Small Biz Spotlight: Hear in Edmonton

Welcome to our Small Biz Spotlight series! An interview series focusing on local retailers and what makes them special. Our second interview in the series features Mandy Sneddon, Director of Business Operations for Hear In Canada and manager of the Hear In Edmonton clinic on Promoboxx.

Mandy first joined Promoboxx with Hear In Edmonton almost a year ago. As an avid believer in the power of online marketing, Mandy soon became a champion among the Promoboxx Retail Specialist team and a member of the Retailer Customer Council. In addition to managing multiple clinics on Promoboxx, Mandy has helped to shape the larger online brand presence of independent clinics across Canada, from listing a website on Google to running targeted advertising campaigns. She does it all!

Over the course of our many conversations, Mandy and I have talked about the importance of an online presence and the difficulty of transitioning to social sharing.

Start off by telling me a bit about Hear In Canada and your role.

Hear in Canada, a hearing care business solution provider, was founded by three leading hearing industry professionals with over 25 years of experience in the field. While many clinics can only concentrate on patient care and retention, the rest of the business gets left behind. Hear in Canada offers privately owned clinics key business solutions including Sales, Marketing, Training, Recruitment, Administration, Accounting and Financial Support in order to maintain and grow their business.

Hear in Canada also has its own very successful clinic, Hear in Edmonton, that has been in operation for 15 years. The success of the business model for this clinic is shared with the other clinics we work with. I have been with Hear in Canada as the Director of Business Development for just over a year.

 What makes your business different or unique?

We run a mobile on-site hearing evaluation service for health centers on reserves. We currently serve 13 clinics on native territories across Alberta and work with the Government to process the claims for hearing aids. Some of the reserves are very remote and hard to find and it can be quite challenging to access and work with elders and leaders on these reserves but is very rewarding.

That is very unique! Could you tell me a bit more about that?

Yes! We promote the mobile evaluation service within 10+ reserves in the Alberta region, as we rely on each reserve giving us a good reference for the next one, they all talk to each other and are very close! The Hear in Edmonton Clinic has been consistent and successful with supplying this service, where other clinics have not experienced such success. Our hearing practitioner Erin Rhyason runs this totally unaided and plans her visits around testing and fitting the devices, about a 4-week cycle. She is brilliant!

Tell me about a time you or your business had to overcome a challenge.

The clinics under the Hear in Canada umbrella can concentrate solely on patient care and retention while we ensure that the rest of their business is taken care of. We train their front end staff and put admin, marketing, and accounting processes in place. The service we offer to the clinics is totally free as we are supported financially by the manufacturers of hearing devices, that makes us totally unique. However, the process of switching clinics over to online and implementing new marketing tactics, like using social media, can be extremely difficult.

If you had one piece of advice about digital marketing for a new retailer in the industry, what would it be?

Don’t ignore it! It’s out there! Don’t underestimate your competitors. Assume that they are using it to develop and promote their business so you need to use it too. You are taking advantage of the largest potential customer database ever created…the world wide web! Targeting an audience that has already expressed an interest in your products? It couldn’t be easier, you have to take part.

Using Promoboxx has changed how I market the clinics work with on all social media platforms. The ready to go created content takes the hard work out of creating my own marketing material. I can set up promotional feeds or hearing information related feeds for the month in one sitting and then be done. For me to create all that content myself, I would have to employ an assistant! Let the manufacturers do it for us! We buy from them, they are giving back to us. Gone are the days of free flimsy brochures, my online feeds are out there forever!