance of focusing not only on patient recruitment, but also on patient retention. “It’s human nature to pay attention to the patients in front of you, and not the ones who you don’t see (those who have dropped out of care). Studies have shown that people who were depressed were far more likely to drop out of their IVF cycle." Domar points to a 2004 Boston IVF study: Of 112 respondents, 40% displayed psychiatric disorders while going through infertility treatment. A separate 2011 study shows that care was significantly higher of a priority for patients, as opposed to physicians, for whom the greatest priority was success rates. "67% of people declined to fill out a survey on self-reporting depression because they didn’t want their physician to know how depressed they were," Domar adds. To date, four different studies show that infertility patients have the same levels of anxiety as cancer patients.
Boston IVF tested retention techniques in a 2015 study that was published in Fertility and Sterility. Drop out rates reduced 67% in the intervention group."If you have effective communication with your patients, they perceive that you spent more time with them". Domar brings to attention the dollar amounts that practices spend on marketing to new patients, and how little is spent on retaining them by responding to trends in drop outs.
Hannah Johnson speaking on patient retention, courtesy of Vios Facebook page
“Intrinsic motivation tends to be lost when we only focus on the extrinsic motivators, so we have to focus on activities where the reward is inherent in what we’re doing". Hannah Johnson, Director of Operations at Vios Global dives deep into how we motivate and empower our team members to take personal interest in each of their patient interactions. We need to allow our team to step back to appreciate the positive difference they make, including making sure they are aware when they are named in positive patient comments. We also need to empower them to correct errors. "It’s okay for your staff to make mistakes. Let’s talk about how we can make the patient feel really good about what happened.”
“People don’t do what the mission of the organization states, they do what their managers pay attention to.” Lisa Duran is the CEO of Reconceived and has trained dozens of fertility centers in North America on how to build a patient-focused culture. Duran says that when many practices don't feel like they're fulfilling their mission statements, it's often because of a breakdown in the details of execution. We broke out into separate teams to identify challenges that different members of our team face in their day-to-day duties, and how we might be able to support them. Departments and staff need reinforcement and understanding from one another. “I want to know that my opinion matters,” Duran says of the most common desire that staff report before going into training.
We had the privilege of hearing the first hand account of a couple who has gone through infertility treatment for many years. When asked what would have most benefited them to know when they first began their treatment, they each replied
"Don't be complacent if you're not getting the answers you need. Keep asking".
"I wish that I wouldn't have waited so long. I wish I would have sought out treatment much earlier".
Hearing from patients in panel-form was a first for me at MRSi, and should be common practice at our conferences...imho.
"Perception is reality. What patients feel is what they share." Rick Dietz, Chief Business Officer of Boston IVF, spoke in detail about the constant feedback loop of implementing and adjusting to patient input. Dietz says that practice strategy should be informed by a number of different metrics, and that self-reporting from patients is only one method at our disposal. "We can use patient surveys to give us clues and direction. But they don't tell the whole story."
"Nurses need proper training of how to talk with patients or you're going to get a lot more questions." Lori Whalen, RN, of HRC Fertility spoke about the importance of nurses as agents of patient retention. Whalen reminds us that nurses frequently have the most contact with patients and can be excellent sources of what patients want or what about our operations might be frustrating them. They can even find other solutions to patient problems, such as helping them find ways to save money. "Shared donors can cut costs in half for patients who wouldn't be able to afford it otherwise," Whalen says.
It was my first time speaking in the field and I was very pleased to have a great audience that asked meaningful questions. What can I say in this single post that isn't better summarized in greater detail throughout the blog? Suffice it to say that I reaffirmed what matters above all else in fertility marketing: the attention of people dealing with infertility. When we know what people with infertility are paying attention to, then we can measure how we will increase IVF cycles, increase patient-to-patient referrals, and improve our conversions of prospective patients to scheduled patients. You can view the first half of my talk here:
The strongest recurring theme of the Business Minds meeting was the critical involvement of everyone at the practice. I frequently see public feedback when patients are happy with their physicians, but not their staff, and vice-versa. Patients form their opinions about their experience based on every interaction they have with us; from the receptionist who greets them, to the medical team that cares for them, to exceptional customer service both online and offline. When we support all of the role players on our team, and learn about best practices from clinic groups across North America, we can dramatically improve both our delivery of care and patient satisfaction. Now that's an excellent foundation for growth. I recommend that at least once a year, you accompany a few of your team members to an inter-role meeting like MRSi to identify how you can improve your practice operations. You might be pleasantly surprised by what you learn from your own team, and what they learn from you.
See you next year at MRSi 2017!
What a day. Legislation hasn't been this much fun since School House Rock. RESOLVE, The National Infertility Association, held their 2016 annual Infertility Advocacy Day at the Capitol on May 11. Over 200 advocates came to Washington, DC to meet with their legislators regarding a few key issues that deeply affect both the infertility and military veteran communities. This was the largest advocacy day that RESOLVE has hosted to date and we hope it's only a glimpse of the momentum that is building for the future. If the relationships made between advocates are any indication, this is a movement set for growth. If you've ever wanted to connect with the infertility community, you need to come out for Advocacy Day; plain and simple. Read on to determine if it's the right fit for you. Let's start with some background on the issues for which we went to advocate:
Thursday, May 5th and Friday, May 6th marked the 2016 annual meeting of the Association of Reproductive Mangers (ARM). The professional group of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) convened on a pair of gorgeous near-summer days in downtown Chicago. Roughly 100 practice administrators attended, coming from single-physician fertility clinics to multi-state practice groups. At the welcome reception on Thursday, ARM Chair Brad Senstra invited the group to introduce themselves and enjoy dinner with someone they hadn't yet met. It was an in-person networking and educational opportunity that isn't especially common for practice admins. Here's some of what we learned
Last night I had one of the coolest conversations that I've had in a little while. The best part, is, we recorded the whole thing. This week is National Infertility Awareness Week and I wanted to participate in the #startasking dialogue, not just with sound bytes or with a scripted narrative, but a candid, meaningful conversation between people who really want to see the infertility community receive the recognition they deserve. So I invited a few cool people to chat on Blab.
