Have you ever wondered why two different people can open the same type of practice—say, two naturopaths, two coaches, or two holistic healers—and one of them thrives while the other barely scrapes together a living? Both want to provide their clients or patients with valuable services and create long-term relationships, but one succeeds and the other doesn’t.

If you’ve been in the position of the one who doesn’t, you may be feeling frustrated by having to get a job in a different field, instead of supporting yourself with the work you love. Perhaps you look at someone else in your speciality and think, “I have just as much experience and training as that person. Why do they have a full practice, while my phone never rings?”

What makes the difference?

I’m going to answer this question in two separate posts, because your success is determined by two powerful and very different factors. One is internal and one is external.

The internal factor is the single biggest problem that affects every unsuccessful or marginally successful practice: your beliefs and fears about money and success. If you don’t deal with these, you can work as hard as you want and you’ll end up sabotaging yourself every time. We’ll look at that in the next post.

So let’s go to the external factor. If you don’t have this nailed down, you can lose more money than you make.

This factor is all about the nuts and bolts of how you manage your practice. It’s the key to your business success, whether you run a part-time, one-person healing practice out of your home, or a large, multi-staffed dental office in a medical building.

How do you find clients or patients and bring them in the door? How do you let them know the extent of your services? What about client follow-up? How do you document your sessions? Track your success? Know what’s working for you and what isn’t? What kind of literature or hand-outs do you have available? What if you have staff—how do you manage them? How do you answer questions and deal with complaints?

For a detailed picture of what’s involved in running a successful practice, I talked to practice management specialist, Zoe Tsoraklidis, of My Practice Admin, a division of Centered on Success. www.mypracticeadmin.ca We also discussed how she can help you, since having a successful practice means you’re going to be too busy with clients and patients to do everything I talk about in this post by yourself!

Zoe is what’s known as a “fixer.” She is a seasoned professional who analyzes your practice to determine what’s needed, so cash and clients or patients flow into your business instead of away from you. Then she helps you implement the necessary changes that impact your bottom line.

Whether you are just beginning your practice or are already established, if things are not going as well as you’d like, Zoe suggests looking at several areas of your business.

Practice Marketing

First of all, how do clients or patients find you? Do you have a website? A business card? A brochure? Even if you do, are they coordinated so your practice has a recognizable brand and looks professional?

And how do these marketing materials reach your intended audience? You need a strategy for internet marketing and for becoming noticed and known in your community. For those who feel overwhelmed by the thought of having to organize all this, Zoe offers both services.

Going Face to Face

“Clients like to go to practitioners they know or have met,” says Zoe, so there is great value in making face-to-face contact. To raise your profile in the community, she recommends holding different types of presentations. Offering public lectures or workshops is a great way to meet people and let them know about what you do.

If you are in a niche market, or you’re new in town, connecting with other practitioners to create referral networks may be the best way to go. Zoe often organizes targeted seminars for professionals, as well as Meet-and-Greet dinners, and cocktail nights.

“When you’re paying for their food and drink, people come,” she observes.

“Isn’t it expensive?” I ask. “What if you’re just starting out as a one-person practice and you don’t have a lot of money to spend?”

“You can do a Continental breakfast—either in your office or a room in the local library or community center. Even with the food and the room rental, it doesn’t cost you any more than running a single newspaper ad! And this way, you have the face-to-face contact that helps create referrals.”

Not to mention that you connect with exactly the people you want to reach! BTW, if you know anything about print ads, you’ll know they’re notorious for having a lousy response rate, so you’re better off spending your money on the food.

When you need help putting together workshops, seminars, breakfasts or dinners, whether for 20 people or 200, contact Zoe.

(And if all this talk of public speaking and face-to-face contact makes you nervous, contact me. EFT is very effective at helping you get rid of your “stage fright.”)

So you’ve connected with potential clients, patients and other professionals who will refer people to you. Now what?

Client Intake

When a client comes in your door, Zoe suggests you look at your intake process.

Are you loading up your patient or client with too much information at the first session and trying to do everything at once? Or have you broken down your services individually, so you can begin with an overall assessment, then proceed to offer the client a variety of services depending on their needs? In this way, you not only customize your approach to the client or patient; you add value to your practice.

