As a cash practice owner, you’re likely busier than ever. You’re working hard, but does it feel like you’re not making the growth you expected? Many owners struggle because they’re tackling everything without focusing on what really drives growth. Today, we’re diving into how you can make smarter, more strategic decisions to boost productivity without burning out.
Why "Busy" Isn’t Always Better
We often hear that success in business comes from being busy, checking off a never-ending list of tasks. But here’s the truth: busy doesn’t always mean productive. If you’re using sticky notes and to-do lists without prioritizing, you’re probably spending time on tasks that don’t move the needle. To truly grow your practice, you need to learn to prioritize tasks that make a real impact.
The Framework to Identify High-Leverage Decisions
So, how can you identify which tasks will truly make a difference? It starts with understanding what you should track and how to make informed decisions. The first step is recognizing the constraints in your practice and using those constraints as a guide for where to focus your efforts.
Key Metrics to Track in Your Practice
The first step is identifying your KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). Here’s what you need to focus on when you’re starting out:
Call to Evaluation Booking Rate
Evaluation to Plan of Care Conversion Rate
These two metrics can make a big difference as you scale your practice. By tracking these regularly, you’ll know where you’re performing well and where you need to improve.
The Importance of Healthy Habits
As business owners, it’s easy to neglect ourselves. However, your personal habits play a big role in your practice’s success. For example, getting enough sleep and exercising regularly helps manage stress and improves decision-making. Without healthy habits, it becomes difficult to stay on top of the business tasks that matter.
Organizing Tasks: The ICE Framework
Once you’ve tracked your core metrics, you need a system for prioritizing tasks. This is where the ICE framework comes into play:
Impact: What is the potential percentage increase this task will have on your business?
Confidence: How confident are you that you can implement this task successfully?
Ease: How easy is it to execute this task?
You rate each task based on these three criteria, and the one with the highest score should be your focus.
Using Data to Make Decisions
Tracking the right metrics isn’t enough—you also need to make sense of that data. For example, if your goal is $10,000 in monthly revenue, you need to know exactly how many leads and conversions you need to achieve that goal.
Let’s break it down:
If your package costs $1,500 and your close rate is 85%, you’ll need about 15 leads per month to reach your goal.
From there, use the data to forecast what happens if you improve key metrics like your click-through rate, booking rate, or lead generation.
With these insights, you can decide which metric will have the biggest impact on your growth and focus your efforts on improving that metric.
Focusing on One Constraint at a Time
When you identify a constraint in your practice, it’s critical to focus on that one thing before moving to the next. Spreading yourself too thin by tackling multiple problems at once can waste time and lead to burnout.
In the early stages, you may have to build a baseline and juggle multiple tasks, but once your business is running smoothly, focus on solving one constraint at a time. For example:
If you’re generating leads but have a low close rate, focus on improving your sales conversion before scaling lead generation.
If your retention rate is low, prioritize improving patient visits per care plan before working on lead acquisition.
The Importance of Forecasting and Projections
In order to make the best decisions for your practice, you need to look beyond just the data. By forecasting the impact of different strategies, you can make more informed decisions.
For example, improving your click-through rate by just 1% may have a $50,000 impact on your revenue over time. The key is to forecast and project how small changes in your metrics can lead to big changes in your bottom line.
Conclusion: Aligning Your Goals and Prioritizing the Right Tasks
Ultimately, the key to success in your cash practice is prioritization. By using frameworks like ICE and tracking KPIs, you can make informed decisions that will actually move your practice forward. Focus on improving one thing at a time and ensure that your actions align with your long-term goals. Doing so will reduce stress and lead to more predictable, sustainable growth.
Watch and Listen to the Full Video
For a deeper dive into a cash physical therapists’ journeys, make sure to listen to the full video: Busy Isn’t Better: The Strategic Growth Plan Every Cash Based PT Needs.
About Author:
Although the company eventually failed, it provided Jordan with invaluable learning experiences. He became passionate about designing world-class patient experiences and building efficient marketing & sales funnels for cash physical therapists. Utilizing this expertise, Jordan became the CMO of a well-known physical therapy media company, and consulted for and built marketing funnels for some of the top physical therapy business coaches.
Eventually growing tired of the typical agency and consulting grind, Jordan, alongside Max Zirbel, founded Clinical Marketer. They infused it with the hands-on support and mentorship that they benefited from in their initial venture. The company was a success from the start, aiding clinics in scaling to 6 and 7 figures in revenue. During its first launch, Jordan and his team met Dr. Ben Bagge, whom they later partnered with after helping him grow his business from $200K/year to over $1M/year in three years.
