Latest / Pharmacy Podcast Network / Marketing That Moves the Needle with Bruce Kneeland, Independent Pharmacy Marketing Specialist | The Bottom Line Podcast

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Marketing That Moves the Needle with Bruce Kneeland, Independent Pharmacy Marketing Specialist | The Bottom Line Podcast · Pharmacy Podcast Network

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: You are listening to the global network of podcasters dedicated
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  Speaker 1: to the pharmacy profession. Welcome to the pharmacy podcast Network.
• 0:22
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  Speaker 1: now on to this show. Welcome everyone to another episode
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: of the bottom Line Pharmacy Podcast. It's just me on
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: the mic today. Scotty and Bonnie are out there doing
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: a post tax season lunch with the rest of the team.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: But with me today is someone who needs no introduction
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: at all, but we're going to introduce him here. Bruce Neelan.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: He is the independent pharmacy Advocate. If you don't listen
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: to his podcast, I listened to it all the time.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: It is a Pharmacy Crossroads podcast. It's part of the
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: Pharmacy podcast Network. One of my favorite personal podcasts that
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: I listened to with pharmacy and he's all over the place.
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  Speaker 1: We're going to talk about pharmacy marketing today. We're going
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: to talk about all that. So Bruce, thanks so much
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  Speaker 1: for jumping on the podcast today.
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  Speaker 2: Austin, it's great to be here, and let's get going.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Let's start with you know, we kind
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: of we've talked a lot beforehand about this episode and
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: some of the things that you want to cover. Let's
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: kind of start with your background. So let's talk about
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: your journey to from pharmacy to basically be in a
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: pharmacy advocate. How you got into independent pharmacy. You told
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: me this story before, and I'd love to hear it,
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  Speaker 1: but I'm sure our listeners would love to hear it
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  Speaker 1: as well.
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  Speaker 2: Well. We'll keep it brief, but I'd like to call
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  Speaker 2: it a happy accident. So I was married with a
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  Speaker 2: child in graduating from Brigham Young University with a degree
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  Speaker 2: in communications that's public relations, journalism, advertising, that kind of stuff,
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  Speaker 2: and needed a job. My wife and I are born
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: and raised in southern California. I'm walking through the student
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: union and there's a sign up says some guys looking
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  Speaker 2: for a salesman. I go in and interview and end
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: up accepting a job as a detail rep for Peiser
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  Speaker 2: Pharmaceuticals in of all places, Fargo, North Dakota. So we
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: started out calling on independent drug stores in North Dakota,
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: got a promotion, moved to Saint Louis, met a friend
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: there as a daughter, actually babysat our kids with medicine shops.
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: So my real cutting my teeth in this business was
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: as a medicine shop operations guy. Did that for a
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: number of years, and then got recruited to move from
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: Saint Louis to Dallas, Texas to work for the Foxmere
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: Drug Company, which was the creator and sponsor of the
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: Healthmart program. So I am not a pharmacist, but I
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: ended up being the director of professional services for Healthmart.
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  Speaker 2: Did that for nine years, then ended up moving to
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: Virginia to work for what was then called the National
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  Speaker 2: Wholesale Druggist Association, which was my first opportunity to be
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: on the national stage, and there I ended up being
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  Speaker 2: the vice president of marketing and Communications, got to know
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  Speaker 2: all of the wholesalers, all of the major trade relations
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  Speaker 2: guys with the drug companies, and all of the pharmacy
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  Speaker 2: magazine people. Got recruited from there to go to Amerisource
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  Speaker 2: and ended up being the vice president of retail Sales
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  Speaker 2: and Services for Amerisource. Ran their trade show, ran their
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: family pharmacy program. Then we merged with Bergen and I
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: got my walking papers. So when the Burgen AMERI Bergen
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  Speaker 2: was created, I was put out, hung up my shingle,
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  Speaker 2: and I became a consult So in two thousand and two,
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  Speaker 2: I just started doing odd jobs and project work, and
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  Speaker 2: I've worked for twenty twenty five different companies in this
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  Speaker 2: capacity over the last twenty two twenty three years and
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  Speaker 2: it's been a wonderful experience. Probably the thing that was
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  Speaker 2: the biggest turnaround for me as a consultant was when
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  Speaker 2: I became the road trip guy. And I had read
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  Speaker 2: an article in Time magazine about them putting two editors
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  Speaker 2: or writers on the road and traveling from New Jersey
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  Speaker 2: to California visiting small towns, and I was able to
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  Speaker 2: pull together a coast to coast road trip in two
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  Speaker 2: thousand and eight, which had me me and my wife.
