Printable
The initial flyer
The leave-behind for a first visit: one full sheet, five pieces of information, and nothing anybody has to sit down to read.
Supports Stage II, Step 1: Getting Prepared of Frameworks. Read the book →
A leave-behind is something the office looks at after you have gone, and its job is to remind rather than to inform. Nobody is going to refer to you on a first visit, so a thick brochure is money spent to be thrown away. What you want is a sheet that survives on a desk for a week and gives you a reason to come back and fill in the rest.
The test is three to five seconds. Anything denser than that is too dense. When you hand it over, ask that it be shown to the referral coordinator or the doctor — that way the front desk feels some obligation to hold on to it, and a conversation about you happens in the office after you have left.
The five elements
- Your logo image and/or logotype
- Your location
- One line about what you do, pulled straight from your elevator pitch
- A clear indication of which insurance you take
- How to make a referral to you — fax, phone, whichever
That is the whole list. Anything more is too much for a first visit.
If you cannot afford a designer, do not fake a logo image — use a logotype instead, which is nothing more than one typeface you always set your business name in. Colour is worth using sparingly and with purpose here. This is the medical world, and what reads as quality in it is not what reads as quality on a consumer flyer.
[YOUR CLINIC NAME]
[Street address] · [City, State ZIP] · [Cross-streets or landmark]
[One line about what you do, from your elevator pitch — who you treat and what it does for them]
Insurance accepted
[Insurer] · [Insurer] · [Insurer]
[Motor vehicle / personal injury] · [Workers’ compensation]
To refer a patient
Fax [(555) 555-0101]
Call [(555) 555-0100]
Prints as a single 8.5 × 11 sheet. Replace everything in square brackets, then hold it at arm's length and time yourself reading it. Ctrl/Cmd + P does the same thing as the button.
Adapting it
The one line is the hard part and the only part worth agonising over. It is the same sentence as the core of your elevator pitch, so if the pitch is not written yet, write that first and come back — the flyer is downstream of it, not a separate exercise.
The insurance block earns its place because it answers the question an office would otherwise have to phone you to ask. List what you actually take, in the words the office uses. If you take almost nothing, say so plainly rather than hiding it; an office that finds out later remembers the flyer as the thing that wasted their time.
Later flyers do a different job. Once there is a relationship, a flyer is how you answer a question somebody in that office actually asked — a new therapist, an expansion, a change in what you bill. Hand those to the person who asked, and ask them to show it to whoever wanted to know.
Print on the best paper you can justify at the quantity you need. The flyer is the cheap piece; the business card is the one to spend on.
Written for licensed practitioners. What you may claim on marketing material about treatment and about insurance is limited by your state’s scope of practice and its advertising rules — check both before this goes to a printer.