PAINS

   Low enrollment
   Broker management issues
   Low customer retention
   Inaccurate reporting
   Quoting and underwriting delays
   Marketing campaign issues
   Competitor tracking
   Low productivity
   Increasing claims costs
   Increased expenses
   Billing issues
   Profit losses
   Merger difficulties
   Multiple offices and branches
   Internal communications
   Excessive paperwork
   Decrease in service quality
   Other

PAIN DESCRIPTION:

As you prepare the next marketing campaign for your Health Plan, make sure it is as effective as possible. People do not want "policies," they want solutions to their problems.

What makes a marketing campaign effective? There are several important factors:

• Selection of your target audience
• Delivered message
• Methods you convey your message
• Tools you use
• Measurement of results

Usually HMOs/PPOs pay most of their attention to what they want to tell their prospects and overlook the invisible mechanics of marketing campaigns.

Most HMOs we worked with reported the following problems their marketing reps experienced:

1. Cannot get marketing reports they need (e.g. lead sources).
2. Do not track marketing materials being sent to each client.
3. Cannot tell which marketing strategy worked the best.
4. Cannot provide sales with enough leads during low enrollment season.
5. Do not have a tool to measure their effectiveness/ROI.
6. Cannot measure quality of leads.
7. Cannot track lead sources effectively.
8. Cannot establish brand positioning by increasing communication with prospects, not just sold groups.
9. Do not buy the right lists.
10. Experience pressure with mailings (e.g. duplicates) and scheduling.
11. Do not use multiple types of communication (fax, email, letters) in a fast, effective, personalized way.

All of these issues can be easily solved with HMOZ. Marketing and education are important for membership increase; HMOZ allows you to do it cost-effectively and provides a great flexibility at any stage of your marketing campaign.

PAIN ANALYSIS:

Marketing has been the most important tool used by corporate giants in the conduct of their businesses. A connection with potential clients can be made in many ways, including print advertisements, news releases, a Web site, involvement in community service projects, public awareness campaigns on various health and safety issues, lectures on health topics, or even a health column in the local newspaper.

Marketing's prime purpose is to increase membership so that profits can be generated. Education is a new form of marketing; HMOs/PPOs can use it to promote their products, discourage clients to switch to their competitors, and encourage claim reduction through a healthier lifestyle.

Case Study: Orange County, "Smoking Cessation" campaign

A substantial number of Orange County residents continue to smoke in spite of being aware of the health risks associated with this behavior. The majority of smokers surveyed reported they would like to completely quit smoking. However, most smokers have not tried any way of quitting apart from "cold turkey" which is seldom successful because of withdrawal symptoms. Based on the results of these surveys conducted by the Bureau of Economic Development, a reasonable strategy for reducing tobacco use among adult Orange County residents would be a broad-based campaign to increase awareness of the efficacy and availability of newer techniques to help motivated smokers to kick the habit.

Marketing is also used to create an image, boost corporation credibility, perceived reliability, financial stability, and convey the idea that standards of care are excellent.

Case Study: Kaiser Permanente

Email can be a killer app for healthcare marketers, especially HMOs. Capable of delivering a dialogue over time in an efficient and personalized manner, email can help emphasize the "maintenance" aspect of health maintenance organizations.

In mid-2001, Kaiser Permanente, America's largest not-for-profit HMO, realized the need for partners to help them build an email marketing strategy and campaign to improve customer relations through delivering high-quality healthcare information. Working with Internet marketing and consulting firms, Kaiser Permanente launched a newsletter entitled "Partners in Health."

"Partners in Health" was designed to increase awareness of Kaiser Permanente's Website – specifically the regional functionality and capabilities that could be found there. The newsletter campaign was a tremendous success:

• 42 percent of recipients opened the messages
• 52 percent of those viewing the message became Website visitors
• Newsletter subscriptions increased 61 percent over a six-month period. Previously, growth was flat.

As is the case with most email campaigns, Kaiser Permanente was able to build its database and engage its target with an ongoing dialogue. A primary benefit of acquiring email addresses of interested consumers is that once a prospect is acquired, he or she can be re-marketed to over and over until the prospect opts out of the relationship.

It is important that Mail tool has the ability to dynamically customize email content when the email is viewed, rather than when it is sent, ensuring that customers receive the most appropriate and timely content.

Email is a tremendous opportunity for healthcare companies, as demonstrated by the results above. A campaign like this has tremendous potential to reduce healthcare costs for an HMO by disseminating preventative healthcare tips, reminders for checkups, and other types of content that can help an HMO member to be more health-conscious.

The old marketing model was such that an HMO marketer does everything to attract a prospect, and the prospect signs up. This push marketing was equivalent to shooting in the dark because HMOs were wasting money and valuable marketing resources to hopefully hit someone. The new HMOZ model builds a two-way stream of continual communication. Marketing can understand prospects better by listening and seeing a complete picture, and later easily turn them into subscribers. This allows you to close the plan services gap and understand exactly how to refine your marketing strategies: targeting the right person at the right time with the right message.

HMOZ is the best way to test different calls to action against one another, on different profitable groups of prospects; to increase marketing campaign response rates and qualified leads when you need them before open enrollment. On the other hand, boosting renewals through process improvement and automated knowledge strengthens existing relationships with brokers and direct sales. Avoid the opportunity cost of not knowing what other HMOs have gained through HMOZ.

ADVICE:

HMOZ does not provide only a solution to the problems mentioned earlier, it also gives your HMO/PPO the following benefits:

• Target specific types of members, sizes of companies (e.g. mini markets).
• Up-sell faster and more effectively.
• Cross-sell smart additional riders.
• Convince and educate brokers to carry more lines.
• Educate your prospects about your products.
• Track shipping costs for marketing materials
• Track campaign sources and costs.
• Compare lead sources.
• Test different plan offers, different calls to action.
• Organize/manage seminars, educational events.

We can gladly demonstrate how HMOZ solves marketing campaign issues unique to your organization.

One Demo is better than a thousand words, and one Solution Audit is better than a thousand demos. We encourage you to follow our CRM proverb and take advantage of this opportunity.

Click on one of the three links below to continue your HMOZ research.