Summary of this blog
- A clinic growth plan runs ads and search together for 90 days, reviewing each on a fixed day, so ads bring enquiries while search is built.
- Each phase ends with something you can check, up to one report on what a patient costs from each channel.
- At day 90, use the recorded spend and bookings from each source to plan the next quarter.
The two-column test
Write last month’s new patients in two columns, from an ad and from search, with what you spent under each. If you can fill both columns and both costs in ten minutes, you have a clinic growth plan. If you have one column, or two with no idea what either cost, you are guessing. When an ads agency and a search agency each send you a report, nothing puts the two side by side.
You pay for ads, you are building search, and you still cannot say what a booked patient costs you from either. A clinic growth plan fixes that: it runs ads and search together for 90 days and judges both on one number, what a booked patient costs.
An ad reaches a patient typing the treatment and your town this afternoon, and stops the day you stop paying. A page that ranks takes months to build, then keeps bringing patients with no bill for each click.
Say you sell a $900 treatment and have ten empty slots a week, worth about $9,000. Either channel earns its keep if a booked patient costs less than the treatment leaves after the clinician’s time and materials. Our guide to health and wellness marketing covers the wider plan, and our services page shows the work.
A clinic growth plan puts ads, search and booking costs in one report, so you can see where to spend next.
Days 1 to 15: a clinic growth plan starts with the page
The first fortnight produces one page and five numbers: new patients by source, what each cost, what each is worth over a year, the share of enquiries that booked, and the share of patients from each channel. A specialist counts all five in week one, from your diary, phone log, form inbox, ads account and agency invoice.
The gap to close, say ten slots a week at the treatment price, goes at the top, because every later phase is judged against that sheet.
The page comes second and matters more than any ad, because every click you buy lands on it. Rebuild the treatment page to answer price, treatment, proof and people on the first screen, with the booking button in view. At Healthora, a health and tech marketing agency, we saw one dental clinic grow bookings by 20% after a rebrand and website optimisation.
Day 15 gives you that sheet and a page you would send to a friend. Every claim and image on it is checked before it goes live. Our guide to health clinic landing pages covers the page block by block. This article is marketing guidance and never medical advice.
Days 16 to 45: turn the ads on and price every booking
The ads go on in week three, once the treatment page is ready. At day 45 you review the enquiries, bookings and spend so far, with a cost beside each booking. Two settings matter first, the radius and conversion tracking: one aims the ads, the other records which clicks became calls, forms or bookings. Our guide to Google Ads for clinics covers the rest of the account.
Google’s help page on targeting ads to locations explains that an ad can be shown within a radius of at least one kilometre of your clinic, to people physically in that area. So you pay mostly to be seen by patients who could drive to you this week. Google also says location targeting is not always exact, so the report checks where enquiries came from.
No ad runs until conversion tracking is in place, because an ad you cannot measure is a guess with a budget. Say the ads fill five of your ten slots a week at a cost the $900 treatment supports: that is one line of the day-45 report.
If a booking costs more than the treatment leaves, stop the ads and fix the page before buying another month. The exception is a treatment patients come back for, where the first booking can cost more, if your records show they do come back.
What a specialist sees in your 90 days
Half the budget on ads, half on search, and nothing tying them together?
Book a Growth Diagnostic, a paid, fixed-scope piece of work. In two to three weeks we count your five numbers, name where patients are lost and say what to fix first. The document is yours whether you work with us or not.
Book a Growth Diagnostic
Days 46 to 75: build search that keeps working
At day 75 you review the search work and look for its first enquiries, which carry no fee per click. Enquiries can only arrive this early if the slow channel was started on day one. That channel is a page per treatment with your town in its heading, a Google Business Profile in the clinic’s name, and reviews answered weekly.
Google’s help page on improving your local ranking says local results rest on relevance, distance and prominence, and that a better local ranking cannot be bought. Search is never free: the pages and the profile take writing, website work and updates, so count those costs when you compare the channels.
Our guides to local SEO for clinics and the Google Business Profile for clinics cover both in full. Each treatment page shows the price, the clinician, a few answered reviews and a booking button, and the profile lists the same treatments and hours.
At day 75 your report has an ads line and a search line, each showing bookings, cost and treatment value. The question changes from whether to run ads or search to how much of each.
Days 76 to 90: the clinic growth plan report
At day 90 you hold one report with both channels on it and one cost per booked patient across them. You make one decision from it: how to split next quarter’s budget between ads and search. If a line has no bookings yet, the report shows the spend and says the cost per booking cannot be worked out until it does.
Say the ads filled five of your ten slots by day 45, and search fills three more by day 90. Eight of the ten are now full, and three came through search. Compare those three against the writing and website time behind them before you call anything a saving. The ads shrink only as far as the recorded search bookings justify.
A clinic growth plan puts the cost per booking from ads beside the one from search. Use that to decide what to review next.
Ready to plan your next 90 days?
HEALTHORA IS A HEALTH AND TECH MARKETING AGENCY
Book a Growth Diagnostic, a paid, fixed-scope piece of work. We count your numbers and say what a 90-day clinic growth plan would change in your diary.
Book a Growth DiagnosticFrequently asked questions
What is a clinic growth plan?
A clinic growth plan is a 90-day plan that runs ads and search together and judges both on what a booked patient costs. Phase one fixes the page and counts five numbers. Ads are reviewed at day 45, search at day 75, and day 90 sets next quarter’s budget from one report.
Why run ads and search together instead of one at a time?
Ads can bring enquiries while you build unpaid search. The plan reviews both together, with their costs and bookings. The mix depends on your budget and the results recorded.
What should a clinic see by day 45?
The enquiries, bookings and spend so far, with a cost beside each booking. If bookings are below the goal, check the ads, the page, appointment availability and your follow-up before deciding the next change.
When does search start to bring patients?
Review search between day 46 and day 75. When the first enquiries arrive depends on your website, your competition and the work needed; a new site takes longer than an established one. Local results rest on relevance, distance and prominence, and a better ranking cannot be bought, so the channel is earned with a page per treatment, a profile in your clinic’s name and answered reviews.
What does the day-90 report show?
Five numbers, each split into an ads line and a search line, from new patients and cost per patient to the share from each channel. You use those to set next quarter’s budget, line by line.
What does a clinic growth plan cost with Healthora?
Fees depend on scope: a single-room clinic with one treatment needs less than a three-site group with no pages. The scope is set after a Growth Diagnostic, a paid two-to-three-week piece of work that ends in one document and one recommendation, yours whether you work with us or not.
Keep reading
More on the two channels this plan runs, and the pages it is built on: