Module 4: Marketing & Website Discovery

Section in wizard: Marketing / Website IQA Time to complete training: 9 minutes Time per discovery: 3–5 minutes

Why this section matters

Marketing is the section where you discover the prospect's growth posture. A practice that's already at capacity doesn't need a new website; one that's growing or struggling to fill the schedule absolutely does. Every other service we sell — credentialing, RCM, consulting — operates on the practice's existing patient base. Marketing changes the size of that base.

But there's a second reason this section matters: it's the easiest service to bundle. A practice signing up for credentialing and RCM is already mentally committing to a relationship. Adding a website and a baseline marketing engagement at signup — when the buying impulse is already firing — is dramatically easier than going back six months later to upsell.

The pricing on marketing is also the most flexible in our portfolio, which is both a feature and a bug. It's easy to scope something that fits any budget. It's also easy to scope something so loosely that it doesn't actually deliver. Be specific.

What we're really learning

What's their current digital presence and is it working? A practice with a 2014 WordPress site that ranks for nothing and converts no one is in a different conversation than a practice with a polished site that just isn't ranking well.
Where do their patients actually come from today? Referrals from other physicians? Insurance directories? Google search? Walk-ins? Each source implies a different marketing strategy and a different ROI on what we'd build.
What's their growth intent? Trying to fill an existing schedule? Adding a provider and need to bring in 20 new patients a week? Opening a second location? Each goal sizes the engagement differently.
Have they been burned by marketing vendors before? Many have. The healthcare marketing space has a lot of low-quality vendors selling templated sites and undifferentiated SEO. Acknowledge the bad actors before they bring it up.

Listening cues

Strong buying signals:

"Our website is really old / embarrassing / not mobile-friendly."
"We need more new patients" with a specific number or schedule gap.
New practice with no website at all — they need everything.
They're adding a service line and need it featured.
They've tried marketing before and it didn't work — if they can describe what specifically didn't work, they're educated buyers, which is good.
Adding a second location.
Reputation issue (bad Google reviews, want to recover).

Lukewarm signals:

"Our website is fine, I think."
They have plenty of patients but vaguely want to "do more marketing."
They want SEO without context — usually they read an article.

Cold / disqualify signals:

Solo physician practice at full capacity, not adding providers, not opening locations. They don't need marketing; selling them on it is a disservice.
They want to pay for results (i.e., per-lead pricing) — we don't do that and shouldn't pretend.
Looking for a one-time "build a site and walk away" engagement at the lowest possible cost — refer to a template service like Squarespace.

Red flags / disqualify guidance

De-prioritize when:

The practice is already at capacity and not growing. Adding more leads creates more frustration, not more revenue. The right answer for them might be a phone system upgrade or a scheduling redesign — not marketing.
They want guaranteed results. "How many new patients will I get from this?" is a fair question. "Will you guarantee 20 new patients a month?" is a bad-faith question that signals they've been burned, are about to be burned, or want a contract you can't deliver on. Educate them on why guaranteed-lead pricing is a red flag in the industry.
Compliance-sensitive specialties asking for aggressive tactics. Pain management practices wanting paid ads for opioid-related searches, or aesthetic practices wanting before/after content that violates platform policies — say no. The compliance risk to us is real.
Reputation crisis driven by actual quality issues. If a practice has 30+ one-star reviews about clinical care, no amount of marketing fixes that. Refer to a practice management consulting engagement instead.
They don't own the domain / website / Google Business Profile. A previous vendor controls everything and won't release it. We can sometimes recover this, but it adds cost and risk. Surface early.

Common rep mistakes

Selling a website without selling the strategy. A website by itself is a brochure. A website plus content strategy plus local SEO plus reputation management is a growth system. Frame the engagement as the system, not the asset.
Not asking about referral sources. For specialty practices, 60–80% of patients often come from physician referrals, not search. If that's the case, the marketing engagement should focus on referral relationships, not Google ads. Don't sell SEO to a practice whose growth lever is referral cultivation.
Quoting marketing before scoping the problem. Marketing pricing is flexible by design. That doesn't mean you should quote a tier without understanding the goal. A $1,500/month engagement and a $5,000/month engagement do very different things.
Forgetting that "Not Needed" is a real answer. The wizard has a Not Needed option for a reason. If the prospect doesn't need marketing right now, mark it Not Needed and move on. Don't push.
Skipping the patient acquisition cost question. "How much would a new patient be worth to you?" is the most clarifying question in this section. If they say $300, a $2,000/month marketing engagement that brings 10 new patients a month pays for itself with the first month's patients. If they say $30, the math doesn't work.

Sample dialogue

Opening the section — context first

Rep: "Outside of insurance and referrals, where do new patients tend to find you today?"

Prospect: "Mostly word of mouth and a few referrals from a couple of primary care doctors in the area. We have a website but I don't think anyone really uses it."

This answer tells you a lot. Word of mouth + physician referrals = a referral-driven practice. Their growth lever isn't SEO, it's referral cultivation.

Probing on growth intent

Rep: "Are you trying to grow the practice meaningfully, or is it more about filling gaps in the schedule?"

Prospect: "We're adding a third provider in October. We need her schedule full by January or it's going to be a problem."

Now you have a deadline and a target. This is no longer a vague marketing conversation — it's a specific provider ramp-up project.

Reframing the engagement

Rep: "Here's how I'd think about that. With a referral-driven practice and a new provider coming on, the highest-leverage thing we can do isn't necessarily SEO — it's making sure your referring physicians know about the new provider, the website looks credible enough that referred patients book the appointment, and your Google Business Profile and reviews don't lose anyone who Googles you between the referral and the booking. That's a different mix than what most marketing companies sell. Does that resonate?"

You've reframed the conversation around their actual growth model and made yourself the educated voice. That's the win.

Reputation conversation

Rep: "What does your Google review situation look like? Be honest — most practices have at least a few they'd rather not have there."

Prospect: "We have one really bad one from a former employee that's been killing us."

Rep: "Got it. We can't always remove reviews, but we can build up enough five-star volume around them that the bad one stops being the dominant signal. We typically include a reputation management piece in marketing engagements for that reason."

Transition out

Rep: "Last section — I want to ask about your technology setup. Phone systems, EMR, internet, basic office IT. The reason this matters is that even great marketing won't help if the front desk can't pick up the phone, or if your EMR can't accept new patients efficiently. We see those failures all the time."

Tee up the technology section by linking it back to growth.

Wizard fields covered in this section

hasWebsite, patientSource, growthIntent, websiteMarketing

What good looks like

A completed Marketing IQA where:

Patient acquisition source is captured (referral / search / insurance / walk-in / mixed)
Growth intent is specific (filling schedule, new provider, new location, no growth needed)
Website status is captured (none, old, recent, professional)
The recommended engagement matches the actual growth lever — not a default tier
If "Not Needed" is the right answer, it's marked that way and the section is brief