To better compete with food baskets and other seasonal promotional items, Forum Health Hillside Rehabilitation Hospital in Warren, Ohio, sent its key referral sources holiday pre-paid phone cards. The five-minute cards are "useable" gifts rather than promotional pens or coffee mugs that people tend to throw away, says Paula Maggio, the hospital's manager of marketing and community relations.
The phone cards, which cost less than $1.50 each, will be included in a direct mail holiday card promotion this week targeting several hundred area social workers and caseworkers in the Northeast Ohio and Pittsburgh markets who refer patients to the hospital. The phone cards, which feature a highly recognizable photo used in its ads and promotional literature during the past year, extend the hospital's branding efforts.
(Forum Health Hillside, Paula Maggio, 330/841-3707)