The Galen Group: Questions & Answers

Q: Isn't the cost of hiring a marketing firm quite high?

A:  No.  The whole point of hiring a marketing firm is to make you money, not cost you money. Look at it this way. Say you're a physician. For what it normally costs to let us increase your patient count by as little as five patients -- that's right, if we get you five more average patients -- that by itself is often enough to cover all our costs and fees and pay for itself in less than a year. And then give you those same profits free and clear the next year. And the next and the next, year after year after year.

Well, we've raised client counts more than by five. We've raised them literally by the hundreds. And we guarantee we can raise yours. (Besides. Maybe our prices aren't as high as you think. Why not give our offices a call and see?)

Q: What if your efforts fail?

A: We have never -- that's right: never -- failed to increase the client count of anyone using our full marketing services. Period. That isn't just a fact: it's a guarantee. If we can't get you more clients, you don't have to pay us a cent. And as for some of our subsidiary services --if you want a mailing list compiled, say, or an annual report written, or a focus group conducted in order to gauge reaction to a new product or service -- well, failure just doesn't enter into it. We simply do it, and give you the results. Granted, there's a difference between just gathering information, and using that information to get you more clients and greater profits. But we do provide both. And we guarantee results either way.

Q: What happens when you leave? Does our client count drop again?

A: Not at all! Your staff will have been shown all the relevant marketing techniques to maintain your practice at its new levels, or even to improve it further, if you wish. Remember: your new clients aren't going to be coming to you because of some flashy and empty ad campaign. They're going to come to you because your genuine skills and services and qualities will have been made clear to them by our marketing, and because your business will have been tuned by feedback from your clients into providing services that your clients want and need. You and your people will be shown the simple but effective steps needed to get new business and secure regular clients. And your firm will continue to grow at the pace you want.

Q: I need to do a focus group...

A: Then you came to the right place!

Q: But I'm a bit confused: I've looked through your page, and sometimes it seems as though your company specializes in marketing medical practices, at other times it seems as though you work for some extremely large national corporations, at still other times that you specialize in focus groups. Which is it?

A: All three. (Though, you're right, the point could do with some more explanation.) You see (as we often tell our clients): businesses evolve. And smart businesses evolve the way that clients want them to evolve. We provide several marketing services to clients, and in the course of over a decade of doing it, we learned that clients wanted some services more than others. So we've geared ourselves to provide them. Originally we began providing general marketing services to small professional practices only. But -- we did a good job. Word got around. Larger organizations called us and hired us, and in time they came to make up the majority of our clients.

That doesn't mean we only handle corporate giants. We've adopted a sort of modular approach that uses outsourcing. What that means is that if a very large client needs very complex work, we add top local professionals to our team to get the job done. If smaller clients need smaller services, we tailor our sources (and our prices) to supply those services. No client is too large -- or too small.

Our services have followed the same pattern -- we offer many, but some just seem to be in higher demand. Focus groups, for example, have been so popular and successful a service with our clients that some people have suggested we specialize in doing such groups exclusively. The thing is, part of the reason we are so good at doing them is that we're able to to plan and do them in the context of our overall marketing experience. An organization that does focus groups exclusively is, well, out of focus: they don't see the whole picture. We do. Our general expertise has made that particular service, the focus group, our most popular single service among our clients. They want it, and so we see to it that they get the best focus group work possible. Listening to what the client wants is our job -- the job of every successful business.

Q: Won't getting involved in marketing take away from me doing my job?

A: Just the opposite. After all, you're hiring us precisely to do all the work of interviewing, writing, mailing, data analysis, dealing with printers and media people. You'll be able to take care of your clients just as before. Better, in fact. Because our marketing techniques will not only free up your time so that you can concentrate on your job, but give you information about your clients that can bring you closer to their concerns than ever before.

Q: Isn't marketing simply unprofessional and unethical?

A: Marketing is simply communicating facts about your business to your public, and getting feedback about your business from your clients or from your possible clients. If you have a listing in the yellow pages, you're marketing. If you have a business card, you're marketing. If you try to serve your clients to the best of your abilities, you're marketing. Every business markets. Because every business sends out a message about itself, and every business gets some kind of response. The only question about marketing is: are you doing it well or are you doing it badly?

Certainly, some marketing is unprofessional -- usually because it's not done by professionals. But does not marketing really make any sense as a mark of 'professionalism'? Of 'ethics'? Is it 'professional' not to tell your clients who you are and what services you offer? Is it 'professional' not to ask them how they feel about your product or service? Is it 'professional' to make word of mouth alone the only criterion for those people finding the help they need?

The ethical professional tries his best to know his clients' needs and thoughts and to serve them. He does his best to tell people that need help that he's there, and ready to render service, and competent to render it. An ethical business or practice doesn't reject marketing: it requires it.

Q: Why should I hire you when I can market myself?

A: Do you really have the time to compose a battery of questionnaires? To collate and analyze stacks of raw data? To write and illustrate your own brochures and mailings? To produce your own newsletters? To create and place your own media promotion? Be realistic. Marketing isn't magic. It's hard, time consuming work. It isn't a part-time hobby. It takes years of professional training. Do you really have that much time to take away from your work? From your family?

Tell me honestly: if you had to advise someone else, would you recommend he get his marketing done professionally by people seasoned and experienced in the business, or hit-and-miss and learn-as-you-go? You wouldn't try fixing your own TV, or ordering your secretary to do it. You'd call an professional. Particularly if he offered to give you a free consultation and estimate. Like we do. Call an professional for your business. It's the reasonable thing to do.

Q: Why should we go to The Galen Group and not some other professional services marketing firm?

