Lead
A prospective patient’s contact that the clinic receives from advertising, the website, social media or a referral: a name and number, a form, a message. A lead is not yet a patient, just an opportunity to handle.
≈ leads · sales lead · patient lead · incoming lead
Leads in a private clinic
Marketers usually report in leads: how many enquiries came from advertising and what each one cost. For a clinic owner that is not enough. A lead turns into revenue only when the front desk replies quickly, books the person in, confirms the visit and guides them to a decision on treatment.
So cost per lead on its own tells you little. Patient acquisition cost is more useful: advertising spend over a period divided by the number of people who came in and paid for treatment in the same period. Cheap leads that nobody followed up end up being the most expensive ones.
Where leads get lost
- Slow first reply: while the receptionist is busy, the person messages another clinic.
- Website and ad-form leads go to an inbox nobody checks in time.
- Asked about price, the receptionist quotes a figure and goes quiet, without offering a consultation.
- No follow-up: if the person did not answer the first time, they are forgotten.
- Marketing and the front desk argue about ‘lead quality’, but nobody has listened to the call recordings.
Before changing the ads, check how leads are handled: how long it takes to reply, what share of leads book and what happens to those who do not. Often the problem is not the leads but what happens to them once they arrive. You can estimate what this costs in the loss calculator.