Being proactive rather than reactive can help develop a business. Seek out and implement the opportunities that you identified for your pharmacy in a SWOT analysis. These could include:

• Building bridges €“ When you consider that the majority of pharmacy business is derived from one or two surgeries, it is important to have exceptionally good relationships with the doctors and receptionists concerned. They can help market your business if they are happy with your service. Building bridges with a range of health professionals and other stakeholders in your area is extremely important
• Collection and delivery €“ With the use of electronic transmission of prescriptions and proliferation of online pharmacy it is important to protect our customer base. Promoting a strong prescription and collection service is vital
• Refits and relocation €“ Ask yourself whether your pharmacy is in the right location and is the right size. Having a proper consultation room and space for the display of adequate stock, a waiting area for customers and an adequate dispensing area is essential. It is also important to give your shop a facelift every seven to ten years. We decorate our living rooms at home that often, but tend to neglect our shops. It can be a costly exercise, but sometimes it only needs a new floor and improved lighting to make a difference that customers will notice. However, if you are planning to refit, ask yourself first whether the shop is in the correct location. You could take this opportunity to relocate the pharmacy to better premises, closer to GP surgeries or to a location where the pharmacy would be more visible and have better footfall.
• Professional services €“ A £29 fee for a medicines use review is not at all the same as a £29 sale at the counter. In fact, MURs can equate to nearly £500 in cash in the till. Here's how. Say an average pharmacy's gross profit is 28 per cent, allowing eight per cent for pharmacist costs and six per cent for other staff costs, plus seven per cent for establishment costs including rent, rates, utilities and so on. That leaves a profit before bank interest of approximately seven per cent. If you take out VAT from £500 counter sales it leaves you approximately £400. Your profit of seven per cent thus almost equates to £29. So, remember that professional service income, such as that from medicines use reviews, drops straight to the bottom line.
• Marketing and advertising €“ You only need to wander into a supermarket pharmacy or one owned by one of the larger groups to realise the difference in the manner in which the shop is marketed, both internally and externally compared to many independent pharmacies. A few independent pharmacies still have cluttered windows and overflowing with manufacturers' stands inside. There tends to be less use of professionally-produced point of sale materials and signposting. There is a lesson to be learned here from some from the bigger boys. This may be a step that you need to take.

If you are looking for help and advice, the pharmaceutical industry representatives can be a great source of help. After all, you are promoting their products.