Mix it Up for Greater Profits

As practitioners, we live our lives under a microscope, closely scrutinizing our practices – and our lives – to be the best we can. Have we hit the pinnacle? Have we hit close to the pinnacle? Of course, there is always room for improvement. With that in mind, I encourage you to do a line-item review of your practice . . . and then mix it up and be the best that you can be!

Why Should We Mix It Up? 
Many of the professionals we work with get used to a standard way of doing things, which can lead to mistakes – many of which are propagated from year to year. As practitioners, our day-to-day operations become so commonplace that we carry forward mistakes that we may not even realize. We need to refresh, or mix it up, in our practices to ensure we’re increasing our profits and minimizing our losses.  

Staff Training
How often in our practices do new employees get trained by experienced or departing employees that they are replacing? How do we know that the “experienced” or departing employees were trained properly? Potentially, and more often than not – likely, these employee-trainers may be training forward improper protocol that they learned from previous employees.

To that end, how many of us have employee manuals? How often do we review and update those manuals? If we have them, and they are updated, how sure are we that new employees not only read them but implement what’s in them? Do we quiz, review, and/or shadow our staff? When we make sure that all this is standard operating procedure, this will ensure that new employees implement our best practices. 

Improperly trained staff costs the practice immeasurably. Inefficient staff can result in lost revenue when more staff may be needed when less suffice. Additionally, revenue may be affected if poorly trained staff affect the flow of patients, as we won’t end up reaching as many patients as we could have.

Purchasing from Labs
Our labs have the potential to be vast cesspools of unnecessary expenses. Optimizing lab purchasing can save startling costs that can squeeze significant percentages from our cost of goods sold. Where we buy, if and how we negotiate how we buy, and what to keep in stock are critical for this huge line item. We also need to review this process of “where” and “how” and “how much” on a set schedule, because that’s what optimization requires. Check your lab’s competitors and compare what you pay for your products.

Marketing
Instead of marketing externally to many people who may not need our services, or are wed to others, we should consider the benefits of marketing internally to our existing patient population. Spare the expenses! If you are established, and even if you are not so established, market from within. Cost = zero! 

We have a giant pool of existing patients at our disposal that we need to take advantage of. Many practitioners may ask how to get started with marketing or how to determine what marketing strategies actually work. For starters, with our practice management software, we can do what the marketing pros do. We can do test marketing, which allows us to market specifically to different demographics or zip codes to see what works and what doesn’t. For instance, if you have new presbyopic contact lenses, send targeted emails to the over-40 crowd. We have done that in our office, and it works!

One way to excel at this is to get ideas from other fields. If you want to find experts at this, check out local cosmetic medispas. See how they advertise their services and learn from their tactics. Many of them offer flash sales on slower days, compelling people to come in when they typically wouldn’t. Bottom line: why can’t we do the same? Try something new in your practice. Test out a few different things and see what works with your patients and what doesn’t work.

A Closer Look at Our Trusted Professionals
In addition to looking at the inner workings of our office, it’s equally important to take a look at the outside help we source to make our practices run optimally behind the scenes. 

CPAs
CPAs notoriously carry forward mistakes. This occurs when computer entries are “populated” to the future years, which is how many of their computer systems automatically function. The CPA may bypass checking those auto-populated numbers, and this means if something is incorrect, misinterpreted, or omitted, you’ll be feeling the effects of those errors. For example, one CPA I had missed an entry for a contractor that I used annually. After making the assumption once, he failed to bring it up again, carrying forward the mistake year after year. Thankfully, I questioned it, and we were able to amend back three years to regain what was lost. 

My best advice: review your tax returns. Every few years, bring your return to another CPA and pay them for their time to review the return. For all you know, the new CPA may determine that you may be categorized as a less than desirable or even wrong type of corporation, they may find items missed, and they may have suggestions of what can be done better. It will surprise you how a fresh set of eyes will look at your return differently, especially if they think there is an outside chance they can win your business. If what they find is significant, then it may just be time to make a change. Missed opportunities recovered can amount to significant dollars.

Retirement Plan Advisors
Similarly, have a new set of eyes review your retirement plan. Plans are complicated, and not all advisors are up to date on all the plans. It’s easy for busy professionals to overlook things. Perhaps they have not taken into account that you have reached the age where you can benefit from a “catch-up” defined benefit plan. Perhaps they don’t understand that you want to use the retirement plan as a vehicle to retain employees. Having these kinds of conversations can help you see things differently and see where you can potentially save money. 

Lawyers
Have a new employment lawyer review your employment agreement. If it’s time to renew your lease, try a different lease lawyer. Mistakes or new ideas can be pointed out. If the new lawyer finds nothing different or unusual, that is a good “peace of mind” expense.

Insurance Agents
We have renter’s/owner’s insurance, worker’s comp, liability insurance, malpractice, car, health, and more. Get another opinion and have that person compare what you have to what they believe is better. If they say yours is best, you get peace of mind. If they have other options, decide what’s best for you and your practice. 

Change Can Be Good
Greater profits are achieved through fewer losses and greater revenue opportunities. Together with improved well-being, mixing it up is essential! We all have ideas about how to do this. Let’s continue sharing them with each other so we can collectively see more profits in our practices.