Do you have an intake form? A consent form? A system for documenting what goes on in a session? In private practice, it’s extremely important to create a paper trail, especially if a client comes back at you for any reason. A good paper trail may seem time-consuming initially, but it can save you plenty of agony and money in the long run.

Literature

What kinds of brochures, handouts, and treatment literature do you have to explain procedures and services to your client? Do you have a newsletter? A blog? How do you keep clients informed about what’s new in the office, and let them know when you have special workshops or events on the horizon?

Maybe writing isn’t your forte. Fortunately, Zoe can help you with this and provides writing services, not only for your website but for your other literature needs. (Just don’t ask her to ghostwrite your novel. She’s too busy for that!)

Tracking

Zoe also emphasizes having a way to track your benchmarks. How do you track your success? Your client inflow? How many patients come in, stay, walk away, never return? Are you tracking your hours of work? Referrals? Your revenue? Do you have any idea where you might be losing money in your practice?

Tracking gives you a clear picture and lets you know where to take the precise actions that lead to success instead of mediocre results or losses.

Scripts

Now, here’s something you may never have thought about: How do you talk to your client or patient? Zoe points out that when you develop scripts for yourself and your staff, it becomes much easier to deal with questions and concerns in a professional manner.

Scripts are useful for connecting with your client or patient over the phone, during an exam or session, and when explaining treatment plans and payment options.

Maybe you think having a script is too planned, too artificial. But think about this. When you’re a health practitioner, you need to be as prepared as an actor on stage. It’s showtime in the office!

The next time a patient or a potential client asks you a difficult question, will you be able to answer it easily and fluidly? You will if you’ve considered it ahead of time and committed a well-thought-out answer to memory so it pops up automatically.

Yes, I know you’re smart enough to answer questions off the top of your head and you don’t want to sound like you’re trotting out rehearsed answers. But what if you’re tired or preoccupied when the questions or objections come? What if they’re fielded by one of your staff members? Would you rather have people in your office stuttering and stammering in front of patients because they don’t know what to say? Or worse, being rude, because they are taken by surprise?

How will you react if someone calls you up and cancels at the last minute? You need to be able to focus on the desired outcome—rebooking the appointment—rather than panicking because that was your only session for the day.

Your scripts will reflect you and how you choose to present yourself to your clients. Hey, even Barack Obama rehearses. Because we all have our off days.

The truth about scripts is that they let you and your staff relax. And when you’re relaxed, you feel more confident. Your client or patient senses that, and it gives them confidence in you, as well as your team, if you have staff. Clients who feel comfortable and well-looked after are much more likely to return, and satisfied clients who keep coming back are the foundation of your success. They’ll also tell others about you.

Follow-up

Finally, there’s follow-up. How do you keep the conversation open with your client after their appointment? In a larger practice, what is the office protocol for following up with patients? Here again, it helps to have systems and language (yes, scripts again!) in place to make this easy for all concerned.

Free Consultation

Right about now, if you have a one-person practice, you’re probably thinking that you’ll never be able to do all the stuff I’ve mentioned above. Don’t worry! You don’t have to. Just call Zoe and she’ll set it all up for you. She’ll even give you a free initial phone consultation for about an hour, to determine your needs.

Expect to answer some questions like:

- What are your services?

- Are you certified?

- Do you have a dedicated phone line, or do your clients reach you on your private cell number with the funky message that your friends find so hilarious?

- What is your business presence? (Not sure what that means? She’ll explain.)

- What is your desired annual income? By knowing this, Zoe can determine how you need to structure your business.

- What are your areas of concern?

- Do you have any experience in managing a business?

- Are you tracking your hours of work, your revenue, your case acceptance ratio?

- Do you have or need staff?

- Do you need a website?

- Are you currently asking for client feedback?

- Are you asking for referrals? Are you tracking them? What about testimonials?

Professionals with an established practice can also benefit from Zoe’s experience in team management, team development, and skills training.

Remember those two people I mentioned back at the beginning of this post? If you want to be the one who thrives, and you’re ready to experience the difference professional help can make to your bottom line and client list, I suggest you contact Zoe now, before she’s all booked up. She’ll help you implement the strategies in this post, while you enjoy her warm personality and great sense of humour! www.mypracticeadmin.ca

Stay tuned for Part Two of this series…