Revenue is crucial to sustaining and growing a clinic's operations. Whether it's through providing exceptional patient experiences or implementing strategic initiatives (revenue streams/buckets), every aspect of a clinic's functions contributes to its financial health.
Understanding Revenue Generation
Let’s start by assuming revenue is made up of these elements:
- Patient experience
- Staff experience
- Operations
- Strategic initiatives (revenue streams).
Revenue is an outcome of doing some of these well or not well. In this case, revenue is influenced by delivering high-quality care, such as effective treatment planning, and by efficiently managing operations, such as promptly answering phone calls and successfully booking appointments .
Patient experience directly correlates with revenue generation. When patients have positive experiences, like completing their plan of care and achieving their specific ‘why’ or desired outcome, they are more likely to access additional services (revenue streams), return, and recommend the clinic to others, thus increasing revenue.
Expanding the Revenue 'Pie'
It’s also important to note the difference in philosophy here between revenue and profitability. To me, it is easier to ‘build a bigger pie’ than change profitability. That is, if we are getting 15% of 100 at the moment, can we get 15% of 150 or 200? This can be done through establishing your revenue streams (buckets), continuously improving them to produce more, and finding ways for one stream to flow into another.
Roles in Revenue Generation
On the staff side, investing in better training for staff members leads to enhanced skills and ultimately, higher revenue.
Every member of a clinic's staff plays a crucial role in revenue generation. Let's explore the responsibilities of each role:
The Owner(s):
- Operational compliance: identifying what’s been done and not done
- Clinician recruitment
- Determining strategic initiatives (revenue streams)
- Delegation (implementation), coaching, mentorship
Clinic Director and Clinicians:
- Personal brand and self marketing
- Treatment plan methodology
- Patient fall-off process
- Family/friend referrals
- Cross referrals (team-based approach to care)
- Product sales
- Re-activation calls (past patients)
- Clinician recruitment
Office Manager and Front Desk Staff:
- Schedule optimization (% of schedule booked)
- Treatment plan methodology
- AR collection (+ overall payment collection)
- Phone answer rates, phone booking rates
- Cancellation and no-show process
- Fall off process
- Re-activation calls
Marketing Coordinator:
- Weekly assessment target
- Recurring, weekly marketing tactics
- Marketing tactics that ‘spike’ assessments
- Clinic events and community events
- Managing referral relationships
Maximizing clinic revenue requires a collaborative effort from every staff member. By empowering each role to contribute towards revenue growth, clinics can not only thrive financially but also deliver exceptional patient care. From the owner(s) to the front desk staff, every individual has a part to play in building a successful and sustainable clinic model. Together, they can create a thriving ecosystem where revenue generation and patient satisfaction go hand in hand.
