It’s often said that an organisation’s character is set by the person at the top and that is certainly true of Optix. Maverick managing director Trevor Rowley is a well known character in optics whose no-nonsense approach has made its mark on the company he runs. The former founder of mail-order contact lens business Post Optics now counts Viewpoint, a swish York practice and the business management software company Optix among his achievements.
Anyone travelling to the Midlands for the seventh Optix user group meeting last month expecting to see a succession of dry presentations on software upgrades would have been disappointed. The 300-strong meeting enjoyed a gala dinner, a lively exhibition and some thought- provoking presentations.
Rowley used the meeting to encourage frank feedback from users, an approach which appears to have built strong bonds and a real sense of community among Optix users.
He was keen to show his support for the 18 optical suppliers who had thrown their support behind the event and encouraged delegates to back them. This was not the kind of event where sponsors were banished to the background, he said.
Upgrades and additions
Over the two days of the meeting Optix’s users were taken through some of the latest upgrades and additions to the business software including a rework of the contact lens fitting and aftercare sections. Optix Mysight offers Optix users a web presence for their customers including real-time, online appointment booking.
Additions to Optix include the integration of the Adaro contact lens fulfilment and branding service, postcards as a recall and marketing tool, along with other recall system improvements. A wide range of admin and back office functions have also been refreshed, such as more powerful NHS debt control reporting, and improved recall analysis.
Interest was particularly keen on the business intelligence part of the application which includes new key performance indicators. These allow managers to track the efficiency and effectiveness of people and processes. Metrics available through Optix allow managers to drill down into individuals’ activity with the patients and chart the effectiveness of different approaches.
Andrew Harrison, financial director at Optix, said: ‘What was really pleasing was the positive response from the audience following the demonstration of the new features. We have some very business savvy customers and, while we obviously have lots of our own ideas to improve our products, it’s always such a great feeling when they can see that their feedback and ideas have been listened to and incorporated into our software’.
Introducing the conference, Rowley said Optix now had close to 500 live sites up from 415 a year ago. This growth had been achieved without marketing or advertising, he said, but through word of mouth.
That number is likely to jump as Asda joins the fold with its own version of the package, which, with typical honesty, Rowley informed the group would benefit all through increased investment.
In a detour for the techies present, Rowley ran through the hundreds of thousands of pounds the company has spent upgrading its server and back-up infrastructure. The result is 28 terabytes of superfast database which can completely update in 33 seconds and is protected by its own standby generator. Too much technical information for some but a demonstration, he said, of the system’s robustness of data.
A session on direct debits explained how the software upgrades were secure and easy to use. Rowley underlined the fact that: ‘You can’t run an optical retail business these days without a regular payment option.’ An explanation of how direct debits were integrated with the various payment plans endorsed the recurring theme that payment schemes connecting value to professional services are essential in a modern practice. This prompted discussion within the group around the need for a credit licence when offering regular payment plans.
Following lunch, communications guru Sarah Morgan gave a presentation on getting to know your customers which highlighted the importance of educating and empowering staff. ‘Staff need the confidence to know that they can answer questions from patients,’ she said. Always give them that little bit more information, it’s a great retention tool and it boosts their self esteem. Finding out about customers’ lives and what they do and what they need their eyewear for is crucial, but it doesn’t happen by itself. ‘If you don’t understand a patient’s needs you can’t make intelligent recommendations,’ she added.
When it came to contact lenses, typically 21 per cent of patients were asked if they would like them, 17 per cent would make it as far as a trial and just 10 per cent would purchase them. When a recommendation for contact lenses was made to all patients, who didn’t ask themselves, 26 per cent trialled them and 16 per cent purchased.
Morgan demonstrated the power of recommendation through the Enhanced Approach to Selecting Eyewear project which showed that if patients were fitted with a lens, in this case to see their spectacle choice, a greater proportion would go on to trial and buy contact lenses. In this study 70 per cent did a mini-trial and 26 per cent went on to purchase contact lenses.
