Unlock the Secrets to Building Strong Referral Relationships with MDs

Hello and welcome to the Evidence Based Chiropractor. I AM your host, Dr. Jeff Langmaid and on today's episode I'm going to highlight Marketing Chiropractic to Medical Doctors. After eight long years, I decided to go back double the length of the original book. Version 2 is out there and I want to talk a little bit about the process, but also more importantly how highlight what's in the book so that you can take actionable items away from today's episode and hopefully implement them in your practice to start building better referral relationships in your community. So for those who have been following along for a while, you probably know in 2016 I released marketing Chiropractic to Medical Doctors and it was the book that kind of planted my flag in the relationship building right realm. If you've thought about writing a book, two things. One, it can open up a lot of opportunity for you. Two, it's brutally hard, so take that with what you will. But when I released it in 2016, I had no idea what would happen with it. But over time it has perennially been a bestseller in the chiropractic space on Amazon. It's led to a host of conversations, opportunities and it's just been awesome. But one of the things that's been nagging at me for over eight years has been working way too many typos. There was no Grammarly at the time, there was none of those tools available. Two is I knew there was just more information that I could get out there. It really was a first, maybe not a first draft, but it was a first opportunity to get out there and tell that story. And I know there's just so much more expertise after over the last eight years working with probably over 500, maybe over a thousand somewhere in between there additional docs helping them build referral relationships through the evidence based chiropractor and the MD connection program. There is just so much more that I could put into the book. Additionally, there were tools and resources I wanted to share that maybe wouldn't fit in the book, but I wanted to give QR codes in the book so that anybody who read it would have more tools, more systems, more resources to generate those referral relationships. So I'm super happy and proud to say that at the beginning of this month the updated version went live on Amazon within 24 hours. Blew me away. Number one new release in chiropractic. Number one new release in direct direct marketing. And I was just like, wow, this is awesome. So if you're somebody that picked up a copy thank you so much. Really, it means the world to me, literally. You know, I'm not selling 400,000 copies of this book, so every single copy really matters and really makes an impact. So I'll drop a link down in the show notes, or you can just search on Amazon. Marketing Chiropractic to Medical Doctors. If you've gotten value out of this podcast for 14.99, I'll ask you to please pick up a copy. Literally, the single copy that you pick up makes a dollar difference in the Amazon algorithm and just everything. So I would greatly, greatly appreciate it. But let's talk about what's in the book, what's changed, and some things that you can take home from this episode to start building better referral relationships. So, number one, this starts with, in my opinion, with the opportunity of referral relationships. And what do I mean by that? Well, I mean that we know nearly everybody on planet Earth is going to have neuromusculoskeletal challenges. Whether you include back pain, neck pain, and, you know, you add in people who are interested then in performance benefit. You can just say 99.9% of people, you know, probably should see, need to see, or will want to see a chiropractor at some point in their life. Right. So that's a lot of people. Well, we also know that only about 15% maximum. I think that's a little bit of an overstatement, but about 15% of the population will ever really see a chiropractor. And that is a gap of opportunity. Throw out a couple more stats. We know that the opioid crisis has ravaged the United States amongst many other places around the world as well. And that's a big deal because people. Where does that start? Well, we know over 50% of individuals who get hooked on opioids started with a spinal or a musculoskeletal issue. They took the medication, next thing you know, they're ending up in a world of different types of pain. And that is a big deal. And it's a big opportunity for you and I to get out there and bridge the gap. Not only is it great for your business, but it also is just really important in your community. Literally. I just think about it super pragmatically. Any literal single individual in your practice career that avoids going down the path of what I call professional indifference, meaning they receive medications for structural issues. They sensitize to the medications. They have an injection, the injection. Injection works, doesn't work. And if it works, I mean, it works for like short term they end up going through surgery potentially and or the medication route if they refuse surgery. This creates massive challenges. It's what I call the professional journey of indifference because the other doctors should be doing better. And we'll get to that in a moment. But if you can help one person in your community over the course of your career avoid that journey, to me, then this is worth