If you’re ready to implement more efficient & effective marketing strategies for your practice, book your FREE strategy session & marketing plan: https://go.medspamagicmarketing.com/schedule 

How to Take Your Med Spa From GOOD to GREAT

Inspired by Jim Collins’ Good to Great
By Ricky Shockley, Founder of Med Spa Magic Marketing

Introduction: Why Incremental Momentum Beats Overnight Success

Running a med spa today is both exciting and challenging. The competition is fierce, services are often commoditized, and standing out requires more than just another promotion or trendy treatment.

As I often tell our clients at Med Spa Magic Marketing—and as Jim Collins outlines in Good to Great—real growth isn’t about one massive breakthrough. It’s about consistently doing the right things well, over time. This is what Collins calls the Flywheel Effect—a series of small, disciplined, and aligned actions that create unstoppable momentum.

In the med spa world, that momentum is built through leadership, hiring, accountability, focus, discipline, and smart use of technology. Let’s dive into seven key principles you can apply to take your med spa from good to great.

1. Level 5 Leadership: Lead with Humility, Drive, and Vision

Greatness starts at the top. Whether you have one provider or a full team of injectors, your med spa will only rise as high as its leadership.

Lead by Example, Not Ego

In my own business, I’ve learned that leadership isn’t about power or recognition—it’s about showing up for your team. Your primary role is to make the lives of your people better. For med spa owners, that means creating an environment where your team feels supported, empowered, and proud to contribute.

When your staff knows you have their back and are invested in their success, the “joints” of your organization stay well-oiled. Culture, operations, and patient experience all run smoother.

Empower Your Team to Think Like Owners

A common bottleneck I see in med spas is decision paralysis—when everything has to go through the owner. Empower your team to think and act strategically. Trust their judgment. If you don’t yet have people who can be trusted with decisions, your job as a leader is to develop and train them until they can.

When things go wrong, take responsibility. When things go right, give your team credit. That’s how you create loyalty, accountability, and scalable growth.

Set a Vision Beyond Sales Goals

It’s easy to fixate on revenue, but great leaders connect their team to a purpose. Your mission isn’t just to sell Botox or filler—it’s to help people feel more confident in their own skin.

That’s your north star. When every business decision aligns with that purpose, growth follows naturally.

At Med Spa Magic Marketing, one of our core values is:

“We do what’s in our client’s best interest, free of self-serving financial impact.”

That means our team never tries to upsell a client into something unnecessary. We operate as if we were running the client’s business ourselves. Your med spa can (and should) do the same. Trust, consistency, and genuine care will always compound faster than gimmicks.

2. Hire for Heart and Discipline, Not Just Skill

The second pillar of greatness is people. You can have the best technology and marketing, but without the right team, it all falls apart.

Hire Slow, Fire Fast

When hiring, prioritize attitude and alignment over technical skill. You can teach technique and systems—but you can’t teach heart, integrity, and discipline.

Even if someone has years of experience, if they lack the right mindset or attention to detail, that’s a loose thread that can unravel your business. Be selective and clear about expectations before anyone joins your team.

When we hire at my agency, I’m upfront:
• Here’s what it’s like to work here.
• Here’s what some people don’t like.
• Here’s exactly what success looks like.
• Here’s why past hires didn’t work out.

That clarity ensures alignment from day one.

Build Internal Talent

Many of the best med spas I’ve seen grow sustainably have built their own injector teams from within. They bring on newer injectors, invest in training, and mentor them over time.

This approach builds loyalty and creates a consistent standard of care across your brand.

Create a Culture of Accountability and Learning

Accountability doesn’t mean micromanaging—it means owning your results. Build a culture where everyone takes responsibility for their performance and growth.

Meritocracy matters. Reward the people who show excellence and commitment, and hold everyone (including yourself) to the same standard.

For example, even though our team is remote, we operate with an in-office mentality. Work starts at 8:30 a.m.—not 8:31. Why? Because consistency sets the tone. If 8:31 is “fine,” then why not 8:33? Standards slip when they’re not enforced.

Ultimately, accountability should become cultural—where team members hold each other to the standard, not just leadership.