A: Well, as far as the Rochester area goes, there isn't any other professional services marketing firm. Here, we're the only ones: only the Galen Group specializes in professionals and professional services. The rest do not specialize in highly educated and skilled individuals and their services -- they market used cars, dog food, and canned goods. And there's a difference.

Elsewhere? Well, there are some fine organizations we're aware of. We ourselves only take on so many clients per quarter, but we'd we'd be happy to recommend others. But generally, when people ask us just why they should hire us, we say: don't 'just' hire us. Shop around. We think our qualifications are good, and our prices competitive, and our record excellent. We think you'll agree. Look into it. Call us and talk to us and see.

Q: I'm interested in learning more. What do you charge for a consultation?

A: Nothing at all. Our consultations are entirely free. We're happy to meet and talk over our services at any time. Call us now, and we can talk over your needs directly on the phone, or arrange a meeting at your convenience. No charge.

Q: I'm interested in some of your services, but my practice is considerably far away. Is there anything you can do for me?

A: Certainly. We can do anything for you that can be mailed, emailed, or handled over the phone. Not everything can, of course. We can't train personnel effectively over the phone, or conduct focus groups, for instance. But brochures can be written, direct mail sent, radio commercials scripted, speeches ghost-written, press releases issued, demographic studies assessed. Quite a lot, actually.

Q: How long have you been in business? And who, specifically, have you worked for?

A: We've been in business for over a decade. (Actually, if you'd like to know more about us as an organization, click here. As for a list of our clients? Sure. Press here and you'll have the names of dozens.

Q: I don't really need full-scale marketing, but I would like to try putting out a newsletter. Do you do jobs that are that specific?

A: Absolutely. In fact, we can even design just the logo for your newsletter, if that's all you want.

Q: What exactly is 'marketing'? I keep thinking of it as supermarkets or stock markets, or just some fancy new name for plain old Madison Avenue hard sell.

A: Marketing is about opening up and improving communications between businesses and their clients, and using that communication to get more clients and to make a better business. And, yes, it is surrounded by misconceptions.

Too many professionals equate marketing with simple direct advertising. They imagine they'll be 'packaged', put on display, treated like a commodity, made to lose precisely that sense of trust and honesty which is often the heart of their clients' regard. They're wrong.

Marketing is not advertising. Advertising tries to sell to people it doesn't know, things they may or may not want. Marketing finds out who they are, and what they do want. And then helps the business to supply it. Advertising is centered on the product. Marketing is centered on the person -- on learning what people look for, why they go here and not there, why they stay with a service, why they leave that service, what they expect, what they need, what they demand. Advertising is static. It merely sells a given product. Improving that product is outside its scope. Marketing is growth, evolution, innovation; it sensitizes its clients to their clients' want, to changing circumstances, it explores and initiates ways to adapt and expand -- and succeed.

Advertising is for things. Marketing is for people.

Q: I notice you say you guarantee the results of your 'full' marketing plan. Do you guarantee the results if your client doesn't use the full plan?

A: It depends. Look at it from our perspective. It's a simple matter of common sense -- a mechanic can't get your stalled car running if the only thing you let him do is clean the ashtrays. And we can't guarantee 100% success if we're only allowed to do 2% of the job. If we're hired only to write a brochure, and we do, and three people in your office re-write it, and then forget to mail it -- something we've actually seen happen -- well, it's hardly surprising if your client count doesn't quadruple.

Don't misunderstand us: we're not asking you to take all our services in one huge bunch. We sit down with you and talk out where you are and just what you have to do to get your client count up, assuming that's your goal. If what we need to do is all right with you, and seems to us to be effective and workable, you'll get your guarantee. That's how we do it. If you only want some one very small particular sub-service, you will get it done to the best of our ability. Your guarantee in that case is simply that we want your repeat business and your recommendation.

But that's a pretty strong guarantee too.

Q: I work in the legal field, and I'm just not convinced that getting your name in the papers or on TV results in business.

A: It didn't seem to hurt Johnny Cochran. But getting your name in print is only one aspect of what we do. Check out our list of services by clicking here.  You'll be surprised.

Q: I'm a doctor. And I just don't see that marketing has anything to do with how I deal with my patients. It's skills that matter, not 'marketing'. If I'm good, the clients will come to me. Isn't that so?

A: Look. To a sick patient in a hospital bed, to a dental client in pain, to a person facing a law suit, the performance of a doctor or lawyer can be crucial. A superior performance can be the difference between health and sickness, ease and suffering, freedom or imprisonment, even life or death. Performance. Skills. Your skills. The skills it took years of study, education, and practice to achieve, and a small fortune to acquire.

But the finest skills in the world don't mean a thing if no one hires you to use it. You may know how to help your clients. But if you don't know how to get their notice, and attract them, and hold them, the finest abilities and the most superb education and training won't matter. The people who need your help won't get it. Because they don't know where to look. To serve people you have to reach out to them. And reaching out to people means marketing.

Q: I'm not a doctor or a lawyer, and I'm doing just fine as far as my clients are concerned. I work in industrial products, though, and I'd like to know how some of my distributors are handling my merchandise. Can you do something about that?

A: Sure. Look. Essentially, our business is communications. Information. We get information for you, which you use to improve your business and to get new clients. Or, we can get information out about you, so people can know about what you have to offer and why they should take advantage of it. Now if there's something in the distribution process you want to know about, we can easily contact and interview your distributors and give you a detailed breakdown of their views. Or, we can observe them privately and tell you if what they're doing tallies with what they're telling you. Or, we can give you an analysis of conditions and outlooks affecting the entire distribution process. You tell us what you want to know. We find out. And so do you.

Q: What I'd like to know how to get in touch with you.

A: Just click right here.