Outreach Strategies
Innovative outreach strategies are sometimes needed to reach all aspects of your target audience and to promote the “Open Door” policy. This section provides information about Outreach Strategies and Social Marketing.
What is outreach?
The overarching goal of outreach and enrollment is to promote the use of primary care services and enrollment in publicly funded health insurance programs. Outreach, much like marketing, involves utilizing your resources to reach a target audience. In the case of the Community Health Center, it often means reaching community members who are eligible for assistance programs (such as Denali KidCare) but are not currently enrolled.
Many times there are barriers to enrollment for these individuals, such as lack of access to information, inability to understand enrollment processes, fear of enrollment, incorrect understanding of eligibility requirements, and other reasons.
Outreach happens through a variety of methods. Your organization or center can reach out to the community in both direct and indirect ways. In addition, your organization can learn more about social marketing, which is described in the “Social Marketing” section (beginning on page 25 of the toolkit).
Strategies:
-
Utilize media and marketing skills.
Develop a marketing plan using the templates and the Social Marketing section in this toolkit. Be specific about your target audience and your strategies to reach them.
-
Emphasize quality of care at your center.
As you develop marketing strategies, keep in mind that people are loyal to a brand or organization they trust. They might begin coming to you for financial reasons (perhaps because you accept their insurance or use a sliding- scale payment plan) but they’ll return because they trust that they’ll receive quality care.
-
Emphasize the notion of your center as a “community medical home.”
As you develop your marketing strategies, also think of developing your center as the primary care home for the community. Find ways to ensure that your center knows, and is involved in, the community and that people can come to you for primary care without fear.
-
Identify ways to partner with the community in outreach efforts.
Innovative ways of reaching out include partnering with organizations which share your goals. If you’re working to reach English as a Second Language populations, partner with organizations that do this well and cooperate to publish materials or plan events. Many times, your patients may also have contact with other social service providers. Promote your center with those other providers in your community and try to do the same for them.
-
Build coalitions and partnerships.
Participate in nationwide events, such as Health Center Week or Cover the Uninsured Week, as a means of reaching out to your local community. The organizations that put these events together often provide technical assistance, event ideas and free event promotion for your local events. For more specific outreach strategies and ideas, please contact APCA, www.alaskapca.org.
-
Influence State Policies and Regulations.
Current outreach strategies can extend to educating the community about how legislation affects availability of and/or eligibility for many programs, such as State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP). Utilize the Alaska Primary Care Association to conduct research and inform you about current legislation, provide training, and craft compelling messages aimed at state policy makers.
-
Get assistance with outreach and enrollment efforts from the Primary Care Association.
The Alaska Primary Care Association is available to assist you in your outreach efforts. We can provide technical assistance in all of the areas
mentioned in the above list.
-
Keep track of data.
In order to develop effective outreach strategies, each time you participate in an outreach activity, keep track of how many people you reach, what your efforts where, what worked and what did not.
One way to start an effective outreach strategy is with an internal review of patients, via a short survey they fill out when they arrive at your center or clinic. Ask question such as: “How did you hear about us?” or “Do you know anyone who could use information about our clinic?” or even, “What additional medical information can you use?” Tailor the questions to the information that will be most useful to your organization. Make sure you have a way to tally the information on a monthly basis. This will help you determine how effective your current marketing and/or outreach efforts are and help you tailor them positively.
Some of this information was adapted from the Centers for Medicare + Medicaid Services resources: "Learning Team Network: Special Topic, Outreach and Enrollment.”
