BUSINESS

  BY THE NUMBERS

FOCUS ON CAPTURE RATES

TRACK CONSUMERS’ USE OF THE PRODUCTS AND SERVICES YOU OFFER

JAY BINKOWITZ

ONE OF the easiest ways to increase your revenue is to focus on your capture rate. There are many types of capture rates for both your optical and clinic. Let’s look a bit deeper and review several examples.

OPTICAL

For optical capture rate, the industry looks at this as a percentage of pairs of spectacle lenses sold against refractions. But I am a fan of assessing complete pair sales. The reason is because a practice cannot operate a profitable optical without selling frames! The sale of lenses alone will not get you to your goals, and most vision plans have a frame benefit. Your goal should be 65% sell through on complete pairs of eyewear.

You can measure capture rate in two ways, one accounts for optical sales in which the consumer may not have received his or her exam from you.

1) Complete pair sales / No. of refractions. For example, you completed 20 refractions and sold 10 complete pairs of eyewear = 50%.

2) Complete pair sales / No. of consumers with prescriptions who shop in the optical. For example, you had 10 consumers walk into the optical with prescriptions and sold 8 complete pairs of eyewear = 80%.

You can also break down the capture rate to track for specific lenses and frames. For example, use the number of prescription sunglasses sold in the numerator of either equation to identify this capture rate.

CLINIC

For clinic capture rate, look at the percentage of sales of contact lenses vs. the number of contact lens exams. Your goal should be 75% to 80% sell through on both annual and less-than-annual supplies of lenses.

1) Total number of patients who bought an annual supply of contact lenses / No. of contact lens exams. For example, 15 patients who bought an annual supply of contact lenses / 20 contact lens exams = 75% capture rate.

2) Total number of patients who bought contact lenses less than annual supplies of lenses / No. of contact lens exams. For example, 5 patients who purchased less-than-annual supplies of contact lenses / 20 contact lens examples = 25% capture rate.

There are opportunities to break down capture rate here too. Simply adjust the numerator for the desired capture rate.

GET TRACKING

Capture rate measures whether your patients are taking full advantage of all that you offer in products and services. Once you pick which capture rates to track, get yourself a scoreboard, and share them with your team. Knowledge is power, and you must equip your folks with it on a consistent basis. Once you incorporate capture rates into the fabric of your business, you will increase and/or maintain the revenue goals you have set. OM

MR. BINKOWITZ is president of GPN, a leading businesss management company based in Farmingdale, N.Y. He has had extensive experience in retail operations, merchandising and marketing. Email him at jay@GatewayPN.com, or to comment on this article, visit tinyurl.com/OMcomment.