The Client

Launched in 1971, Wilmington, North Carolina-based Wilmington Health is the largest private, fully integrated, multi-specialty medical group practice in the area. Wilmington Health offers a wide range of services and specialties, including primary care, urgent care, and surgical care.

Switching Tactics As Needed

In a competitive healthcare market, Wilmington Health sought to increase the quality and quantity of the patient reviews it had been receiving as a way to rank higher in online searches, stand out from other practices in the area, and improve the quality of care for patients.

Wilmington Health had used other reviews-focused solutions in the past, but grew frustrated with their inability to sync or integrate with other tools and software it regularly used, like its NextGen electronic health record system. Lacking automation, the medical group’s process for getting reviews was to talk to each patient in person after their visit and give them a physical card asking them to leave a Google review.

This strategy worked somewhat sufficiently — then the COVID-19 pandemic hit. As a result, the cards were not printed or handed out as often, due to fear of germ transmission and concerns for paper waste.

“We quickly had to find an automated solution that would help us effectively and fairly showcase our providers and our locations,” says Desirae Hrynko, Marketing Manager at Wilmington Health.

The medical group audited Reputation against some of its competitors, ultimately launching a partnership with Reputation in January 2022 due to the breadth and depth of the company’s experience in the healthcare industry.

Wilmington Health began its partnership with Reputation by utilizing the platform’s Reviews and Review Booster features to drive higher review volumes and raise its stature in searches in local markets. Thanks to RepConnect integrations, the medical group was also able to merge the company’s own scripting into the Reputation platform so that patients see Wilmington Health’s specific messaging at different touchpoints across their journey, all of which has paid off substantially.

“We’re now ranking as a leader in the market thanks to our enhanced review volumes, which makes us more visible,” says Hrynko. “And most importantly, our providers’ reputation in our community is fairly illustrated in the online review space.” 

Using Insights to Improve Outlier Data

The Reputation platform also provided Wilmington Health with useful site and provider-specific data, which the company was able to use to identify providers and facilities that weren’t meeting performance targets.

“Our goal was to be more competitive, and Reputation has helped us identify specific providers and rooftops that were unjustly underperforming, due to not all of our patients being equally solicited for review feedback,” says Hrynko. “We want everyone to be rated 4.0 or above, and this gives us a good sense of how we match up with our competitors and where we can improve.”

Once Wilmington Health reaches that 4.0 goal, however, the medical group does not intend to rest on its laurels.

“Our goals will not stop there, as we will strive to continue to improve ratings with a ‘someday goal’ of being closer to 5.0 as well,” says Hrynko. “Ultimately, this is all centered around our goal of providing quality care and the best patient experience for those that we serve. Reputation has allowed us to garner all feedback received to continually strive for the highest quality in care.”

Assisting in this is Wilmington Health’s performance data transparency. The provider group shares its Reputation data across the entire practice so that everyone at Wilmington Health can see what all comprises the score as well as targets for improvement — which has helped generate buy-in from the frontline up to the C-suite.

What’s Next?

By leveraging Reputation to place more focus on acquiring and analyzing patient feedback, Wilmington Health has been able to raise the review scores of its providers and facilities across the organization. But the provider group isn’t stopping there and has instead decided to set some lofty goals.

“Our goal is to help all of our providers and rooftops that aren’t rated at 4 stars improve and get there by April 2023,” says Hrynko. “Reputation helps us plan our moves and tailor our approach to different provider groups and service lines within the business because it isn’t a one-size-fits-all thing.”