A new vision and different strategy for IVF centers to thrive beyond 2018 - Fertility Bridge (2023)

VonGriffin Jones

Part 2 of aFour part series on the key business challenges facing fertility centers as they transform from "small clinic" to "entrepreneurial company".

We could criticize REI grantees for not wanting to take over existing IVF practices, but they are making the same decision that current practice owners have been making for decades. They choose to become doctors and not CEOs. At that time, founding an independent practice did not yet mean founding a trading company. The difference is that new doctors know they can't get away with it today.

In Part 1 of our series on the transformation of today's fertility practice from a "small, independent healthcare practice" to an "entrepreneurial company"we talked about the outdated business structure of the traditional model. Now, in Part 2, let's talk about how leadership at the top of this structure dramatically affects a fertility center's ability to do business today, let alone tomorrow. We will discuss eight critical elements of the vision and strategy and examine in depth those that IVF centers typically struggle with the most.

A new vision and strategy for fertility centers

We mentioned that the practice director is in charge of an IVF clinic, wherethe manageris entrusted with the overall responsibility for the creation, planning, implementation and implementationIntegration of the strategic directionan organization. But what happens when infertility clinics don't have a clear vision? Here are some real life examples:

• A partner wishes to sell their interest in the practice to a private equity firm, but their partner wishes to remain independent.

• The practice director wants to increase fertility preservation, but the rest of her team knows very little about this initiative.

• Practices jump from one marketing project to the next, wasting time and money by not letting their advertising work towards their vision.

• Business development projects are started and abandoned because practices have few benchmarks and consequently do not accurately measure whether they are moving towards their goal.

"Hope is not a strategy" - Rick Page

Are any of these issues consistent with your practice? We have accepted that the head of our company, director, founder, CEO, president or whatever we call it, has responsibilities that go well beyond the role of physician and even medical director and practice director. Now visionaries can run their practices in such a way that we can optimally care for their patients and grow. The leader of a company identifies, articulates and plans his

• core values

• Core focus

• 10 year goal

• Marketing strategy at a high level

• 3 year picture

• 1 year plan

• Quarterly Priorities

• subjects

All of these principles are essential, with priority starting at the top of the list. Some we will link to external sources for further reading as we need to spend more time on the most common principles that fertility clinics struggle with.

1). core values

I bet your values ​​are far more compelling than the average company's. After all, you have made a professional commitment to helping loving parents create life. ButHow do you articulate your values?to your team, to patients and to the public? We work in a field that is both changing society and changing society fast. How do we stay true to who we are and what we believe in while adapting? When core values ​​are true and defined, leaders make hiring decisions that allow them to delegate responsibility and feel confident that their practice is in good hands.

2). Core focus

Your why and your what. Purpose, passion and cause combined with your niche. The more closely aligned employees are to core focus and values, the more prepared they are to make decisions in the best interests of the practice and the fewer practice owners need to micromanage.

3). 10 year goal

Where you want to be in ten years is the goal from which the further roadmap is drawn. Here, fertility centers often get off track. Would you like to open more offices or laboratories? Do you want to attract patients from overseas? Would you like to pilot a technological solution? You may find that we cannot move on to the next core principle of vision and planning, high-level marketing strategy, until we have solid long-term goals.

In the same week, I received two calls from two different fertility doctors asking the same question: "How much money should I spend on marketing?"

A million dollars. A few thousand dollars. My answers to each of them were completely different.

The first doctor was in his early sixties. He works for a larger practice group and does some marketing for himself. He wants to do seven or eight more egg retrievals a month. He plans to retire in the next two years.

The second doctor just completed his REI board certification in the United States. He's in his early thirties. He wants to return to Latin America to open a large IVF center that will attract patients from the US, Canada and Europe.

These are two very different long-term goals that will dramatically affect who they will hire, how they will build on patient feedback, and how they will market. The 10-year goal may be the most measurable differentiator between visionary entrepreneurs and independent physicians. Fertility groups without a defined long-term goal find themselves guided by the demands of the day rather than focusing their resources on becoming who they want to be.The founder of the Entrepreneurial Operating System (EOS), Gino Wickman,says 10-year goal is not the time to be conservative. Dream big for the best version of yourself and your practice.

4). Marketing strategy at a high level

Do we know whom we want to serve and what we mean to them? Has our 10-year goal been defined? Great. Our high-level marketing strategy includes everything it takes to get there within our core values ​​and core focus. It describes our

• Goals (obtained from 10 year goal, 3 year picture and 1 year plan)

• Benchmarks

• Unique Marketing Position (obtained from Core Values ​​and Core Focus)

• practice brand

• Content Strategy

• Sales strategy (advertising)

Benchmarks

Many practices want to jump straight into marketing without having reliable benchmarks or key performance indicators (KPI) to plan their strategy. Without them, money and effort can be wasted. If you've ever spent money on advertising and aren't sure of the results, double-check your KPIs. Do you have access to all or some of them?Essential indicators?

