At the annual NACCHO conference in Pittsburgh I made an offer to give the first 20 people that came to our booth a copy of my new book “Selling Public Health” and a $697 marketing analysis free of charge.

Our booth was located in the exhibit hall where the welcome reception was held. Within the first 30 minutes the books were gone with 20 health departments signing-up for the offer. By the end of the three-day event, a total of 39 health departments received the book and scheduled their free marketing analysis!

In speaking with the administrators I heard the same general issues such as: “Nobody knows what our health department does.” “People think our services are just for poor people.” “My staff is frustrated because we don’t have the traffic we used to.” “Local pharmacies / supermarkets are taking away our flu clinic business.” “We don’t have a clue on how to bring in new customers and how to cross-sell the ones we do have.”

Another thing that stuck out was just how much public health has changed in the past 20 years. Back then you could stumble into enough business, even without a plan or a marketing strategy. Not anymore! There is too much competition coupled with too little traffic and slashed budgets.

The most encouraging thing was that after all of these years of helping local health departments reverse their downward spiral, 39 more raised their hands and were open-minded to discovering a system that attracts customers like flies to honey.