~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Growth in the Agency Of The Future Keys to Growing Your Home Health Agency December 5, 2007 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In this issue... -- Growing the Home Health Agency Of The Future -- Six Factors Affecting Your Growth -- Marketing Planning and Sales Training for Fast Growing Companies -- Sales and Marketing Strategies for PPS Performance -- About the Author -- Permission to Reproduce Welcome, ...to Stephen Tweed's Leading Home Care Report. This special report is for CEOs and senior executives of America's leading home health care companies. This report is published every other Wednesday by Leading Home Care ... a Tweed Jeffries company for our clients, friends, and advocates who want to grow their home health businesses.

Growing the Home Health Agency Of The Future ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ It's cold here in Louisville. Our balmy fall weather has turned more winter-like, and my rose garden has finally gone dormant. Elizabeth and I love to grow roses. Like all living organisms, our roses go through periods of growth and dormancy. If they don't start growing again in the spring, they die. The same thing is true of your home health agency. Every agency goes through periods of growth and then plateaus. If your agency doesn't begin to grow again, it will die. For the past eight issues of Leading Home Care Report, we've been talking about the Home Health AOTF - Agency Of The Future. We've identified Six Pillars of the Agency Of The Future: Quality Service People Technology Growth Finances In this issue, I want to give you some ideas about growth. Because, like my roses, if your agency is not growing, it's either dormant or dying. As I've studied growing home health agencies over the past 25 years, I've defined six characteristics of growth in the Agency Of The Future.

Six Factors Affecting Your Growth ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Looking at the fastest growing home health companies in our country, I've identified six factors that affect their growth. Take a look and see how you are doing in each of these six areas. If you have questions or comments, give me a call. 1. Entrepreneurial Leader Clearly, the number one factor in agency growth is a CEO who has a strong desire to grow the company. He or she has a clear vision of what they want the company to become and part of that vision is growth. These leaders want to run bigger, fast-growing companies. 2. Finding Top Talent I often quote University of Louisville basketball coach, Rick Pitino, who says that one thing he learned from the NBA is that talent wins and wins big. Finding and keeping top talent is one of the attributes of entrepreneurial leaders of fast growing home health companies. Last week I was working with the leadership team of a very large home care company whose founders are turning over their company to a new leadership team. One of the founders talked about how he and his partner had developed an innate ability to find good people who shared their vision for growth. Then they found ways to keep them. Finding top talent is a critical characteristic of fast growing home health agencies. 3. Clear Competitive Advantage Fast growing companies are clear about what makes them different in the marketplace. They have defined their competitive advantage, and have crafted their marketing message. They get that message out to all of their stakeholders; patients, families, physicians, referral sources, payers, employees, owners, the community. If you can't answer the question, "Why should I buy home health services from your agency instead of your competitor?" then you'll have a hard time convincing your customers to buy and your referral sources to refer. 4. Formal Sales & Marketing Function The fastest growing companies in home health care have clearly defined their sales and marketing strategy. They have put people and processes in place to reach out to key referral sources. They know their customers better than their competitors, and they have built better relationships with their customers. The biggest challenge we see in home health care marketing is finding and selecting great people. There is a real shortage of competent sales and marketing people in home care. Too many companies make poor selection decisions and hire the wrong people. It's a costly mistake. 5. Feedback for All The fastest growing home health companies have developed a process of sharing the numbers with their team members. Everyone knows how the company is doing in several critical measures of success. And of course, these numbers are related to growth. They track referrals and admissions daily. They track referrals by source and they know which customers are giving them new patients. Having a scorecard to report your results and then sharing those results with your team are key factors in growing the Agency Of The Future. 6. Incentives for All You're tired of hearing me say, "What gets measured gets managed, what gets rewarded gets repeated." But the fastest growing home health agencies have put in place methods to reward team members for growing the business. In most cases, their compensation is tied to meeting growth targets. Several months ago, Michael G. and I were working on marketing planning and sales training for a client company. They were having trouble growing their business so they brought us in to beef up their sales and marketing efforts. What we discovered, however, is that the problem was not in sales. It was in intake. The intake department was not doing a good job of converting referrals to admissions. And further investigation revealed that they had no incentive to admit more patients. More admissions meant more work for them, more pressure, more stress, but no more money or reward. Their incentive was to keep things the same and not grow the business. Because the agency was short staffed in nursing and PT, the clinical department was putting on pressure to not take new patients, and the sales department was putting on pressure to take all referrals. The intake department was in the middle and they were stressed. If you are an entrepreneurial leader who really wants to grow your Home Health Agency Of The Future, find the talent you need, clarify your competitive advantage, formalize your sales & marketing process, give everyone feedback on daily growth, and find ways to reward your team members for taking more patients.

