Tik Tok, Tik Tok, technology is coming. But one independent practice believes the support of national independent network ProVision is helping it to remain relevant and thrive with access to innovative business tools.
Don’t worry. You won’t be seeing Mr Michael Jones on Tik Tok any time soon.
He’s quite relieved about that.
It’s not that the co-owner of RJK Optometry in Coffs Harbour, NSW, doesn’t do social media. He knows the value of it in the modern business landscape. It’s more that, after 25 years in the area, he knows his community well and has developed a great communications strategy to stay connected with it.
A communication and engagement strategy backed up by new data and analysis tools from national independent optometry network ProVision.
A communication strategy that doesn’t include Tik Tok. At least not for this particular practice.
Jones, who is one of three optometrists/partners in the large regional independent practice and who recently advanced to the ProVision board, knows that in the past he might have blundered into the platform as part of some misguided strategy.
He might have relied on his gut, he might have made certain assumptions.
But ProVision has the tools, the data, the analysis and the experts to ensure he not only targets the right people, but he also puts the right content in front of them.
That expertise goes beyond social media to all parts of the business, from the purchasing power of a large network to marketing, recruitment, practice and stock management, even helping independents harness the power of new technology and innovation.
It’s about keeping those practices at the “cutting edge” of a competitive industry with large players.
As Jones points out, his relationship with ProVision has been a “game-changer” for his business.
“My practice wouldn’t have grown to what it is today without ProVision,” he says. “Business expertise is something you don’t have as an optometrist to begin with. I would have been floundering . I’m fairly confident in my business abilities now, but there’s no way I would have got there without ProVision.”
That confidence has grown over the 25 years he has been at the practice, and in partnership with the network.
Coffs Harbour, he says, has a large community of reasonably well-off retired people, so his patients tend to be older, with all of the vision issues that come with that.
That means Jones is kept pretty busy managing dry eye, an area he specialises in, along with specialty contact lenses.
“I get a lot of referrals from GPs, ophthalmologists and other practitioners in the area, and people will travel 100 kilometres to come and see me.”
One thing he is not busy worrying about is the practice’s social media.
Previously that was assigned to a younger team member, who would spend four to five hours a week creating and collating content for the business’s digital community.
Thanks to ProSocial, a social media support platform introduced by ProVision in November 2024, that’s now down to just an hour.
“The brilliance of ProSocial is that it’s giving you so much branded material,” says Jones.
Users can browse and search an extensive collection of social media images and videos, customisable Canva and Mailchimp email templates.
There are comprehensive social media guides and tutorials specifically designed for optometry practices, as well as thousands of assets uploaded by ProVision’s supplier partners.
“So we can actually schedule posts – bang, bang, bang. It’s cut down the amount of time the team member has had to devote to it because of the shortcuts and everything that ProSocial has enabled us to use.”
But it’s not just about the content and delivery; ProVision has played a key role in devising strategy as well.
“We’re very well known in the community and everything would be completely different if we were a greenfield practice; ProVision get that and understand what we’re trying to achieve.”
Which is why the strategy for a largely older audience is more about Facebook, rather than Tik Tok and Instagram.
Jones doesn’t believe it brings new patients to his practice; that’s mainly driven by word-of-mouth.
“But that ProVision-backed social media strategy, in terms of Facebook, is like the cream on the top, in terms of just keeping you in people’s minds,” he says. “I think it’s more a touch point in terms of keeping in contact with patients about our reputation, our quality eyecare and eyewear.”
Drilling down on performance data
He is even more enthusiastic about another ProVision innovation, its practice management support tool, ProIntel.
He refers to it as a “game-changer” more than once during his conversation with Insight.
ProIntel allows Jones and his partners to drill down into practically every aspect of the business and analyse its performance.
“The analysis in the data that you can go in to is incredible,” he says. “Plus the ability to benchmark anonymously against other practices of a similar size to us. So we can see how we’re going. We’ve never had the ability to do that before.”
Previously they were relying on their gut and decades of experience to handle stock rotation and practice management.
ProIntel sometimes backs those initial thoughts; sometimes it shows their gut instincts can be wrong.
“We would talk about how we don’t sell many of these frames and then we went in and, oh, actually, they’re our third biggest seller.”
Now the partners have plenty of quantifiable data and analysis to discuss when they meet once a month to review business performance.
“We will drill down into it and go, OK I think we need to improve this – this one’s going really well, this one’s dropped down a little bit. How about we try and boost this particular KPI or this particular lens,” he says.
“And then you can actually measure how much you’ve gone up again. You can manage it and check the profitability.”
Jones and his colleagues were early adopters. Now they see the tool as essential for any independent practice trying to keep its nose in front of those bigger operators.
“It has given us access to so much stuff that we didn’t have before and that we knew all the corporates could see, through their own systems.”
He appreciates that ProVision is always working behind the scenes to find more innovation to support independents. Creating systems like ProIntel that plug into the varying configurations of independent practices is a significant undertaking.
CEO Mr Tony Jones says “innovation is at the heart of ProVision’s identity”.
“We’ve consistently demonstrated our commitment to being at the forefront of systems development, most recently with our successful launches of ProIntel and ProSocial,” he says.
“What’s always set us apart is that our members’ needs and feedback directly shape our innovation process.
“As we look towards 2025 and the increasing role of automation and AI in business, this member-centric approach will remain our guiding principle.”
Part of that member-centric approach involves keeping practices up-to-date with what is emerging before them.
Michael Jones was particularly impressed during ProVision’s national Edge24 conference in Perth last year, during which technology expert Ms Inbal Rodnay delivered a keynote presentation on applications for AI at the optometry practice level.
She has also contributed to other webinars for ProVision members.
“There was a good discussion about AI and other things, and she was really inspiring,” he says.
That continuing discussion about the impact of technology, and ProVision’s ongoing innovation in practice tools such as ProSocial, ProIntel, among many others, are not only helping practices overcome the fear of the ‘new’, says Jones.
They are helping independents to harness that innovation and thrive in their competitive markets.
“We’ve always got to be on the edge, on the cutting edge of anything, because otherwise you die, basically – you’re going to get swamped.”
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