Are you planning your New Year campaign?

I know you want to stop already; Christmas is almost here, and you are ready for the time off. But before you stop, you must do this!

Planning your New Year offer is essential right now. Waiting until the new year is too late. If there is ever a time of year to do a New Patient campaign, the new year is it. But with all the good intentions of doing the work between Christmas and New Year, we all know this is set for failure.

So here is my simple formula for a great new year campaign.

This is an objective that makes everyone a winner, from your current patients to the new patients and including the team. The idea is to structure the campaign in a way that everyone benefits. So how do we do this? Easy, simply include each of the following three parts for the win!

1.       Discounted New Patient.
This is the only time of year I do a half price offers. This is only for patients who have the referral voucher of the New Year campaign. This is an incentive for the new patient to book an appointment, and therefore a win for them.

2.       Prize draw for the current patient.
Choose a great prize, don’t be cheap, make it worth a win. It could be £100 voucher for a restaurant or a big goodie hamper. Whatever you choose, your patients are going to want to work for it. So, what happens here is that the current patients are given vouchers to give to prospective patients (their friends and family). When a new patient books with that voucher, they must mention who gave them the voucher. This then puts the current patient of yours in the draw to win the prize. The more people who book in off them giving vouchers the more entries they have. A win for your current patients.

3.       Team bonus.

And finally, your team need a piece of the pie. Choose a number of new patient bookings as a target. Let’s say 20, and if 20 new people book in off this incentive, give a cash bonus to the team. This could be £50 or £100 each. Hence the team win too.

Now I can hear some of you saying, hold on, that is expensive! I would say to the contrary. Think what one patient has the potential to bring you? This is known as the lifetime value of your patients. But for arguments sake let’s say it is £600. If just one person converts to care after this campaign, it will pay for itself. Don’t be cheap, you have to invest to win.

So there you have it, simple and effective. Time to go to work. Here is your checklist to make it easier.

1.       What’s the discounted New Patient price and how long will you run the offer?

2.       Design and print vouchers.

3.       Choose a bonus for the team. And choose a target.

4.       Discuss and role play giving out vouchers and explain bonus structure to your team in the next meeting.

5.       Go to work and make it happen.

With love,

Tom