How to Hold A Successful Open House For Your Clinic

An open house is a great way to grow your business. It strengthens your connection with existing clients, attracts new clients, and showcases your community-involvement. So how do you plan an open house? How do you ensure your open house differentiates your practice from others in the area?

Planning an Open House: The Basics
The first rule of planning an open house is to start simple.

“It doesn’t have to be big, a huge thing,” says JC Burcham, DVM, Olathe Animal Hospital. “We make it way harder than it needs to be.”

That doesn’t mean an open house can be thrown together last minute. To be successful, it must be detailed and well-planned.

Though the planning period will vary for each practice, Burcham recommends allowing as much time as a year to develop a budget and list of activities, and identify ways to advertise your event.

How often should you hold an open house? That depends. As a starting point, Burcham suggests once a year. Then, in the future, hold an open house whenever there is something big to promote, like some sort of recognition or award your clinic received. The Olathe Animal Hospital held its open house after it was named the second place winner of the 2011 AAHA-Accredited Practice of the Year award.

Organizing an open house can be a full-time job too. Form a team to alleviate too much stress on any one employee. “Realize the importance of delegating and having people help,” she said. “Try to get everyone’s input.”

For instance, Burcham asked her colleagues for input on which charitable organization their open house should benefit.

“I gave people a week to write down suggestions of their favorite charity, whether local or national, animal and non-animal related, and put their nominations in a box in the breakroom. Then I compiled a list of everyone's suggestions and let everyone vote on their top two choices,” she said.

“If there was a large number of people who felt like their favorite organization was neglected, it would be harder to get people excited to raise money for it, but when I shared the results with everyone, they could clearly see that we were all behind this cause and wanted to raise as much money as possible for it,” she added.

Once you’ve picked a date and formed a team, it’s time to start putting the pieces together. “Establish your budget and then work on getting sponsors,” Burcham says.

Sponsorships

Getting sponsors is all about reaching out. At Olathe Animal Hospital, Burcham said the inventory coordinator asked for donations, both product and financial, when she spoke with vendors.

Burcham also made a list of the hospital’s main pharmaceutical or supplier companies and contacted them individually, by phone and email.

“When contacting them, I mentioned our appreciation for their past support at previous open house events, and explained what we were planning for this event,” she said.

Advertising

One of the biggest challenges of holding an open house can be advertising. “If people don’t know about your event, no one’s going to show up,” Burcham said.

Olathe Animal Hospital developed a creative idea to make sure its clients knew about its open house.

“We made bookmarks that we stapled to invoices promoting the event,” Burcham described. “Everybody who came to the hospital the month before the open house received one.”

The hospital also made flyers to promote the event, and asked each employee to distribute the flyer to friends, family members, and local businesses and schools.

“One of the best things we did was ask for volunteers from several of the local high schools. They supplied us with lots of great volunteers,” Burcham said.

To reach new clients, consider placing ads in your local newspaper, on the radio, and in local magazines and journals.

Also, don’t forget the power of social media.

“Using social media provides a great way to connect with clients and local pet-related businesses,” Burcham said. “The key, though, is to already have an established and active presence on Facebook.”

Activities

An open house celebration should include a range of education and entertainment opportunities for visitors. It also shouldn’t just be about your clinic, but serve a greater purpose.

Olathe Animal Hospital, for example, partnered with Greenies Healthy Dog and Cat Treats to host a Pet Dental Checkup Day. Together, they offered clients a free dental checkup, complete with a goodie bag.

“We also had all kinds of vendors giving away products and free samples,” Burcham noted.

Local rescue groups were also present and showcased their pets available for adoption.

Olathe Animal Hospital also partnered with the Kansas-based charity Operation Wildlife (OWL), which provides rehabilitation services for injured and orphaned wild animals.

“We sold hot dogs, chips, and pop,” she said. “All of the proceeds went to Operation Wildlife.”

There was also a pet costume contest, a silent auction, a raffle and a dog agility course for pets to run through.

Benefits
There are numerous advantages of holding an open house. “It strengthens the bond with existing clients,” Burcham said.

Secondly, showcasing your staff and your services allows you to meet new clients, therefore increasing your revenue. Also, if you partner with a local charity, like Olathe Animal Hospital did with Operation Wildlife, it allows your clinic to raise awareness about a particular cause.

Finally, it demonstrates your presence in the community and your commitment to promoting pet wellness. “It reaffirms your relationship with the community,” Burcham added.

Advice
Burcham offers two key pieces of advice when it comes to holding an open house. First, she says every open house needs to be about more than just revenue.

“It needs to be something that’s not so self-centered,” she said. “Something not just to celebrate, but, to benefit others.”

Second, Burcham says don’t make it bigger than it needs to be, or bigger than you have the support for.

“Keep it small enough that it can be fun for everyone,” she said.

Other open house tips include:
• Avoid holiday weekends.
• Decide on charity and contact vendors and sponsors well in advance so they may plan in their yearly budget.
• Print fliers 6 weeks before event with charity and sponsors listed.
• Display fliers in schools, grocery store bulletin boards, churches, and hand out to clients and staff to share with friends.
• Have a protocol set up in advance as to how to handle and account for monies collected for raffles, and services offered.

 All photos courtesy of Olathe Animal Clinic