This document contains an outline of a marketing plan for a healthcare practice. This
document can assist healthcare businesses in considering and implementing their short
and long term goals. This plan contains sections such as setting the marketing goals for
the business, auditing the marketing undertaken in the last three years, and an action
plan to help put goals into actions. This form contains language specific to the
healthcare industry. Physicians, nurse practitioners, rehabilitation therapists,
psychologists, nutritionists, and any patient-care professional can use this document to
create a successful marketing strategy.
Healthcare Marketing Plan
This document contains an outline of a marketing plan for a healthcare
practice. Physicians, nurse practitioners, rehabilitation therapists,
psychologists, nutritionists and any patient-care professional can make
use of this tool to create a successful marketing strategy.
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The elements of a plan
Healthcare businesses – like all businesses – must carefully consider both short and long-term
goals. Although owners are typically practitioners who are more focused on patient-care than
finances, the bottom-line still matters. Start with a vision and then map out the steps toward it –
which should including bringing patients through your doors.
1. Set your marketing goals
Map out a series of steps and marketing activities for the next 18-24 months. Because of
the constantly changing nature of healthcare, don’t plan much further. You’ll need to
leave room for flexibility and adaptation.
Create a timeline, breaking your steps into months 1-6; 7-12; 13-18 and 19-24. Just like
your goals for patients, make your marketing goals specific, measurable and realistic. For
example:
Increase the number of new patients seen in the practice by 10 percent within the first six
months and 20 percent by the end of the first year.
Shift your patient mix by expanding the pediatric and adolescent patient base from 15
percent to 30 percent of total patient visits within 18 months.
Increase your gross revenue by 40 percent within 24 months.
Improve your practice’s image, measured by “before” and “after” scores on a community
survey or by reviews from focus group participants.
Share your goals with staff members and find out whether they believe the goals are reasonable.
Bring them onboard and help them believe in the goals. To succeed, your staff must support your
marketing efforts.
2. Marketing audit
List and review all marketing activities you’ve undertaken in the past three years.
Include every announcement, advertisement, phonebook ad, open house, brochure and
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seminar. Consider whether each was successful and what kind of return you got for your
money and time.
3. Market research
To make good choices, you must understand your business and its environment. You
need to know about your community’s needs, your competition and how you stand in the
eyes of potential customers. With this information, you can project future growth in the
community, identify competitive factors and explore nontraditional opportunities such as
nutritional counseling, smoking-cessation programs or massage therapy. Your research
may even identify problem areas in your practice that you can troubleshoot .
4. Analysis
Analyze your data to develop insights for selecting your best marketing strategies. The
research should illuminate the wants and needs of both current and potential patients and
will help you to define your target audience. Also take a look back at your goals to make
sure they are feasible and properly directed. You may need to modify them depending on
what you learn through your research.
A strategic marketing plan should focus on what your practice does for patients. Research
analysis will reveal your strategic advantages. After looking closely at your practice as well as
your competitors’, consider the similarities and differences. What sets your practice apar