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  Speaker 2: We drove from I stuck my toe in the Atlantic
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  Speaker 2: Ocean and ended up on the Golden gate Bridge and
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  Speaker 2: we visited thirty pharmacies in two and a half weeks,
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  Speaker 2: and that just became a great platform for everything that
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  Speaker 2: I've done since. So independent pharmacy is in my bones.
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  Speaker 2: It's all I've ever known or done. And I like
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  Speaker 2: to say I started in North Dakota. It's the state
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  Speaker 2: where they still don't let any chain drug stores in,
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  Speaker 2: so there's no Walgreens or Walmart or CVS in North Dakota.
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  Speaker 2: So it was all independence all the time.
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  Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah, that's that's incredible, just the journey and everything.
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  Speaker 1: And I love the cross country road trip. You know,
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  Speaker 1: we've kind of talked about something like that. Here is
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: doing a not necessarily not necessarily as a tests as
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: a cross country road trip, but we've talked about doing
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: a pharmacy road trip ourselves. But that's a that's an
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  Speaker 1: awesome story. And you know, you've got all this experience
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: with marketing, you know, in your communications background. One of
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: the biggest I think kind of confusions with people is
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  Speaker 1: marketing versus advertising. Are you marketing or are you advertising?
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  Speaker 1: Some people kind of use that terminology kind of interchangeably.
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  Speaker 1: What exactly how would you define marketing versus advertising? A
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  Speaker 1: pharmacy owner comes to you, or a pharmacy a B
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  Speaker 1: to B pharmacy business says, should we be doing marketing
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: versus advertising? What do you tell them when that's their question?
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  Speaker 2: So the simplest explanation, and I think it's the piece
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  Speaker 2: that pharmacists miss is Marketing is deciding what you're going
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: to do, why you're going to do it, how you're
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: going to do it, what it is you're going to do.
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  Speaker 2: Advertising is telling people what you're doing and where we
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: are with pharmacy right now. It's absolutely critical that pharmacists
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: understand marketing. So as I look at my talents, my pharmacy,
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: my footprint, my staff, and my community, what is it
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  Speaker 2: that I can do new, better and different that will
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  Speaker 2: appeal to the people in my community? And the list
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: of those is long. I can do med sinc, I
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: can do immunizations, I can do long term, long term
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: care at home. You know, all of the options that
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: you have are what you need to look at and decide,
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  Speaker 2: first of all, what do I want to do because
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: if you don't want to do it, you're going to
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: be in trouble. And then you have to carefully examine,
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: you know, is my community ready for it? So you know,
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  Speaker 2: if I'm in a growing suburban neighborhood where everybody's just
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: out of college, you know, probably not going to do
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: long term care at home. If you're in an older
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  Speaker 2: community with everybody is old, then you're going to do
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: long term care at home. So marketing is deciding what
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: you're going to do. Big companies spend all kinds of
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: money on research. You know, pharmacists, you're going to have
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  Speaker 2: a pretty good feel for that. You know you need
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: to do too much studying, but you need to do
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: a little bit that. Then advertising is how you tell
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: people what you're doing. And advertising is essential, and it
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: just drives me crazy when people say, well, you know,
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: my advertising is word of mouth. I don't like to
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: say it. I feel an obligation to say it. If
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: you're depending on word of mouth, you're killing yourself slowly.
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  Speaker 2: Most things that happen in a typical pharmacy that people
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: are going to talk about are the bad things. I
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: went to the pharmacy and my script wasn't ready. I
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: went to the pharmacy and they said they only had
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: twenty eight. Can I give you twenty eight? You come
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: back in two days and I'll give you twenty more.
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  Speaker 2: That's what people are going to talk about. And so
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  Speaker 2: you have to you have to create an environment where
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  Speaker 2: people will say something noteworthy about your store. And that's critical.
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  Speaker 2: But if you're not organized and planned and have a
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  Speaker 2: plan for creating word of mouth, word of mouth is
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  Speaker 2: killing you more than it's helping you.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, I think word of mouth is incredibly fundamental.
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  Speaker 1: You've got to have it in there, but it's not
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  Speaker 1: something that you should rely solely on, especially in this
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: digital aids that we're in where yeah, you know social media.
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  Speaker 1: I mean you've got you've got all the different social
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: media platforms. But I think also to your point, Bruce,
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  Speaker 1: you know, word of mouth is not the only way
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  Speaker 1: that customers make buying decisions. It is a way, but
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  Speaker 1: it's not the only way. And you know, if you're
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: relying on word of mouth, really all you're doing is
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  Speaker 1: capturing the amount of audience that relies on word of mouth.
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  Speaker 1: You're not capturing the audience that is active on social
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  Speaker 1: media that gets their information through maybe email or maybe
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: through any sort of like local magazine that gets distributed out.
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  Speaker 1: So when you're relying on word of mouth, you're really,
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  Speaker 1: as you mentioned, you're kind of doing yourself a disservice because,
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  Speaker 1: while it is fundamental, you're limiting your growth and who
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  Speaker 1: you're able to reach with your message that you're putting
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: out there.
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  Speaker 2: Well, the other thing I will insert here is advertising.
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  Speaker 2: It's an art and a science, and the fact of
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: the matter is most pharmacists are not creative geniuses. And
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  Speaker 2: my biggest argument right now is that if you're trying
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: to succeed today, and if you're depending on new, different
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: and innovative new services, whether it be med sync or
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: immunizations or long term care at home, or drug nutrient
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  Speaker 2: depletion or whatever, nobody gets up in the morning and
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: tells their spouse, Hey, honey, after my cup of coffee,
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  Speaker 2: I'm going to go to the pharmacy and get an MTM,
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: or I'm going to go to the pharmacy and ask
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: about a drug nutrient depletion. So the notion everybody knows
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: what a pharmacy is. You put a sign up over
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: your store and it says pharmacy. Everybody knows that you
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: can go there and get prescriptions, but if you're depending
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: on just filling prescriptions, you're in trouble. So you have
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: to figure out something new to do. And if you're
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: doing something new, you need to advertise it, and you
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: need to advertise it smart.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so that I'm glad you brought that up because
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: that kind of goes into my next question here. You know,
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: we've had Hasham on our show, Hashim Zambak on our
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: show multiple times, and the last time we had him on,
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: he talked about the ownership workshop and he talked about
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: getting into those diversified services. So some of those other
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: things like MTM, long term care, at home, all of that,
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  Speaker 1: and you brought up three points two of them are
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: you know, you have to make sure that there's a
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: need for it in your community and you have to
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: have a passion for it, and you kind of mentioned
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: both of those things. I'm an owner, I've got a
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: passion for servicing my client on a more, I guess,
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: kind of intimate level, and I know that there's a
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: need for uh, let's say, compounding in my community. So
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: I decide I'm going to expand into compounding. From there,
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: after you've made that decision of expanding your services, how
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: does the marketing or maybe PR or whatever it is
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: that you're doing. What are the next steps there? Like,
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: how do you how do you market you know, these
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: services that you're that you're expand into.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: First of all, whoever you're expanding into that with it
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: would be the first place that you would look to
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: for help. So if you're compounding, you know, start talking
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: with your compounding suppliers, obviously the equipment people that you're
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: dealing with. If you're going to focus on you know,
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: consultations and drug nutrient depletion, which is a vastly overlooked opportunity,
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: you know, you need to be dealing with your high
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: end vitamin people and those kinds of things. The general
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: thing that I would say is figuring out how to
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: do a headline or a caption or a tagline is
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: harder than you think. And figuring out how to say
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: that smart, clear, defined, communicative is harder than you think.
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: I'm planning another road trip right now, so I've spent
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: the last couple of days looking at fifteen websites for pharmacists,
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: and they will say, we do compounding they will say
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: we have DME. They will say we have durable medical equipment.
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: That doesn't mean anything to a person. So you have
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: to say, hey, we work to carefully develop prescriptions that
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: work specifically for you. Now that's too long. I wish
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: I was a better wordsmith. But you've got to figure
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: out how to say these things succinctly. When I give
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: CE programs and try to explain this concept, there's a
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: way I've said it that I think illustrates the point.
