Couldn’t it be wonderful if whenever potential customers look in the phone book for your services, your name is the most recognized, even if your ad size is not the largest? And what a boon to your business it would be if your company was the first one your referral sources thought of when they had a patient in need of HME.

There is an inexpensive way to make this happen—develop and sponsor an annual health fair. Besides providing a service to your community, a fair can lead to increased sales and company name recognition, and strengthen relationships with referral sources, physicians, and nonprofit agencies.

Be warned, the first year of a fair requires paying some up-front expenses and committing significant time to the project. However, many of the expenses can be offset by vendor support, and after the first year, the time required lessens.

Getting Started
The size and extent of your health fair will depend, in part, on the size and nature of your business, the size of your community, and how many years you have held the fair. For example, the broader your base of vendors, the larger the fair will be able to grow. One fair I was associated with grew to include nearly 200 vendors and drew a crowd of more than 2,500 members of the public and 450 health professionals by its 11th year.

However, the basics apply to any size fair. Begin by completing the following 10 steps.

1. Determine location and date. A hotel or convention center is most appropriate.

2. Estimate a budget. Count the cost of the facility rental, the booths and tables, mailing and office supplies, publicity expenses, materials, and food.

3. Determine exhibitor fees. Have different schedules for nonprofit and profit companies. Offer display tables as an inexpensive alternative to booths for smaller agencies or companies. Suggested fees could be $50 for a nonprofit table, $200 for a nonprofit booth, $200 for a for-profit table, and $300 for a for-profit booth. Remember, keep fees low the first year to attract more exhibitors. When the event becomes better known, you can increase fees.

4. Send exhibitor invitations 4 to 5 months in advance. Contact company vendors and any other health-related businesses in your area, including nonprofit health agencies, nursing homes and agencies, physician groups, health food distributors, noncompetitive pharmacies, and insurance companies.

5. Seek out co-sponsors. They should include hospitals, which can provide programs during the event, and media sponsors, such as TV stations, radio stations, and newspapers, which can provide free advertising and local media personalities for the event. You will probably still need to commit some of your budget to advertising, but having a media co-sponsor that helps you promote the event saves money.

6. Determine the audience. The first few hours should be open only to health professionals, such as nurses, social workers, case managers, physical therapists, occupational therapists, dieticians, recreation directors, and physician’s staff. A continental breakfast and appropriate 1-hour program will attract professionals to your event.

The target audience for the public should include your customers, as well as members of groups such as diabetic associations, lung/respiratory disease associations, and the Multiple Sclerosis Society. Most of these groups will also help promote the fair for free by putting information about it in their member bulletins and newsletters.

7. Schedule programs for both health care professionals and the public. Professional programs could include wheelchair seating and positioning, wound care, and health insurance policies. Your local hospital systems and manufacturers can often provide expert speakers on these topics.

Public programs could include Alzheimer’s disease information, nebulizer medication advances, stroke treatment news, and cardiac care updates. Since health information is generally most important to attendees, entertainment is usually unnecessary.

8. Offer testing and screening for diseases to draw the public. In addition to the traditional screenings, such as blood pressure, consider adding vision, glaucoma, hearing, foot, skin cancer, stroke risk, and posture assessment. The last event I produced had 21 different screenings, plus influenza vaccinations.

9. Get vendor support. By paying a booth fee to exhibit, vendors offset the cost of putting on the event. They may also help publicize the event and provide speakers. They can provide door prizes for attendees. Finally, at vendor displays you can place signs and order sheets that tell attendees the vendor’s products are available through your store.

Draw a crowd
Providing the attendance is a major responsibility to ensure your vendors are satisfied and will return next year. Miss no opportunity to publicize the fair. All company mailings, including statements, announcements, certificate of medical necessity requests, etc, should include the date and location of the fair. Even your fax cover sheet can announce the fair in the months preceding the event. In addition, press releases, nonprofit groups’ bulletin announcements, and newspaper, TV, and radio appearances help get the word out.

Budget Time
Your employees will need to provide services for the health fair. Make sure you have the staff resources necessary for setting up or expanding databases for exhibitors and attendees, sending fair-publicity mailings, receiving vendor applications and payments, mailing confirmations and updates, and being on hand at the show itself to help during setup, greet attendees, and answer questions. In addition, to have your own booth, displaying the products and services that you feature, your employees will need time to set up the booth and man it.

Your company’s reputation is as important as the products and services you provide. Increased sales and name recognition are obvious health fair results. But just as important is what the fair will do for your company’s reputation. At the fair, networking can take place between nonprofit and for-profit exhibitors, as well as between nonprofit groups themselves. They will consider this a wonderful service provided by your company. The public will view the disease testing and screening you provide as a service to the community and form a positive opinion of your company. Finally, the valuable information included in fair programs enhances your reputation with both the public and health care professionals. And thanks to vendor support, after a few years, the fair will be essentially free marketing for your company.

Joe Groden is president of JG Consulting, Penfield, NY, and former chairman of the New York Medical Equipment Providers. Before becoming a marketing, sales training, customer service, and business management consultant, he built one of the United States’ largest independent HME companies and owned a pharmacy chain. Contact him at (716) 388-8824; jgroden@jgconsults.com.