Professional
Referrals
"Communication — it’s the oil that keeps
the team machine moving and
you can never have enough of it." —Brad Sugars
In addition to building
client-to-client referrals, you can spread the word about your practice
through a professional referral network. Forging professional relationships
with physicians and other health professionals can help develop your
credibility, increase your expertise, and increase the likelihood that
clients in need find you.
Developing professional referrals
- Build your own referral list. This is a good
first step in developing referral relationships. When you see a condition
that requires medical attention, you should refer the client to a good
physician or other primary health practitioner. Many practitioners
also refer clients to other clinicians when chronic conditions aren’t
improving as quickly or completely as they would like. Choose your
list of professionals carefully. To your clients, how good these practitioners
are will reflect on you as much as on them. And of course, referring
a client to someone else often results in referrals back to you.
- Introduce yourself to other health professionals.
Who else serves the groups of people you want to work with? For instance,
do you do pregnancy massage? Are you having success with fibromyalgia
clients? With athletes recovering from injuries? Make a plan to introduce
yourself to other health professionals who work with these groups.
Here’s some general guidelines to follow.
or other mainstream medical professional, someone
you can ask for advice or whose name you can use when introducing yourself.
If you don’t already have a friend or relative that fits the bill,
an easy way to start is with your own doctor or other health practitioner.
Tell them what you are trying to do, and ask if they would be comfortable
helping you. Assure them you won’t need much time, and that you
are doing this so that more people can get the benefits of your work.
Also ask clients, especially clients who are happy with their progress,
to mention your name to the other practitioners they see. Make sure
they have a few of your business cards to
make this easy for them. Before long you will find someone socially
or professionally you can approach and ask if you can talk about developing
professional referrals.
, offer your services as an addition, not as
a replacement. Physicians and other health professionals can be territorial,
so don’t present yourself as if their patients will be better
off getting your care and not theirs. Adopt a team approach.
,
like chronic pain or any condition where stress is a factor. In most
cases, you’re really offering something different than they are.
Tell them you about your successes in helping certain kinds of clients
feel better. Focus on how you’ll make their patients’ lives
easier. Their referrals to you will then make them better providers
to their patients.
. Treat records
and patient contacts with confidentiality, observe procedures and provide
organized reports.
Writing letters of introduction to health professionals can be an important
step in developing your referral system. Look for our follow-up article
with tips on letter writing to physicians and others.
More Articles: advice about developing professional referrals.
“Leveraging
the MD Referral Base.” Great tips on getting referrals from
physicians.
“Your
Professional Team.” Advice on building a referral network of
physicians and other health practitioners.
“Get
More Clients for Your Alternative Health Practice.” How to network
with professionals to build your client base.
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