Did you know that one of the easiest and cheapest ways to increase the number of patients at your health center is through referrals from current patients?
Let’s do some quick math:
One primary care patient:
✅ Uses your health center 4 times yearly.
✖️ Your reimbursement for those visits is $200 (just to make the math easy).
🟰That's $800 per year per patient.
If one of those patients refers three friends during the year, that is $2400 in additional revenue (3 patients x $800 annual revenue).
Now, let's say 100 primary care patients refer 3 friends.
That's $240,000 in additional annual revenue that costs you nothing in advertising or marketing. Now imagine what those 300 referrals will spend at your pharmacy and other service lines. (hint: it's a lot of $$$$)
Referrals can equate to exponential growth in a very short amount of time.
So, how do you get patients to make referrals?
1️⃣ Well, the most important step is to provide excellent service. Happy patients will tell one or two friends about you without you needing to do much to get that referral. (if they're unhappy, they'll tell ten people, but that's for another conversation).
2️⃣ Next, ask patients to make the referral. Like any other customer, your patients will only know what to do if you tell them. And they'll be more likely to do it if you give them something back in return. For example, if a patient refers someone to your dental clinic, they can get a free tube of teeth whitening gel, or if they refer someone to your pharmacy, they can get a free gas or grocery card worth $20.
3️⃣ Make It Easy: Give out business-size cards with a referral message and a link to schedule an appointment. Ensure your intake forms have a "Referred by:" line and a system to track and reward referrals.
The key to growing your revenue is getting more patients. Referrals are a great way to increase unique patient numbers quickly. You just need to do it intentionally and watch the numbers tick up.
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