Learning from Target Clinic®

I have to admit that I have become fascinated with the story of Walmart, Target, Walgreens, and CVS making revised pushes into health services.  There are so many interesting questions surrounding it.  Over the next few weeks I’m going to address some of them.

For today, my question is: Can we learn anything from the health services websites of the big box retailers?

Let’s look at what we can learn from the online marketing efforts of Target Clinic®.  I think their page titled, “GuideTo a Great Visit” is awesome.  It’s all about the warm and fuzzy.  It features a couple pictures of young woman, and here are some excerpts from the text:

• Let’s get you back in the game

• Come on in to a Target Clinic®......get a game plan for your health

• …personalized summary of your visit will be printed…

• …you’ll have time to ask the provider questions.

• You’ll leave feeling confident about your treatment, how to best spend your time healing, and what, if any, medications to take.

• We’ll coach you back to health

 

Doesn’t this sound warm and inviting?  Go team!  And it hits on so many of the complaints we still hear from patients such as, “I can’t remember what the doctor told me”, “the doctor came and went so fast I didn’t get a chance to ask my question”, and “I’m not sure what I can and can’t do”. 

Notice all the “you”s?   Lots of “you” on this website, which, as marketers will tell you, is a good thing. 

Contrast these “you” statements to this excerpt from an actual website (I changed the name of the practice): “Clear Dermatology, Inc. physicians and staff are committed to providing quality dermatologic services in a safe and compassionate manner that enhances our patients’ lives and well-being.” 

This is their mission statement, and they lead with this prominently on their homepage.  Now, I don’t doubt that this mission statement is true and they have a heartfelt desire to abide by it.  But it feels cold to me.  I would save this for the break room wall, and make the homepage about the patient. 

Target Clinic® also uses photos effectively.  They don’t use lots of them, but the ones they have make you smile.  And that’s really what our websites are about, right?  Making the connection with the patient or potential patient. 

My next website example is so close to getting it right, it hurts when I view it.  I’m a fan of the website in general.  It’s fast, logical and aesthetically pleasing.  It has lots of useful features like downloadable forms, a bunch of online information references, and online bill pay capability.  Overall a great webpage.  Unfortunately, it’s also an example of pictures gone dull.

I’m not normally a fan of flash animation on medical practice websites because people tend to do it wrong.  But in this case the concept worked well.  The flash animation goes as follows (not real practice name):

• “Welcome to Sporting Orthopedics”, fade to picture of an empty room with sports rehab equipment.

• “Physician Led”, fade to picture of a framed print on a wall next to a window. 

• “Patient focused”, fade to picture of an empty exam room.

• “Outcomes Centered”, fade to picture of an empty waiting room.

 

So is everyone invisible?  I mean, the pictures are beautifully done, well lighted and well framed.  But it looks like test shots as we wait for everyone to come back from lunch.  What if it had gone like this instead:

 

• “Welcome to Sporting Orthopedics”, fade to picture of staff dutifully assisting patients in rehab room.

• “Physician Led”, fade to picture of white coated doctor talking with patient as they look at an x-ray image. 

• “Patient focused”, fade to picture of doctor watching therapist work with same patient.

• “Outcomes Centered”, fade to picture of smiling doctor, therapist and sweaty, uniform clad patient at sporting event.

 

Now that’s a story to make you smile.

So your homework is to browse the web and see what you can learn from the multimillion dollar marketing efforts of your well healed competition.

Straight ahead,

Bob