Semantics Can Hurt

Ok, Politicians don’t want to call it a recession. They point to positive numbers like employment and even corporate earnings. They want to change the definition. Potayto, Potahto, tomayto, tomahto.

If you, Dr. Small Business owner, act as if everything is honky dory, you’re setting yourself up for disappointment, or worse. Is this going to be a blip or a blimp?

Call it what you will, recession or slow down, transitory or whatever, your patients are feeling the effects. When they watch the news they’re reminded of it. When they look at their devices it’s in their faces. When going to the gas station and the supermarket they feel it in their wallets.

The Government can spin this any way they like, people no longer trust them. They have lost all credibility. People, normal people, see a different reality. Remember when they said that inflation was going to be “transitory”?

You should’ve believe them either.

And you should act upon reality not some government scripted fantasy.

Communicate with your patients. Empathize with them. Get in sync with their concerns and fears.

Then, promote how YOU can be a SOLUTION.

We know the benefits of what we do. We know how, in the long term we even save money!

It’s not good enough for US to know this, patients need to be told it and reminded of it. Over and over and over, in as many creative ways as possible.

It starts in the office.
• Do your patient really know what you do?
• Do they know how what you do helps them?
• Do they appreciate how you do it better than others?
• Do they really feel the value?

The only way to compete with a “feeling”, like the ones your patients have of “scarcity”, when they go to the gas station or market, is to replace it with another “feeling”, that of abundance and security.

Sometimes, you might even have to use FEAR.

But don’t scare people by telling them that bad things are going to happen if they don’t act. Fear is best communicated via STORIES.

We all have them. People who we can point a finger at and say “I told you so!”

While that’s never helpful, relaying those stories to others can instill enough fear to promote them act in their own self-interest. It’s all about the message and the OFFER.

Regardless of what you or anyone wants to call this economic epoch, confronting your patients’ reality can make a real, not fantasized difference.

To confronting reality and acting successfully,
Michael

P.S. Want help crafting an effective marketing communication’s?  HELP IS AVAILABLE HERE.