Public attitude towards alternative medicine is rapidly evolving - though not as rapidly as some would have you believe, and certainly not as rapidly as some would like.

Nevertheless - what was once considered 'wierd' is now often considered as normal. A perfect example is chiropracty. Once there was an enormous stigma attached to it and laws prohibiting it. Now it is covered by some insurance programs, and licensed by most jurisdictions the same as dentistry.

Since what constitutes alternative therapy is so broad, assessing public attitudes towards it is an 'iffy' practice. There have been studies that show most people have participated in some form of alternative health - yet when you look at those studies you find that they count anyone who has done something for stress reduction or who has prayed as 'participating in alternative medicine'.

A better estimate is that most people - perhaps 60% - are neutral or undecided about the benefit of the entire holistic movement. About 30% are convinced that it has value - often these people have had therapeutic alternative treatment themselves or know someone who has benefited. Many regularly see a practitioner. Another 10% or so you will have a very hard time winning over - if not impossible to convince. These might be people who come from a very strict belief system, whether that be religion or science. They may be skeptics who will not believe anything unless they see multiple double-blind studies. They may be 'loyal subjects' who won't accept something until it has government endorsement.

What this means is that the majority of our marketing effort should be towards educating that portion of the public that is uncertain about alternative medicine. Put another way, the stress in our marketing is not so much selling, as educating.

I wish I could tell you that the 'regular' medical community has changed and is embracing alternative treatment, but that embrace if it exists at all is an arms length one like the kid who is forced to dance with the most unpopular person in school.

There is a great reluctance. The University of Pennsylvania Medical Centers was going to create new center and originally it was to have been called the UPMC Center of Excellence in Complementary and Alternative Medicine. But chief executive officers of the 19 UPMC Health System hospitals balked, according to Bruce Rabin, a Pitt professor of pathology and psychiatry who chairs the program.

"They told me: 'No way. We don't want to be associated with anything called complementary or alternative medicine. Doctors will not send patients to these programs. People will say it's quackery.'"

They decided to name it the UPMC Health Enhancement Program instead.

It is true that many allopathic MD's are hostile to the alternative health movement. Whether they see it as competition or quackery is a personal matter, but the hostility is there.

It is not always as widespread or general as some alternative practitioners think. I'm convinced that some use the hostility as a crutch to excuse their own lack of success.

More and more we are finding that the MD's are coming around and giving referrals to holistic practioners, trying the techniques themselves, or at least reading up on the subject.

There is not much you can do short-term when you run up against outright hostility. Long-term, you can make great inroads by sharing success stories with the medical community. Nothing produces results like results. Nothing changes minds like results.

We often are operating on a shoestring - maybe even a borrowed shoestring. A traditional MD when finished with medical school can qualify easily for a loan, since their earning power is a given. They can use that to establish a practice, or purchase that new Mercedes.

The stereotypical alternative practitioners on the other hand is among the poorest members of the community. The stereotype is of them wearing Goodwill clothes, sandals and driving a beat-up old Volvo station wagon with leftist bumper stickers on it. Obviously not an accurate assessment of everyone, but there are enough of us like that for the stereotype to fit.

It is harder to market when you don't have much money. It costs money to buy advertising, to print flyers, to have a website, etc.

We are therefore going to concentrate in this manual on low-cost, high impact ways of marketing that don't require much in the way of cash. If you have wads of money to burn through, than buy national TV time! If you don't have much, this manual should get you up and growing with a minimum of outlay.

When you go to work as an MD in a clinic or hospital, you can concentrate on providing medical services. There is a ton of paperwork of course, but generally time is spent on:

1. providing care

2. care-related paperwork

3. training

Alternative practioners must spend time on:

1. providing care

2. care-related paperwork

3. training

4. marketing

5. accounting

6. filing

7. website maintenance

8. client follow-up and appointment reminders

9. cleaning

10. organizing

11. computer maintenance and troubleshooting

12. correspondence

13. shopping for supplies

Obviously both the MD and the alternative practitioner are blessed with the same number of minutes each day. Both must try to get everything done in the time allowed. The alternative practitioner too often slights the marketing time.

This is especially true when you are busy. If you have a full appointment schedule, it is easy to ignore the marketing.

What happens if you are doing your healing job well? Your customers will get better and leave. Then if you haven't been doing your marketing, you have to scramble to get new customers. That is why many practitioners who do not have a constant marketing effort repeatedly cycle through feast and famine.

Unlike the allopathic medical doctor who typically goes to work initially in a large hospital, the alternative practitioner often is working by themselves. Sometimes they are home-based, and many feel quite isolated and alone.

When you are working in a large organization like a hospital or even an established family clinic, there are probably people dedicated just to marketing and customer relations. Most of us have to do everything on our own.

One of the reasons for skepticism about alternative medicine is the modern attitude of total tolerance. In this field more than any other, it is considered a virtue to have an 'open' mind.

Often that means a reluctance to point a finger at someone else and contradict them or accuse them of fraud.

Yet perhaps more than any other field, there are plenty of hucksters and scam artists in this field, as well as those who honestly believe in things which just don't make sense.

This has been true for centuries - we are all familiar with snake oil salesmen and radium potients. It is no coincidence that these stereotypes of bad business have to do with healing.

What doesn't make sense logically and what is clearly wrong scientifically should be decried and discredited when it is encountered. Those practices that are unproven should be treated with a healthy dose of skepticism until you've done research that convinces you. We should be very careful of our patients - they are looking to us as the educated ones in the field, and we do them a disservice by not warning them against the scamsters.

If I were to stereotype the AP, I'd say almost all are left of political center. Not a lot of Rush Limbaugh fans in the group, I'm afraid.

Not that I care a whit about your politics. OK, I wish you all thought like me....

Why this is important is that it does influence attitudes towards marketing. Those with 'progressive' politics tend to read publications and listen to media that reinforces those politics. The downside to this is that business and profit are commonly villified in these media. Whenever mention is made of profit or business, it is usually in terms of the 'evil' corporation and the woes of rampant capitalism.

This can set up a negative attitude towards the business side of things. The truth is though that if you don't have a focus on making money, you won't be in business for long enough to do a good job of healing others.

Most APs in their training spend very little time on learning marketing. Our formal schooling is designed to teach you how to get a job, not start a business. Most people have never taken a course on how to market. They have done tons of homework, but have never had to put together a Marketing Plan.

One well-known alternative medicine school has only a single 2 hour class on marketing in an entire 3 year program. Graduates are in for a shock when they go into the real world.

If you don't know what you are doing, and know that you don't know, it is very uncomfortable to be doing it. We tend to ignore that which we feel unconfident in doing. For many practitioners, that means it is the marketing that gets slighted.

This manual is designed to give you the tools and self-confidence to overcome this lack of training.

We, like most people, are natural procrastinators. This is especially true regarding things which we don't enjoy. It is natural, but it can also be deadly for your business.

Don't leave your marketing till later. Do it now, do it daily, do it religiously. There really is nothing more important for you to be doing in your business.