How to Create a Dietitian Private Practice Business Plan

Dietitians usually work for larger care providers, so the idea of creating a business plan isn’t something that’s second nature for most of us. For any startup to succeed, it needs a solid strategy, and your new practice is no exception. Developing your strategy with the right elements in mind will help keep you focused on the next steps for growing your brand and expanding your client base.

Even if you’re completely new to running a business, creating your dietitian private practice business plan doesn’t have to feel overwhelming or complicated! There are numerous ways entrepreneurs can build out their businesses, and depending on your focus and interest the elements will change. Fortunately, there are a lot of basic principles that apply across the board to serve as a basic framework for success. 

We’re here to help you understand how to structure your business so you can get it right the first time around. These are the core elements you need to consider, along with some expert tips for refining your plan. 

1. Know Your Audience

Before you get into the logistics of naming your business and building out your website, you need to have a solid idea of what your business is offering. Is your focus going to be on helping clients lose weight? Will it be centered around getting others to develop healthy nutritional habits? Dietitians can provide a variety of services in client coaching.

To know what service to provide customers, however, you must dig deep into their needs. Talk with people you know and do research on the demographics of potential clients to determine what their struggles are. Match those demographics and pain points with the services you want to offer. Once you understand who you want to sell to, the other pieces will start falling into place. 

2. Establish Your Services

Once you have a firm grasp of the needs of potential clients, you can build out exactly what you want to offer. Remember, you need to provide products or services that people are willing to invest in, so they must reflect many aspects of the things they value in addition to objective health concerns. 

Niching down is often a great strategy when you’re looking at services to both help your clients and create value that will sustain your business. For example, you might focus on helping women maintain healthy nutrition during their pregnancies. You could also concentrate on young athletes and help enhance their sports performance by coaching them through healthy diet plans and weight management. 

It may seem counterintuitive, but shooting for a smaller customer base that you can precisely target may be a much more successful strategy than trying to take all comers. 

3. Settle on Your Perfect Name

When you’ve determined exactly what type of service you want to offer, it’s time to get into the particulars and create a name for your business that captures what you do. Be sure to stay away from names that might sound similar to competitors—these can create expensive trademark and copyright issues you definitely want to avoid! 

You will also want to consider a name that’s easy to pronounce and web-friendly. It should allow potential clients to locate your information easily when searching on Google.

Along with naming your business, you need a strong URL for your website. You don’t have to fully build out your site yet, but get a domain that visitors can remember and is simple to find. 

Finally, making your site’s URL SEO-friendly can help you attract visitors, and it can be worth consulting an SEO or web design pro to make sure you’re on point. These are details you want to get right the first time, so it’s often worth the investment.

4. Define Your Goals—Carefully!

Creating your dietitian private practice business plan is exciting, but like any other part of the process, you won’t be successful if you’re not practical and realistic. Stating your goals helps center everything you do for your practice around clear, manageable objectives. 

Your business goals need to be specific and measurable. How many clients do you intend to coach regularly? How many would you like to bring on in your first 6-12 months? How much revenue do you hope to drive in your first year? Creating goals will guide you as you set pricing, market to clients, and build out your various offerings.

5. Set Prices for Your Services

Dietitians are passionate about using their knowledge and skills to help other people improve their lives. As a result, quantifying the value of your work can feel very unnatural, but it’s a necessary part of running a business. 

The big difference between working for yourself and working for a healthcare provider is who sets the prices—but one way or another somebody has to do it! Why not you?

Some basic research will help you determine how much to charge for your services. Will you charge by the hour, per session, or simply institute a monthly fee? Look at what other businesses are doing so you’re familiar with what clients will be expecting. 

 

Also, keep in mind that your reputation and price points are related and will develop over time. Many practitioners will begin their pricing at a lower rate to get clients, then increase pricing down the road. As you gain credibility and deliver strong results, your business will naturally command greater value in the marketplace. 

6. Explore Marketing

As you go through the goals and pricing for your dietitian private practice business plan, you’ll need to think about how to market your services. Developing a strong content marketing strategy is more than posting your website link to social media or writing an informative blog. It’s built around knowing your audience and what resonates most with them.

Your website is one of the most important parts of your practice. That’s where potential clients will come to learn about your offerings, pricing, and ways to contact you. From there, you can develop brand awareness via key social media channels like Instagram and Facebook. Over time, you can collect email addresses and build out a list to market to. As always, you’ll need to keep a keen eye out to identify what the best marketing strategies might be for your practice.

7. Developing a Plan for Success

Having a dietitian private practice business plan is like a blueprint for a building. It gives you a framework for each component of your practice so your marketing, pricing, and services all work together to generate the revenues you need to support yourself and grow your business. 

The idea of starting a business on your own can be scary, but you don’t have to go it alone! I started Dietitian Boss to help dietitians take control of their life and career. We have the resources and experts to help you start, grow, and scale your dietitian business no matter where you are in your journey. From creating your first business plan to connecting with new clients, we have the tools and experience to make your private practice a success. 

Get in touch with us today (and ask us ANYTHING!) to find out what we can do for your business.