In this episode, Barbara and Jessica discuss:

  • How  Barbara got into medicine and marketing
  • How Dr. Hales helps fellow doctors market themselves
  • A cause that she cares about

Key Takeaways:

“If you have a published book, then that perceives you as being the authority in that field or the services that you provide.” – Dr. Barbara Hales

 

Connect with Jessica Koch:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/JessicaLKoch

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessicakoch1/

Website: https://www.jessicalkoch.com/

Email: Jessica@jessicaLkoch.com

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCS47vSJ-G5KHodkYD1kz09w

 

Connect with Barbara Hales:

Twitter:   @DrBarbaraHales
Facebook:   facebook.com/theMedicalStrategist
Business Website: www.TheMedicalStrategist.com
Email:   halesgangb@aol,com

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/TheMedicalStrategist
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/barbarahales

Books:

Content Copy Made Easy
14 Tactics to Triple Sales
Power to the Patient: The Medical Strategist

 

 

TRANSCRIPTION (139)

Jessica Koch: Hello, everybody. I am Jessica Koch, your host of Profound Professionals and we have had the joy over five years of featuring amazing, brilliant people from all over the world that are profound in so many different ways. They are inspiring. They’re outside the box in their industry, and they care about amazing, brilliant causes far above themselves and outside of themselves that support our community and the world.

 

So today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Barbara Hales. Dr Hales is an author, speaker and health marketer after having practiced medicine and OBGYN for many, many years. She has also appeared on ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS. So all of the major networks that are the most important, I would say. So welcome, Dr Hales and thank you for joining us today.

 

Dr Barbara Hales: Well, thank you. And it’s a pleasure seeing you today. And thank you for having invited me.

 

Jessica Koch: Are you still practising as an OBGYN? Tell us about your journey.

 

Dr Barbara Hales: Well, my journey started out with a bit of a challenge because, in the days that I wanted to apply to medical school and wanted to apply for a residency, there was an unwritten quota about females in medicine. The interview I had way back, is totally illegal now. But you know, what’s acceptable at that time, was an interviewer asking me if I planned on ever getting married and having children. At that time, I was too young and naive to do anything but be honest. So I said, Yes, of course, I really don’t see one as being mutually exclusive over the other. At which point he turned red and snapped his fist as hard as he could on the desk, saying, How dare you? Your children will suffer, your husband will suffer, and your patients will suffer. Because you cannot pay attention to all of them with all of your being. You won’t be home when your husband gets home to have dinner on the table. And he just went on and on about that. But fortunately, we have come a long way since then.

 

Dr. Hales’ Journey

 

Jessica Koch: Yes, we certainly have. And so, what’s your journey now? How are you supporting people at this point?

 

Dr Barbara Hales: When I practiced medicine, I went into private practice. I didn’t buy a practice, I didn’t join a larger group. And so, after outfitting the office space to what I thought would be pleasant for patients, as well as effective, there was only about a few minutes before realizing after I opened the door that if I don’t market myself, since I have no patients, it will only be a matter of a few weeks before I would have to close the door. So unlike most people, I started marketing right away to promote myself. I considered myself a bridge between patients and medicines so that I could let people in the communities know not only what medicine was all about but in a sense, translate for them what medicine was for them. And I got into networking, promoting myself, to writing articles, to writing spots for patients to write in and ask questions. And so, over the course of time, I went from no patients to 10,000 active patients at the time that I left.

Unlike most physicians now, when you ask if they market themselves, they say, Well, I don’t know how to market myself, or I don’t have time to market myself, or is that even ethical? But the fact of the matter is that marketing is actually just telling people what you do and where you do it. Can you imagine telling people, this is what I do. These are my services and products. But guess where my office is? Or rather, this is where my office is. Guess what I do? Sounds absurd, doesn’t it? So actually, even though people don’t realize professionals need to market themselves, either themselves or outsourcing yet, it’s really a necessary part of the world.

 

Jessica Koch: Do you specialize in helping people in the health space market themselves? Is that your key gift?

 

Dr. Barbara Hales: Good, that is correct. After I left medicine, I haven’t really totally left it. But rather than seeing patients, what I felt was a transition calling to help my fellow colleagues in medicine, not just in traditional medicine, but alternative medicine, in complementary medicine, to get their name out there so that everybody has an important service for patients in their community and a message that they want to get out. But if patients don’t know that they’re there, then obviously, they won’t be able to serve the community. And so that’s what I do now to help patients. Get the services that they need by helping physicians get their name out there.

 

Working with Dr. Barbara Hales

 

Jessica Koch: That’s awesome. So if I were to work with you, what would that look like? Is it an online course? Is it group coaching virtually? Is it in person? Is it a combination of all of those? Is it one on one? How do I work with you if I’m your customer?

 

Dr. Barbara Hales: Well, the first thing that I would do is to analyze what you actually have in progress. Do you have an active website? Have you ever written a book? Do you have speaking engagements? Do you do networking? What is it that you already have so that we can enhance it?

 

I’m not here to criticize you like what you have currently, but just to enhance it. So I do have a do it with your program. And I have a done for you program. And I also write books for you. Now the thing that is important to think about is, unless you’re in a rural area and you’re the only physician within 1000s of miles, then the likelihood is that there are going to be many positions in your specialty within a given area. So when push comes to shove, how do patients know who to go to? How is it that you’re going to stand out from everybody else? Well, if you have a published book, then that perceives you as being the authority in that field or the services that you provide. So when patients look at ten people in a row, they say, Oh, well, that one wrote a book. That one must be an authority in their field. So it does give an authority or celebrity status to that physician and puts them above their colleagues.

