Shining the Media Spotlight on Your Practice!

Learning how to work with the media system

Media meets medicine is not something that happened with the arrival of reality television and shows such as Dr. 90210 and The Swan. The media has been reporting on developments in the aesthetic medicine field for more than 2 decades.

Innovative surgeons have always realized the "power of the press." However, positioning yourself in the media is not an easy task. It can be time-consuming and costly if you don't know what to do or who to hire.

First, you need to understand how the media works. Media courses can offer in-depth training on such topics as press release writing, finding news within your own practice, approaching the press with a newsworthy story, and proven follow-up techniques. Until you have the opportunity to take a media course, there are practical ways to kick off your very own media campaign right now:

Think news. Every patient who comes into your office is a potential news story. They each have a personal reason for wanting surgery. Oftentimes, they want to share their stories with others and are willing to be candidates for press interviews.

Keep up with trends. Each year, societies and academies publish results of surveys conducted among their members. Those surveys result in statistics that show the increase in trends and procedures.

The media love to see growth statistics, especially those that can be proven by such credible organizations. Whereas most national media outlets report these statistics, many local press outlets are never shown the results and may welcome the chance to interview you as the local resource.

Get more than CMEs at industry events. Though many of you attend meetings and events to learn new techniques and fulfill CME requirements, don't overlook the gold mine of information in the exhibit hall. This is where all the new future possibilities lie, and things are discussed there before they are discussed from the podium.

Also, should you be in the market for a new piece of equipment, many of the larger technology firms offer promotional packages that you can use to obtain valuable media coverage in your area.

Be charitable. Charitable work or philanthropic contributions are of interest to the media. In these instances, aesthetic surgery is considered "surgery of the soul," especially when it is reconstructive surgery. Such a media campaign promotes a positive community image.

Making a move? If you are planning a grand opening, invite the press. Many community newspapers have a "society" or "locals only" section. If you are opening your practice, get involved with the local Chamber of Commerce and have a ribbon-cutting ceremony.

Obtain the press—literally speaking. If you have written a book, are involved with clinical research, or are conducting community speaking engagements, let the media know.

USE THE MEDIA TO BUILD YOUR PRACTICE
Hiring a professional dedicated to public relations, who can apply his or her experience dealing with the media, can be the best way to garner media exposure.

Don't delegate this task to your office manager or receptionist. He or she may not have the necessary expertise in dealing with the media. This position carries full-time obligations and high expectations, and requires minute-by-minute responsibility and work-related creativity. Whether the person you choose is part of a PR agency or is part of your office staff, he or she should have a lineup of easily accessed media contacts.

A PR firm can provide you with credibility that advertising cannot buy. If you are quoted during a local newscast, the audience's perception is that you must be an expert. Why else would a reporter be interviewing you? Not only does this kind of PR boost patient awareness and peer recognition, it affirms to the patients who have already booked surgery with you that they made the right choice of physicians.Finally, understand that getting yourself in the spotlight does not always happen overnight. Public relations campaigns can take weeks, months, or even years to become successful, depending on your goal.

Ready For Your Close-up? Article Featured in PSP

There is only one way to look on television: Good

Q: Are you a real doctor?

A: No. I just play one on television!

Fortunately for you, you are a real physician. Yet, some of you may actually get to "play" one on television—you may get a chance to play yourself on television.

Like it or not, reality television is here to stay. As our population continues to age, the increase in medical television shows and consumer interest in those shows will only grow.
For those of you who are looking to further your medical career and increase your practice revenues by being regularly featured on television, here are a few ways you can still keep the appearance of being a physician and also project an image that is professional, knowledgeable, and—most importantly—attractive to the viewer.

Oftentimes, a television producer or reporter will have an agenda regarding the interview and how it is going to proceed. Although you need to be knowledgeable about the show's format and the producer's demands, you must never forget that this is about you. You are not there to provide entertainment. You are there because you have decided that you want to build a practice, build an image, and build a brand. And the medium of television is the fastest, most cost-effective medium in which to achieve that goal.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS COUNT

There is only one way to look on television—good.

Image is everything, especially when you talk about aesthetic surgery. The best choice for clothes in a television interview is still a conservative blue or gray suit for men. Some men wear black and look great. Others look washed out. If you are uncertain, choose blue or gray. Both colors look neat and photograph well.

Wear a light blue or cream shirt and a tie with a small print or striped pattern. White shirts may make you look pasty on camera and can reflect glare. Light blue is still the best choice.
Check the length of your socks and pants (in a sitting position) to make sure no leg is visible. There is nothing more off-putting than watching a man on television who crosses his legs to show hairy legs under his pants. Wear higher socks or longer pants to be certain this does not happen to you.

