This Memphis DC’s energy and spirit attracts many patients, bringing success and growth to his practice

The Chiropractic Memphis team (L–R): (seated) David J. Kellenberger, DC, and Matt Haydon, DC, associate; (standing) Kitty Carpenter, office manager/insurance and billing; Amy Rushing-McDowell, front-desk CA; and Jessica Staples, front-desk CA.

Take it from David J. Kellenberger, DC: an energized office attracts new cases like metal to a magnet. “It’s more powerful than anything you can do with marketing alone,” insists Kellenberger, owner of Chiropractic Memphis in Memphis, Tenn.

By energized, Kellenberger means showing ample enthusiasm for the work of getting patients well and keeping them that way. “When your energy is down, it leads to increased cancellations and no-shows among existing patients and a drop in the flow of new patients,” he warns. “By the opposite token, if you have passion and focus, you’ll exude a confidence that says to patients, ‘You’re going to see results.’ Patients pick up on this right away and it gives them them hope and reasons to choose the care you offer over that being offered elsewhere by others.”

Chiropractic Memphis, with its strong emphasis on wellness, currently accommodates 300 patient visits a week. Kellenberger expects that number to reach 500 by the end of this year. “And we’ll achieve most of that increase simply by making sure our energy stays high,” he predicts.

Stoking the Flames
Kellenberger says his fervor for chiropractic is shared wholeheartedly by his staff, which includes four chiropractic assistants (one of whom serves as office manager) and an associate, Matt Hayden, DC, fresh out of Logan Chiropractic College. “Dr Hayden has been here a month and is already seeing more than 50 patients per week,” Kellenberger says. “Like the rest of us, he’s totally on fire for what he does.”

Keeping the flames of enthusiasm stoked requires Kellenberger to make sure his team feels that they are just that—part of a cohesive, mutually supportive group. “Every Monday, we hold an in-office lunch meeting to talk about goal-setting and issues of concern,” he says. “We also spend a lot of time on affirmations for each person in the office.”

None of this is to suggest, however, that Kellenberger eschews marketing as a growth inducer. He invests considerable time and effort in outreach, although the most effective kind in his estimation is internally targeted. “In my office, at least 80% of my new patients come from internal referrals,” he says. “When you get a good group of patients and they feel good about the practice, they start referring their friends and family, who are more likely to have similar opinions about health and wellness.”

Among the most successful of these internal marketing mechanisms are his patient appreciation nights and holiday theme parties. The catered appreciation nights are held at a local restaurant or hotel to thank patients for choosing Chiropractic Memphis. The parties, simple affairs employing light refreshments, plus appropriate decorations and costumes, mainly occur around Halloween and Christmas.

These are all good ways to build a fun office people enjoy coming to. The key to it is taking a moment during the festivities to invite attendees to refer family and friends. “True, it’s direct, but a little directness is necessary,” he says, cautioning that patients might not think to refer unless given a bit of a push.

Kellenberger makes an upper extremity adjustment to the patient’s wrist and hand joints.

Kellenberger’s other main internal marketing strategy involves sending personalized greeting cards to patients whenever the opportunity arises. For example, patients can expect to receive cards, signed by each member of the staff, in commemoration of a birthday or when they achieve a chiropractic-related goal.

As for external marketing, Kellenberger enjoys considerable success exhibiting at various local health fairs where he and his staff provide free screenings. He also advertises in the Yellow Pages.

Here Comes the Neighborhood
Chiropractic Memphis occupies a converted 1,800-square-foot home in a commercial-residential mixed-use part of the city. The site itself is close to ideal: it is right off an interstate highway, which makes the place readily accessible for patients traveling from miles away. Moreover, the immediate market area for Chiropractic Memphis is a blend of blue- and white-collar neighborhoods, which allows Kellenberger to cater to hourly laborers as well as salaried office workers. “I like the diversity of people,” he says. “It makes for a much more interesting practice.”

The vast majority of patients seen by Kellenberger and his team are adults, with women predominating. One of his practice goals is to increase the number of children patients. “I want to build this into a family practice. I think that’s where the market is here,” he says.

Half of Kellenberger’s patients pay cash for services. To encourage patient visits by those who lack insurance (or who have insurance but no coverage beyond 12 visits a year), Chiropractic Memphis offers wellness membership plans that give patients the option to spread the cost of care out over an entire year. Meanwhile, 35% of the payor mix is PPO, 10% Medicare, and 5% personal injury. Says Kellenberger, “I see very, very little workers’ comp. Just a handful of cases a year. Although the laws have been changed recently in this state to permit chiropractors to take a wider range of workers’ comp cases, most employees still don’t know about this.”

Within his facility are four adjusting rooms and areas dedicated to a subluxation station and an x-ray machine. Chiropractic Memphis is outfitted with intersegmental traction tables, so, naturally, techniques most routinely utilized include low-force Thompson, Gonstead, Cox, and Diversified. “I’m most comfortable with these techniques,” says Kellenberger, “because they’re the same ones that were used on me as a kid.”

Kellenberger’s first visit to a chiropractor occurred in 1984. He was 11 at the time and had sustained an injury to his neck while participating in youth football. Being that this was in Davenport, Iowa, birthplace of modern chiropractic, it would have been odd had Kellenberger’s father not taken him to see a chiropractor for primary intervention.

Treatment worked so well that, Kellenberger considered a chiropractic career at the suggestion of his high school wrestling team’s assistant coach (who also happened to be a doctor in training at nearby Palmer College of Chiropractic). “The coach told me he thought I’d make a great chiropractor,” Kellenberger recalls.

Kellenberger’s journey to doctorhood took a brief detour after high school graduation. He felt he owed it to his parents to follow in their footsteps and join the family’s insurance agency. Not eager to disappoint them, Kellenberger attended the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls to study business. Alas, he hated every minute of it.

By his sophomore year, Kellenberger decided to shift his education focus to health care. Certain he would be happiest as a chiropractor, he transferred to the community college back in Davenport where he completed the prerequisite courses necessary to qualify him for enrollment at Palmer.

Satellite in Orbit
Kellenberger finished at Palmer in 1998. That same year, he departed for Memphis after a friend (who had graduated from Palmer a few semesters earlier and taken up practice in Tennessee) invited him there. During that stay, Kellenberger made the acquaintance of an established chiropractor, Don Cole, DC, of Cole Chiropractic, who was in the market for an associate. Sufficiently impressed with Kellenberger, Cole offered him a position as an independent contractor. “I accepted because Dr Cole’s practice was wellness-oriented, and that’s where my interests as a chiropractor were,” Kellenberger explains.

Kellenberger’s involvement with Cole Chiropractic continued for more than 2 years. At the midpoint of that relationship, he took charge of the practice’s satellite office. “It was a great opportunity for me to see how I would do out on my own without actually being out on my own,” he says. Kellenberger did quite well. The caseload at the office did nothing but grow.

Cole offered to sell the satellite clinic to Kellenberger about a year later. In weighing the proposed purchase, Kellenberger considered whether he might be better off starting a practice of his own elsewhere in order that it might bear his imprimatur alone and not that of a previous owner.

But Kellenberger came to the conclusion that such would not be the case. Why? Because of his enthusiasm. Daily exposure to the high level of spiritedness he brought to the table would, he realized, distinctively etch his personality into the practice’s identity. And so it did. Proof positive that an energetic office is fundamental to a practice’s success. CP

Rich Smith is a contributing writer for Chiropractic Products.