DC to DC: Building a data-driven marketing practice

This data-driven marketing practice can help you convert more clients to care, increase retention and reach more people

If you’re looking for another way to improve your patients’ experience as well as your own business, think about marketing your practice with a data-driven marketing strategy to bring more patients in the door and for a clearer picture of your patient base.

Shawn Dill, DC, and Lacey Book, DC, while chiropractors by trade, today work with more than 650 DCs through the Black Diamond Club, where they teach DCs about marketing, sales, and mindset strategies. In addition, they co-authored “None of Your Business,” a book for service providers; they own The Specific, a chiropractic franchise with 12 offices; and a SaaS company, Katana, The Art of the Specific for upper cervical and chiropractic.

Dill and Book took time from their busy schedules to answer our questions about a data-driven practice. What follows is an edited version of our interview.

What is a data-driven marketing practice?

A data-driven marketing practice makes decisions based on understanding the analytics and statistics centered around everything — not just patient acquisition, patient visits, and revenue.

You can derive stats and data from virtually any part of the office’s processes and procedures.

What kind of data should chiropractors be collecting?

Some of the stats that we recommend chiropractors collect include new patients coming in the office, new patients converted to care, patient visit average, collections visit average, kept appointment percentage, no shows, reactivations, conversion to wellness, and of course, collections.

All of these numbers can help you determine if your systems are working properly. If your stats are not where you would like them to be and you understand them, you will see what needs to be altered and focused on. Oftentimes we can tell what is causing the so-called “leaky bucket” by just analyzing our stats.

We also recommend keeping track of where referrals are coming from so that you have an understanding of your best referral sources. This is highly important so that you can nurture those referral relationships or put more money into the strategies that are paying off. And while this is more of a business discussion, stats can be kept around clinical outcomes as well.

These metrics could potentially help you with data-driven marketing. For instance, how many of your patients report a marked improvement in certain conditions or situations?

What should DCs be doing with this data?

In order to be data-based, you must be consistent in keeping track of the information. Too many offices do not do this on a daily basis and do not review them often enough.

You must put a system in place to look at your data at least once a week to know what is going on in your office. You need to collect data not just to “have it.” You must also learn to base your decisions off of data and not just “gut feelings.”

Who should have access to this data?

You should be the primary individual who has access to the information because you are the one who can best assess and understand the numbers. Oftentimes, an office has an employee enter the information on a day-to-day basis. We are big believers that you should always be in touch with watching what your numbers do.

This practice can help you to not only convert more clients to care, increase retention, and reach more people, but also put more money in your pocket so you can live the lifestyle you deserve.

What are the benefits of a data-driven practice to both the DC and patients?

When you are data-driven and consistently trying to make systems and processes better, this will increase the experience for the patient. As you work on everything, from your new patient exam to increasing care compliance, the ultimate benefit is that your patients will get better results and you will see higher retention.

What are mistakes DCs should look to avoid?

One of the biggest issues we see is when chiropractors only focus on new patient acquisition and conversion. If you only focus on ways to increase your new patient numbers, you will forever be chasing people for care. When you rely on new patients, you inevitably will experience the whiplash of cash flow — good months and bad months.

This is why it is so important to look at all of the other data so that you can create predictable cash flow, increase retention, and get paid what you deserve for your care.

Putting data-driven marketing tools in place

Be sure that you have all the proper tools in place to help you be a data-driven marketing practice. Many platforms out there do the tracking for you.

Our EHR company merges your EHR with a marketing platform. It tracks every single one of the stats listed above plus all of your marketing stat strategies and allows you to view a comprehensive report. This takes out a ton of the work and allows you to focus on ways to fix the numbers vs. calculating them.