The same color schemes apply to women, although they can wear more spring colors such as beige, light brown, and pale blue. When in doubt, stick with the basic that feels comfortable.
Skirt length for women is important. Just as our fear of seeing a guy's hairy leg is very real in this context, there is also the fear of seeing a little too much thigh should your skirt ride too high when you sit down.

If you are unsure about this issue, practice in front of a mirror. Wear the clothes you are thinking about wearing on camera, and place a chair in front of the mirror. Try sitting in a couple of positions, crossing and uncrossing your legs to see what is revealed. Then make the choice.
In addition, I suggest that you bring a change of clothes (at least a shirt or blouse) to the shoot with you. All clothes should be freshly laundered. You do not want to run the risk of being without an alternate change of clothes should you spill something on yourself.

MORE THAN A DRESS REHEARSAL
Although looking good is imperative when making a television appearance, being well rehearsed is of equal value. Most times, you can go into an interview with the confidence that you know more about your subject than the host or reporter does.

However, don't be fooled. Make sure you really do know your subject. For example, if you are going to talk about a specific procedure, know its history. Who else has performed it? Are there any complications?

Anticipate questions that the reporter might ask, and have a friend ask you these questions at home and before the show. Listen to your answers. It is important to rehearse out loud so that you remember your answers in your "mind's ear" rather than just in your "mind's eye." That way, when you are under the lights and feel the tension of the interview, you will hear what you say and immediately recognize that you got it right or not.

Think about the messages you want the viewers or listeners to receive. Decide in advance what key points you want to convey, and then plan to include them. A clear objective will help you keep the initiative during the interview.

Watch the program in advance of your appearance. Watch it more than once, if possible. Get a feel for the interviewer's style and interests. Determine whether or not your interview will be brief or lengthy, restricted to a single issue or wide-ranging.
Will you appear alone or share the platform? To what type of audience is the program focused? Can you use visuals?

If possible, speak briefly to the interviewer in advance. This will help confirm your understanding of the situation. Also, understand the program's audience. Is it largely made up of women? If so, try to appeal to women when discussing topics or answering questions.
Anticipate the questions you might be asked. Pretend Matt Lauer of NBC-TV's Today show is about to interview you. First, remember that this is the media and they (and their viewers) are people who are expecting to be entertained. Talking in a friendly, upbeat manner is very important. This is not a patient consultation. Think about what you would ask if you were the interviewer. Pay special attention to potentially sensitive areas. Then formulate your answers. Decide not only how you will respond to each question but also how you can use it as a bridge to your communications objective.

You are not presenting at a medical meeting. You are talking to a broad range of people. You are talking to the public. Find ways to answer negative questions on a positive, upbeat note. Make a special effort to compose concise replies to technical questions and express those answers in easy-to-understand, layperson's language. Avoid slang.

STAGE PRESENCE AND ON-CAMERA SUCCESS

On the set, you will usually be seated next to, or opposite, the interviewer. At first, this may seem unnaturally close, but on camera it looks very natural. Resist the urge to back away when the interviewer leans forward. If you do, that will look awful from the viewer's point of view.
During the interview, look at the interviewer throughout the segment. Do not stare at the studio camera or the floor. Most times, you will be sitting. Do not cross your arms in front of you. This creates a barrier between you and the viewer, or it makes you look arrogant. Rest your arms casually on the arms of the chair or on your lap. This projects a relaxed, comfortable, and self-assured look.

If you ever need to stand, let your arms hang at your sides. This will feel awkward, but on camera it will look fine.

As much as possible, keep your legs uncrossed—or crossed at the ankle—or else you risk looking a little rumpled on camera. Or, as I mentioned earlier, you risk showing too much leg.
Be conscious of your movements. In particular, do not sway back and forth or side to side in your chair. It is a nervous movement, and that's just how it will come across to the viewer.
Often, there will be a monitor off to the side of the set where you can glance and check for your posture and position. Check yourself just before you go on the air. Whatever you do, avoid glancing at the monitor repeatedly during the interview. Otherwise, you will look distracted.
Finally, refrain from standing up until the entire interview or your segment of it has been completed. Then lean forward and shake hands with the host/interviewer and end with as pleasant a closing expression as you can make.

CONCLUSION
PlasticSurgeryPractice.com
The more you consider yourself to be an asset to a news- or interview-based television magazine program, the better you will become at the interview process.

