21 + Ways to Sell More Hearing Aids This Valentine’s Day
We were trying to figure out how to email you chocolate when we came up with an even sweeter idea: sending you 26 ideas to sell more hearing aids this Valentine’s Day.
Holidays can help you sell more hearing aids, and Valentine’s day works better than most. After all, more than a third of people admit that hearing loss negatively affected their relationships, and 44% of people with hearing loss become more romantic once they can hear better with hearing aids. We don’t have any corresponding data on “Answer Your Cat’s Question” day.
What better time of year than Valentine’s Day to sell hearing aids and help your patients hear better live better, and yes, have more romance in their life?
Use these 26 crazy, romantic, and smart audiology marketing ideas to boost your hearing aid sales in February and rekindle the romance in your patients’ lives. We’ve included the most powerful one at the end as a bonus.
1. Make a Plan
Scan the following plethora of ideas for ways to boost your hearing aid sales. Yes, we’ve included some that push the envelope and may be new to your practice. Pick one or two and then contact the MedPB Help Desk right away so they can put up any special offers or promotions on your website before February 14th. If the hearing aid promotion idea is linked to Valentine’s Day, you want people to see it as soon as possible. Though, even after Valentine’s Day, the thought of romance is on their minds (and if they “forgot” to get flowers along with the other hints they didn’t hear this might be a more meaningful way to say I’m sorry).
2. Make the Effects of Hearing Loss Palpable
Use social media or other patient communications to talk about how hearing loss affects relationships. You can cite studies that show:
- Nearly half (44%) of participants say that hearing loss affected their relationships.
- Two-thirds of people said that hearing loss made them feel left out.
- More than a third felt that they lost touch with people they love because they couldn’t hear them.
3. Run a Special Promotion for Loved Ones
Offer a free hearing evaluation or another special value-added offer to patients that come in with a loved one. You want patients to do this anyway. Use this great opportunity to motivate them to come in with their spouse or loved one.
4. Use the Dog Card
Invite patients to stop by with their dog. Offer free hearing aid tests for their dog, not to mention heart-shaped dog treats. Everyone loves to show off their pet, and dogs are the most loving animals alive.
5. Do Something Adorable
Make February a month of love stories from your happiest hearing aid customers. Invite them to share how hearing aids have improved their relationships, romantic or otherwise. Invite them to write stories that you can share on social media and in emails. You can even film these adorable interactions and share them on your social media channels.
6. Free Stuff, Free Stuff, Free Stuff
Everybody, and we mean everybody, loves free stuff. Come up with some special Valentine’s Day tchotchkes that would get people excited to come in.
7. Dinner and a Movie
Try a special promotion where couples who’ve been out for dinner can come in and watch a classic movie with popcorn and snacks afterward. Again, demonstrate how much better you can hear the movie with hearing aids!
8. Gift Certificates
Advertise that everyone who schedules a hearing aid fitting on Valentine’s Day gets a gift certificate for audiology services and/or from a partner business in town. And don’t forget the cookies!
9. Valentine’s Cupcake Party
Partner with a local bakery for some glam cupcakes. For those who have a fitting and buy hearing aids, give them a gift certificate for more cupcakes with some free batteries thrown in!
10. Host a Charity Event
Think of local charities that could benefit from an event in your office. Would it get people excited to come in on Valentine’s Day and help out? Maybe a blood drive or a food drive—something that would really help your community and generate positive local traffic.
11. Relationship Seminar
Host a special relationship-building seminar focused on how hearing and listening are crucial to solving relationship issues. This is one of the main reasons people end up buying hearing aids!
12. Free Flowers
Partner with your local florists’ shop and give roses to everyone who comes in for a hearing aid fitting on Valentine’s Day. (The guys who forgot to get flowers will really thank you!)
13. Bribe Patients with Chocolate
Partner with a local chocolatier for a special event where anyone who schedules a Valentine’s Day hearing exam or hearing aid fitting gets a little chocolate surprise. When you make hearing aid sales, those patients get a gift certificate to that local chocolatier’s boutique to sweeten the deal. Just make sure to have great discussions and inform your patients of what to expect and how long it might take to get used to wearing the hearing aids. Extra chocolate helps.
