Enhancing Your Practice

This time of year is a great time to sit back and evaluate your practice. What things are you doing well? What can you do better? What do you want to do that is new and different? Let's start off with your web site. Are you proud of your web site? Is it portraying your practice is a positive and professional manner? I look at many web sites and, to be honest, most of them do not impress me. Does your web site have a virtual tour on it? Has it been upgraded recently or do you have a doctor or two on it that has not been with you for years? Today web sites are not an option-they are mandatory. People moving into your area are checking out your web site. Applicants are checking you out on the web before they even come in and apply. You need to have a web site as professional and up-to-date as your practice. It should be one you can be very proud of.

Do you have a shop site on your web site? Again, I think this is no longer an option but a requirement. If you are going to compete with internet pharmacies then you must have a shop site on your web site. Think about this for a second… one of the competitive advantages of an internet pharmacy is convenience. Clients can get up at 3a.m. and go to the computer and order something that will be sent directly to their home. If you have a shop site on your web site, clients can do the same thing. If this is something you wish to do, check out VetStreet. They do an amazing job in web site development and can help you place a shop site on your web site.

How well are your receptionists doing with their telephone communication? Do you know how effective they are in converting phone shoppers to new clients? There is an old adage that I live by, "Don't expect what you don't inspect." A wonderful new service we have started using with our clients is one called LocalVets.com. I met with this company during CVC Central and did a little test market with some of our clients. Everyone has been impressed. The way this company works is that you sign up with them (no charge) and they will set up a special web page for your practice. If a client moves into your practice area and does an internet search, such as "veterinary hospitals or animal hospitals in ___ city USA", the search will come up with a box "find local veterinarians in your area." If the client clicks on that box they will get a list of veterinarians or animal hospitals closest to their zip code and it consists of a list of clients who have signed up with LocalVets.com. If they then click on your practice it will take them to your special web page. On this page you can have pictures of your practice, list your services and hours and even have pictures and bios of your doctors. There is a special phone number listed on this web page and if the prospective client then calls that number, the call will ring into your office. What is amazing about this service is that all those phone calls are recorded (clients and team members are informed about this ahead of time). You, as the practice owner or manager, can then listen to those phone calls on the internet whenever you wish. If the client makes and keeps an appointment with your practice, you will be charged $35.00. If the prospective client does not make an appointment or does not show up for the scheduled appointment, you are not charged anything. What we have found that is so amazing about this service is not necessarily all the new clients we are getting, although they are great, it's the monitoring of the phone conversations. In listening to these phone conversations we can identify team members who are excellent in their telephone communication and the ones that need coaching. This, in and of itself, has made this service invaluable. Management can sit down with the individual employee and listen to those conversations and help them improve upon their telephone communication skills. Check them out. There are no contracts, so if you don't like it you can opt out of the service but I think you are going to find it invaluable to "inspect what you expect".