Elevating your Aesthetic Clinic

Dr Bonny Armstrong looks at the role of luxury in enhancing the patient experience

DR BONNY ARMSTRONG

Dr Bonny Armstrong is an award-winning aesthetic doctor and medical director at the Dr Bonny Clinic in Belfast. Dr Armstrong attended Liverpool Medical School, gaining her medical degree before training for two years as a junior doctor in Leeds. She is the cofounder of AesthetiDocs, a booking and documentation system for the aesthetics industry.

In the fast-evolving industry of aesthetic medicine, where artistry meets science, patients are guided and influenced by you, your clinic, and your reputation. Creating an ethos that excels is important for establishing and growing your aesthetic clinic in a saturated market. Understanding that the experience you provide is as essential as the treatments you offer will elevate your clinic above others, so how can you best captivate your patients at every step of the journey?

Adding luxury isn’t just about lavish décor or having a prestigious clinic; luxury can be added to any clinic, big or small, and involves creating an immersive experience from the moment a client walks through the door or has an encounter with your clinic. From the ease of booking and the way you communicate to the music selection and lighting, every detail combines to form the patient experience.

1. BRANDING AND BRAND IDENTITY

Before your patients encounter you or your clinic, ideas, thoughts, and expectations are built around your brand, reputation, and online presence. It is important to portray your clinic and brand as an embodiment of a cohesive and captivating identity that resonates with your ethos as an aesthetic practitioner.

Your brand identity is the cornerstone of your whole clinic- establishing a logo and colour scheme is a vital step to infusing luxury into your clinic and should echo through to your clinic interior, website, uniform, social media presence and communication with your patients. Your brand will become a symbol of trust and exclusivity, instantly recognisable and associated with the care and experience you provide.

A clinic’s online presence is becoming increasingly important and is usually the first interaction a patient will have with you and your services. A well-designed website can be expensive but is seen as a reflection of prestige and becomes a gateway, showcasing treatments, expertise, knowledge, and skill. Social media platforms, when aligned with the clinic brand’s identity, provide a visual storyboard for patients and are a great way to showcase you, your personality, your clinic and what you have to offer compared to others in the industry.

Patients are drawn to consistency, relatability and trust, and a well-established online narrative of your medical profession and background provides a strong presence. In essence, a cohesive brand identity in the clinic and online is the foundation upon which an aesthetic clinic’s luxury stands.

2. YOUR CLINIC’S AESTHETIC

Your clinic’s aesthetic and interior design are paramount in creating an atmosphere of luxury. A refined colour palette that matches your brand gives the impression of professionalism, continuity, and harmony. Patients will have an expectation of your clinic from your online presence, website, or social media. Ensuring your clinic interior matches or exceeds your patients’ expectations will immediately instil reassurance and trust.

Creating waiting areas for patients is important, it ensures both privacy and flow to your clinic and your patients will feel respected and comfortable in your premises. While your patients wait for their appointment at your clinic, look at adding details to your waiting room that set the scene of luxury. This can be flowers, books, product displays, candles, or diffusers. Each corner should be designed with purpose, promoting an emotion or experience for your patient.

Investing in your clinical room is also important, patients will feel nervous and anxious as they proceed for a treatment. Ensure you have an open airy room that includes a consultation space, bedside tables, mirrors, tissues, and anything that will make a patient feel comforted. Investing in a luxurious or electronic beauty bed can create both physical relaxation and psychological reassurance to patients as they enter a clinic room and is a great investment for any clinic. Ensuring the room is well-lit but exudes warmth will again help patients feel relaxed.

3. YOUR CLINIC COMMUNICATION AND ATTIRE

Communication with your patients is written/verbal as well as visual and involves not only what you say, but how you are dressed and how you interact.

