“If you think you might be able to help, there’s no harm in introducing yourself and offering your services. The worst thing that can happen is they tell you they’re not interested.” -Dr. David Leprich If you want patients to come to your practice, go and get them. This would be a good time to brush up on your public speaking skills. Talk-ing to the people in the community about who you are and what you do is the first step. Speaking from experience, Anderson-Peacock says speaking to people or groups of people is the best opportunity to promote chiropractic and what it’s all about. When going out and speaking to people, it’s a good idea to talk about the profession and the practice of chiropractic, and by doing so, you are promoting yourself. “Any time I went out and speak to anybody… there are times when I will be talking about what I would do, and then there are times when it would be more of a promotion of the profession,” she says. The reality is that if people like you, they’re going to refer to you or they will see you themselves.” Know thy neighbours. It’s a good idea to get a sense of what your com-munity is all about, especially if you plan on serving them. Communication is a two-way street, so while you’re out there giving a talk about chiropractic, try to engage in a conversation, ask them about their health concerns, what their expectations are of their health-care provider, and other things that would give you insight on how you can best serve their needs. A good way to get patient insight is by polling them, says Anderson-Pea-cock. And one of the basic questions you could ask is, “What is it you are looking for in health care that you’re not currently receiving?” “If you know something that could help another person and you have the ability to help them now, why wouldn’t you want to tell them?” -Dr. Elizabeth Anderson-Peacock If the opportunity comes up, talk about chiropractic as a profession, its principles and, maybe a little bit of history. Then discuss what people can expect from their chiropractors – how they would approach a health problem and why. “It’s helpful for people to hear things that their chiropractor is doing, so that makes them feel good about themselves, and so they are going to remember you. 24 Canadian Chiropractor May 2014 “I learned a lot just by asking people that question. And then I really fine tuned my practice to deliver the essence of what they were really looking for,” she says. Start talking. If you think you’re not ready for public speaking or you have not one oratorical bone in your body, get over it. Leprich says it is through constantly talking to people and making connections in his community that made his practice the success that it is today. “One of the things I learned is that if you think you might be able to help, there’s no harm in introducing yourself and offering your services,” Leprich says. “The worst thing that can happen is they tell you they’re not interested or they already have somebody doing it.” “A lot of people just don’t take the step because they don’t think it’s going to work out. So, people just have to get over that idea.” Throughout his career, Leprich has approached people and organizations about chiropractic and conducted nu-merous company safety talks about low-back care. It’s a lot of hard work at the beginning, but 36 years later it’s still paying off. Leprich is now the “pre-ferred chiropractor” for several compa-nies and organizations in his commu-nity and that happened only because he took the time to come out and talk to the employees. Another food for thought, says Lep-rich: just because there are other more established chiropractors in your area it does not mean there is little room for you to make yourself known to the community. You’ll be surprised what you can learn just by talking to people. Leprich recalls a time when he de-cided to visit a local baseball team in St. Catharine’s. He just decided to in-troduce himself to the trainer, while assuming he’s probably not the first chiropractor or health-care provider to approach the team. Turns out, he was the first chiropractor provider to offer his services to the team. Public speaking may not always come naturally to most people and it takes lots of practice to get better at it – and it will get better, says Leprich. “You just have to get out there and do it – it gets easier every time. Book the talk and then you’re kind of forced to put yourself together. Even if the talk is not very good, you’re still going to gain from it, and as you go along you’ll get better and better at it.” It’s whom you know. Sometimes, great opportunities come from unex-pected places – or in Leprich’s case, a patient. In 1989, a patient – who was an administrator for the Shaw Theatre in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ont. – asked him if he would be able to come out to www.canadianchiropractor.ca
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