Six Month Sales Review

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It's Time to Assess Your Sales Results for the First Half of 2008

July 9, 2008

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In this issue...

-- It's Time for Your Six Month Sales Checkup

-- Bring Your Annual Sales Meeting to San Antonio in September

-- Join the Private Duty Track at the Home Care Sales Professional Workshop

-- Building Relationships with Physicians

-- About the Author

-- Permission to Reproduce

Welcome,

. . . to Stephen Tweed's Leading Home Care Report, the premier online newsletter for CEOs and executives of America's leading home health care agencies. (For strategies and insights on how to grow your Private Duty non-medical home care business, we invite you to subscribe to Private Duty Today, our newsletter for non-medical home care.)

It's Time for Your Six Month Sales Checkup

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This Monday, the first day back after the July 4th Holiday, I did something I do twice a year. I went to the dentist for my six-month checkup. I don't know about you, but I really don't like going to the dentist. I really like my dentist, but I don't like sitting in her chair and having my teeth poked and prodded. But I do it anyway because it's the right thing to do. It's good for me even if I don't like it.

The same thing is true of your sales team. You need to take time to conduct a six-month checkup to see what is working and what's not in home health care sales. Here are six questions you can ask to guide your six-month checkup:

1. How many new referrals are we getting?

Take a look at your referral source tracking system to see how many new referrals are coming in each month, where they are coming from, and the sales activities that have generated those referrals.

Can you make a direct connection between the actions of your sales reps and the new referrals that are coming in? If not, why not?

2. What is your conversion ratio?

What percentage of the new referrals coming into your agency are being turned into admissions? Our experience says that an 80% conversion ratio is a good benchmark.

If your conversion ratio is lower that 80%, there are three potential reasons why you are not converting them:

Poor quality referrals of patients who are not appropriate for home care
Poor job at intake converting the referral to an admission
Staffing shortages keep you from staffing the case

We find that shortages of nurses and therapists are one of the biggest causes of low conversion ratios. It's a shame to spend time and money selling and marketing your services and then not being able to admit the patient because you don't have the staff.

3. What sales activities are getting the best results?

Take time to review the detailed reports of your sales reps. How are they spending their time? Who are they calling on? What results are they getting?

It is really important to review the activity of your sales reps and connect their actions to referrals and admissions. They need to see the results of their efforts, and be able to connect their actions to the outcomes.

4. What marketing techniques are making the phone ring?

Most home health agencies support their sales team with other marketing strategies such as their web site, paper or electronic newsletters, public relations, public speaking, and other forms of promotion.

Are you tracking the referrals that come in from your various marketing methods? Do your intake team members ask callers where they heard about your agency? Do they ask whether or not the caller heard or saw a particular marketing message?

5. How are you doing in achieving your sales goals?

I presume that you have specific sales goals for the year. Your goals should include new referrals, new admissions, conversion ratio, percentage of admissions by payer source, case weight or revenue per episode for your Medicare referrals, and total dollars of revenue.

How are you doing? What are the biggest factors affecting whether or not you are hitting your goals? What do you need to do the rest of the year to keep on track?

6. What adjustments do you need to make in your sales action plan?

You will probably want to make some adjustments in your sales action plan for the rest of the year. We find this in our business here at Leading Home Care. Even though we have a clear strategy for growing our business in 2008, we need to adjust our action plan to take into account changes in the marketplace and new opportunities that have opened up during the year.

Taking time to conduct a six-month sales checkup can pay big dividends for your agency. Home health sales teams do not run on auto-pilot. You need to take the controls from time to time and make sure your agency is still on course and on target to hit your goals for the year.

If you have some questions about conducting your six-month sales checkup, please feel free to contact me. Hit reply to this email and send me your questions, or call 502-339-0653 and Julie Raque can set up a telephone appointment for us to talk.

Bring Your Annual Sales Meeting to San Antonio in September

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Many home health agencies with a dedicated sales and marketing team have an annual sales meeting. The purpose is to review results, set goals, and provide additional sales training.

