Create a Master List of Prospects

Now that you know who to target with your marketing efforts, the next step is to start discovering prospects and add them to a master list.

Search engines

Start by performing a simple Google search. Use the words “Occupational Medicine” and your location. Add all of the names that come up to your CRM. Record the name of the doctor or doctors, phone number, address, fax, and specialty. Use the notes section of your CRM to include any additional information that the internet search results might give you.

After you have entered all of the names that show up on the first simple search, start searching for doctors in your specialty in the same way that a patient seeking their services would. For example, “Low Back Injury Specialist” and your location, or “Shoulder Injury Work Comp Doctor.” Do as many searches as you can think of and record every name that comes up. As you do a search, you might find it helpful to note that you performed a search with those terms. The prospecting stage will be an ongoing process, so it can be helpful to note what you have done along the way.

Provider lists

After you have exhausted the results from search engines, it is time to move on to finding provider lists. This is harder to find and less formulaic than a Google search. Some states require work comp providers to register with the state. You should check to see if your state has a Board of Worker’s Compensation, or some equivalent. If it does, check their website to see if a list is provided of all registered doctors. If not, try writing to the board and asking them if there is a place to obtain one.

Insurance companies will also sometimes provide their customers with a provider list. These lists are significantly harder to find, but they are certainly out there. For this you will want to search for the type of insurance companies that will eventually be paying you, i.e. “Work Comp Insurance” and your location. To find the provider lists, you will generally have to poke around a bit on the websites and find where to get their lists. You can improve your ability to access these lists by taking the name of the company you find and using that in a search with “occupational health” or “medical provider.”

Hospital networks

The last thing to do is to scour the hospital networks for any missed names. Often a hospital’s website will have a search tool that will allow you to search their site and network of doctors. Use this search tool and look for keywords like “occupational” or “rehabilitation.” These doctors are sometimes not practicing within the actual hospital, but they are just associated with it, which is good. If you can avoid calling on a hospital, do so. Many of these doctors will have a clinic elsewhere that will be a better place for you to visit them.

Once you have gathered all the prospects that you can, it is time to move on to the next section, in which you will focus only on a certain number of your prospects at a time.

How many prospects you have on your master list will differ depending on where you are. A therapist in rural Iowa will probably have a short list (20 to 30 prospects) while a therapist in New York City will probably have a long one (200 to 500). If you are in the latter city, you will probably want to decide when enough is enough for your purposes and make a note that you can do more prospecting at a later time.

Take your time with creating your master list. It is the foundation on which you will build your entire referral framework.