I once saw a financial report for a practice that used colors to show if their spending was above or below average in different expense areas—green for below average (good) and red for above average.
There were two green areas: occupancy costs and marketing. My CFO and I were looking at it together, and he said what I was thinking.
“This report has it backwards. I see a practice that needs to invest in a bigger space and increase its marketing budget if it’s going to grow.”
We already covered budgeting for increased space in a previous blog, so let’s look at optometry practice marketing this week.
Goals and Needs Come First
The important thing to remember is the best marketing plan is to deliver exceptional care and service to your patients. That way, they won’t ever go to another practice, and they will refer all their friends and family to your office.
This plan will show up on your P&L at a cost of $0. Creating a culture of service and professionalism takes time, effort, and intentionality. But I’ve talked to enough practices with a six-month backlog to know that not everyone needs to increase their patient recruitment initiatives to grow. (Notice that I didn’t just say marketing. I’ll elaborate on this later in the blog.)
However, let’s say you want to at least let the public know you’re open and work on nurturing your existing patient base. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t take a lot of money to show up as a practice that’s open for business and wants to grow. And if you really want to push it, a bit of smart spending can go a long way.
Average Marketing Spend for Optometry Practices
The chart below shows the average marketing spend for optometry practices (including website, patient communication software, and any investment in social media, digital, print, or other advertising):
Eighty percent of practices spend less than $28,000 per year. When considering the larger picture, it’s not a huge budget item. Here’s what that marketing investment translates to as a percentage of total collected revenue.
For 80% of practices, less than 2% of the budget goes to marketing. Most of that is spent on having some web presence, patient communication software, and maybe Google Ads.
OK, A Little Goes a Long Way. So What?
After showing you that optometry practices don’t spend much on marketing, you might react in one of two ways:
- You may be wondering why I haven’t mentioned the huge discount you offer on vision care plans and medical insurance charges compared to U&C rates.
- Whether or not you had that reaction, you might also be thinking “Why would I want to spend more on marketing if I’m doing well with minimal spending?”
Without tripling your marketing budget, let’s consider some opportunities to increase your marketing spend, even if you’re already busy.
- You could start a campaign to remind (or inform for the first time!) your patients of all the products and services you offer. Show of hands, how many of your patients have a pair of dedicated hiking glasses? Too much? Then how many of your patients know how you can help alleviate their dry eye symptoms?
- You could spruce up your website to be more appealing to potential employees. Like potential patients, prospective employees will be checking online to see how great your practice is to work at before they commit to working there.
- You could identify and target cash-pay patient populations, especially if you want to drop a vision care plan or all of them.
- Consider going omni-channel with your marketing efforts. Online may be cheap, but it’s also very crowded. Sending a mailer or planning a physical marketing campaign where a lot of eyes would see it can be a very effective strategy in a world where everyone is marketing digitally.
And if you’re not into spending money, below are some “free” ways to promote your practice. These tactics go beyond creating an amazing internal culture that translates to exceptional patient experience, which everyone should pursue but can be difficult to achieve.
- Take an hour a week to call one referral source. One. Hour. That’s all. Call ophthalmologists, PCPs (do you know what the OMD waiting list is for glaucoma care right now?), pediatricians, nail salons, dentists, schools, HR departments of the largest employers in town, and even other OD practices if you have a niche practice in vision therapy or myopia control.
- Join a civic association and get involved.
- Ask your patients for referrals. It takes less than 5 seconds, and, given that most providers have around 2,000 patient encounters a year, even a low hit rate means something.
- Write for your local newspaper. It’s free, the paper is always looking for content, and it will set you apart in the community. Besides, you know you’ve shouted at the TV at some point because bad medical advice was being broadcast. Go be the expert.
If you want to accurately assess your marketing budget (and all your other expenses), contact us to learn how we can automate your business accounting. Our experts at Books & Benchmarks will provide valuable insight into not only cost controls but also areas where you may want to invest more, such as marketing.
And if you think this website is a great digital representation of what we do at Books & Benchmarks, check out our sister service that designed it and manages our digital presence, Optometry Marketing Services.