it. Not only is building referral relationships just a really good idea, but it also is about people's lives and about the impact you can make on people's lives in your community. And as a bent, as a byproduct of that, of course, revenue comes from the service that you deliver. So it always comes with a service mentality first. And the opportunity. I can't think of a bigger opportunity. This isn't competing in a space where it's like, wow, there's so many great options people are utilizing and I'm just trying to get my way in. I like, literally people are having horrible options presented to them every single day that catastrophically affect their life. Now consequently, I also talk about in the book, which this is wild to me that you are practicing in your community right now. If you're listening to this, you're probably in practice in your community and there are probably insert number of doctors within earshot within down the street from you, 20 doctors in your community in a small town, thousands of doctors in your community. If you're in a major city and you and them will choose to practice in the area, maybe even across the street from each other, maybe even in the same building and you will take care of, because you live in the same town, you'll take care of the same people. Of course, over the course of decades and many people will retire and have never met the other doctors that they've co managed with their entire career. That is absolute insanity to me. The only place it shouldn't happen is within healthcare, yet it's the place that it happens all the time. Two doctors practice down the street from each other in complimentary fashion, not the same type of doctor. Right. And they never meet each other. What, like this is normal in how the healthcare system goes? But that's insane, number one. But number two, that's your opportunity. The fact that nobody else is really getting out there and bridging the gap and building those relationships. And times have shifted, but many times this is just a lack of knowledge issue, more than a bias issue. So for many other healthcare providers, they just don't know who you are, they don't know what you do and there's no relationship. So of course they're not gonna refer anybody just haphazardly on their own. But it doesn't take a lot in many cases to generate some referrals coming into your practice. But you need the systems and processes to generate the consistency you need for success. That's what the book's all about. That's what MD connection with the evidence based chiropractor is all about. Of course. So with that setting the stage in the context, I don't think there's a more important marketing strategy that you can have maybe besides reactivating your inactive patients in your practice. And that is building relationships externally. Why? Because people come in not skeptical. They come in ready to accept your care recommendations because they've been referred from a trusted physician. Two, when you build a relationship, it's not like an ad, like the day you turn off an ad. It's like it might as well not have existed. A relationship can last a career. Three, these things can compound over time. I think of it like a faucet when you have a referral coming in here or referral coming in there. Awesome. That's like drips coming from a faucet. You know, there's a lot of water backed up, ready to come out if you have the systems and processes necessary to be consistent, which is the key to success. So all of that is really the background now in terms of the practical approach. Some of it we've highlighted on previous episodes of the show. But it starts, and this is all outlined in super detail in the book with additional QR codes that you can scan and get additional tools and resources to make this process as easy as possible. And if you want guidance along that path and you want all of the resources and everything you need, complete package. That's where MD connection comes into play. For less than 100 bucks a month, you can have access to every single thing you need. But the book will set the stage for you if you want to do it yourself. It all starts with building your target list. Building your target list is knowing who you're going to reach out to, right? Who are those doctors who you're going to reach out to in your community? I like to have a target list of around 50 docs. That seems to be a good list size with the expectation that 10 to 20% of that list will turn into relationships over time. Then you want to go about the process of verifying that list. Verifying that list just simply saves you time, effort, energy and money. By knowing your list is like super Tight and dialed in. Then you're really going to go through those three pillars of relationship building. Case notes, research in meetings, all elaborated on in super detail in the book. But case notes, what is the point of a case note? A case note is to show that you are co managing to show that your practice exists. To show that you get great results. Case notes happen to have clinical information on them, but I want you to think of them. This is the mindset shift like a business to business testimonial. A case note is not an insurance note. It is not a personal injury or a work comp narrative. This is the point of a case note is to be a B2B business to business testimonial. All of us focus so much on B2C testimonials, aka Google