Bright Horizons Home Health: Case Study

Bright Horizons Home Health is known for being one of the most prominent health agencies in both Los Angeles and Orange County. The agency has consistently understood the challenges and successes associated with healthcare and is both committed and dedicated to providing top-notch care to each and every individual.

Current Brand Position

Both Los Angeles and Orange County are replete with home health care agencies that adhere to the standards associated with quality healthcare. Thus, to separate themselves from the others, Bright Horizons Home Health's current brand position is to achieve four distinctive objectives that include: testing and training annually of all nurses, certified nursing assistants, and home health aides on a yearly basis; conference meetings on cases; staff members that are hired must be committed full time to the healthcare services that Bright Horizons provides and the home healthcare services ensures that measures that the company takes are compliant with quality assurance initiatives set forth by management ("Bright Horizons Home Health," 2013).

The current brand positioning of Bright Horizons Home Health is their abundance of services and resources available on their website. Offering services ranging from catheter care to skilled nursing to HIV and Infectious Disease Management, Bright Horizons Home Health has made a name for themselves in the area of home health ("Bright Horizons Home Health," 2013). One of the first interesting aspects that Bright Horizons executed to get themselves known was to utilize what Orsini (2011) notes is the website hub (p. 1). Essentially, what is the purpose of the service that one is trying to create? Why Bright Horizons? Orsini (2011) identified that all marketing of any kind must be enhanced with sales tools such as an email blast and a call to action (p. 1). Kaye (1995) echoed a similar type of aggressive call to action but noted that homecare agencies must use their resources efficiently before executing any kind of marketing technique (p. 111-112). Moreover, Kaye (1995) stated that in order for a home health care agency to grow and satisfy client needs, they must have a wide array of services and/or products (p. 135). Bright Horizons has established their marketing efforts by offering a diverse spectrum of services to ensure consumer satisfaction. Given the prominence of home health care services as of late, Bright Horizons has been able to keep its clientele by understanding that caregivers should go above and beyond the typical fare associated with healthcare.

SWOT

The services that Bright Horizons offers is their strength. Bright Horizons offers skilled nurses, disease management instruction, catheter care, diabetes management, geriatric patient health assessments and home care, intravenous therapy, guidance on nutrition, post surgical care, oxygen and respiratory equipment services, and total parenteral nutrition care. The agency also offers physical therapy, certified home health aides, occupational therapy, registered dieticians, and medical social worker assessments and has a unique assortment of medical equipment and supplies ("Bright Horizons Home Health," 2013). Thus, the best use of marketing efforts would be to do what Kaye (1995) stressed which was plan ways to reach the consumer, develop ways to engage the consumers, enroll clients, solicit funding, have advertising and continue to collect information pertaining to both the internal and external aspects of the organization's environment (p. 135).

In a report by the Joint Commission, it acknowledged that the home is the best place for care - and quality of care for that matter. It noted that in the home, there are a nominal amount of incidents regarding patients’ because the patient knows their home better than a clinic, medical setting or other facility. Furthermore, home care promises less errors in medication for both acute and chronic conditions as well as assists in improving performance (p. 2-3). For Bright Horizons, the agency can significantly impact the home care industry by essentially exploiting these attributes of home care. Moreover, the onus will be for them to establish effective advertisements that will keep them current among several different home care agencies in the Los Angeles and Orange County area that offer similar type services.

With regard to their weaknesses, Bright Horizons’ website seems outdated. There is nothing interactive, nor is there a proficient social media strategy. In an article by Scott Herrmann in Home Health News, he stated that social media has heavily impacted all sectors, but that the healthcare sector has not fully used it as much as it could. Since social media is instantaneous, it behooves them to embrace the many opportunities that applications that Facebook, Google+, Pinterest and others offer. Herrmann (2012) specifically adds that "social media platforms open a plethora of opportunities to understand disease and further evolve communication about the current conditions of a given patient to providers, caregivers and family” (p. 1). Bright Horizons could make more usage of social media in order to impact the consumer landscape more about what services they provide as well as why Bright Horizons is the choice over the numerous healthcare services that provide similar offerings.

Much of the opportunities that Bright Horizons can employ are based on their weaknesses (i.e. social media usage) and further promotion of the brand by updating their site to become more user friendly and current. Additionally, Bright Horizons may need to make use of a PR agency that can assist them in better marketing their program. Lautenslager (2003) advocated that organizations need to know and accept that getting their name out there is crucial to making it in any sector (p. 1). PR agencies assist with all kinds of activities that can be beneficial to the organization and effectively render an opinion about the good or service on the public. As far as threats are concerned, Bright Horizons needs to engage these recommended opportunities immediately in order to avoid the inevitable of similar agencies that offer some of the same services capitalizing on the consumer marketplace. People are in effect dazzled by newness and insightful advertisements. It is essential for Bright Horizons to perhaps employ a brand strategist that will assist them in combatting the threats that could potentially “wipe” them off the map per se in the realm of home health care services.

Benchmarking

One of the more well-known home health services in California, is California's Best Home Health Services, Inc. Driven on the philosophy that healthcare is the basic human right, the company has established itself across not only the Los Angeles and Orange Counties, but also Santa Barbara and Riverside Counties ("California Best Home Health Services, Inc.," 2013). This particular organization would be useful for Bright Horizons to measure itself against because of the freshness and newness of its website, and the fact that there are more services that the company offers than Bright Horizons does. Additionally, Bright Horizons website lacks an area where questions can be asked about the services it provides, while the aforementioned California's Best has a place where referrals can be sent as well as a Q&A section. It would behoove Bright Horizons to in essence formulate a strategy that consists of what the home health industry is doing currently while keeping with their overall mission and vision. The purpose of the benchmarking process will be to enlighten Bright Horizons on what they need and should do for further who they are as an organization and remain a viable selection among the healthcare services far in the state of California.

References

Bright Horizons Home Health. (2013). Bright Horizons Home Health. Retrieved from http://www.bhhomehealth.com/index.php?pageId=45

California Best Home Health Services, Inc. (2013). California Best Home Health Services, Inc. Retrieved from http://www.calbesthomehealth.com/

Herrmann, S. R. (2012, May 15). Social media can help home healthcare and hospice organizations. Home Health News, Retrieved from http://www.homehealthnews.org/2013/05/social-media-can- help-home-healthcare-and-hospice-organizations/

Kaye, L. W. (1995). New developments in home care services for the elderly: Innovations in policy, program, and practice. Florence, KY: Psychology Press.

Lautenslager. (2003, November 16). Why you need PR. Entrepreneur. Retrieved from http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/65672

Orsini, M. (2011, May 5). New techniques boost traditional home health marketing efforts. Kinnser Inc. Retrieved from http://www.kinnser.com/home-healthcare-blog/new-techniques-boost-traditional-home-health-marketing-efforts/