Halloween is almost upon us.
Businesses all over the United States are coming up with marketing tips and tricks to make the most of this festival. If you are a doctor or dentist with a busy medical practice, you may not have thought about the unique and different ways you can market your practice during Halloween.
In fact, you may have wondered whether you should market your medical practice during this festival at all. However, it is really important that you do so. Not only will you be able to be top of mind for your patients and prospective patients, but more importantly, you will help them have fun, which can help them cope with their health condition better.
In this article, we’ll talk about some of the tips and tricks you can use to market your medical practice during Halloween….
- Ask your staff to dress the part: You can ask your clinic staff to dress up in Halloween themed costumes. You can also ask your patients to vote for the best costume and give out a prize to that employee, as well as the patient. However, do ensure that the costumes are not too scary or otherwise inappropriate.
- Give out trick-or-treat bags: You can give out these bags at the front desk, with your clinic information on them. Do ensure that all the patient-facing information you want to disseminate is on that bag as it is something that your patients will continue to use or will pass on to friends and family.
- Organize a pumpkin-decorating contest in your clinic: You can ask your staff to decorate pumpkins and place them in your waiting rooms. This tip is especially effective if you have a pediatric clinic. You can also ask your patients to vote for the best pumpkin and let them take it home with them. You can also give out prizes to the three best-decorated pumpkins.
- Create a fun game for trick-or-treaters: You can create a really interesting game with prizes for trick-or-treaters. You should include your business card and other marketing information along with the prizes.
- Distribute Halloween safety tips: You should design a half-page or full-page poster with Halloween-specific safety tips and hand it out to your patients. Again, do ensure that your marketing information is prominently displayed on that poster.
- Buy back candy from kids: You can buy back candy from kids at a reasonable price, like $1 a pound. This makes for a fun incentive for kids to visit your clinic during Halloween.
- Decorate your clinic in a Halloween theme:Add spooky themes to your clinic and never underestimate the power of themed décor. This will help draw patients to your clinic as it imparts a very human touch to an otherwise clinical experience.
- Team up with other local businesses for special Halloween celebrations: You can join other businesses in your area to come up with special Halloween events in your city or town. During these events you can hand out marketing promotion materials for your practice without it seeming too obtrusive.
- Throw a Halloween party for your patients and their families: Let your patients and their families have a lot of fun during your Halloween party. This is a great incentive for patients to visit you and know more about you, even as it adds a human touch to your medical practice.
- Add Halloween elements and themes to your branding: One of the most effective marketing techniques is to add Halloween themes to your branding. So, all of the medical pouches or medical literature that you hand out during this festival time, should be designed to incorporate spooky but fun Halloween themes. This goes a long way in making patients comfortable and helps them enjoy the festival.
While these tips are for Halloween, they can be tweaked slightly and used for any other festival as well. If you are a healthcare professional with a medical practice, do know that you need to ensure that your patients have fun, even as they consult you for serious treatment.
Adopt these marketing tips and tricks for your medical practice and watch how patients and their families respond in a positive way to your Halloween celebrations. Here’s to a fun patient visit to your medical practice!
For more information on how you can incorporate Halloween marketing tips and tricks for your healthcare practice, contact Kristine Grace DDS, MS, MBA at kristineg@intellahealth.net.
by Kristine Grace, Oct-31-2016