I had the pleasure of being one of the Congress Chairpersons at the 2nd IVF Worldwide Live Congress: Growing IVF Clinics in the Digital Age that took place from October 31 through November 2, 2013 in Berlin, Germany.
The Conference was focused on providing knowledge, practical guidance and experience-proven tips geared towards increasing an IVF clinic's online footprint and lead generation across a variety of digital marketing disciplines.
The sessions and speakers picked for the Conference seemed to be highly appreciated by the audience of just under 100 fortunate attendees. After the event, one of the written feedbacks I received from a Founder of an IVF clinic was: "We are really working hard on doing better and with all the ideas I got in Berlin.... I feel like I should give up medicine and focus on marketing!
--- That feedback was worth my entire trip!
Notable Highlights Focused on Online Marketing for IVF Clinics
The following are several highlights that I'd like to reiterate through this post:
Highlight #1: Increase your IVF Clinic's investment in marketing, and seriously treat the activity as a profit center rather than a cost center.
Take a glimpse into your desired future – the online operation of your IVF unit performs like a 'machine'. Web and mobile are generating most of your new clients, and 80% to 90% of your online marketing budget goes into ROI effective activities (should I mention AdWords again as the primary activity? :-) and thanks to precise performance measurement and tracking, you have got the assurance that that every dollar that is invested in marketing generates an incremental net profit for your business.
Online marketing is an investment, not only an expense, Doc!
Highlight #2: Understand your exact business logic behind your online marketing activity. Start with understanding your fundamental business case.
The Business Case of Online Marketing for IVF Clinics (please ask yourself these questions, and answer them):
- How much is a new paying client (AKA patient) worth in gross profit to the business? Example: $4,000 per treatment. Assuming an average of 2.5 treatments per patient, then your gross profit (some call it 'net revenue') is, on average, $10,000 per each new patient.
- What is your Lead/Client conversion rate?
Example: Take a 10% conversion rate; meaning – out of every 10 legitimate inquires you receive, you "close" one sale, you deliver treatments to 1 patient. - What is your cost per lead?
Example: Say you are effectively paying $300 to obtain 1 legitimate inquiry, regardless of what channel you are using to generate the lead or who referred the lead (e.g., a referring doctor aboard, an in-house employee managing your marketing, or a dedicated outsourced provider selling you leads). In other words, you have spent $3,000 to obtain 10 inquires. Each inquiry is exclusive, meaning that the prospective patient is being driven to contact your clinic only, and not others.
*** PLEASE ASK AND ANSWER THE ABOVE 3 QUESTIONS. Every IVF unit Founder/Manager and Marketing Manager should understand the business case of online marketing as it pertains specifically to their operation, to their margins.
In the above business case example, your CPL (cost per lead) is $300 and your CPA (cost per acquisition, AKA cost per client acquisition) is limited to maximum $3,000 (since you know that you are converting at least 1 out of 10 leads into a real sale, a real patient).
If you understand this business case, I can now say: "Welcome to the wonderful world of direct response marketing!" It's a world where every dollar counts and every invested dollar should be generating a profit for your IVF clinic. Furthermore, it is a world where business can be scaled up significantly, completely revolutionizing your business success in the modern era.
And if you 'get' the big deal about the potential of online marketing for IVF clinics, what you should be doing now, on behalf of your IVF business unit, is investing more dollars to acquire a significant number of new, legitimate leads to your business. If executed well, this a paradigm shift that can more than double your entire IVF business within 2 years.
If you're already generating and/or buying leads for your business, the next questions that should be asked are: How can I double the number of new clients my business generates today? What is the cost per lead that I am willing to pay? How can I practically achieve this practically?
Highlight #3: Allocate the proper time and resources to supervise, manage and expand your marketing.
Doctors and IVF clinic staff are busy and typically under-resourced when it comes to managing the clinic's increasingly complex digital marketing in a competitive manner. Management should understand that without being seriously committed to marketing -- their business will not only witness unfulfilled growth potential, and it might (in the very near future) leave critical market share to competing IVF clinics that will be quicker in advancing throughout the learning curve, eventually mastering the online marketing space for IVF treatments.
Also, most IVF clinics are currently allocating ONLY 1-3% of their entire annual budget to marketing. If your marketing is ROI effective, then underutilized investments in marketing means you're leaving money on the table. A more profitable IVF clinic will be allocating 10%-15% of their budget to marketing that generated a positive return on the investment.
Furthermore, let's face it... the majority of IVF clinics today need the professional assistance of outsourced suppliers in order to expedite their clinic's business growth.
Among the companies discussed at the recent conference are:
- Seperia – an Israeli-based company that has been specializing in international online marketing for over a Decade, and offers IVF clinics to increase the number of leads/inquiries received via Google AdWords, Bing, Facebook, among other channels. The big benefit for clinics: Pay for results, i.e., pay just for each legitimate lead you receive. Contact Seperia here and mention IVF-Worldwide to get a quotation with special terms.
- RedPants – an Australian-based company offering to make your website fully mobile compatible for a very basic monthly fee. Contact RedPants here and mention IVF-Worldwide to get the special treatment we aspire to enable for all IVF-Worldwide members. Contact RedPants here and mention IVF-Worldwide to get a quotation with special terms.
Words of Gratitude to IVF-Worldwide Founders
Last but not least, I'd also like to extend my warm gratitude to IVF-Worldwide Founder: Prof. Milton Ka Hong Leong, who continue for the 2nd year to show their committed support to the IVF-Worldwide community. Additionally, I'd like to thank this event's Chairpersons, Moderators, Speakers and the dedicated staff that made everything tick well at the event.
And... Let's Stay in Touch!
Let's all extract long-term value from the IVF-Worldwide events and... keep in touch! For those who have not yet done so -- Join the IVF-Worldwide Linkedin Group, designed for the purpose of professional networking within the IVF industry! You can also find and connect to me on LinkedIn here: www.linkedin.com/in/itailevitan
