Patient acquisition cost is what you spend to bring in one new patient. It is the number that tells you whether your marketing is paying for itself.
The simple version
Add up what you spent on bringing in new patients over a period, then divide by the number of new patients who actually came in during that period.
What to count
- Ad spend, for example Google Ads.
- Agency, freelancer or software fees for marketing.
- Website and listing costs that exist to bring in new patients.
- Staff time spent on marketing, if you want the full picture.
What trips people up
- Counting inquiries instead of patients who came in. A form fill is not a patient.
- Mixing new and returning patients.
- Comparing months with very different seasons or capacity.
- Not knowing where patients came from. Call and form tracking fixes this.
Work out your own
The formula in plain words: patient acquisition cost equals what you spent on bringing in new patients during a period, divided by the number of new patients who came in during that same period.
Worked example (illustrative numbers, not from a real practice). Say a practice spends $2,000 on ads and $1,000 on marketing help in one month, so $3,000 in total. That month, 20 new patients come in for a first visit. $3,000 divided by 20 is $150 per new patient.
Run the same sum each month with the same rules, and you will see whether the cost is going up or down. To judge whether it is worth it, set it next to what a new patient is typically worth to your practice over time.
If you would like help finding out where your new patients really come from, book a practice review.
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