The Challenge of Running a Health Clinic Today
Trying to run and grow a health care clinic these days is a bit like a 3-D chess game.
Practitioners are hard to find and keep, and they want leading pay and flexibility. Costs are going up, but fee increases need to be manageable for your patients. Plus, people’s habits are changing – they commute less and are more open to online options.
Whether it’s a therapy, chiropractic, or physiotherapy clinic, the struggle is real. It can make you forget why you started your clinic in the first place – to help people get better.
I’ve been there too. Over the past 20 years, I’ve seen my various businesses hit rough patches. It’s stressful, embarrassing, and really distracting.
What’s needed is a method to profit first for clinic owners, to relieve pressure and allow focus on providing more and better patient care.
Discovering Profit First for Clinics
If you are in this situation, I’ve found a dead-simple solution that is perfect for clinic owners.
The ‘Profit First‘ method, created by Mike Michalowicz, is a great way for all types of health clinic owners to lock in the rewards they need. The book is an easy read, and I highly recommend it.
It flips typical thinking on its head. Instead of hoping for high profits after expenses have eaten away at them, you lock in the profits first.
By changing the age-old accounting formula from ‘Sales – Expenses = Profit’ to ‘Sales – Profit = Expenses’, you make sure you have the money you need, and don’t spend more than you can afford.
Profit First in Action
This method works in any discipline, whether you are a therapist, chiropractor, physiotherapist, or in another field. Here’s how to make it work for you.
Take Profit Up Front: 🔄 Think of it like dividing your money into different envelopes, like my grandmother used to do. One for profit, one for taxes, another your pay, and the last, untouchable one for profit. It’s simple to execute by setting up a few bank accounts, and it really works.
Keep an Eye on Your Money: 📊 Every month, at least, assess your cash situation. Adjust your spending to protect the profits if you need to.
Make Your Clinic Efficient: 📲 It’s time to say goodbye to paper, stop sharing Dropbox links, and to do less on the phone. You need to be as efficient as possible, especially for booking, payments, scheduling, patient intake, and billing.
Help Your Team Help You: 👥 It’s important to help the team to get onboard with any new systems and help with smooth operations. The goal is to be able to add more patients without having to grow the team.
Bring in Tech: 💻 Don’t just hire another person for a job that simple tech can do better. Save your team for helping your patients. Automate parts of onboarding, intake, billing reconciliation, referral processing, offboarding, and more.
Take Your Clinic to The Next Level
Once you’ve taken these steps, you will have a new foundation for your business. You’ll leave cash flow drama behind and be ready to grow.
You can then invest in marketing, hiring the right people and upgrading your clinic. Your waitlist will be full, and your patients will be singing your praises.
A Profitability Guide
Looking for someone to guide you through the process? We can help you to figure out what moves to make so that you have an efficient, scalable, and modern clinic.
Book a Discovery Call to start the process.
