I gave a speech the other night about patient-centered care at the American College of Healthcare Executives in San Diego through SOHL. I called it: Improving your Organization's Vital Signs: Strategies & Tools for a Patient-Centered Approach. Really, it was about Customer Intimacy as an umbrella concept which gives shape and focus to patient-centered care.

One of the key takeaways was that everyone says they're doing patient-centered care. What other kind of care is there, one participant asked! In fact, there is doctor-centered care, technology-centered care, insurer-centered care, and money-centered care, among others.

Another main message was that Customer Intimacy is not for every healthcare organization. It requires a long-term view, one that looks at the lifetime value of the "customer" - not just this quarter's revenues. And when I challenged the audience to identify why patients or providers or funders should choose them; that is, what sets them apart, most were hard-pressed to do it. Fun evening with good people.

Interesting, that what we all have in common is uniqueness.

We've been consultants to AARP for many years. Whenever we talk to their (40 million) members, we hear the same thing again and again. People really trust AARP. They may not know exactly what AARP does or what policies AARP supports, but nonetheless they trust AARP to do whatever is in the best interest of older Americans. Which I see as AARP's essential value proposition.

This was confirmed in a poll that NPR reported on today. Several politicians are attacking AARP's stance on healthcare reform (which would be better framed as Health Security Reform), claiming that profit motives are driving AARP's policy agenda. Here's how the "under-voiced" public sees it:

"The poll by NPR and the Kaiser Family Foundation listed seven of the biggest players in the health care debate and asked which one would recommend "the right thing for the country." AARP easily led the list among Democrats and independents. Among Republicans, it tied for first with an option titled "health insurance companies." So it's hard to tarnish AARP, in part because it's not seen as serving an ideology or a narrow economic agenda."

AARP is not perfect, but they have earned the public's trust through years of hard work, and tuning into what their members want and need, then delivering on their promise. I believe trust is the ultimate prize in marketing. It cannot be bought, it must be earned.