← Med Spa Success Strategies
Med Spa Success Strategies
Wednesday Thoughts: Med Spa Devices - Only Buy What You Believe In
00:07:54
Loading summary
Transcript1 lines
- [00:00]
A
Hey, MedSpa owners. I wanted to talk today about devices. I think this is something that comes up over and over again on our podcast and discussions with other consultants and strategists and people that we trust, and also just anecdotally in our experience working with clients. I had a podcast interview last week with Ben Hernandez from Skytail Group, and this came up again and it's been on the top of my mind. And I wanted to record this for our Wednesday Thought series. So many times I see practice owners with devices try to fit a square peg into a round hole. They see the business opportunity, they see dollar signs, and they get excited. And as a result, they dish out hundreds of thousands of dollars, usually in the form of a loan, in the hopes that they're going to boost and generate a bunch of revenue for their practice. And what happens so many times is that you get that new device, you start trying to sell that device, you go to your marketing agency, you get them to run ads for the device, and the results are lackluster. And I think that's something that happens over and over and over again. We just talked to a client that's launching a big med spa out on the west coast and they came to us wanting to talk about a device purchase. And they're very business savvy. And their original idea with this was, hey, this is going to be like a gateway drug to our med spa. We're going to use this for low cost leads to generate foot traffic through the door that we can cross sell and upsell into other services. And after we went through analysis of the stuff that we've tried and the conversations we've had with other people that we trust, they realize that it's probably the opposite of the truth. The reality is, for so many of you, your lasers and your devices are something that are primarily going to serve as an upsell or cross sell to your existing client base. And this is something that Ben, who's in the mergers and acquisitions space, so he deals with what are the most successful med spas look like that are profitable and are candidates for acquisition. And this is one of the things that he sees over and over again. So when we're talking about not only boosting the value and profitability of your med spa, but also giving you peace of mind as an owner, that you're diversified, that you have recurring revenue that you can put in your head, your head on the pillow at night, knowing that your business is healthy, I think from all available evidence, the best way to do that is to Treat your devices and your lasers as something that's designed to match the demand of your existing clients and, and your existing market. If you've got people that are a bunch of your existing clients asking you for a service, that might be a good indication that it's something to consider incorporating into your practice. If all you're doing is grabbing a device that's super expensive because you think it's got enormous upside in terms of the potential financial impacts, because that's what the device rep has told you, I think that can be very dangerous and we see this happen over and over and over again. A few other things on devices here, you want a device that your providers really believe in and that your patients love. If your device or your laser does not provide an outstanding result that patients love, don't do it. It goes back to fitting a square peg into a round hole. If you don't have high customer satisfaction on that device, you're not going to have retention, you're not going to have referrals, you're not going to have word of mouth growth. Your providers aren't going to believe in it, so they're going to be hesitant to talk about it and to recommend it. So above all, make that you and your team believe in the device, the laser product that you're incorporating into your practice. If you don't believe in it, you're not going to be effective in terms of selling it to your existing patients. So I hope that's really helpful. I know this is a popular topic. So many of you are, are purchasing devices, maybe are already robust in terms of device sales and it can be really successful, especially if it's used as a supplementary revenue source to sell more services that complement your core offerings. That can be great, right? You've got a bunch of Botox clients that want microneedling as an add on to get better results. Amazing. But to do this in a, in a reverse order can be really, really detrimental to your med spa. So I would encourage you do things you believe in. Make sure that it's, it's meeting the demand of your market. You're not going to rely on those to generate cold traffic. That's probably not going to be the most effective gateway drug and the entry point into your med spa. Most of these devices and lasers, they have relatively low brand recognition. There's not a lot of proactive search demand them and it's going to be harder to market them at a cost effective rate. Now this can still work. I've used this example a few times. I talked to a practice in New Jersey that spends $40,000 a month on meta ads, and they generate $200,000 a month in revenue on CoolSculpting. But they basically have to go back to the well and do that every month because those patients are generally not retained at a high rate. So going back to my conversation with Ben, you know, if you're looking at acquisition, that revenue is coming and gone. You have to go back to the drawing board to generate the revenue each and every month. And that carries more risk. So not only in terms of valuation and potential saleability of your med spa, but also just in terms of peace of mind and operations. When you build a med spa, Ben's, Ben's number that he referenced was 50 to 60% injectables. And when you do that, you have confidence that a large percentage of your revenue is operating under a recurring revenue model. People are coming back, you know, every few months for service to maintain a result in perpetuity that's really advantageous. So, again, it can work. But if you want to, if you want to market lasers, it absolutely can work. There's a time and a place for it. Some of these things have low consumables and high margins. But to do it effectively as the gateway drug and to advertise as the first touch point for, for a prospect, you're going to have to have incredibly aggressive price points. Because with these devices, there's not a perceived differential in outcomes. Meaning if I'm coming to get CoolSculpting or BBL, you know, I'm assuming that there might be a little bit of provider skill involved. That very well might be true. But in terms of the percept, most people see it as apples to apples. So if they find a reputable med spa that's offering that service at a lower cost, they're probably going to go there for these services. So in order for it to be effective from an ad standpoint, you've got to be really competitive in terms of your price points and your offers. You're going to accept a high customer acquisition cost, so you're dramatically shrinking the ratio or the difference between cost of customer acquisition and revenue generated. And that money generally comes and goes because there's not a ton of retention on some of these devices. Now, if you've got a device or a product line that's got better retention inherently, great. Consider that a checkbox in the positive column. But all this to say, when it comes to lasers and devices, avoid squid fitting a square peg into a round hole. Don't get dollar signs in your eyeballs and make decisions that way. Make sure that you're, you're putting forward and incorporating things into your practice that you and your team believe in, that your patients love and your patients are asking for. I think that's going to make it a lot easier and a lot more seamless to generate high profitability from the devices and lasers that you bring into your spa. Thanks and we'll see you on the next one. This episode is brought to you by Med Spa Magic Marketing, my agency. We help med spas and aesthetics practices grow with more effective marketing strategies. And I know that's a vague phrase, right? That's a vague claim. So I have an offer for you. I offer this to any new prospects if you're interested in exploring any of them. Another marketing option, a new agency, or just getting into Facebook, Instagram, Google Ads for the first time. I'd love to show you why we're different, what we're doing for clients. And we can do that via a one and a half hour planning session where I'll outline a specific marketing plan and I'll give you all of the blueprints that we would implement if we were to do business together. Now, you can take that, use that on your own, hire someone else to help you execute it or work with us. We really don't hold anything back on that strategy call. And I think you'll have a lot of confidence in how you manage your marketing investment moving forward, understanding some of the nuances that can help you implement more effective marketing strategies for your business. So if you want to do that, you can go to medspamagicmarketing. Com.