Ensuring excellent communication with patients sets the tone for the experience and patient journey within your clinic. A united and branded team appearance immediately establishes a sense of exclusivity and professionalism – look at ensuring you and your team are wearing a uniform that can be embroidered with names or logos. Aesthetic scrubs are a great uniform investment and tiedback hair ensures a polished and tidy presentation. You can look at adding charm or glamour to your uniform by implementing a lipstick colour, a hair accessory or shoe colour that aligns with your brand and that stands out.

Through your written communication in-clinic, personalised email interactions with tailored touches reflect a commitment to individualised care and make your patients feel known and heard. Ensuring you are using your patient’s name with all communication methods and using a thoughtful email sign-off add warmth and a genuine touch that resonates with clients on a personal level. Inside your clinic, reducing patient anxiety and surpassing expectations from the offset is important. A first impression and greeting should be warm and friendly and using the patient’s first name sets the tone for a bespoke experience. Making a note of patient conversations, holidays, pets, or upcoming events and returning to these conversations when patients re-book to the clinic makes your patients feel valued and creates a sense of privilege.

4. SMALL TOUCHES OF LUXURY

Transforming your clinic into a place of luxury means looking at the small details and incorporating subtle touches that enhance the clinic experience and give a lasting first impression. Luxury clinics will scrutinise the small details and it is important to recognise these within your own premises.

As your patients step into your clinic, the use of scents, aromatic oils or diffusers can create an instant sense of relaxation and indulgence. The sense of smell will be one of the first senses triggered in your patients. Ensuring a fresh or spa-like scent will evoke an immediate sensation of luxury and opulence as they enter your clinic.

Offering bottled water, tea, or coffee upon arrival pampers your patient from the outset and can add a personalised and comforting touch.

Relevant displays of leaflets, products, awards, or certificates, not only offer information but serve as a visual reassurance of professionalism and commitment to education. You can mix your clinic displays with friendly notices, beautiful ornaments, fine art, or fresh flowers to ensure the atmosphere is not too clinical but conveys warmth, care, and refinement. The interplay of these small elements creates an experience you want to portray to your patients.

5. USE TECHNOLOGY TO ELEVATE YOUR CLINIC

Embracing a software-based system for booking and documentation instead of paper files and notes creates an immediate sense of modern elevation. By replacing your paper processes with a sleek iPad or tablet, clinics can instantly portray an image of innovation and sophistication.

Patients associate luxury with effortless, convenient, and successful experiences. Ensuring patients have that freedom and luxury of choice through an online booking system provides them with that essence. Bespoke aesthetic management software such as AesthetiDocs can be found at a reasonable monthly price (from £25/month) and elevates your clinic’s operations from the patient’s first point of contact.

Automating personalised reminders and notifications to patients using their name and appointment details demonstrates attentive care. Software systems can send patients Happy Birthday notifications from your clinic name and offer gifts or discounts to use on their birthdays. Meticulously branded pre-information and aftercare sheets sent directly to your patient based on their treatment accentuates the feeling of exclusivity, mirroring the level of attention clients expect from luxury establishments.

Using a clinic management system and technology within your clinic provides a bespoke, attentive, and innovative approach to managing patients without manually having to do so. In this digital era, where convenience and personalisation are sought, it is a functional luxurious addition to any clinic wanting to excel.

Generating long-term patients through luxury A luxury experience allows patients to shed their stresses, build trust and enjoy a treatment that makes them feel and look good. The true magic of luxury lies in the ability of your clinic to do this for your patients and be rewarded with loyalty and longevity from those you treat. When patients are immersed in an experience that treats them not as a number or a visitor, but as individuals, your patients will feel valued and understood. This establishes patient-practitioners rapport and connections, and on each return, the memory of your clinic’s luxury experience reinforces how you made your patient feel within your presence and your company.

The path to patient loyalty and longevity can be accelerated through the elegance of luxury. It is through the commitment to offering luxury within clinics that patients continue to return and will recommend your clinic to others. Clinic legacies are built on ensuring the patient experience is a priority, how you make your patients feel from start to end will leave a lasting impression.