Supporting this presentation was another by Rowley on Optix’s contact lens module. A recent enhancement allows close monitoring of contact lens use and habits along with clinical audit trails. It also allows the business manager to see which practitioners are doing which aftercares and the number and type of fittings they are conducting.
The inclusion the Adaro fulfilment service within Optix also caught the interest of a number of delegates and will be covered in more depth in Optician shortly. Adaro allows the practice not only to mix and match contact lenses and solutions from different suppliers but also to brand the packaging to the practice.
Harsh words
Paul Surridge had a severe warning for the independent sector predicting an apocalyptic future if things didn’t change within the independent community, (News 04.04.14) including a dire prediction that the number of full-time independent practices could fall to 1,400 in 10 years.
Every practice is different, he said, but the one thing they have in common is that they are independents. He stressed the need for each practice to set goals along with the reasons for them and the route to achieve them. That meant working on the business, spending the right amount on training and marketing and working with other independents to strengthen the sector.
‘Your success is linked to the success of other independents,’ he said. There is a positive future but it requires a commitment to change. His biggest fear was saved for those independents not at events such as this user group. He urged delegates to reach out to those practices and get them enthused about the sector. His fear for the sector as a whole was that if it shrank too far the suppliers may well decide it no longer had a scale worth bothering with.
Day one of the user group meeting was concluded with an excellent dinner, featuring wine tasting and singing waiters, giving delegates time to discuss the issues raised during the day. After dinner, broadcaster and former MP Michael Portillo entertained the guests with a few stories from his career.
[CaptionComponent="253"]Recall round-up
Day two of the event was largely taken up with an expert session on Optix’s modules along with a keynote address by Jonathan Lawson (Optician 04.04.14). Other sessions covered electronic equipment integrations, patient record training, the business intelligence model, the web shop API, general administration and a CET-accredited lecture on OCT.
These presentations started with a round-up by Rowley of recall, considered the most important feature of any practice system. Perhaps of greater note than the technical implementation was the direction users had brought to bear on the changes. Optix had originally brought in a postcard service as a marketing tool. These carry bespoke messages to particular groups of patients. Overwhelming demand from users had led these postcards to be adopted also as a recall system.
This is at the heart of Rowley’s approach and Optix’s culture, he said. ‘It’s all about community. The users all feel as though they belong to a family. We have a live forum and everyone is on it,’ he said. ‘This was in stark contrast to some vendors who try and stop their customers from talking to one another. We do the opposite.’
He said what Optix wants is honest feedback so it can improve the product. ‘We ask them [users] what they want and we try and deliver that,’ he added, returning to the recall postcard example. ‘That wasn’t a simple task, Optix rewrote a lot of code to make it possible.’
‘Optix is a business product, we are giving users the tools to help them make money. It’s the gold standard clinically but that is not enough. The big difference with us is that we are a single database model. The patient becomes a patient of the group not just the practice.’ He said many of those who take Optix on may have two, three or four practices but have ambitions to be bigger. It gives an overview and offers business intelligence and analysis of what is happening.
When asked what had enabled Optix to grow and why users choose the product over others he puts it down to culture and approach. ‘Practices like the transparency of the product, communication with the development team and the support and trust in Optix as the provider.
When delegates at the conference were asked why they chose Optix, or switch, from other systems, it was the support, service and culture that were raised as reasons. Security of data, back-up, technical support and trust all come before functionality. One prospective user, switching from a soon-to-be discontinued product, said switching practice management systems was a big leap of faith. He had come along to see what the product offered but more crucially to talk to existing users and gauge trust in the product and the company.
As a practice owner Rowley understands the needs of an optical retailer. His practice, Viewpoint in York, trials all of the functions and he sees the scope of Optix growing from patient management, business intelligence and on to a web presence for the practice.
This latest element is key. ‘People expect their optician to be able to offer online what their airline does. There are still old-fashioned web systems out there that ask you to phone the practice,’ he concludes disparagingly.