14. Hold a Couples Costume Contest for Valentine’s Day
Use your email contact list and your social media channels (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, etc.) to advertise a Couples Costume Contest! Folks who come in costume get a discount or gift certificate. Definitely have treats and freebies on hand, as well as a photo station where one of your staff can snap cute pictures for people to take home and share.
15. Speed Dating Party!
Remember, not all of your patients are in a committed relationship. Advertise for a few weeks in advance and let your patients know there will be a speed dating party in your office on Valentine’s Day (and show them how much easier it is to hear your dates with hearing aids in).
16. Audiology Match-Making Service
It may seem like a crazy audiology marketing idea, but it’s pretty smart. Advertise all over social media, email newsletters, etc. that you’ll be running a little match-making service for Valentine’s Day. Get opt-in and permission from your single patients first, of course.
17. Valentines in the Mail
Many of your audiology patients and their friends still love to get snail mail. In addition to sending Valentines to all of your current patients, ask patients who they’d like to send a personalized Valentine to, and have them fill one out in the office for you to send to their friends or secret crushes and include a $50 coupon for a new hearing aid.
18. Email Newsletter
Email is one of the most effective audiology marketing tools. Use the email contact list you already have and create a special Valentine’s audiology newsletter with important hearing and listening tips for couples, families — and anyone really. Include an exclusive offer and invite them to an event happening at your practice on Valentine’s Day! What kind of event you ask? Well…
19. Use Social Media to Promote Your Valentine’s Event
Whatever promotion you’re running, you must be active on social media. Post teaser updates daily and make sure to respond to any comments, questions or messages you get over Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Relationship-building is absolutely key to making any social media audiology marketing ideas work, so make sure someone in the office checks those channels, responding and updating posts on a regular basis.
20. Try Video Hearing Aid Marketing
A lot of these ideas can be filmed at the time, or you can come up with short, informative, funny videos that you can post to all your social media channels showing how hearing aids can improve relationships.
21. Join Snapchat, Use Story Mode
It’s not just the domain of self-absorbed teenagers; you’d be surprised how successful some healthcare professionals have been by posting day-in-the-life videos on Snapchat—some have thousands of followers who tune in daily for their short videos on Story Mode. Why not use it for hearing aid marketing? Post short, entertaining, informative, personal, Valentine’s stories from your staff and your happiest customers. Story Mode videos are visible for 24 hours at which point you can upload a new batch.
22. Send a Press Release to Get the Media Involved
Whatever hearing aid marketing idea you use, alert the local media and get them to come down to your office and film what’s happening!
23. Offer Discounts for Duos
If both partners get sets of hearing aids, offer to throw in some goodies or a discount. If they buy together they will be more likely to stick with it and keep the hearing aids beyond the trial date.
24. Remember the love.
Love isn’t just about courtly romance between two people. People show love for humanity and the community all the time. Why not honor people who have given selflessly to others with hearing aids. Get the local press to stop by and spread the word about how you passed the love forward. This also makes great fodder for social media, so be sure to take your own video and pix.
25. “Date Your New Hearing Aids Before You Buy”
Nobody jumps right into marriage. For those afraid of commitment, how about a free trial period they can’t resist? This is also a great way to get current patients to trade in their current hearing aids for a newer model.
26. “What I Never Told You”
Have a couple come in and demo hearing aids…let them each try on a pair and have a conversation they’ve been waiting to have. Invite them to tell each other what they never had the chance to express before.
Bonus Idea.
We saved this idea for last because it’s so powerful. Almost everyone we know loves… sugar, and you can rarely go wrong with brownies. Yes, chocolate is worth mentioning twice.
Review your database and pull a list of patients who’ve owned their hearing aids for three years or more and should replace them with this year’s model. Then, send them a few brownies, one per hearing aid should do. Wait a few days and call them up to schedule their next hearing aid checkup.
Want to help more people discover better hearing and maybe even improve their love life, too?
Pick one or more of these audiology marketing ideas to try for Valentine’s Day. You’ll stand out from your competitors by helping more patients while they’re sitting around their offices listening to crickets.
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