 

Jessica Koch: So normally, I asked what’s one really specific thing someone could do today that would make a difference in the world, but what I hear you already saying is author a book. Right? Am I wrong? Is that the thing you would suggest?

 

Dr. Barbara Hales: Well, that is, but I do have two tips. That person can go ahead and implement it immediately. The first one is if you do not have a web, if you do not have domain with your name, run, don’t walk, to the nearest service you can purchase a domain from, whether GoDaddy or one of the competitors.

The thing is, you don’t ever have to use that domain. You just have to keep anybody else from using the domain. Can you imagine if you did not have the domain, and rather than the website being used as a physician or a marketer, it is a porn star or something that is contrary to what you would like to represent? So, the first thing to do is go get the domain with your name and have it with dot com. There are plenty of other suffixes available. But you know, by habit, the first thing that people do is, regardless of what you tell them, the suffix is they automatically type in.com. So that does have a real importance.

 

The second thing you can do, which is also very important, is social media. Now, you really only have to go into the sites where your target market hangs out because otherwise, it’s kind of a waste of time. But the profiles available to you on every site can be filled out by you using the keywords that represent what people are looking for to find you and your services. It doesn’t mean that you have to be active on that site. But in reality, the reason for these profiles is that it directs people from your profile to your website. And filling out these profiles are free. So you can go into every single solitary social media platform and fill out a profile that is stellar, and that represents you. And you can do this anytime, as a step two that you can implement right away to promote yourself.

 

Jessica Koch: Absolutely. I think that’s wonderful. Those are great tips. So one of the other main reasons we started profound professionals was to feature these industry leaders like you, Barbara, who are doing things out of the box and unique from a unique perspective, especially for your industry, but also to take the time to learn about the causes they care about and how else they’re showing up in the world to help spread cause awareness. The more that we can let you know what causes are available and talk about them and promote the websites and push that information around them. It’s like staying top of mind. The more we help people remember, oh yeah, I want to do something with them. Or I want to volunteer where I want to give, or I know someone who needs to know about that cause I didn’t know that cause existed. And so that was part of the premise of starting profound professionals. Can you share with us a cause that you care about or that you’re involved in?

 

A Cause Dr. Hales Care About and Where She’s Involved

 

Dr. Barbara Hales: Absolutely. One of the causes that I feel very strongly about is St. Jude’s Hospital. This, for anybody that hasn’t seen the commercials on TV, or gotten emails about them, is a hospital that is geared towards the treatment of children that have cancer problems or severe medical conditions. But in addition to being a great pediatric hospital, what makes it even more passion-driven, is that not only does the family not have to be burdened with all of those medical expenses, but the family itself is given support financially for the time the patient is in there regarding living accommodations, food, family support, so well, without being financially burdened by the family themselves. It is all paid for through sponsorship, and people are suffering as it is with medical conditions. They’re in despair over how their child will bear, whether the child will live or die. The last thing they need is to worry that they will not be able to continue care because they can’t afford it.

 

Jessica Koch: Absolutely, I totally agree with you. The other thing people know about me as they follow this show is that I am totally in love with books. And I always like to learn about a new book so that I can explore it, read it, share it with others, and add it to my ultimate book list. So do you have a book that has inspired you in your life or helped you grow your business?

 

Dr. Barbara Hales: Yes, well, a book that I love. Is Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. I think that it’s just one pearl after another. If you could implement just a few of them, it would take you to the next level.

 

Jessica Koch: And you’re an author yourself.

 

Dr Barbara Hales: I am. And I have books that have made the bestseller list, one that is helpful in terms of how you can best use Google searches and surfing to enable you to get the best information. And it still is accurate, like how to recognize which sites are effective and which sites are bogus, which is found in my book. How the patient can’t really see that but power to the patient, the medical strategist. And another one is Content Copy Made Easy, where I tell you how to put out press releases, how to best put out your newsletters for your patients, and how to do networking to be most effective, amongst many other things. But you can also find these on my website, themedicalstrategist.com

 

Jessica Koch: Awesome. That’s wonderful. It has been such a joy to have you today, Barbara. Thank you so much. And if you happen to be a profound professional and you have a passion or something you can give that will help improve someone’s life personally, and spiritually, or help them grow their business, I would love to have you on the show. But even better, be a hero to someone else that you know is a profound professional, introduce them via here to them and to us and introduce them to us to the show so that we can feature them. Now before we say goodbye. I always ask my guests to share one last piece of inspiration or information. Barbara, what would you share with our audience before we go?

 

Dr. Barbara Hales: What I would share is that it is really great being on podcasts. Regardless of putting out a podcast of your own, try being a guest on a podcast, which allows you to have exposure on other people’s stage without the tremendous expense. And then, from doing that, you can see how much you enjoy it before putting out your own podcast.

 

Jessica Koch: That is some great advice. That is absolutely right. Well, thank you so much again, Barbara. And I am so grateful that you are watching today and even more grateful when you share because you just never know who needed to hear this message from Barbara today. So again, I’m Jessica Koch, your host of profound professionals. Until next time, be kind to yourself and be kind to each other. Bye, everybody.