The Power of an Open Ear: How Customer Listening Helps Healthcare Organizations Enhance Experience and Increase Revenue

As healthcare continues to evolve, the key to unlocking sustainable revenue growth may lie in an unexpected place — the voices of your patients. Actively listening to your customers (patients) at every touchpoint uncovers valuable insights that can drive improvements, increase revenue, and build loyalty.

Forward-thinking healthcare leaders are discovering that delivering an exceptional customer experience (CX) is not just about making patients happier, but a proven pathway to improved financial performance. Adopting a proactive approach with robust customer listening mechanisms and data analytics is key to optimizing your revenue cycle.

Why Customer Listening is Critical for the Revenue Cycle

The revenue cycle encompasses all patient financial interactions, from initial cost estimates to final payment. Listening to the voice of the customer throughout this process will:

• Identify pain points: Uncover specific areas of friction that hinder a smooth and positive financial experience.
• Understand needs and expectations: Gain insights into patient preferences, communication styles, and challenges related to financial interactions.
• Improve processes: Use customer feedback to streamline processes, reduce administrative burden, and enhance digital tools.
• Increase trust: Show patients their opinions matter, leading to reduced complaints, improved loyalty, and positive word-of-mouth referrals.
• Drive innovation: Use patient feedback to develop new services and solutions that meet their needs.

Unlocking these benefits starts with having the right data to develop a comprehensive understanding of your revenue cycle experience.

Moving Beyond Traditional Metrics

Traditionally, health systems have measured patient satisfaction through metrics like net promotor scores (NPS) and Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (HCAHPS) surveys. While these metrics are valuable, they do not fully capture the patient experience or identify areas for improvement. As RevealHX studies indicate, many patients struggle with financial services, an area typically ignored from an “experience” perspective.

Leveraging customer listening and adopting metrics such as ease and trust enables you to identify and understand issues more quickly, such as:

• Areas of friction in scheduling, financial assistance, and bill payment.
• Patient channel preferences, enabling you to offer services through preferred methods of communication.
• Performance against other organizations to identify areas of opportunity.
• The impact of changes on patient satisfaction and financial performance.

Integrating experience management (XM) customer listening platforms such as Qualtrics allows you to gather valuable insights and implement data-driven strategies that transform the patient financial experience.

The ROI of a Customer-Centric Revenue Cycle

A customer-centric revenue cycle leads to better financial outcomes, such as increased bill collections and reduced costs, while enhancing patient and employee satisfaction. This is what we call a win-win-win. These improvements drive revenue growth and create a more positive and efficient healthcare system.

Healthcare organizations are already seeing these benefits. For one large US healthcare system, the Cortico-X team helped drive a 14% improvement in cash collections, a 33% improvement in employee turnover, and a 5% improvement in customer satisfaction scores – all within one year.

What drove these results? Key initiatives included:

• Enhancing patient satisfaction: Addressing pain points and personalizing communication improved patient satisfaction and loyalty.
• Improving bill collections: Simplified processes, digital solutions, and clear communications increased payment rates and reduced bad debt.
• Reducing costs: Optimized self-service options that met customer needs and streamlined processes led to reduced administrative overhead.
• Enhancing employee satisfaction: Addressing system pain points reduced employee frustration and turnover.

A Proactive Approach is Key

The power to transform your revenue cycle lies in capturing the full value of your customers’ voices. By prioritizing customer listening, you can unlock insights that drive better outcomes and deliver proven ROI.

This is not just about improving processes; it’s about creating a culture of empathy and responsiveness that drives lasting growth and patient loyalty.

Partner with Cortico-X

Ready to transform your revenue cycle and build patient trust through a customer-centric approach? Contact Cortico-X today to learn how we can support you with data-driven strategies and proven expertise. If you found this article informative, please follow Cortico-X on LinkedIn for more strategies on transforming healthcare experiences and driving measurable impact.