Marketing Planning and Sales Training for Fast Growing Companies ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You want to grow your home health agency. You have a great position in your marketplace. You've been successful. Yet you're frustrated. You just can't seem to get your sales and marketing function to click. Do you have the right marketing strategy? Have you developed a clear message for your customers? Do you have the right people in place? How can you recruit and select more effective sales representatives? What sales training is best? These are questions that entrepreneurial home health leaders who want to grow their businesses are asking. If you would like help in finding the answers, call Leading Home Care at 502-339-0653. Julie Raque will help you set up a telephone conference to discuss your needs. We can help you assess the current reality of your sales & marketing situation. We can help you develop a clear, concise marketing strategy. We can help you select and hire great sales people. We can help you train, coach, and manage your sales people. At Leading Home Care we're in the business of helping you grow your business and get ready for the future. If you want to be a fast-growing Agency Of The Future, you'll want to partner with Leading Home Care. Click here for more information on how Leading Home Care can help you GROW your business!

Sales and Marketing Strategies for PPS Performance ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The hottest topic in home health care today is the upcoming change to Medicare PPS. This adjustment in the way your agency is reimbursed for care will have a huge potential impact on the future of your agency. Since this CMS reimbursement change is designed to be "budget neutral," some agencies will win and some will lose. Will your agency be a winner or a loser under the revised PPS? One of the ways to be a winner is to focus your sales and marketing team. Help your sales team members understand the changes in PPS, and how their sales efforts will affect revenue and profitability. Then help them focus their sales efforts on those referral sources that are most profitable for your agency. We're NOT talking about cherry picking the system here. What we ARE talking about is helping your sales and marketing team members understand the changes to PPS, and how their sales effort will affect your agency either positively or negatively. As we work with hundreds of sales and marketing representatives in agencies around the country, we are constantly amazed at how little they really know about home health reimbursement. They don't understand the impact of their sales actions on the agency's bottom line. If you want your sales reps to grow your agency by bringing in referrals that turn into profitable admissions, then you need to help them understand the best way to do that. Join the Team from Leading Home Care . . . for a three part audio teleseminar series on Sales and Marketing Strategies for PPS Performance beginning on Thursday January 17, 2008 at 1:00 p.m and then running every three weeks for three sessions. Stephen Tweed, Judy McGuire, and Michael Giudicissi will lead you through an in-depth discussion of the changes in PPS, the information your sales reps will need to be winners in the marketplace, and how you can measure your sales and marketing performance under the new PPS. Thursday, January 17, 2008 - 1:00 p.m. Eastern - How PPS Impacts Sales & Marketing Thursday, February 7, 2008 - 1:00 p.m. Eastern - Sales Team Strategies for PPS Thursday, February 28, 2008 - 1:00 p.m. Eastern - Measuring and Managing Sales Success Now's a good time to register if you still have some money in your 2007 Sales Budget that you need to use before the end of the year. "Use it or lose it" is how the saying goes. For the very reasonable price of $399.00 per calling location, you can receive this value-packed audio learning program for all of your sales and marketing representatives. You will also want to invite members of your management team. The more people in your agency who understand these principles, the better your bottom line performance will be. Just click on the link below. Enter the contact information and your credit card. We'll send you a telephone number and log in information a few days before the teleseminar, along with a link to download the handout materials. It's a simple, easy, effective way to help your Sales and Marketing team members get the information they need to bring in more referrals that turn into admissions with higher revenue per episode. It's NOT TOO EARLY to Register for Sales & Marketing Strategies for PPS Performance.

About the Author ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Stephen Tweed, CSP, is Chairman and CEO of Leading Home Care ... a Tweed Jeffries company. For nearly 25 years he has been a recognized leader in strategy and leadership development for home care companies and associations. He is the author or co-author of five books, four of which were written specifically for the home care industry. He has served on the boards of directors of three not-for-profit home care agencies, and has served as interim President & CEO of a $25 million home care company. Stephen is a past-President of the National Speakers Association, a 3500 member international society of experts who speak professionally. He is also the father of a 37 year-old son who is physically disabled and uses the services of home care on a daily basis. Meet the entire Leading Home Care Team

Permission to Reproduce ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Permission is granted to healthcare publications, associations and companies to reproduce this article in your publication, or to distribute copies to your leaders, on the condition that you reproduce the credits and contact information as follows: "Reprinted with permission from Stephen Tweed's Leading Home Care Report. Copyright 2006 Stephen C. Tweed. To receive a FREE subscription to this newsletter, log on to www.leadinghomecare.com."

Contact Leading Home Care ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ email: stephen@leadinghomecare.com phone: 1-866-209-5101 web: http://www.leadinghomecare.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~