A step-by-step plan for transforming your practice without spending a lot
A step-by-step plan for transforming your practice without spending a lot of money
You already spend a lot of money on just having an office. That overhead alone can cut profit by at least 20%. That’s why this step-by-step plan for transforming your practice without spending a lot of money is a sure way to get help your practice grow without breaking the bank.
Why does the space you create matter?
Creating an effective and memorable sensory experience isn’t something that happens by accident. It can happen through minimal dollars spent and intentional effort. Building a memorable but aligned branded office experience for your patients is powerful. It has the power to define the experience of the indoor environment and can greatly affect the realization of your vision and the success of your practice.
More than just the aesthetics, creating a “modern” medical office is about veering away from traditional, cold, uninspiring medical spaces to a medical office that promotes warmth, intuition and space that your patients would feel comfortable to be in.
Creating a tactile and sensory experience that not only resonates with your patient and reinforces your brand is the silent hero of any positive patient experience.
It’s not active, it constantly works in the background but if done right – allows your team to carry out service efficiently and your patients are always made comfortable. Below are some ideas on how I helped a client level up their office.
Where do you start?
Prework: We wrote down each phase of the journey. This act as our constant when developing our list of possible changes to the environment. Think, what are your patients and prospective patients doing at this stage of the experience?
- Office Arrival: Main Entrance and Waiting Room
- Meeting with Provider: Treatment Rooms located Upstairs or Downstairs
- Stops along the way: Bathroom, blood pressure or weight areas, or side rooms
- Departure: What areas contribute to the departure of the patient
Next, we map it out together as a team and go from room to room.
Step 1:
We create a list of possible ideas to consider what the patient is doing and how we want to support that particular experience at the moment with the design of the office. Think about what activities the patient is doing in each room – the possible ways that interact with your brand or the environment. List all the possibilities.
Here is a quick list to get you started!
Sit down, Read Books/Magazines, Look around, Snack on Something, Drink Something, Talk with Receiptionist, and Hear Music.
Step 2:
Next: Do an audit of what is in each room and decide as a team, ” does this support the experience or does it take away from it?” For example with Cima Health, we removed all old magazines about soap stars and replaced them with healthy, nutrition, and wellness magazines.
Step 3:
Next, you can list “How can we improve?” and dump all of the ideas here. This is a great brainstorming session to do with your team with your branded keywords in mind. List the ways that we can shift the environment to relate more to the brand.
Step 4:
Next, you highlight the ones you want to implement first and assign roles, estimated budget, and due dates to those that are going to participate in the updates. We did this all in Asana. If you would like to work together on this, we would use the existing boards.
The Case Study:
In the case of Cima Health, we looked at several areas, What patients were looking at, reading, smelling, tasting, and hearing. We applied those same principles and benchmarked them against our feedback and our brand personality words. That inspired us to find solutions that would make the most impression.
- We added plants, and a graphic of the purpose statement and placed it on the wall across from the door.
- We changed the graphics on the outside of the windows and signage.
- We replaced and moved the graphics down so that patients were sitting in the chairs it was distracting to look outside. We added other graphics to the wall inside the Gym.
- We replaced old outdated posters with new branded posters that told the story of CIma Health and reinforced our brand position.
- We got bold and painted the brand colors, a striking purple color rather than the sterile white color that had been there before. We painted the walls in the hallways and redesigned and rearranged the storage and space so that it didn’t look cluttered. And replaced them with plants.
- We even set up new rules of engagement for our staff so we could keep the office looking in tip-top shape and brought everyone on the same page about what was acceptable when it came to where to store their belongings.
- We added a tv presentation that talks about the services, their team, and the new cohesive brand.
- We even added a “cima” scent for the office. It smells amazing!
- We added an inspirational card deck that highlights quotes that people can be inspired by when going to the bathroom along with some artwork that supports their brand statement.
To say the least, we left no stone unturned, and it paid off! Changing the work environment and patient experience had a significant impact on employee happiness, with satisfaction increasing by 27%. Increased communication, open and honest feedback, collaboration, and fun permeate the Cima Health culture that extends throughout the office and into the patient experience – all without costing a fortune!
Maybe you’re looking for a done-for-you package. Maybe you don’t have the time to involve your team. That’s fine! I have that option available as well! I come in as the brand consultant to provide an assessment with recommendations, purchase the new and updated upgrades, and set up all your brand-new practice designs within your budget.
About Michelle Roberts
President of Novus - Be Known, Inc.