Last year, two innovative home care companies brought their sales teams to San Antonio, Texas for the Certified Home Care Sales Professional workshop sponsored by Leading Home Care and Decision Health. Shield Healthcare based in Santa Clarita, CA, and Bayada Nurses in their Tucson, AZ office brought members of their sales team to the workshop. During the day, they participated in the workshop, and completed the requirements for the CHCSP designation. In the evening, they had time for team meetings, fellowship, and sales planning. After the close of the workshop, they stayed around for an extra half day and conducted their annual sales meeting.

Vickie Shoopman, the Director of the Tucson West Office of Bayada Nurses said,

"We all completed the 15 hours of training in San Antonio, passed the written exam, and demonstrated proficiency in acquiring home care referrals that turned into admissions. Overall, this was an excellent training that fine tuned our sales skills in the areas of selling to physicians and relationship selling. We are excited and proud of our accomplishments and the success we are seeing in Tucson."

Why not consider bringing your sales team to San Antonio, and holding your own sales meeting in conjunction with the CHCSP certification workshop. You'll get great sales training, a great location for your sales meeting, and an opportunity to reward your team for their performance this year with three days in a fun city.

For more information on the Certified Home Care Sales Professional workshop, log on to the registration web site.

To discuss how we can help you create a very special sales meeting for your team, call us toll free at 866-209-5101 and talk with Julie Raque.

Join the Private Duty Track at the Home Care Sales Professional Workshop

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We're making a change in how we conduct our home care sales professional workshops!

Last year, we held the first Certified Home Care Sales Professional workshop in San Antonio, TX, and over 100 people attended. Then we held a private duty home care sales workshop in April of 2008, and introduced the Certified Private Duty Sales Professional designation.

After reviewing the results of these two programs, the faculty - Stephen Tweed, Dr. Tray Dunaway, and Michael Giudicissi - have decided to combine the two programs into one workshop. We'll have two tracks; one for home health, hospice, and HME, and a separate track for private duty home care.

That means that no matter which segment of home care you represent, there will be a track in the 2008 Home Care Sales Professional workshop for you.

And, you will have your choice of which designation you would like to receive . . . the CHCSP^TM - Certified Home Care Sales Professional or the CPDSP^TM - Certified Private Duty Sales Professional.

So take a look at the web site, and then sign up today for the most powerful sales training event in home care . . . the 2008 Home Care Sales Professional Workshop, to be held September 17, 18 and 19 at the wonderful Westin Riverwalk hotel in beautiful San Antonio, Texas.

Building Relationships with Physicians

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One of the most effective ways you can grow your home health care business is to build relationships with physicians. Research shows that the #1 source of home health referrals is hospitals, and #2 is physicians. If you want to grow your business, learn to effectively connect with physicians.

In this interactive audio learning program, you will hear Stephen Tweed and Dr. M. Tray Dunaway discuss in detail specific techniques you can use to grow your business. Recorded live during a series of audio teleseminars, each CD gives you 60 minutes of valuable information, followed by a question and answer period with Dr. Dunaway.

The four programs are:

Special Skills for Communicating with Physicians
Marketing Techniques that Work with Physicians
Building Relationships with Physicians' Office Staff
Marketing Specialty Home Care Programs to Physicians

In addition to the four hours of audio instruction, you will receive a web link to download a participant learning guide, a discussion leader's guide, and CEU forms for each program. Continuing Education hours are provided for nurses and other professionals.

Order your CD set today!

About the Author

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Stephen Tweed, CSP, is Chairman and CEO of Leading Home Care ... a Tweed Jeffries company. For over 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 homecare 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 38 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

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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 2008 Stephen C. Tweed. To receive a FREE subscription to this newsletter, log on to www.leadinghomecare.com."

Contact Leading Home Care

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email: stephen@leadinghomecare.com

phone: 1-866-209-5101

web: http://www.leadinghomecare.com

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