Any advice/ideas on how to be cost effective in running my new dental practice and bringing in new patients?

I own a start up dental practice which opened it's doors in a leafy riverside community in South East England. I am coming up to my first year at the end of this month and am running the business in the negative with concerns about being cost effective without cutting corners and trying to increase my new patient numbers. I have competition from a surgery half a mile up the road. In two months time I do run the risk of falling short of meeting the bank payments and have already plundered my personal finances in trying to keep this business running. I have a good practise manager and a couple of other motivated staff members but find my associate, limited in her dental experience, and a nurse lagging in their motivation to help in helping the business flower. My finances are stretched that I cannot invest in advertising on radio or on billboards around the community. Up until now it is word of mouth that has brought new patients in but I do need to do more. Any advice/ideas?

Any advice/ideas on how to be cost effective in running my new dental practice and bringing in new patients?
Consider going out into the community and conducting free classes on the importance of good dental hygeine.





Talk to schools, hospitals, community centers, etc.





Include a freebie bag of promotional items with your information on them like: toothbrush, toothpaste, dental floss - the standard fare you get when visiting the dentist.





http://www.custom-business-promotional-p...
Reply:The first step is to understand the difference between investments and expenditures. Investments are cost that bring patients into the practice and expenditures are the cost of running the practice. Divide every single one of your cost into these two catagories and evaluate them. Report It

Reply:Begin to make small changes that cut expenditures. Print double sided using black ink on white paper costing aprox 2cents instead of Fancy colored paper costing aprox 1.50per page. Do you really think the patient comes to see you because you have colored tooth shaped paper? Report It

Reply:Patients hate filling out all that paper work no matter what color the paper is. Start looking at these small unnecessary expenditures, they will add up quickly.


Take care of the little things and the big things will take care of them selves Report It

Reply:recommend you give a gift to any of your current customers who refers someone. i have a gift business and it works great. plus you have a small overhead in sending out information letters to current customers and they know how great your service is. email me if you want gift ideas.