Hosting a canned food or clothing drive for your local homeless shelter is a great thing to do. Did you know that about 2 to 3 million Americans are homeless? Post some facts about your cities homeless in your office or in a mail out letter to your patients. This will help raise awareness to your patient base about your community’s homeless population and how they can help. Your community and patients will respect your efforts to help those who are in need.
So now you are ready to host a food and clothing drive. That’s great! Contact your local homeless shelter and tell them what you are doing and when you plan on bringing in the donated goods. Ask them if certain items are needed more than others or if there is a certain time of year where they are in need.
A great time of year to do this is October and November, just before the cold weather and Thanksgiving. Once you set a date and time the shelter may be able to help you promote your event. They should be able to post minimal signage and make phone calls to previous donators in your area. Remember to encourage your patients to donate as well. If you would like, you can offer incentives for patients who donate. If your patients have a friend or family member who wants to donate this would be a good time to introduce yourself to them. It will also be great time to introduce yourself to the general public who show up to donate canned foods and clothes.
Once the date has been set, get ready to educate the general public who walk into your office. I offer a free spinal screening to everyone who is not already a patient who donates something. I also held a drawing at the end of the week or month for Biofreeze, a free exam and set of x rays (if necessary) to a few lucky donors. When a donor shows up, they sign in. This is the time that they fill out your slip for your drawing as well. Information should include name, address, phone number and optional email address for monthly email newsletter that your office should be sending out. Another good piece of information to ask for on your drawing slip is, “do you have any questions for the doctor?” This gets the potential patient already thinking about possibly getting help from you. It also gives you information to talk about if you decide to make a follow up call.
Thank those who come to your office to donate and talk to them about chiropractic care. As always there should be plenty of take home information about your practice for your guest. With any event I cannot emphasis enough how important it is to follow up on potential patient leads. Although you want to make sure you do not excessively bother people. Following up on a lead means either sending a letter or phone call stating, “It was nice to meet you and please let us know if we can help you or anyone you know in anyway.” You can also leave a magnet with your practice information and two business cards in the letter. People will respect your professionalism if you do not badger them. You would be surprised how many people will call even six months to a year later to make an appointment.
This should be a very successful event for you and your practice. We have done very well in the past. Even some of the shelter employees have even started care in our office!
Once you host a successful food and clothing drive you should consider hosting one annually. This will make the community more aware of when and where they can donate to their local shelters. At the same time it generates positive exposure for your practice. Again another win, win, win situation for you, your patients and those in need of clothes and food at the local shelters.
This article is intended to help medical businesses grow and at the same time help the community. This information is geared for use in a chiropractic office, but can also be applied to many other health care professionals such as dentist, ophthalmologists or even primary care physicians.
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