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: If you remember back when you were dating your spouse
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: or your girlfriend, you know, for the first few times,
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: you might find yourself in a park or by a
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: you know, by a lake or something, and you look
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: into her eyes and you can say, you know, when
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: I look into your eyes, time stands still, and boy,
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: she gets a big smile on her face. Or you
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: could say you have a face that would stop a clock.
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: So it's the same message, but it completely different connotation.
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  Speaker 2: You got to figure out how to say HRT when
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: you're compounding. Doesn't tell us female what it is you're
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: doing or why she should care. I've got a fifty
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: year old daughter who's just going through that phase, and
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: she's got a compounding pharmacy a half mile from her home,
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: but she still goes to Costco and I can't convince
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: her to change because the pharmacy around the corner is
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: so intimate, she's afraid to go in there. She goes
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: in and asks a question, she can't get out Costco.
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: She can get out anytime she wants. So you got
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: to recognize how to invite people in a manner that
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: they're not afraid to come in and act ask a question,
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: and that's hard to do. So again, I think hiring
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: some professional help, particular if you're moving into a major
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: new field, would would be an important consideration. How are
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: you going to say it? How are you going to
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: say it?
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah? No, I agree with you. It's all about taking
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: because you know patients, you know, when they see compounding,
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: to your point, it is that is complex and they
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: don't know what that means. And so being able to
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: find a way to you know, kind of lean in.
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: You're expanding in the compound and you're like, all right,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: the people that I'm trying to target, what are their
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: pain points? What are they going to find value? And
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: how can I take their pain points and what they
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: find valuable into a succinct message like like you had mentioned.
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: I think that that's incredibly important. It goes a long way,
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: especially when you're positioning. You know a lot of pharmacy
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: marketing is relying on how a pharmacy is positioned, and
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: that's probably the key point there. And you know, your
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: success and your positioning is the message that you're putting
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: behind it.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: And we just met a couple of weeks ago for
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: the first time or at least major at this Atrium
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: X conference. And I'll tell you the biggest aha I
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: had there. A lot of neat stuff, but the biggest
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: AHA I had there was they were talking about compounding,
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: which is a big focus of their program, and they
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: were talking about customers. And about halfway into one of
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: her presentations, Nicolette had to say, Oh, when I say customers,
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: I don't mean people. I mean prescribers. And that's another
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: interesting thing about marketing is you need to figure out
• 18:46
  Speaker 2: who your customer is. When you're compounding. You know, you're
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: not going to stand there and tell missus Jones she
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: needs an hr T thing. You're going to tell the
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: doctor who's going to tell her that she needs it.
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: And so you know, marketing, you have to figure out
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: who your audience is, who you talking to.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, we we had Amena on our podcast
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: the last time she was on. She's built out a
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: B to B model where you know, her entire focus. Yes,
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: she will do like some marketing for you know, for
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: the patients, but it's mostly just like you know, you
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: come into the pharmacy, there's like a sign or something.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: Her biggest focus in her marketing is targeting those prescribers
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: and targeting the people that are you know, she basically
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: looks at the people that are writing the prescription as
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: her customer, and she finds ways that you know, maybe her,
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: maybe the patients that they work with, you know, some
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: of the services that they can't get at a traditional
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: big box pharmacy. You know, she's able to offer that.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: And so that's her kind of leading. She's built out
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: her entire marketing strategies dependent on that. I forgot that
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: they brought that up at atrim X, But I think
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: it's a fantastic point and it's something that I actually
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: don't see a lot of. I think it's a hidden
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: opportunity in pharmacy marketing. Is that B to B play there.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: I think that's something that you know, a lot of
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: pharmacies could do more of. I think could really move
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: the needle. Let's go back to the messaging port and
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: a big part of messaging is PR. And you have
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: a deep, deep background in communications. So how do you
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: make PR work for pharmacy owners. I know it's kind
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: of a loaded question, but I guess that's kind of
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: I want to hear your thoughts on how this works.
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: So Number one is it's not all that complicated. It's scary.
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: I learned this quite by accident. And you may have
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: met Tom Depietro at Atrium X. He's got a pharmacy
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: in Pennsylvania. The way you get involved in PR is
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: you understand that something happens in the news almost every week.
