On October 2, 2007, we will celebrate our 40th year in practice. To celebrate, we have a number of different activities occurring during the 40 days leading up to the anniversary. Among the activities during this celebration, we are acknowledging practice members who have been coming to our office on a regular basis for 20 years or more by hanging their name in our front room. We’ve designed 51/2 by 81/2 papers (see right) with trophies on them that say “Outstanding Lifetime Practice Members.” As active practice members come in during these 40 days, we note their original starting date (which is a part of their case number in our office). Those who qualify have their individual names and the years they have been coming into our office written at the bottom of the trophy which is then hung on our wall. (An active practice member is someone who has been in at least once within the past month).
I had no idea how many people would fall into that category. If I had, I would have done it differently because we used an unbelievable amount of colored ink printing out these little slips of recognition. The walls of our front room are now completely covered and the slips now extend down the hallway. Over three-week period, we have had over 270 honorary practice members who have been recognized for coming over 20 years. Of that number, 94 of them are practice members who have been coming for over 30 years on a regular basis. I share this with you not to brag. In fact, I am humbled by the number of people who have placed their confidence in our office for that long a period.
I do not consider myself an extraordinary adjustor. I do not have a charismatic personality. So what is the reason for this kind of statistic? Well, people know that I feel strongly about the benefit of what I do and we make chiropractic care affordable to the people who come to the office. However, I believe the most important reason why that many people have come that long is because we see the importance of our practice members understanding what chiropractic is and how it can benefit them and their family by coming regularly for a lifetime.
I believe there is a difference between practice building and practice sustaining. There are a lot of things you can do to build a practice, but to build a practice and then sustain it, making hundreds of people want to come weekly for years and years, that’s something else. Unless you find ways to keep people coming on a lifetime basis, you are going to find yourself in practice building mode 25 or 30 years from now. Perhaps you want to keep building your practice forever. I hope you do. Still, it should be a matter of wanting to do it, not having to do it. We have some ideas that we have used to help sustain our practice. This month’s special can help you implement a few of them.