Price With Confidence: Why Top Aesthetic

Good evening, everyone, and welcome to another Business of Aesthetics expert panel. I'm Angie, and I'll be your host for tonight's discussion. So tonight, we're tackling a topic that affects nearly every aesthetic practice at some point, that is pricing confidence. So many practices work hard to attract patients and deliver excellent outcomes, yet still find themselves relying on data.

Discounts, promotions, or pricing concessions to close treatment plans.

Over time, that can create pressure on profitability, team confidence, and long-term growth.

Our goal tonight is to explore how successful practices communicate value, maintain pricing integrity, and create sustainable profitability without competing solely on price.

We're excited to have a fantastic panel joining us, and I'll think you walk away with practical ideas you can apply immediately.

Now, before we begin, just a few how, quick…

housekeeping items for you. So this session is being recorded, and a replay will be shared afterwards, so we'd also love for this to be very interactive, so throughout the discussion, please feel free to share your thoughts, experiences, and questions in the chat. If you have a question you'd like our panelists to address, please submit it through the Q&A feature. Our support team and I will be keeping an eye on both.

Throughout the evening.

Before we dive in, I'd like to thank tonight's sponsor, that is Equa Marketing. So, for more than 50… 15 years, ECWA has helped aesthetic practices strengthen their online visibility, attract qualified patients, and build sustainable growth through digital marketing strategies focused on SEO, websites, content marketing, and patient conversions.

We're grateful for their continued support of the business of aesthetics community, and for helping make education conversations like this possible.

Now, this topic is, actually really, really great because it connects closely with one of the biggest challenges practices face today.

Patients often form opinions long before they ever contact your office.

They're searching online, they're reading reviews, comparing providers, and evaluating value before they schedule a consultation.

That means pricing confidence doesn't start in the consultation room, it often starts with visibility, trust, and the impression your practice creates online.

That's one of the reasons tonight's discussion is so relevant.

Now, before we jump into the conversation, let's take a quick look at where we're headed tonight. We'll discuss the hidden cost of discounting, why busy practices aren't always profitable practices, how successful teams communicate value without feeling salesy.

Building confidence around pricing conversations, creating sustainable pricing strategies that support long-term growth, and most importantly, we'll explore practical ways to protect profitability while continuing to deliver an exceptional patient experience.

With our roadmap in mind, let's meet our panelists.

Joining us first is Kim Lodati, founder and CEO of SomaCell and IT Intelligent Treatment.

Kim is a provider, educator, and leader in regenerative aesthetics who is passionate about delivering science-backed patient care while helping providers communicate treatment value with confidence. Kim, we are thrilled to have you with us tonight.

Thank you, I'm always so excited to be here. I appreciate you asking me to be on this panel this evening.

Thank you so much. Our next panelist is Brian Hayes, president and founder of Orion Strategic Consulting. Brian brings more than 25 years of experience across sales, marketing, leadership, and business strategy within aesthetic medicine.

Helping practices build stronger teams in more profitable operations.

Brian, thank you so much for joining us.

Thanks so much for having me, I appreciate it.

And joining us as well is Kelsey Sherrick, a Senior Practice Development Consultant with Curtis.

aesthetic.

With nearly two decades of industry experience, Kelsey works closely with practices to improve profitability, maximize technology investments, and create sustainable growth strategies.

Kelsey, welcome!

Thank you, so excited to be here for the first time.

Alright, let's get into the conversation.

Brian, I'd like to start with something many practice owners can probably relate to. Practice runs full books for 6 months and still feels financially stuck.

What is actually happening to the margin when volume is high, but prices were set reactively?

Yeah, that's a great question that, is a great way to start it off when we're talking about pricing. And while the conversation tonight's about pricing, I think it's important to answer this that I start and touch on strategy first.

Because simply put, strategy is your long-term goals, the vision for your practice, and your strategy determines your priorities, and ultimately how you set your pricing.

And if I oversimplify in the interest of time.

We could categorize all the business models available into essentially two core categories.

One is focused on lower volume of patients or customers, high touch, premium pricing. The other model is more high volume.

Lower touch, typically lower pricing. So you can think of it as having a full schedule of patients, let's say 10 patients who reach… generate $1,000 for the practice.

or having a day with two patients who each generate $5,000 for the practice. And most aesthetic practices, in my experience, tend to focus on patient volume and focusing on full schedules, and their pricing reflects that.

And it works, but the challenge is it's overly focused on top-line revenue.

And we're seeing many practices lower their pricing or adjust it in some way to try to maintain that volume or those full schedules.

At the same time, operating costs are rising.

And so this leads to the worst-case scenario, where costs are rising, revenues are dropping, and ultimately that leads to an erosion of profit margins.

So…

In summary, the high-volume transactional model can work in our industry, but it's getting harder to make this successful. The practices that follow this model

Really need to,

focus on controlling the cost side, if they can't control the pricing side. Otherwise, the pricing's unsustainable, and it's going to be difficult.