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: There's something about Trump RX, there's something about what you know,
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: the new Medicaid benefit playing. There's something about the news
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: all the time. What you do is you watch for that.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: You get yourself a list of the newspaper and the
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: radio and the TV shows that are in your area,
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: and when something comes up, you send them a simple
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: email says hi, I'm Tom from Dipetro's pharmacy. I noticed
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: on the news that there was a big story about
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: xyz GLP drugs. If you ever interested in somebody talking
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: about that and what it means in your local community,
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: give me a call. I'd be happy to talk. It's
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: not going to work the first time, but probably won't
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: work the second time. But the problem is is those
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: local news stations cannot call the CVS pharmacist and ask
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: them what does this mean? The CVS pharmacist can't talk
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: to the press, so they are hungry for a local angle,
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: and so Tom gets on the radio frequently. He gets
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: in the newspaper frequently. Simply by doing that. Now the
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: discipline comes is you have to figure out how to
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: talk quickly and succinctly make it local. But once you
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: get involved, you're gonna get called all the time. Doctor
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: h I can't say Hamusha's last name. He gets on
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: the local TV station in the Dallas Fort Worth area frequently. Uh,
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: doctor Mack, the superman pharmacist. You know, he's he's played
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: this in spades. So it's a little bit of moxie,
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: a little bit of guts, But that local news stations
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: are dying for somebody who they can who they can
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: go to when something comes up, starts with an email.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so it starts with a simple email. And one
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: thing I want to piggyback on there too, Bruce, that
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: you know, you talked about how a lot of these
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: pharmacy owners are getting these PR spots with their local
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: news stations or their local radio stations. One thing is
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: in the digital space now you can do things like
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: collaborators on Instagram. So you know you've got a get
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: You've got this news section where you know, you've got
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: a pharmacy owner that goes on their local news station
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: talks about some of the some of the changes that
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: are happening in the pharmacy space. Maybe like grabs onto
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: some of those news headlines. They send out a simple email,
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: they get a guest spot on a news station. You
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: can take the video or the coding from that station
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: that you do and you can upload that to the
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: pharmacy social media page.
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: Almost like a podcast where you know, like for example,
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: you and I are recording here, you know, you can
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: take the clips from this show and upload it onto
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: your social media. So you've got that extra component as well,
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: So you're not only taking advantage of the PR and
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: of that channel where you've got, you know, access to
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: potential customers, but you're also taking advantage of it from
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: your digital presence as well.
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: Well. And to come back full circle, that's the kind
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: of thing people will talk about, Hey, my pharmacist was
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: just on the Channel five news. You know that spurs
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: positive word of mouth, that creates word of mouth. So
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: kind of come full circle back to word of mouth,
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: which is you're going to get it whether you like
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: it or not, so work to make it work for you.
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah. No, that's that's a incredible You know, you sound
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: very passionate about pharmacy marketing. How did you How did
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: you come to be so passionate about pharmacy marketing and advertising?
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: You kind of talked about your story a little bit,
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: but like where did that passion switch kind of flip over.
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: With the road trip?
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: I mean it, you know it was something that worked
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: for me. I mean with my road trip, I got
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: covered in every magazine and so, you know, companies that
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: were looking for help selling to independence, they they started
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: hiring me to do stuff for them. And then I
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: saw by accident what it's doing for pharmacy owners out there.
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: Uh.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: Dennis Song and Flower Mound Texas. I used to live
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: in Flower Mound, so he and I've been close. You know,
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: he was a he was a genius at doing this
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: kind of stuff. So I just saw it working for
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: people and and it's it's an untapped resource. It really
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: is available to far more pharmacy owners than are taking
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: advantage of it.
