HomecareCRM Industry Insights
| Managing Referrals - A Better Way | |
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 Managing Referrals – A Better WayThe home health care industry relies on referrals from others as part of a larger marketing strategy. In order to receive the highest quality referrals, consider implementing a referral management system. After all, you don’t want to rely on chance alone for referrals. At the heart of any referral management system is a plan. How you power that plan is up to you with choices ranging from paper-based organizational tools to software dedicated to the job. Referral Management Plans If you don’t currently have a plan for managing your referral sources, create one ASAP. Begin by identifying your ideal patients. These would be the types of patients that you prefer to care for, perhaps because of your area of specialization; perhaps because of the profit margin. For example, if your agency provides care to hospice patients as well as skilled nursing care and you’ve found that the skilled nursing care patient is more rewarding -- or more profitable -- then the skilled nursing patients are the ones that you’d prefer. While you’re at it, identify the types of referrals that you do NOT want to encourage. Once you know the types of referrals that you do and do not want, identify the sources of these referral types. This is a referral plan at its most basic: identify your ideal patient and target the professionals that can refer these patients to you. Though basic, a plan is useless unless properly carried out. When will you call on these referral sources? How will you encourage them to send you referrals? What will you do once a referral is granted? How will you follow up? As your list of referral sources and referrals grows, relying on sticky notes and trying to remember to say “thank you” are no longer effective. That’s where a customer relationship management tool, such as HomecareCRM, comes into play. Imagine having all of your referral sources in the software and having access to each source’s history, detailed notes, quality of referrals, and overall rating. Now imagine being able to schedule calls, mailings, status updates, and thank you notes so that you never take anyone for granted again. Additionally, imagine being alerted by CRM to your phone when your referral sources refers patients -- HomecareCRM doesn't replace your EMR system but rather links to it. Because HomecareCRM can integrate many aspects of your business and can be shared throughout your organization, all of the details surrounding a single referral source are linked. For example, let’s say that a physician refers a patient to your agency. Your EMR system can link to your CRM system providing you (and anyone else) with key information the next time you call on that referral, without having to ask your intake coordinator for it. You will know the latest information and will be better informed. As the software prompts you to call the referral with a status report, all of the notes entered by various employees will be at your fingertips. In summary, a good referral management tool will provide these key benefits: * Creating a premium level of service and awareness to the Referral Source community * Increasing average daily census and revenue, as well as margin per patient for your company by maximizing Referral Source utilization * Getting the most out of internal sales/marketing resources as well as the investments in business development through a good activity and reporting system. |
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