The four Ps the four Rs and Contact Lenses

In a previous post, we emphasized the importance of the marketing mix also known as the four Ps (Product, Price, Place, Promotion) of marketing in healthcare and Optometry. It is a model that has been developed in the 1960s and has been largely employed ever since in most industries, not just healthcare. There have been many attempts to modify or try to add to the model a fifth “P”. Moreover, many healthcare marketers considered the model too hard to fit in healthcare calling the four Ps concept anachronisms in healthcare marketing. English (2000) has announced the death of the four Ps and has argued for their replacement with a modern set of letters notably the four Rs. The four Rs, championed by English, consist of Relevance, Response, Relationships, Results.

Relevance: relates to knowing, listening, and understanding your patients. As you get to know your patients by listening individually to them and understanding their needs and problems, you start building and analyzing databases about them and you become comfortable speaking in their interests in a relevant and visible way.

Response: related to building and developing products and services through specific experiences that meet the needs and wants of the patients and fulfill their brand’s expectations.

Relationships: relate to shaping correct relations and creating the right links between the provider and the directed patient.

Results: relate to winning reflected in the growing market share and patients base.

The four Rs are very important attributes as completing the four Ps rather than replacing them. Achieving a good and sustainable “relationship” complements the product, the price, the place, and the promotion altogether.

Let’s examine the “relationship” and the four Ps of Contact Lenses:

The “product” is built in a way to provide a lasting benefit that needs to meet the patients’ needs and wants in the long term. Contact lenses can provide the patient with a perfect vision or help him see better as long as he needs them.

The effort costs that relate to teaching how to care for contact lenses are reduced in a sustainable and long-term relationship thus increasing efficiency and reducing the “price”.

A sustainable relationship enables the delivery of care in different “places” to become possible; inpatient, outpatient, online, or by phone are only possible if the patient trusts you and if you have a good relationship with him.

The “Promotion” of new contact lenses is required to new patients but also to existing patients. Communicating new products to existing patients with whom a sustainable relationship exists is much easier.