How do doulas get referrals from midwives and OB practices?
By introducing themselves professionally, being clear about their scope, and being reliable and easy to work with in a birth setting. Referral relationships in this field are built on reputation among practitioners more than on marketing materials.
These are the strongest referral relationships in doula work, and they are built on being easy to work with in a clinical setting rather than on marketing.
What a referring practitioner needs to be confident about:
- Your scope. That you provide non-clinical support, do not offer medical advice, and do not position yourself against clinical recommendations. This is the single most important thing, and it is why some practitioners are cautious about doulas generally.
- Your professionalism in the room. Working alongside staff rather than adversarially, understanding the environment, and supporting the family without creating friction.
- Your reliability. Backup arrangements, responsiveness, and turning up.
- Your training, in terms they recognize.
How to build it:
- Introduce yourself in person, briefly, with a card and a clear one-line description of your scope.
- Be genuinely useful to their patients, which is what earns the second referral.
- Follow up appropriately, within whatever consent applies.
Reputation among practitioners travels quickly in a local birth community, in both directions.
Do you have a marketing system to grow your doula business?
The Doula BrandPack is ready to use, fully customizable, and done for you, so you get all the marketing assets you need.
