The COVID-19 outbreak is having a significant impact on how we are operating our medical spas and elective medical practices. During this time, it’s essential that practice owners find new ideas and ways to streamline their operations, communicate more effectively with both employees and clients, and implement concepts that will continue to help their businesses grow – both during this time when they are closed and on the rebound of the crisis we are in.
One of the most common barriers that our clients face is the lack of time to thoroughly think about and implement new ideas in real time. When your business is fully operational and schedules are busy, and you’re dealing with the day to day “stuff” that comes with running a business, it’s understandable that there is little to no time to dedicate to looking ahead at where you should take your business next – what you can do differently or better. It can be difficult to step back from being in the trenches to see the big picture and make changes that keep your business moving forward.
While there is much uncertainty and very little we can control about this pandemic, we must focus on what we can control. Below are some concepts that you can begin to implement during this time of slow or no in-office aesthetic treatments. Use this time wisely to prepare, so you can take control and take action when business starts up again.
Review and, if needed, revise all Standard Operating Procedures and policies.
• Review your current systems and structure to determine if anything needs to be clarified or changed to help your team function more effectively.
• Have you been wanting to implement a new bonus structure to incentivize your staff to up-sell and cross-sell treatments and products? Outline that plan, using past revenue and projected revenue to establish a “stretch” goal to shoot for.
Review your practice management software to analyze client data related to sales and areas of opportunity.
• Identify your client retention rate overall and by employee. Are there any trends or common themes? Do some employees have higher repeat and retention rates than others? Why?
• Average number of annual visits per client. Look at things such as:
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o On which services should you focus more attention to getting patients to come in more frequently? How will you and your team do that?
o For example, are your Botox patients coming in as regularly as they should? Are they coming in, on average, every 5-6 months instead of 3-4?
• Average annual revenue per client – what can you focus on to grow this?
• Identify your consultation close rate. If this isn’t something you regularly track, now is the time to start. Using your practice management software’s CRM or an Excel spreadsheet, track every consultation that’s been performed and include information on whether they purchased. If they didn’t purchase, why not? What was the follow-up process like? Use this information to improve your sales process and skills, and identify possible campaigns to target the unclosed consultations with unique messaging.
• Break-down of product sales:
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o Staff sales volume (how many products or what percent of an employee’s clients or services result in a product sale?)
o Staff sales revenue (how much product revenue by employee)
In part two of this blog series, our team will outline recommendations for your practice management software and how you can take this time to begin developing a membership or loyalty program.
