chiropractic seminars

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Have you ever joined a chiropractic coaching group, only to find out you’re “required” or strongly encouraged to travel to a seminar every 6-8 weeks?

You know, the type of events with a few hundred chiropractors where they say scripted “cheers” and get really excited.

Not the once a year seminar where you can sometimes find decent content being taught by a variety of chiropractors.

I’m talking about the seminars run by coaching groups called “trainings” or “meetings”. The energy is high. You get really pumped up when the coach parades his “big guns” across the stage and tells you how good they are doing. Then you come back to the office on Monday with your notes and try to implement everything you learned.

This happened in multiple coaching groups I was a part of. I was told that coming to seminars every month would keep me on top of my game. Give me the latest strategies. (Which really meant sell me the latest outdated marketing products.)

I’ll never forget the last “coaching” seminar I went to…

The $2000 Tour of San Diego

A few years back, me and a buddy went to one of the “trainings” as part of the coaching program we were in. You had to attend at least 6 of their seminars a year, or you were kicked out.

We chose San Diego as one of the six to attend since I’d never visited there before. So I bought my plane ticket and reserved the hotel room, plus took money for food. It totaled up to over $2000.

But it was worth it right? Because I was going for 3 days of intensive training on how to grow my practice!

Unfortunately, we were late to the event, and missed all the “awards” that were passed out. After lunch, we grabbed our notebooks, a big cup of coffee, and arrived early for the breakout groups of 20-30 doctors.

Then it happened…

The coach walks in and asks to start numbering ourselves off (you know, like you did in grade school). I looked at my friend to see he had gotten the same number as me, and noticed he was trying his best to keep from laughing at this joke of a “training”.

The coach then told us we were going to get up in front of our group of 30 doctors and “role play our scripts”. I was a bit nervous. Not from the thought of speaking, but because I hadn’t memorized that script perfectly yet.

As we moved into another room, I looked for a seat by my friend to sit down. Strange..I couldn’t find him anywhere. Then it hit me…that sorry dog had skipped out of the session and gone up to his room!

I ran out, called him on his cell phone, and through much laughter, we decided to rent a car and see the sites.

By the time the weekend was over, we’d spent more time sampling the local food than we had in the seminar. When I came home and told my wife I’d paid $2000 to sit in a seminar for 5 minutes, she was more than ticked off!

Here’s my point…

Traveling out of state every 4-6 weeks can get very expensive when you’re not even recovering your investment. Most of these events end up being nothing more than rah-rah, cheerleading events or an excuse to pitch you more outdated marketing products.

Imagine the marketing you could do with the money spent going to seminars every month. That $2000 I spent going to San Diego would have brought in 15-20 new patients to my practice. Once I realized that, I never went to another of those seminars again.

(This post concludes the 5 Chiropractic Coaching Lies series. Thanks to all the doctors who’ve sent me positive comments. I only received one negative, so that tells you how these issues really strike a chord.)

It’s time for a change in the profession and
how coaches help chiropractors succeed.

On Tuesday Feb 24th, you’re going to a see a very exclusive coaching program (limited to only 50 chiropractors) that’s unlike anything else in chiropractic. There’s a huge focus on getting new patients, converting them to care, and keeping them as your patient. The first 6 clients to join will get a very special bonus.

And for all the doctors who’ve picked up my Ultimate Chiropractic Ads, you’re going to get credit towards any coaching. Look for the blog post early Tuesday morning.
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What strategies do you really need to focus on to build a bigger and more profitable practice this year?

Most chiropractic coaches and consultants have a specific “thing” they want you to work on. Many want you to work on your “report of findings” procedures. (In fact, most chiro coaches I had spent 90% of their time on ROF’s.) Others focus on retention and patient education.

But when you look at the big picture, there are really only 5 ways to make your practice more profitable in 2009. Small changes in even one of these 5 can make a huge difference in your practice. Change all 5 just 10% and you will see a doubling or even tripling of your practice this year.

1. More New Patients. Sounds simple right. Everyone knows you need more new patients to grow. Yet as simple as it sounds, it’s much more difficult to actually do. Old, rehashed marketing from the Mercedes 80’s is no longer working and many competitive areas make it difficult to market in. However, with laser targeted marketing you can still see huge return on investments. I gave you my 7 major new patient strategies in the last blog post, which you can see by clicking here.

If getting new patients is so important, why aren’t more consultants and coaches giving you tools to make this easier? (Read my recent rant about this entitled “Chiropractic Coaches: Where’s the beef?“)

#2. Better conversions. Once the new patients are in the door, now you have to convert them to some type of recommended care plan. The conversion process in chiropractic starts from the moment they call your office until the day they agree to a care plan and start paying you. Of the “5 Ways to Grow Your Practice” listed, this is the one that gets 90% of the attention in chiropractic circles. Go to any seminar and you’ll see days spent on how to do consultations, exams and reports. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s very important to have a good conversion process, but it is just 1/5 of the equation. Plus, I believe many of the larger “coaching groups” make the conversion process way more complicated than need be (and thereby less effective and more stressful than is necessary.)

#3. Increase the average $/visit. My first two years in practice, I felt like I was collecting good money per visit by converting patients to long term care plans. But one day I woke up and found out I was only collecting $17 per visit on average. No wonder I was about to go out of business. I was infuriated! After 2 years and $20,000 spent on coaching, plus pages of statistics compiled every month, why had I not been taught to look at this number before. Of course the fault was mine, but I never made that mistake again. Within 3 months I was collecting $57 average per visit. Eventually it got up to and stayed around $85-95 per visit.

**Here’s how you figure it. Take all your monthly collections and divide by the number of total visits you see (yes, even those “scholarships”). Ask yourself if you’re happy with that. Ask yourself if it truly values chiropractic. And if you have a coach and he hasn’t made you figure this, you really need to ask yourself why he would ignore such an important number from you.**

#4. Increase the number of visits per patient. You might call this retention or PVA (patient visit average). Many doctors will read this one and think it’s taken care of in step #2. “More conversions” above. However, we both know what you recommend a patient do and what they really do are two different things. That’s not being negative, that’s reality. And the sooner we face reality, the sooner we can do something about it. So, what can you do to ensure that patients follow through with their care plans and maintenance. Patient education? Sure, that’s important. But if you’ve read this blog for very long, you know I like specific action steps…Not broad generalizations like “You need to do more patient education!” or “You have to have more passion, energy and drive!” To increase the number of visits a patient has, you must have a good internal marketing plan where you communicate and build relationships with your patients.

Here are two articles where I gave 8 internal marketing strategies…

7 Internal Marketing Strategies Part 1

7 Internal Marketing Strategies Part 2

#5. Lower expenses. It’s not how much you collect in practice but what you take home that counts. This often overlooked strategy is rarely mentioned at any of the chiropractic seminars I’ve attended. However, it can make a huge difference in your bottom line. Other than taking home more money, by lowering your unnecessary expenses you can have more to spend on marketing. Are you carrying too much debt in your practice? (I recommend the Dave Ramsey plan for wiping out debt.) Spending too much on employees that don’t work? Blowing money on useless marketing that doesn’t produce? Paying too much (aren’t we all) in taxes?

Yes, this is a touchy subject, after all “No one has a right to tell me what to do with my money!” Maybe that’s why it’s not discussed at seminars. But, by cutting out the “fat”, your practice will be a lean, mean profitable machine.
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The Chiropractic Seminar Lie

The 5 Absolute Ways To Grow Your Practice