If you’re launching a new practice, you likely have limited brand awareness, a lean team, and a finite marketing budget. That means your reach and impact will initially be localized. If you’re planning to launch your clinic in a huge city, recognize that it’s easy to get lost in the “noise” unless you have a strong niche, big marketing budget, or well-established partnerships. It’s better to dominate a neighborhood than to be invisible in a city.

Therefore, consider launching in a well-defined, underserved suburb or town where you can become “the hearing care clinic” of the area. Focus on marketing and promotions in your local area and look for hyper-local referrals. Build a strong network in your community. For instance, partner with other local medical practices to boost referrals. Provide extraordinary service and ask your happy patients to refer their loved ones to your practice. In a suburb or town, word-of-mouth can build quickly, helping your practice grow through referrals.  

Start With Your Own Patient Data
Use CRM or ZIP/postal code data to identify geographic clusters. Determine where your current patients are coming from. Identify patterns that show where there are higher needs for hearing care services and leverage that demand with your new location.

The 30–45 Minute Rule
Keep clinics close enough to share staff, referrals, and operational systems, but not close enough to be redundant. Open the newest clinic within 30-45 minutes of your existing location(s). That way, patients can easily, conveniently be seen in your other clinics, and staff can float between locations, as necessary.

Hub-and-Spoke vs. Scattershot Expansion
In healthcare, the hub-and-spoke model organizes services around a central location (the hub) that coordinates with smaller, connected satellite locations (the spokes). This structure helps optimize resource management across the organization, with shared marketing, scheduling, staffing, etc. The hub-and-spoke model also helps ensure efficient, streamlined, high-quality patient care in all clinic locations.

Alternatively, the scattershot expansion model refers to buying clinics at random, with no discernable strategies, patterns, or shared resources. This haphazard approach leads to operational inefficiencies that can waste precious resources and negatively impact patient care and your clinic’s bottom line.

Buying Out Another Audiology Clinic
If you plan to buy someone else’s clinic, buy wisely. Consider clinics with impeccable reputations and happy customers, that match your service model and are within strategic geographic range. Do thorough research before you commit, looking for signs of a thriving practice – extraordinary clinical reputation, high patient satisfaction ratings, a strong referral network, a desirable location, talented employees, financial stability, and opportunities for growth. Also, identify any potential liabilities, risks, and challenges associated with the business. Review the clinic’s financial records, employee performance reviews, customer satisfaction ratings, etc., and look for any possible red flags. 

Texas stands out for its low taxes, rapid population growth, and simple licensing. 

Florida is known for having a large aging population, high year-round demand, and multiple underserved zones. 

North Carolina offers expanding urban healthcare hubs and Medicaid expansion. 

Arizona has a low saturation of hearing clinics in high-retiree suburbs and easy business setup. 

California has a high-income population, making it good for niche or flagship clinics.  

These states align with important principles: choose where demand is clear, regulation is manageable, and growth can be sustained. 

These are just a few examples to illustrate how different states align with key strategic factors. When choosing your location, be sure to evaluate your own priorities, resources, and target patients.