By Jessica Schroder
Most VARs and MSPs know that moving into the vertical of EHR
(Electronic Health Records) and EMR (Electronic Medical Records) is one area
where their businesses should be heading. There’s a large amount of
federal money available, doctors are being offered incentives to transition to
Electronic Health Records ($20 billion at last count) and the industry lacks
the estimated 50,000 qualified IT practices needed to implement these solutions. You are
behind the curve if you are not figuring out how to take advantage of this.
The challenge: If you are not currently in the health
care arena, it can be daunting and intimidating going enter a new market.
Typical questions you may have: Where do I start? What vendors do I
work with? How do I learn the lingo? How do I go about the selling
process? If you are already in health care, the question becomes how to
squeeze the most money out of this opportunity.
The good news: entering the EHR and EMR field and
prospering in it is not as difficult as you think. There are a ton of
resources out there for you, and most vendors have great programs that take you
through every step of the process. As a result, you don’t have to
restructure your business to start making some real profit.
In talking with our reseller members here at The ASCII
Group, one area that does require some work involves understanding the needs of
the physicians and deciding which vendors you should choose.
One avenue you can take is using your distribution
partners. Distributor partners such as D&H have made major efforts to
help its IT solution provider customers get in the health care market.
There are also opportunities to meet directly with vendors
partners. At ASCII, we have come up with a new member event this year, a
Health Care Vertical Sales Training. The Vertical Sales Training events are a
one-day no-charge event and were developed to teach VARs how to enter the
vertical of EHR (Electronic Health Records) and EMR (Electronic Medical
Records) with confidence.
In planning these conferences, we have been really pleased
with the resources available to our members from the vendor community. As
a result, at the Vertical Sales training we will be having HIPAA administrators
who can teach about HIPAA Compliance Regulations; a health care vendor CEO who
spoke to over 10,000 physicians last year and will show how to successfully use
assessment tools to sell EMR; an array of experts who will show resellers where
they are missing margin opportunities; education on popular technologies in the
health care field; and much more. After the event is over, in only one
day our members will be much better prepared to enter the health care arena.
The need is definitely there. Our first event is fast
approaching on June 9 in the Washington, DC area. Based on the heavy interest
in the DC event we are planning additional events in Chicago and Los Angeles
later in the year. If you’d like to learn more, go to www.asciievents.com/vertical-sales.
Don’t sit back and let this opportunity go to waste.
Jessica Schroder is marketing coordinator at The ASCII Group, an organization that provides education, resources, and other aid to its member IT solution provider companies.