Surely by now you’ve read a dozen plus articles on how to market your practice. While most of them have merit, all of the ones I’ve read have missed something very important. The component that is critical to creating an effective marketing program for physicians and healthcare organizations is a preliminary baseline analysis. This is not an analysis that requires ten people years to complete. It is something that can be done for practical purposes with specific thought from the administrator and each physician. Cumulatively, you will have a good analysis of where you are (your own GPS), of what your practice is really like and what you may want to do to move to the next step.

 

A couple of things to know before you can begin designing an effective, practice specific marketing plan are:

The above information will allow you to determine the direction and actions needed to develop your practice. We’re not implying healthcare workers should be accountants, but it’s important to remember that all businesses, including medical practices, must know the costs and profits associated with their products or services for evaluation and planning.

 

Try this practical exercise in your office. Create a sheet with three blank circles with headings. Have each physician complete the charts individually and return them to you. At your next board meeting have everyone review each others’ chart to discuss differences and similarities. If you can get a group consensus of what the average practice chart might look like you have accomplished your goal of discovering where your patients come from, where they spend their time and where you obtain your revenue.

 

Now that you have the first step completed, it is time to determine an estimate of what each patient is worth to your practice. We have a simple formula that might give a CPA a stroke but we have found it to be very effective in finding a baseline of what an average patient is worth. Here’s how it works. Determine the total dollars billed in one year and identify the number of individual patients (not the same patient six times) that were treated during that same year. Divide the number of patients into the number of total dollars billed. Then, multiply that number times five. That means you plan on keeping the patient a very conservative five years. When you have completed the calculation you will have the dollar amount of what an average patient is worth to your practice.

 

This number is important because it tells you dollars gained or lost based on individual patients. Also, you need to know this number so that you can measure the effectiveness of any programs you put in place to get you more of the “right” kind of patients that your physicians want.

 

A successful marketing effort should produce a minimum of .5 – 1 percent increase in additional monthly billing dollars - compounded. It is a very conservative figure but if you calculate those numbers you will be astonished at the additional revenue you will have by compounding those minor increases over a period of five years or longer. You can calculate these increases yourself or call us at 901-763-3123 and we will provide a confidential report for you at no cost.

 

The lesson learned here is to establish your foundation before you embark on ANY marketing effort. All GPS systems need to know where you are before they can help you get to where you want to go. Medical marketing is no different.

 

 

Vanessa Smith, CMDS, Certified Medical Development Specialist is Executive Vice President of ADF Medical Healthcare Development.www.adfmedical.com