You've poured tons of time and money (maybe millions) into building your practice, only to find it rewarding you with a trickle of clients.
You’ve got a lot to offer your patients, but the problem is...No one knows about it!
I know this feeling all too well!
When I first got my financial licenses, I thought people would start lining up my office doors waiting to get a plan from me. I assumed all my friends and family would start advertising for me because they liked me!
The painful reality of it was most of them didn’t. In fact, some of them didn’t want to see me succeed at all. (That’s a story for another time!)
Our businesses may seem different on the outside. However, just because I’m in finance and you’re in healthcare, the inner workings of entrepreneurship are universal.
Formal education teaches us how to be an outstanding physician, surgeon, dentist, or financial advisor, but they don’t teach us how to grow our practice.
Unfortunately, there’s no formal education to develop that kind of skill. You can only attain it through mentorship and copying systems from people who are doing it already.
I want you to save time and reveal 7 tips that helped me and my business partners create an organization of over 500 licensed professionals and over 10,000 clients.
Share your vision for your practice and explain how they can help!
It’s a big mistake assuming everyone already knows you want more patients!
Share a specific vision for your practice with your patients. Share what you want your practice to look like in the future. How do you want to be known? What are the goals you want to achieve? You want to be known as the practice that provides excellent service or treats patients with compassion. Share how your patients can help you achieve those goals. Let your patients know you are always open to new ideas and suggestions. You want to become the preferred or recommended provider for a certain insurance carrier or employer. Tell your patients how they can help you achieve these goals by referring their friends and family to your services.
Create a referral program that allows your patients to easily recommend your practice to their friends and family.
It’s not enough to ask someone for a referral. Give them a reason to refer to you and make the process super easy!
One of the easiest ways to encourage patient referrals is to offer rewards to those who promote your practice. You can create a simple program that gives patients a certain number of points for each referral they make. It’s also important to make it as easy as possible for patients to refer to you. Create an online form that allows patients to enter the names and email addresses of their friends and family. Include this form on your website, in your practice’s advertisements, and printed materials. Make sure that the information entered is visible on the recipient’s end (e.g. in their email inbox). You can also consider building a patient referral system directly into your online booking and/or medical records software. Patients who are already logged in and are familiar with the system are more likely to refer to you.
Healthcare Professionals
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Keep up with technology and develop a strong online presence
Social media is filled with incomplete and generic profiles that all look the same!
If you want to earn your patients’ trust and earn their referrals, you need to keep your information current and accessible on every major social media platform, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Offer your email address and encourage your patients to contact you there. Be sure to have an online presence that is consistent with the identity of your practice. This includes your tone, images, and videos. Make sure your website is easy to navigate and offers valuable information about your services and contact information. If you don’t already have one, you should also consider investing in a website. Investing in a professional-looking and -functioning website is one of the best ways to increase your credibility with patients and attract even more referrals.
Make your medical office a place where people want to come back to.
When I walk into a medical practice, I expect to check in, sit in a vinyl chair and read a magazine dated 4 months back. There’s nothing worth mentioning, and it’s not referable.
It’s not just your website and online presence that needs to be attractive—it’s your practice, too. Make your practice a place where people want to come back to by creating an experience they can’t get anywhere else. You can get some ideas by simply asking your patients for their opinion.
“John. I want to make my practice a place where people want to come back to. What do you think I can do to make that happen?”
By asking that question, you achieve two things:
- You get a genuine idea of how you can create a memorable medical practice,
- You’re communicating to your clients they’re valuable, which reinforces your relationship with them
Attract the patients you want and repel the rest
It may sound counterproductive, but repelling the patients you don’t want actually will ensure you avoid burnout.
We’ve all heard the saying, “the customer is always right”. That phrase might apply in a clothing store, but there’s no room for that in your practice.
In my world, these are the clients who deposit money into an investment today and withdraw it tomorrow because they bought a new Tesla! (That’s 10 hours of my life down the drain!)
You want patients who respect your time, appreciate your skills and are coachable to your advice. You want to push out those who try to negotiate the dental bill after you’ve done the work, or those who pressure you for a doctor’s note so he can stay on long-term disability.
Simply stop allowing these patients to take up room on your schedule!
I know this may sound harsh, but it’s necessary to grow a practice you will look forward to working in.
Patients don’t care how much you know until they first know how much you care!
I know it sounds super cheesy, but it’s probably the most valuable point on this list.
Toronto is littered with medical practices where everyone is treated like cattle walking through a revolving door. (The same is true in the financial industry). As professionals, our patients and clients want you to care about them. They want to feel that you genuinely care about their well-being.
In my business, I achieve this by communicating with my clients every 90 days and my team twice per week
I make sure they understand the process of what we are doing, the importance of what we are doing, and how it affects their goals. The more you care about your clients and their success, the more likely they are to recommend someone just like them.
