As a marketing and business manager with a number of years’ experience in the dental arena, I have worked with numerous dental practices and believe the key to ensuring the success of a practice is to encourage a shift in thinking which requires a robust but realistic business strategy to be in place. This change in emphasis towards measuring practice performance will help practice owners and managers understand the value of improving their internal processes and identify those areas where a practice may need help. There are many such resources now available, from finding a trusted business advisor or range of clinical and non-clinical staff training options, through to creating an effective website and social media strategy. Practice owners are now able to implement a new approach that will have a significant impact on the revenue of their business.
All dental practices are businesses in one form or another. Whether you are starting from scratch with a squat, or already own one or more well established practices, today’s business owners and managers need to be confident and informed business people.
There are many factors to consider in the day to day organisation of any practice, everything from the running costs and staff remuneration, through to the purchase and maintenance of essential equipment and materials. In today’s increasingly competitive market, where some patients are choosing their dentist by a quick search on Google, there is an increasing need to stand out from the crowd and not only advertise and promote the great service you provide, but make sure that you do provide it - every day.
The days of opening a practice to an eager queue of patients have long gone. Roles have been reversed, meaning most practices now have to go out and actively find new patients, and once they find them they need to have the right balance of treatments, service levels and value for money to keep them coming back.
This may all sound pretty straightforward, but in the real world it is not an easy balancing act to provide the best dental care to your patients whilst simultaneously juggling all the aspects of running a business.
The key to running any successful practice is the same as for any other small business and that is to either increase revenue or reduce costs - preferably both. Achieving this relies on having a realistic business strategy and not being afraid to seek out external professional services that will help you in those areas where you may lack the requisite skills.
I always recommend that practice owners seek out the advice of professional business consultants who can help a practice to benchmark itself against averages in the dental profession for turnover, appointment bookings, recall effectiveness and the like. Having a fresh pair of eyes to analyse your business performance can help identify your strengths and look at where aspects could be improved. This information can then be used to make informed decisions about the future direction of the business, whether that’s expansion, refurbishment, sale, or eventual retirement.
Other dentists may feel that treatment uptake would be improved if they were able to offer treatment finance for patients with 0 per cent interest for example, or require advice on capital expenditure decisions and how tax efficient investments in a practice can be made. Whatever the fi nancial needs of a practice, seeking expert help in these matters is worthwhile in order to benefit from third party, independent advice.
Improving the skillset of the whole practice team adds value to your practice at every level, enabling each member to perform better, with the aim of increasing practice effi ciency and profitability. Every team member needs to be have on-going training appropriate to their particular role, and for those dental professionals registered with the GDC there is also the matter of achieving the compulsory CPD hours.
All businesses need to continue to develop and grow as it is often said that a business that is not growing is in reality going backwards. Growth can come from reducing costs, which increases profi tability, or increasing revenue, which, unsurprisingly, increases profitability. Either of these strategies can be used in practice. Whether you choose to employ the most effective practice management system to help you attract and retain more patients or you choose to find reduced rates on recruitment, or a more cost effective way to dispose of clinical waste.
However, a business cannot grow effectively if the public are unaware it even exists or knows little about the services or products it offers. This is why practice marketing is so important. Creating a strong brand image for your practice makes your business not only look more professional but also helps to get you noticed. An informative and well designed website is now a necessity for every dental practice, and in today’s fast moving world of social media an active presence on the likes of Facebook and Twitter is also an important part of connecting with patients.
So how can busy practices find the time and resources to seek out trusted business advice, the best in staff training or get involved in practice marketing whilst still striving to give the best treatment to patients? The answer is to look to new business initiatives now available that are designed to improve the business health of dental practices
so that they can concentrate on improving the health of their patients.
There are now business initiatives that will positively impact the profi tability of dental practices, by bringing together a range of products and professional services to either help increase revenue or reduce costs. Dental practices still need to be encouraged to grow and progress but by helping them identify those areas where they need a little extra help, these enterprises are having a real impact on practice success.