• Conversion of new patient to IVF

• Phone call to convert new patients

• Online contact forms for new patients

• Cost per new patient

• value of patient lifetime

  (Video) A Generation at War

• Cost pro Lead

We are data-driven marketers. Results must be measured as accurately as possible. If you need help calculating yourEssential indicators, read Chapter 2 ofThe ultimate guide to fertility marketing.

Marke

If you feel like you can't trust your staff or marketing partners with your message, you may need to document your practice's brand. In theMidwest International Reproduction Symposium (MRSi)in June 2018 I will give a branding workshop for fertility centers with a branding expert,Mara Lucato. Here is a little insight into my thesis.

The brand is known to the people we serve: how and why we help them with their problems. Logos, color schemes, and slogans may or may not be relevant as they help us achieve that goal.

In our case, we have a community of people that desperately needs our help. In many cases they don't know who we are or how we can help them. Our brand and high-level marketing strategy involves giving them as much value as possible and then making it as easy as possible for them to do business with us. It contains

• Connect them to peer and professional support

• you educate

• you encourage

• stand up for them

It is our responsibility to ensure that everyone in our region knows that infertility is a common medical problem. That people struggling with infertility are human and their problem is human.
They need to know that we are the ones who will help them. This is the brand of a fertility center.

Content and Promotional Strategy

A fertility practice's high-level marketing strategy activates their brand by delivering their message across the platforms where patients spend their time and attention. The platforms and thus the methods are changing. 15 years ago, creating an infertility support blog was a game changer. 10 years ago, a Facebook page was a great way to reach new people. Three years ago there was neither Instagram Stories nor Facebook Live. Today, they are among the best ways to connect with potential patients. Four years from now there will be new tactics and some of our current marketing efforts will be less relevant. A high-level marketing strategy allows us to align our marketing efforts with tactics that are relevant to the attention of the people we serve.

5). 3 years picture

The 3-year picture and the 1-year plan enlarge the 10-year goal. Where are we in three years? What is our turnover? How many IVF cycles do we do? How many doctors are employed? Just as practices often don't have a 10-year goal, the three-year picture has the same meaning and only gets closer to bridgingvisibility and traction.

6). 1 year plan

Fertility centers often have annual volume goals, but are they set before the start of the year? Are they realistic?

7). Quarterly Priorities

Again, fertility practices often go awry. Do we have three to seven quarterly priorities that need to be met this quarter? Are we meeting priorities that move our company toward its one-year plan, three-year plan, and ten-year goal? Or are we drowning in everyday issues?

8th). subjects

As a fertility specialist or practice manager, you never have to deal with matters in quadrant 1, do you? Yes, exactly. Fertility centers live in quadrant 1. Employers who put their employees and managers to work in quadrant 4 should go to jail (joke... am I?). Work of minor importance and urgency saps people's energy and happiness. Most of the responsibilities in quadrant 4 can be eliminated by definition. Let the software do the rest.

Now we are left with quadrants 2 and 3. As a practice owner or manager, with your very limited time remaining, what do you prioritize from quadrant 1 between “urgent and not important” and “important and not urgent”? It's quadrant 3, isn't it? We often worry about things that are not important but need to be done immediately. That's not to say that issues in Quadrant 3 don't need to be addressed, but that's what we do to address them. By prioritizing issues in Quadrant 2, we solve them. Visionaries who align their organizations with Quadrant 2 make Quadrant 3 less relevant and Quadrant 1 less overwhelming.

Paint the picture, chart the course

With a clear vision and strategy, fertility centers know exactly what their goals are and how to achieve them. Without it, practices frustrate their team members, drain resources and lose market share to competing IVF centers. Whether you want to be the largest fertility preservation company in the world or happily do 150 egg retrievals a year and take great care of your patients, there is no right or wrong answer. Their core values, core focus, and 10-year goal inform their high-level marketing strategy, 3-year vision, 1-year plan, quarterly priorities, and problem-solving. When practices follow a strategy to an engaged vision, they are prepared for the powerful competitors and challenges they pursue. And just in time, because there are plenty of them. We'll talk more about this in Part 3 of our series on the tectonic shift from medical clinic to entrepreneurial enterprise.

If you need help building your practice's high-level marketing strategy, learn more about the Fertility Marketing Blueprint below.