The goal of becoming a good medical resource to television shows is to get invited back in the future. Many news stories that appear today in both print and electronic media stand a good chance of being transferred to the media outlet's Web site. This will double your exposure and can lead to viral media. Sounds scary, doesn't it? Sounds like an illness. However, viral media is good for you and your practice because it remains within the Internet "buzz" network, generating viewer interest and spreading your message.

Therefore, when on camera keep your head up, stay focused, look sharp, pay attention to the environment and, as they say in Hollywood, "Lights! Camera! Action!" Enjoy your celebrity status.

Seven Steps to Economic Survival

The first step is an honest analysis of where you want your practice to go in 2009

For more than 20 years, I have worked with hundreds of aesthetic physicians to help them build a better business through public relations, marketing, and consulting. My clients and I have survived at least three recessions prior to the current one, and have realized that each one brings a new set of challenges as well as opportunities.

Focus on the opportunities, and the results can be excellence in all areas of your life, especially during a down economy.

In the current fast-paced, high-stakes, competitive medical environment, looking at your practice from a "business" point of view will provide enormous benefit.

I have developed a seven-step system that can help you gain clarity and equip you with skills to navigate this new economy. By exploring various alternatives to your current methods, you will feel an increase in motivation, have a higher degree of accountability within the practice, find a greater focus, develop a clearer sense of direction, identify and enhance personal strengths, identify and eliminate/minimize practice weaknesses, have increased effectiveness and confidence, see a higher level of organization and structure, realize the ability for greater earning potential, and (take a deep breath now) still find time for family and friends.

To do this, you need to make a commitment to yourself and to your personal success, surround yourself with a strong team who understands what you want to achieve, develop a vision of your future, assess your current reality, develop a solid strategy, initiate new public relations and marketing programs, and learn how to maintain that success.

Let's start by finding a moment of uninterrupted time so that you can sit down with a pen and paper and begin a brief analysis of yourself, your practice, and where you want to take it.

MIND THE GAP

If you have ever traveled the London Underground, you will recognize this phrase. It is used to let travelers know about the slight gap between the station platform and the train—and you had better not fall in.

The same is true of your practice. Between "what you have" and "what you want" is a gap. The first step toward practice success is to identify this gap and how to safely cross it.

Most of us lack something—money, time, energy, quality staff, location, adequate space, technology, a business plan, team spirit, etc.

Start your reevaluation process by doing a practice assessment. Find your gap. When doing an assessment, consider the following areas:

• Personal effectiveness;
• Practice leadership;
• Staff leadership;
• Marketing needs;
• Sales programs;
• Team ability;
• Time spent on superior skill;
• How supportive is your environment;
• Organization;
• Finances;
• Personal health and well-being; and
• Interoffice communication.

ENVISION YOUR FUTURE

Although none of us need a crystal ball to tell us that 2009 might be a little tough, it will take some insight on your part to develop a personal vision.

Literally, what that vision amounts to is—to paraphrase the well-known cliché—what you see is what you will probably get.

Your vision might be to take your practice from reconstructive surgery cases to 100% cosmetic surgery cases. It might be to add a medical spa to an already successfully practice. Or it might even be the fact that you want to recreate your business as one that supports your lifestyle and allows more time for friends, family, and for travel. Whatever it is, it is all yours and nobody else's.

This vision can be as big and colorful as you want it to be. Write down your vision of you and your future, and then go back to it the next day and write it again. Rewrite it until it is the perfect vision of what you want to create. Once you can look at it objectively, you can determine just how you are going to create this vision of your revitalized practice.

REALITY CHECK

Taking your own "business temperature" is not the easiest thing to do. Many of us are in denial about current situations, are operating out of fear, or are too overwhelmed with daily minutiae to want to find the time to face the facts.

However, in order to be successful, survive in a failing economy, and be the best that you can be under these circumstances, you will have to take out that thermometer, make a diagnosis, and write yourself a prescription for success.

In general, once you take out the thermometer and read it, things will not be as bad as they might seem. You will begin to see the opportunities that are placed in front of you every day.

By doing the personal practice assessment first, you should have a clearer view of your current reality. When I have gone through this phase with a physician, it repeatedly amazed me how many of their open-ended and incomplete projects were holding them back.

Armed with the introspective analysis, you can decide which of these projects are worthwhile (if any) and let go of the ones that are going nowhere. This gives us fresh ground to begin to build toward success.

RX FOR SUCCESS

Developing a strategy for your practice and implementing it can be likened to an architect creating a blueprint and then watching as the house is built.

Your strategy should include long- and short-term goals—that is, 30-, 60- and 90-day measurable action plans on the part of you and your team. This includes daily action items that should be discussed in (preferably weekly) staff meetings.