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely. One thing I know we wanted to talk
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: about that I'd love to hear from you on is
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: you know someone listening in right now pharmacy owner looking
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: at getting their marketing really, you know, jump starting their
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: marketing or taking advantage of some of the marketing stuff
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: that they're already doing. What are some of the two
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: or three of what you'd call like maybe cost effective
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: AD programs that you would suggest to a pharmacy owner.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: The first one is clearly a customer referral program, and
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: you have to create that with props, have something to
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: hand to people that they can read, take and give
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: to somebody else. And you know, there's a variety of
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: ways to do that, but a customer referral program would
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: be the basic place to start. Then you have to
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: have a new customer program so somebody comes into your
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: pharmacy the first time you have to be able to
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: identify that person through the clerks and all that kind
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: of stuff and get that person to meet at least
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: the pharmacist in charge that day, come out, shake their hand,
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: welcome them to the pharmacy, and have some unique little
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: tagline that you can say that says, you know, we're
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: so glad you came in. One of the things that
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: people seem to like most about filling their prescriptions here
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: is ABC or XYZ, So you need to have a
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: program for accepting these people that. The other thing that
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: I really kind of like is demo days. So having
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: something that happens in the pharmacy that's exciting or different,
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: and these are easy to do. You've got five or
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: six vendors who count on you for something, your vitamin
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: supplier or your private label supplier, your wholesale or whatever
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: it would be. You know, have them come in and
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: set up a table in the pharmacy and give some
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: samples and hand out coupons and just create some kind
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: of exciting event exciting is too strong of a word,
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: unusual event in the pharmacy that gives people something to
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: go home and talk about. And the last one that
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: I really like and I'm frankly on a mission to
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: find somebody who does this well. Is a new move
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: in program, and that's the only one you'd need to
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: pay for. These other ones are free. But you know,
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: when people move into your community from out of the county,
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: how are they going to find you? They're going to
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: shop they see a pharmacy, yea, So you need to
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: get something in their hands that invites them to come
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: into your pharmacy where you can do the new customer
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: program and then you can do the customer refer program.
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: So they all they all kind of fit together like
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: lego blocks.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm a little jealous that I hadn't thought of
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: that new move in program. That's a really good program,
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: you know, that demo day. Kind of going back to
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: what you mentioned, I've seen some pharmacies that will also
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: do like health and wellness kind of seminars at their
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: store where yes, they'll have like you know, they'll record
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: a wellness SEVENAR that they're doing. They get that the
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: SEVENAR that they're doing on there as kind of marketing content,
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: and then they get content from it that they can
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: post on their their.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: Social media and face. Facebook is an absolute must and
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: whatever you know, social media program of your your choice,
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: but you've got to be on two different social media
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: platforms and repurposing all of this stuff.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: In the description, you'll find a link to Bruce Neland's podcast.
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: You also find links to his LinkedIn. All the stuff
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: that he does will be there as well. Right at
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: the top, talk to us a little bit about you know,
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: what you've got coming up, some things that people need
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: to be keeping their eyes on, and just some things
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: that kind of send the listeners off here.
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so you know, I'm approaching the very end of
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: my career and i am planning one more road trip,
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: so I'll be going off to Wyoming. I'm just curious.
• 30:22
  Speaker 2: I've had experience with a couple pharmacists up there who
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: I've always wanted to go see. I'm in Salt Lake now,
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: so it's not all that far, so I'll be doing that.
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: But the big project for me right now is helping
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: to build out this Dispense Times digital magazine. So I'm
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: writing for Dispense Times and selling ads for Dispense Times
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: and working on frankly building my legacy. I'm going to
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: write off into the sunset here sometime in the next
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: twelve to eighteen months, and so I want to just
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: be able to leave thoughts like we've talked about here
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: that I write about in the magazine. They give me
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: permission to write about anything that I want, so it's
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: it's a good outlet for me, and I love writing.
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: My high school English teachers would roll over in their
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: grave because I couldn't do book reports or term papers,
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: but somehow or another, I've ended up writing for magazine.
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: So yeah, that's awesome. Well, we thank you for everything
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: that you do for the independent pharmacies out there, and
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: you know we'll be keeping an eye on you as
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: you do the as you do your road trip. I
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: do want to mention also, you know we're very familiar
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: with to Spen's time. We have a lot of respect
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: for Chris and Josh and Todd and everything everybody that's
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: involved with Dispends time. You know, we thank you for
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: your contributions there, and thanks to everyone for listening in.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: If you have any questions for Bruce, all his contact
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: information will be in the description, feel free to send
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: him an email or follow on LinkedIn.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: Particular, I wrote I wrote a four or five page
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: article for America Pharmacist on how to do this PR stuff,
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: and I'd be happy to send it to anybody who
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: emails for me, just you know, just to the email
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: addresses b F n Land It's k N e E
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: l A n D at gmail dot com. I'd be
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: happy to send it out to anybody that they want.
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: Or if you're looking for samples of customer referral things,
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: I've got a few of those electronically. Too happy to
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: send anything you want.
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: Awesome. Well, thanks everyone for listening in and Bruce thanks
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: again for jumping on with us.