The Secret to Getting Big Results for Your Practice
I've helped a lot of practices become more fulfilling and profitable practices. Throughout that time, I've helped some practices make big transformations in a short period of time. I've also watched some practices struggle for long periods of time.
To some people's surprise, the difference between practices that succeed and those that struggle has nothing to do with ability. Having proven systems and strategies helps. The practices that have used the proven systems and strategies we teach get the benefit of years of experience from practices around the world. They get the benefit of learning from other people's mistakes—and successes. It's much easier to make progress when you know the systems and strategies have worked for others. But I've never met a practice leader who couldn't improve their practice. Every practice leader I've met has had the ability to lead incredible change to make their practice more fulfilling and profitable.
So why do some practices succeed while others struggle? Oftentimes, the answer is simple: The practices that struggle either do nothing or try to do too much at once. The practices that succeed do so begin by learning and taking action in small bits. Here are three reasons why learning and taking action in small bits has been the secret to success for so many practices.
Learning and Taking Action in Small Bits Gets Easier Buy-In
It's no secret that running a dental practice takes a lot of work—even more work than most businesses. With many businesses, owners spend all day managing the organization. Practice owners need to do all that work and often still treat patients.
It's not just practice owners who have so much on their plates. Team members have a lot of work, too. This is especially true for PPO practice team members, who must navigate insurance relationships and manage patient expectations regarding out-of-pocket costs.
With so many pressures on our time and energy, asking practice leaders and team members to implement big changes at once can be overwhelming. Asking them to learn one or two small changes for a short period of time makes it much easier to get team members on board. This is one of the reasons our 21-Day Marketing and Practice Growth Challenges have been so popular with practices. The idea of doing small daily challenges for three short weeks is a much smaller ask and something most people feel they can do.
Making Changes in Small Bits Helps Clarify Action Steps
If your only goal is a long-term one, it can be hard to know what to do in the short term. Longer-term goals tend to be bigger and have multiple moving parts. With those, it's hard to know what to do next. Continuing with the goal of increasing revenue, you could advertise, take CE to start performing more higher-fee procedures, network with local business owners, and more. Your options are endless.
But what if you decided to increase revenue over the next twenty-one days? That shorter-term goal limits the number of things you can do. And that forces you to be more strategic. If you wanted to double your revenue this month over last month, what could you do? You could call patients with unscheduled treatment plans and get them scheduled. And you can set up a whiteboard to get your team all on the same page for increasing productivity.
Small Changes Add up to Big Results
With your whole team bought in and working together, you will begin to see improvements right away. Those improvements will add up to big positive changes in your practice.
Nobody runs a marathon 26.2 miles at a time. They run it one step at a time. Eventually, those steps add up into miles and those miles turn into a marathon.
The same is true with changes in your practice. You can't double your annual revenue in one day. But you can increase productivity in a day. And you can increase it even more the next day, and the next, and so on. Over time, those little increases add up. If you want to get big results, start by taking small steps and making small changes.
Are you ready to make big improvements in your practice?
If so, start small. But start! If you want help, consider signing up for my next 21-Day Marketing and Practice Growth Challenge. We'll help you and your team get started taking small steps toward big improvements in just twenty-one days just like we've done with nearly 200 practices.
In just twenty-one days, they built relationships with other businesses in their community. They also broke through fears of video to connect with new and existing patients. They launched successful marketing campaigns and planned out marketing campaigns for the next year! And they created tremendous buy-in from their teams.
You can also sign up for the Delivering WOW Platinum Mastermind to get step-by-step guidance and coaching in all aspects of running a high-profit practice.
