At some point in most chiropractors' careers, you inherit a patient base you didn't build. Maybe you've joined a practice as an associate. Maybe you've bought one. Maybe a colleague has left and their patients have simply been handed to you. Whatever the path, you're standing in front of someone who came in expecting one experience, and getting another.

The natural instinct is to try to win them over by being better than whoever was there before. It's an understandable instinct — and it's the wrong strategy.

Why "better" doesn't work

Consider the position most of these patients are actually in. If they kept returning to their previous chiropractor, they were, on balance, happy enough with the care they were receiving. That's precisely why they stayed. Which means for you to register as better in their mind, you can't offer a small improvement — you need to be dramatically, unmistakably better. Nailing adjustments the previous practitioner couldn't. Getting results faster, every time...