By: Avi Cohen, Director of Operations & Product Management
An agency’s growth is only as strong as its marketing effort ROIs
There are many elements that dictate the success of an agency, from how it onboards patients, to the quality of care. And of course, all of these elements play an important role in the growth of an agency. However, expecting passive marketing to grow any business, barring rare circumstances is typically viewed as wishful thinking.
This naturally leads agencies to invest heavily in marketing, whether it’s online or community field marketing. Lead generation, however, is not the true metric to gauge whether your marketing efforts are yielding the desired results.
Marketing ROIs
By tracking what referral sources provide the highest ROI, an agency can better utilize its limited marketing dollars on the most cost effective opportunities.
The following four metrics are a good starting point when delving into marketing metrics.
1.Lead conversion rate by referrals source
Total New Patients / Total Admitted Patients x 100 |
2. Lead lead conversion rate by referral segment
Total New Patients / Total Admitted Patients x 100 |
3. Referral Source vs Dollars Spent on Marketing
Total New Patients / Dollar Amount Spent |
4. Referral Segment vs Actual Cost of Acquisition
The fourth one is a little trickier to calculate because of a few floating variables, so I will describe it best with a case study to illustrate how to properly calculate the ROI when compared against actual cost of acquisition and why it pays to pay attention to this vital metric.
Case Study
Let’s look at an example where an agency has two strong segments where marketing efforts can be adjusted for a higher ROI.
The first segment, Hospitals, provide the agency with 100 leads per month, but half of those leads do not have Medicaid. Assuming this agency pays to get patients enrolled in Medicaid, there will likely be an additional cost associated with onboarding them.
Let’s assume the average cost per patient is $200.
Even at a 50% conversion rate, assuming half of the patients onboarded need Medicaid assistance (25 patients), the agency’s cost of acquisition would be $5,000 a month. That’s on top of what it costs to market to that specific segment (Hospitals).
At the same time, the agency’s second segment, Clinics, provides it with 50 leads per month, but they all have Medicaid. Even at a 50% conversion rate, the agency ends up with a bigger immediate ROI by not having to spend an extra $5,000 a month helping the patients apply for Medicaid.
On the surface, it may appear the first segment (hospitals) is stronger based on sheer lead volume and conversion rates. However, the moment you factor in the extra $5,000/m cost, things are skewed in favor of clinics in an all things being equal comparison. This knowledge would effectively allow the agency to steer more of its marketing efforts towards clinics. Assuming the trend continues, the same initial dollar spent on marketing would yield higher quality leads.
If you would like to learn more about what these changes will look like, don’t hesitate to contact us!