reviews. Super important. Nothing to take away from that. But many times we're focused way crazy about those. And we never sent a case note in our career. Now case notes you send on eval and eval, of course on re eval as we've talked about. So if you've had a thousand patients in your practice that two notes per person minimum eval and riaval. Imagine if you had tooth thousand positive communications out there. Do you think that would make a difference? I certainly think so. Also case notes, just to be clear, rarely flood your office with referrals on their own. That's why you stack on the research and the meetings. The research, of course, that's what we do in MD connection. That's what we give all of our members. Personalized, completely white labeled research briefs designed for success. The design of these things matter. And the research briefs are really, really effective. And we've been doing it for over 10 years now. Served hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of docs helping them build these relationships. 100% successful when implemented. That's just the way that it goes. Why? Because we've learned and we've just dialed in the system so well. So research fills in the gaps between the case notes. If you go months without sending a case note, which could be normal with the ebb and flow of patients, that is a killer if you're trying to build a relationship. So the research briefs, they are the marketing. They sit there and allow you to communicate with everybody on your target list one time per month. That is why this is a system. There's additional details elaborate on in the book, but then the third component are meetings. Whether you want to set up a meeting, execute a meeting, all of the templates, scripting, everything you need is right there. For you. But the goal of the meeting is to build trust and rapport. You can build relationships with case notes and research briefs alone, but meetings as you can imagine, they accelerate that process of relationship building. So we go through everything you need to know about meetings in the book in great detail, including the number one question. As time has gone on, I've continued to simplify my my meetings down from, you know, hour long presentations to 20 docs that sometimes yielded nothing to 5 to 10 minute meetings standing up at a front desk which tend to be very, very successful. Now the irony there is the non irony meaning relationships are one to one. So it's all about that personal connection. So if you can spend a few minutes with somebody one on one, normally it's more compelling than if you spend 45 minutes standing in front of 30 people and never talking to anybody individually. And we also go through that number one question that I never leave a meeting without asking. Have you ever worked with or referred to a chiropractor in the past? That is the critical question. We also go through how you address that if they've had a negative experience and why the more negative their previous experience, the better opportunity it is for you to position yourself. And finally, we round out the book with information about Grand Rounds. How do you attend Grand Rounds in your community? What's the value there? And additionally imaging representatives looking towards those connectors in your community to assist in your relationship building. They're all there for you. So that is a little sneak peek and hopefully some take home messages and tips and strategy that you can utilize when building referral relationships in your community. If you want to see all of the details, I encourage you to head over to Amazon, pick up the book there. I think I'm super proud of it and if you've listened to this podcast, I'll ask you to do me a solid and pick up a copy. That would be awesome and I'd love your feedback as well. You can always shoot me a message. Jeff the evidencebasedchiropractor.com if you want full support and all the tools and resources, including personalized research briefs modules that walk through the entire process, MD connection is available for you. That's at the Evidence Based Chiropractor. But before we wrap up, I want to say a few things about Stop Pain Clinical. Stop Pain Clinical topical analgesics are exclusively available through chiropractors and other healthcare pros. They're not on Amazon, they're not in retail, and it works to provide people with fast, long lasting pain relief. From things like sprains, strains, bruises, arthritis, muscle aches, joint and back pain. They're a supporter of this podcast. I'll ask you to support them and they have a special offer available. As a listener of this podcast and I recommend their starter kit. It is awesome. You can get it at S T o p a dot IN EBC I'm going to drop that link down below. Head over there. S T o p stop a dot IN EBC Basically stop pain EBC with the dot between the a and the I. I'll drop the link down below. Probably easier that way. Pick up a starter kit for for a pretty cheap cost. That looks awesome. They also have samples available as well. Thank you so much for tuning into this podcast. Thank you for being a chiropractor and I will talk to you soon.

Thank you for joining us on this episode of the Evidence Based Chiropractor. If you want to grow your practice, come back for next week's episode. If you want to grow faster, visit the evidencebasedchiropractor.com and join our MD Marketing membership today.