In a fast-moving world, convenience is key. People look for available and accessible services that integrate seamlessly with their daily routines. That’s why finding an ideal location for your urgent care startup may be the most important strategic decision you’ll make.
Here are 4 main factors to consider when evaluating urgent care locations.
Demographics
The prospects of an area are the main factors of consideration when looking for a location for your new urgent care. Some of the demographic issues to consider in an area include income bracket, gender, and age. Generally speaking, the people who’ll most seek urgent medical services fall in the middle class and dual income households. As such, you’ll find the majority of urgent cares located in densely populated residential areas, where the inhabitants are mostly families with children. Understanding the socioeconomics of your proposed urgent care location will help you define your services in ensuring quality urgent care.
Competition
Competition is what makes a place lucrative for business. But it can also be a limiting factor especially if similar services highly dominate the area. When looking for the right location, know your geographical competitors and the services they offer. While a majority of urgent care specializes in family medicine, not all offer pediatric urgent care and occupational medicine. These may be the kind of services for you to consider if none of the competitors offers them.
Good urgent care locations share one thing in common, and that is positive competition. Too much competition can force you out the business, but a place with no competition can also lead to complacency affecting your quality of service.
Visibility
For your urgent care business to be successful, it has to be seen by the general public and more often. This often translates to establishing your urgent care close to frequently visited places such as banks, restaurant, and shopping centers. These areas attract high foot and vehicle traffic allowing your facility to be seen and accessed by many.
Subconsciously, people will settle for places that seem familiar to them, hence the need to become a familiar sight, so that you are always on people’s mind whenever they need urgent care services. There are several ways to ensure maximum visibility. And one great way is to invest in signage. Signs have a direct impact on your visibility, and therefore it’s important to place them in a strategic position where everyone can easily spot them.
Accessibility
Another important component of visibility is accessibility. Your urgent care facility may be in a highly visible area but getting in and out of the parking is a problem. This is something that will deter people from accessing your services affecting your business consequently. Good urgent care locations must have ample parking to start with and enough spaces for pickups and drop-offs. The distance from parking lot to the office should also be reasonable to make it convenient for ill patients to access.
Once your done assessing these four factors, demographics, competition, visibility and accessibility, you can go ahead and choose your ideal location. But be sure to tailor your services in a manner that addresses your specific demographic health and medical needs.