Many new and even seasoned nurse practitioner entrepreneurs don’t time their marketing campaigns effectively when they are getting ready to open a new practice or implement a new service into their already established practice.

I receive this question often: “When should I start advertising my new practice?”

Many nurse practitioners think that marketing their new practice or service line a month or two before opening or implementing the service is a good idea to “generate excitement.” The problem is that it really doesn’t in most circumstances.

What happens is that a potential new patient sees that your practice is opening in 6 weeks and then totally forgets about it as soon as they click off your website. People have short attention spans and are often impulsive in nature. You BETTER be ready to deliver on your services at the time you are marketing them.

Waiting lists are a waste of time. Most of the people that sign up on them never even convert into a paying patient because they have forgotten about your new practice/service weeks later, they have found someone else that could get them in sooner, or they have changed their minds.

For this reason, I advise marketing your new practice or service just 1 week before its available. Sometimes you can push it out to 2 weeks, but I would not advertise anything more than 2 weeks before opening. Remember, people have short attention spans and want the service in the NOW, not 2 months later! Trust me on this, you will save yourself a lot of money on marketing ad spend if you just stay patient and wait to advertise 1 week before opening or the integration of your new service. I wasted $5,000 on marketing too early one time… don’t make the same mistake!