It’s a crowded marketplace out there—even for medical practices. Finding a niche can be a way of helping you to stand out from the crowd. It can allow you to target a specific audience and tailor your marketing around this audience. But just what type of niche should you focus on? This article delves into a few tips on how to find your niche as a medical clinic. 

When initially setting up a medical clinic, most people will look at their experience and qualifications and use this overall expertise to help them find their niche. For example, if you’ve got experience at an eye clinic or have studied ophthalmology deeply, it makes sense to focus on eye health. The expertise of the staff you hire is also important to consider when choosing a niche.

While there are likely to be fewer people in your local area with a rare condition, you could find that patients are willing to travel further afield to seek your help if you have developed a specialist knowledge. It also gives you a clear marketing angle and keywords to focus on that will help you stand out. Becoming a specialist could mean having to invest in equipment that other clinics don’t have and looking into specialist treatment options. This means having to do a lot more research. There are websites that offer medication for rare conditions like dermatomytositis that offer prescription advice and in-depth drug information. 

Alternatively, you could focus on a more common condition like diabetes or arthritis, but simply offer a more comprehensive treatment plan that is more detailed than your average local doctor may provide. By focusing on a more common condition, you can still market to a large enough local audience. This could make it much easier to attract patients than were you to focus on a rarer condition. 

Some clinics make affordability their niche. This could include offering lower prices than competitors, or simply offering options like payment plans to make treatment more accessible. Focusing on affordability can make it harder to make a profit―you will need to provide a stripped-back service without pessimistically affecting the quality of treatment. The benefit is that you won’t have to market so hard to attract patients as there are likely to be many people out there prioritizing affordability when looking for treatment. 

You could alternatively focus on the opposite end of the spending power spectrum. There are some wealthier patients out there who are willing to spend extra for more luxurious care. While this allows you to charge higher prices, you need to be prepared to splash out on decor and equipment to make sure that you guarantee that level of luxury that patients are looking for. It is likely that patients will also expect a high level of expertise as well as a more plush setting. All in all, expect to deal with more demanding patients if you want to charge premium prices. 

A way that many clinics determine their niche is simply by comparing other clinics in the area. By looking at what other clinics are providing and what they’re not providing, you can identify gaps in the market. There could be a type of treatment that isn’t being provided by a competitor that you can focus on. Alternatively, you may be able to offer the same services but at a better price or by providing a higher quality of care. On top of researching competitor websites, make sure to look at reviews and see what patients are praising and criticizing. You can also conduct surveys to find out what local people in your area think of your competitors.

Some clinics find that the best way to identify a niche is to let their patients shape that niche. You may find that you naturally attract a certain demographic of patient or that many of your patients share a certain condition. You can then sculpt your marketing and your services around these common types of patients. For example, if you mostly attract older patients, you could consider making senior patients your focus. You can then focus your marketing on these types of patients and invest in more specialist equipment to treat them. This is an approach that some general local clinics take when deciding to transition into a more specialist clinic.