Reviews: Joe Public Doesn’t Care About Your Hospital

Heidi W. Grunkemeyer
Terri McNorton
Warren A. Johnson
Tom Hayes
Richard Matula
Ben Dillon
Judy Neiman
Ed Bennett
Dan Dunlop
Lynne Cunningham
Reed Smith

“Not only does ‘Joe Public’ provide guidance to healthcare marketers to lead our organizations with smarter marketing, it was also like sitting in a therapy session! Every ‘bad habit’ I read about reminded me I’m not alone in the battle to shake off the outdated and ineffective methods of healthcare marketing from the past. I’m inspired!

I definitely plan to share this book with my marketing communications team (so they can have the same therapy!) and our executive leaders. Chris’ marketing wisdom will provide credible support for our marketing ideas that may seem ‘out there’ to our leaders. Just as our leaders are challenged with the new realities in healthcare, I want them to be educated on the new realities in marketing, and this book will help me do just that.”

Heidi W. Grunkemeyer
Operations Director – Marketing & Communications
Alegent Health

“Filled with interesting examples and funny (but true) experiences, this book is a great read for all healthcare marketers. Straight and to the point, it provides a clear map to help healthcare marketers move away from old and fruitless methods and journey toward strategic, effective results. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and will recommend it to others!”

Terri McNorton
Vice President, Marketing and Communications
Baton Rouge General Medical Center

“This Joe is an interesting character. I’d like to get his street address so I can realign my billboard placements to reach him more effectively.

In ‘Joe Public Doesn’t Care about Your Hospital,’ Chris Bevolo gives comfort to the hospital marketer afflicted by common political maladies and ineffective organizational habits. By applying his clear diagnosis and plan of treatment, there can be a good prognosis for restored sanity within the hospital marketing function.

Chris effectively articulates and addresses the common frustrations of a hospital marketer without the expense of weekly visits to a psychiatrist. Hospital marketers will want to buy extra copies of ‘Joe Public’ to ‘accidentally’ leave behind in the C-suite and board room.”

Warren A. Johnson
Marketing Director
MidMichigan Health

“From the title all the way to the last page, Chris tells it like it is, calling out the state of the healthcare marketing today and suggesting bold, but common-sense, approaches that offer clear direction in today’s rapidly changing environment. There is an urgency to his message during these times of transition in the healthcare industry, when yesterday’s more comfortable marketing tactics won’t work in the new world of ACOs, healthcare reform and empowered consumers.

This is a book for marketing professionals, folks in the C-suite, physician leaders, and anybody else who is ready to be courageous and look at alternatives to how hospitals and healthcare services are marketed today. Chris helps us see clearly what isn’t working (because Joe Public really doesn’t care about your hospital) and then suggests ways to challenge current thinking and even take some risks to create messages and develop marketing plans that will lead to real, measurable results. He proposes ways to build support and create an offensive line that can defend innovative marketing plans and tactics against inertia, internal political pressure and institutional roadblocks. Whack-a-mole marketing, right-side-of-the-menu marketing, zombie brands … we’ve all been there because we didn’t recognize the alternatives.

This is the first time I’ve ever laughed out loud reading a book about hospital marketing. Selections from his WeeklyProbe blog start each chapter with ‘Onion-like’ stories that would be even funnier if they weren’t so true.”

Tom Hayes
Director of Public Relations and Marketing
Hennepin Healthcare System, Inc.

“Bevolo eloquently explains and exposes the five primary things broken in healthcare marketing. Things marketers understand but only discuss in hushed whispers with their colleagues. This book gives marketers the ammunition they need to explain and implement these “truths” throughout their organization and bring healthcare marketing back to a level of respectability.”

Richard Matula
Marketing Manager
Provena Saint Joseph Medical Center

“If you think there’s something wrong with your marketing but aren’t sure exactly what it is or how to fix it, then you should own this book. If you don’t think that there’s anything wrong with your marketing, then this book is absolutely required reading.
Chris Bevolo demonstrates once again why he’s one of the sharpest thought leaders in healthcare today. ‘Joe Public Doesn’t Care About Your Hospital’ is a wake up call for healthcare marketers. This common-sense, no-nonsense treatise on all of the ways that hospital marketing falls short today is full of both humor and ‘aha!’ moments that just may change the way you approach marketing and branding from here on out.”

Ben Dillon
Vice President and eHealth Evangelist
G E O N E T R I C

“At last … a book that clearly articulates the importance of marketing AND branding in healthcare! Chris Bevolo’s new book is a valuable resource for helping CEOs, physicians, and the entire leadership team in understanding what true branding is and why traditional methods of marketing (think billboards and “Me Too” marketing) are no longer effective in engaging consumers. Chris’s book delivers practical tips for embracing a new marketing mindset, a mindset that focuses on experiences to build brand.”

Judy Neiman
President
Forum for Healthcare Strategists

“A refreshing dose of reality, Chris Bevolo’s new book ‘Joe Public Doesn’t Care About Your Hospital’ examines why healthcare marketing is so bland, boring and ineffective. He pulls apart the organizational causes for this problem and offers a practical framework to overcome internal obstacles faced by many healthcare marketers.”

Ed Bennett
Healthcare Web Expert – Founder of the “Hospital Social Network List”

“Chris Bevolo’s latest manifesto is a rallying cry for healthcare marketers who are besieged by internal marketing pressures that are unrelated to strategy. Meanwhile, our world is rapidly changing due to a number of factors including healthcare reform, economic uncertainty, and empowered consumers carrying more of the financial load for their care. It is in this context that healthcare marketers are being asked to deliver something new: measurable value to their organizations. To accomplish that objective we must reinvent the ways in which we market our hospitals and health systems while answering one really important question for healthcare consumers: ‘So what?’”

Dan Dunlop
President
Jennings

“Chris Bevolo has done it again. His newest book is timely, entertaining, instructive and on-target. After 30+ years as a healthcare professional with expertise in the marketing and communications areas, I wish this book didn’t have to be written – one more time. Unfortunately, it is needed by healthcare organizations across the country that need to sharpen, retune and refocus their marketing efforts for a new era. The chapters on branding and measurement are particularly insightful. Healthcare marketers ready to take the challenge will be energized by the focus on planning, being proactive, taking calculated risks, and measuring ROI. If you’re ready to be a marketing leader in the Value-Based Purchasing era, to be an active and strategic partner at the senior table, and to succeed while those around you are floundering, Chris’ latest book will serve as a roadmap to accelerate your journey along the pathway to success.”

Lynne Cunningham
Coach
Studer Group

“Chris is able to exploit the issues with healthcare marketing we all deal with and provide sound backing on why we should move ‘out with the old and in with the new.’ Chris helps us all reaffirm that patient experience IS part marketing and brand stewardship and how to be there when Joe Public comes calling.”

Reed Smith
Hospital Interactive Media Consultant and former Marketing Director