How to Build a Successful Private Practice
Perhaps you’ve been wondering how to get more clients in private practice. Or maybe you’re filling up waiting lists, but would like to see more of the kinds of patients you are ideally suited to treat.
Providing quality health care often means also running a business. While a lot has changed in recent days, the basics of running a successful private practice are the same. Being reminded of your goals for your business will keep you focused.
1. Maintain an up-to-date, information-packed website
If someone is seeking health care, chances are they are starting online. 80% of people use the internet to make healthcare-related searches.
A visually-appealing, fast-loading and easy to use website is key to doing business. People should be able to tell within seconds what kind of practice you have, and the services you provide. They should also get a sense of the kind of provider you are, with color schemes and images that indicate your brand and area of specialization.
While visuals are important, the most stunning design will only generate patients if people are looking at it. Did you know that 75% of people will not scroll past page 1 of Google search results? Here is where content becomes at least as important as design. In fact, it might be more important.
Google will rank your site based on a variety of factors, including the number of clicks, bounce rates (how quickly people navigate away from your page once clicking to it), and how frequently people search for the kinds of things your website provides.
But it also ranks you for how long people stay on your site, how many pages they visit, the number of words on each page (blogs rank best if they are between 1000 and 2400 words), how frequently new content is added, and the kinds of sites that are linked to and from your site. And this is just a partial list — there’s an entire industry devoted to the mysteries of the Google algorithms called SEO (search engine optimization).
Adding new content frequently (ideally once a week but at a minimum twice per month), and making sure that content is of high quality and speaking to what people are looking for is essential for making sure your practice shows up on page 1 of Google results.
You also need to be aware of what keywords (the words and phrases searchers enter into search engines) you are using in your content. Choosing keywords that are popular but specific enough to your ideal audience that you don’t get lost in an overwhelming amount of noise is a good strategy.
And consider hiring a medical writer for your copy. A web developer is going to build you a great website, but your website copy should be written in the language of your industry.
2. Generate New Leads and Bookings
The first step in generating leads starts with you. Take a few moments and define your target market. What kinds of health problems are they suffering from? What age demographic do they tend to belong to? What kinds of things are they interested in? Which social media platforms are they using? Where do they tend to shop? Defining your client “avatar” will help you narrow your marketing strategies and find your ideal patients.
Then you need to research your competition. Notice strategies they seem to be working for them and adapt yourself to their playbook.
Plan to spend 5-10% of the estimated lifetime worth of the income generated from a client to acquire that lead on marketing. How do you know if you are overspending? Or underspending? Calculating your ROI (return on investment) will keep you on track.
It can be difficult to track ROIs through traditional advertising techniques like buying ad space in print or media. But inbound content marketing strategies are not only more effective in today’s world — the results are easier to track. You and your marketing team should be familiar with Google Analytics, which can help you see what content drove which part of your audience where, and in what numbers. You can even determine the best days and times of day to post.
3. Become an Established Authority
When you make efforts to establish yourself as an authority in your specialty, you put yourself in the enviable position of becoming the go-to for those who are seeking that knowledge.
Publishing sought after, high-quality, regular content online is one of the best ways to establish your authority. Blogs are a proven, long-term strategy for accomplishing this goal. Authoring books, white papers, eBooks, treatment plans, and regular newsletters are also effective, along with courses and workshops, both in-person and online.
4. Raise Awareness of Your Services
Believe it or not, email is still the best way to increase trust and build relationships with clients. You can build email lists effectively through Opt-ins, which are free, usually digital, pieces of content that someone who comes to your website can immediately download after taking the simple, low-cost action of entering their email address.
Opt-ins that generate results include:
Recipe books or sample week-long whole foods meal plans
Recorded meditations
A 7-day workout or stretching challenge
A cheat-sheet for healthy substitutes for sugar
A self-assessment to determine hormone balance
Once you have enough people on your email list, you can educate the people most likely to be interested in what you provide about new offers, services and products. It’s like having your target audience at your fingertips.
5. Increase Patient Satisfaction
Word-of-mouth is still an incredibly important facet of your business marketing strategy. Much of that now happens online of course.
Unfortunately, a tiny minority of unhappy clients can skew ratings, unless your satisfied clients are motivated enough to review you as well. In today’s world, being “good enough” isn’t good enough. You need to go above and beyond to get people excited enough to take that extra step and tell others about how amazing your services are.
Building trust and long-term relationships will increase the likelihood of establishing a client base that is going to share the good word about what you have to offer. Email lists, newsletters, and regular blogs can help tremendously with this effort.
And you need to make it easy for clients to share your resources and rate you highly. Produce content that is easily shareable through social media such as Facebook, Instagram or Youtube, and use testimonials and case studies where possible.
If you’re feeling stuck about what to do next, be inspired by your goals. Pick one goal to work towards today and your direction will be clear.
And if you’d like a review of your website copy, just click the button below :)