Nurture your private practice and watch it flourish in 2016
A private practice can broadly be divided into 5 key business areas; finance, marketing & sales, operations & technology, team & HR, and overall business strategy. Customers, as in patients, filter into each of these areas, as the life source of your business.
Would you like to see improvements in each area of your private practice in 2016, including more new patients?
The views expressed are specifically those of Elite Practice Solutions.
Private practice management
Perhaps you launched a private practice within the last year or two and are now finding your feet, ready to take the next steps to growing your business. Or, maybe 2016 is the year for you to embark on a new journey to practice ownership?
As a business owner there are a million-and-one tasks to juggle on a day-to-day basis, and even with the best intentions, pro-actively taking measures to grow your business can easily get sidelined.
Taking a step back to focus strategically on your business, helps put matters into perspective and, importantly provides the action list you need to grow your practice, step-by-step.
(1) STRATEGY – Run your practice – your way!
Creating a vision for your practice is vital for success.
That vision needs to include all your initial ideas from when you first dreamed of owning a practice, plus allow for encompassing new ideas based on results and experience, for continual evolution.
A business plan is the best way to formalise your goals, so you have a point of reference, clear targets and can share your vision with your team, and with your patients too.
If you want to run your practice “your way”, YOU need to lead the way!
(2) FINANCE – Working towards your financial goals
Of course, in business, money matters.
Business profit and a steadily growing income stream is key to measuring the success of a practice.
Most dental and medical practice owners have an objective to add more income and profit to their Profit & Loss account, but the first step is to truly understand the current financial position, including exactly which type of patients, products and services generate the best results.
Following on from this, developing a set of Key Performance Indicators that can be monitored each month, will allow progress monitoring.
An in-depth understanding of your current financial position and your patient database is essential before setting forth on the road to practice growth.
(3) MARKETING & SALES – Positive communication
If income is your desired result, marketing is your route.
Successful private practices have a key focus on marketing and patient communications, plus, a marketing budget.
Marketing to your existing patients is as important as marketing to potential new patients, to ensure you create a referral culture in your practice and to enhance your patient care.
Make 2016 the year to update your private practice website, implement or improve your social media strategy, or start sending professional patient newsletters. Even if you are doing some of these already, there is always room for improvement.
Tracking marketing performance against new enquiries and new patients is vital to evolve your marketing machine month-on-month and year-on-year.
(4) OPERATIONS & IT – Practice management
Operations are the nuts and bolts behind your business success.
Without a smooth routine, the patients will suffer, the staff will be stressed and in turn your practice will feel the pressure.
IT and technology these days play a huge part in business operations.
Practice management software helps you and your team to manage your patients efficiently and with the care and attention they deserve. That will earn you loyalty, and referrals.
Adequate practice management software will also enable you to profile your patient base, working out who the most profitable patients are, so you can then:
- develop a marketing campaign to target more patients of this profile
- which in turn, brings more income through new patient generation
- which in turn, adds more profit to your profit & loss account
- which in turn, feeds into your overall business plan
Systemising everything in your private practice will save time, avoid inefficiencies and go a long way towards meeting your business vision. Now, where to start?
(5) PEOPLE – your team
Whether your team consists of two or twenty, they are the people you have recruited to work alongside you, communicating with your patients, representing your brand and supporting your business strategy.
Managing people isn’t always straightforward as you may well know from experience.
Systems and processes can help set boundaries so everyone works consistently.
Effective communication plays a key part in team management and skills can be taught and processes put in place to ease this side of practice management.
Create a motivated team by sharing your business vision and ensure everyone is working towards the same goal.
If you want to grow your private practice in 2016, start the new year on the right foot with an Elite bootcamp training day. Suitable for dentists and doctors just launching a private practice too!
Seminar covers each of the 5 areas of private practice management and connects you with professionals who can help your practice start, grow and flourish.
Book in November 2015 and take advantage of the Early Bird price of just £750.
+ 10% extra discount available if booking through Dental & Medical Financial Services.
CLICK TO BOOK with 10% discount