Warren B. Seiler III, MD
John Di Saia, MD
Beatriz H. Porras, MD
Shervin Naderi, MD, FACS
Edward Zimmerman MD
Paula Di Marco Young, BS RN
Seth A. Yellin, MD FACS
Dr. Kevin D. Light
Stephen Weber MD PhD
Brian K. Sidella
Sabine Zenker, MD
Daniel Kaufman MD
Brian Howard MD FACS
Mickey A. Couvertier
Lila Bratani MD
Alex Denes MD FACP
20 CommentsMedical Spa Marketing: Your DVD waiting room loop.
Waiting Room Loop DVD
If you've got a waiting room, it should have a big plasma screen TV with a professional presentation showing your services on it. Actually, you may not want it to be that big but certainly very visible.
Perhaps the easies way to inform your existing patients of what you're offering and keep them asking questions. Like anything else there are some tricks and tips to achieve sells rather than have it look like you're showing your home movies.
Why does it work so well?
It's free: You're already paying $15k a month in advertisng so having something that doesn't have a recurring cost is sweet, sweet love for the wallet.
It's a captive audience: You currently have one of the most desirable situations in all of advertising already built into your waiting room experience…a captive audience and people who are already inside your business. One of the biggest hurdles you have is just letting your patients know what it is you offer.
Education is the key – Research shows that up to 90% of your medical patients do not fully understand aesthetics or the services you are now offering. Showing a ten minute loop with explainations and before and after images presented in a professional way is killer and if done properly will lead to a host of questions and consults.
Insures more comprehensive consultations – Your DVD will provide a great deal of information that will shorten your consultation time and help patients better understand each procedure they are considering. The DVD is an effective tool for those patients who were initially hesitant and in need of more information before making a decision to move forward.
Turn medical “patients” into aesthetic “customers” – A DVD loop in your waiting room is the most convenient and effective way to “cross-sell” patients who are visiting you for medical reasons. Unlike patient brochures, DVD video is a powerful visual medium that stimulates the interest of your target market at a significantly higher rate with a lower cost than conventional advertising such as print, radio and even direct mail.
Personalize your practice with the human touch – A DVD will personalize your practice so that your potential MedSPA patients can actually view brief live demonstrations of your several aesthetic services. The video will help motivate your patients to ask questions, allowing you to answer their questions, express your desire and concern in providing the utmost care for your patients, and sharing your philosophy about their health and happiness. These typically are not things that can be done during a normal check-up or procedure, due to everyday time constraints.
Reader Comments (20)
Jeff-
Do you have any video production companies you can recommend to personalize your videos? Also, what is the price range for producing such things.
thanks
Personally, I like the calm stillness of a well decorated waiting room and absence of noise and flashing images. Wouldn't tailoring your video presentation to fit the services you provide showing your office as the backdrop and your technicians and doctors providing the services be essential?
Personally, I create our loops without any sound.
Where would one find a dvd loop to put on? I bought a plasma and put it in my waiting room just for this purpose but I've yet to find a good DVD for it. Right now I'm running DirecTV just for entertainment purposes.
We have used a local company to edit the portions of DVD's given by the laser companies botox restylane etc. They can even add our logo to the bottom of the screen. It is currently being done. They can give you a digital version as well to run on your computers or even your web site.
I used Practice Profits out of Texas a few years ago. Good quality but pricy.
I am currently looking at Salon Transcripts STX (Mac only) as you can do some charting on it. Mainly like injectables can set up to keep trach of laser HR etc. Also looking at Orchid.
Oops, sorry. I thought this was the blog talking about the scheduling programs. Jeff you can remove these from this post if you want.
LH,
We have used Orchid for almost 3 years. We are very pleased with it. User friendly. Reliable. Love the ability to email pts from Orchid. Love the merchant equipment for credit cards. Would choose Orchid again.
DC
DC,
What do you do for charting? Orchid does not have EMR does it?
New Century Medical Productions personalize all their videos and do a great job. I have been very happy with them in the past. Great new HD products as well.
LH
We actually just use standard charts for treatments. The Lum One actually keeps pts treatments in the software. The MD I work with actually scans all of his treatment sheets (then shreds them) and keeps everything on hard drive. I think this is double work (paper then scanning then shredding).
For scheduling and inventory, payroll, time clock, etc Orchid has been great. I would highly recommend it.
dc
Thanks. I appreciate your input.
I am trying to find a good EMR, scheduling and POS without breaking the bank.
If you're somewhat tech/computer savvy, it isn't too difficult to put together your own waiting room dvd from the dvd's provided by the manufacturers. I was able to do so myself. It looks good, but the transitions could be a little smoother. I did keep the audio with the video. It does help with exposing patients to other services they may not have considered initially. If any of you have teenage kids, they might be able to help you put something together.
We might consider having something professionally done when we put together some new footage for our tv commercials later this year.
On the POS/EMR front, we've been using mSpa & mChart from Mack Software for about 1.5 years. mChart requires using tabletPC's which are bit more of a pain, but looks very slick and professional as you can also use it to capture signatures for all the consent forms and make treatment notes. The POS side is starting to be a bit constraining for us as we've gotten more complex with discounts, packages, VIP programs, rewards programs, etc.
A good idea. Think also about handing out dvds with a promotoional video. People have to much time there, that they will take everything :) Just remember to find good dvd duplication services, that will suit your needs.
We have used mSPA Software in our medical spa for over 4 years now and over a year ago added mCHART which is mSPA's EMR module. So far, it has been a huge cost saver in terms of productivity and space requirements
Epi Center Med Spa , www.skinrejuv.com
I like messing with computers and have been editing video for several years. I used the video given to us by our laser manufacturer and added a few titles and some background music under the titles. The manufacturers dvd had sound to describe the procedures. I would love to get hold of some decent clips for Botox and fillers. the software was pinnacle studio v12. I burnt the dvds at a slow speed and they seem to have worked very well. The manufacturer kindly offered to personalize the original dvd for several thousand dollars!!
It worked out well as we expanded our services and would have had to pay out again to update it. As it was it was quite easy to tweak it. I am sure it could be somewhat more polished but it is certainly more than adequate and passed the critical wife/manager test!
Rgds
David
Great idea Jeff, the only thing I would add is that it would be a good idea to mix in testimonials with the education about the services. Testimonials provide "social proof" and have a huge effect on people, psychologically. These would definitely boost the overall effectiveness of the looping DVD.
Watching a video loop in wonderful spa last Thursday, a woman came in expecting an appointment and for the third time (according to the customer) her Aesthetician was busy else where. It would have been more important for the staff to know this patient, make certain they had a means to stay in contact with her i.e. by Text, Email or Voice an an effective technology to do it.
If you have repeat clients, how do you keep them from getting disgusted with seeing repeat loops of the same info?