As well as including overall practice goals, your strategy should also include financial needs and financial growth opportunities, staffing needs, role designations, ideal marketing budgets and outlets, and, of course, time off for you so you can regenerate.

It is easy to build surgery and consultation time into the weekly schedule, but not as easy to include time for business building, planning, implementation meetings, creativity, sales goals, and other assessments (including the occasional round of golf) that are critical to the health and future success of the practice.

Most of us spend our days working "in" the business rather than "on" the business, when we should really divide our time between both.

MAKE A LEAP

Until you implement a strategy, you don't actually know if it's going to work. Of course, you can follow the example of others or copy things they have done, but don't forget that this is your vision that you are creating and there is not a one-size-fits-all rule here.

Making fundamental choices to change your life may seem risky. Making grandiose ideas come to life seems risky, too, but the payoff can be tremendously lucrative and free you to enjoy life the way in which you want.

The riskiest thing you can do in 2009 is to do nothing. Inertia is not going to help you or your practice survive the current economy. Get proactive about your practice's success—your enthusiasm and high spirits will ignite excitement, not just in you but among your staff, too.

PUBLIC RELATIONS AND MARKETING

There really is nothing mysterious behind implementing a solid public relations and marketing plan. However, in an economy that is in recession you have to stop wasting time and money on hiring the wrong people or thinking that you can do it all yourself.

"You keep doing what you do best—surgery," I tell my clients, "and I will keep doing what I do best—PR and marketing." Allowing professionals to handle your marketing tasks will, for most physicians, be the best approach. A minority of physicians have successfully run a practice and also spent the time necessary to adequately market themselves and their practice. Most don't know where to start, though.

In my case, all of my clients are holding steady with practice revenues, are continuing to see themselves on television news shows, and are regularly interviewed by the media.

Implementing a sound PR and marketing plan requires a strategy that is separate from your business-building strategy. Also, you should surround yourself with people who can create a highly creative campaign that gets attention.

Public relations remains the most credible and cost-effective way to promote a practice. Appearances on television and articles written about you in newspapers and magazines offer a third-party endorsement that simple advertising and Internet promotion cannot do for you.

Now is the best time to evaluate everything you use to market your practice, from logos and stationery to brochures and your Web site, as well as advertising and branding, and events.

MAINTAINING YOUR EDGE

Just as when James Bond takes that final leap looking battered, tired, and dusty—and we think this must be the end of him—he always comes out looking suave and debonair and ready for the next adventure.

As with Commodore Bond, you need to learn how to emerge from a scuffle, such as the current economy, and keep the "edge."

This translates into keeping your name in lights and in the forefront of your patients' minds, and maintaining a thriving practice.

The only way to do all those things successfully is to be vigilant about your success. While maintaining your growing success will not take as much of your time as your initial "gear up to success," you should be constantly monitoring your overall business goals and day-to-day milestones during your weekly staff meetings. In this way, you can keep a close eye on sales, budgets, and spending; as well as return on investment.

Don't ignore intangibles such as staff attitudes and your own quality of leadership, and take the global and local temperature of the aesthetic medicine industry.

10 Ways to Maximize Your Time!

1. Starting your day 15 minutes earlier each day, can add an extra 30 more minutes of productivity.

2. Get rid of distractions. Schedule times to check cellular phone and email messages. Do not

keep checking them every 5 minutes.

3. Make lists and take notes. None of us has a perfect memory.

4. Plan ahead. Spend the last 10 minutes of today, planning for tomorrow.

5. Group similar task together. i.e. phone calls, filing, report writing, etc.

6. Do the 2 minute tasks FIRST. It will make you feel like you are getting through your "to do" list faster and the day will seem less overwhelming.

8. Organize, organize, organize. Do I need to say more?

9. Regulate your daily responsibilities and set a time limit on each one.

10. Use shortcuts when you can, but not in a way that can negatively impact the end result.

How to Impress The Press!

1. Pick up the phone. Don't hide behind emails. Developing relationships is key.

2. Have your "Top 5 Things I Want To Say" list in front of you.

3. Don't sound like a telemarketer. Learn as much as you can about the reporter you are about to call.

4. Learn the "beat" of the reporter.

5. Make sure your Press Releases and Media Kit are up-to-date.

6. During conversation, take the time to note personal comments, i.e they like to travel. It will help build future rapport.

7. Know your stuff. Don't call on things you don't fully understand.

8. Make sure your contact list is up to date.

9. If they ask you to call back at a specific time, do so. And not a minute later.

10. Ask what their deadline is.