3. Confront the Brutal Facts

To move from good to great, you have to face reality head-on. Don’t sugarcoat problems or ignore the metrics that make you uncomfortable.

Know Your Numbers

Track data relentlessly—new patient acquisition, rebooking rates, retention, profit per provider, cost per lead, and average lifetime value. If you don’t know your numbers, you’re flying blind.

When you identify weak points, address them. Improvement starts with visibility.

Tackle the Hard Stuff First

Every owner has those nagging problems they keep pushing off—the messy system, the underperforming employee, the outdated pricing model. Those are the things that usually hold the key to your next level of growth.

Stop kicking the can down the road. Fixing those issues now creates exponential results later.

4. The Hedgehog Concept: Focus on Your Sweet Spot

In Good to Great, Jim Collins describes the “Hedgehog Concept”—the intersection of passion, excellence, and profitability.

In the med spa world, this means knowing what you do best and staying laser-focused on it.

Don’t Try to Be Everything for Everyone

Many struggling practices try to do it all: injectables, lasers, skin tightening, hormone therapy, weight loss—the list goes on.

The result? They spread their team, marketing, and expertise too thin.

The most successful med spas often dominate one category—like injectables—before expanding into new areas. Once you’ve mastered and systematized your core service, you can layer in others strategically.

Don’t Sell What You Don’t Believe In

If you wouldn’t personally pay for or recommend a service, you shouldn’t sell it. Chasing the next “hot” device because it looks profitable often leads to regret.

Focus on treatments you believe in—the ones that genuinely help patients and that your team feels confident promoting. That authenticity builds trust and long-term loyalty.

Know Your Economic Engine

Track which services drive most of your revenue and margin. Make sure your time, marketing, and resources are focused there first before expanding your menu.

5. Build a Culture of Discipline: Systems Create Freedom

This principle might sound paradoxical, but it’s true: the more systems you have, the more freedom you gain.

Without clearly documented processes, you’ll forever be tied to the day-to-day.

Create SOPs for Everything

Every part of your operation—from consultations and follow-ups to treatment protocols and marketing—should have a clear standard operating procedure.

The goal? Your med spa could run smoothly even if you stepped away for a week (or a month).

• How should consults flow?
• What’s the rebooking process?
• How are leads handled?
• What are the service standards for patient interaction?

These systems protect your brand consistency and empower your team.

Define Which Parts Can Be Flexible

On the Med Spa Success Strategies podcast, Dr. Alex Roher from SD Botox shared a unique approach: he allows his injectors flexibility within a structured framework.

For example, the consult experience and patient intake process are standardized, but once the patient is in the room, injectors have creative freedom to personalize their approach.

That’s fine—as long as you’ve clearly outlined which parts are flexible and which are not. The key is clarity.

6. Use Technology Intentionally, Not Reactively

Technology should amplify your efforts, not complicate them.

Automate Repetitive Tasks

For us, using GoHighLevel allows automation of lead nurturing so our team doesn’t waste time chasing unqualified leads. The system filters out tire-kickers while keeping serious prospects engaged automatically through text and email workflows.

This saves time, reduces staff burnout, and increases booked consults—all without extra labor.

Avoid Shiny-Object Syndrome

Every month, a new marketing platform or automation tool launches, promising easier results. But adopting too many new tools too quickly creates chaos.

Stick with what’s working. Scale the proven systems first, then strategically test new technologies when you have the bandwidth to manage the learning curve.

As entrepreneur Alex Hormozi often says:

“Every change you make in your business to maximize efficiency creates four or five new problems.”

Be thoughtful. Choose tools that genuinely make your processes better, not just trendier.

7. The Flywheel Effect: Building Unstoppable Momentum

This is the heart of it all. The Flywheel Effect is the compounding force of consistency.

Your med spa won’t go from good to great because of one viral ad, one new service, or one good month of bookings. It happens through steady, intentional, daily progress.

Focus on Consistent Excellence

• Train your front desk team to master patient communication.
• Ensure every injector provides an A+ experience.
• Hold providers accountable for results and rebooking.
• Keep marketing simple but effective—focusing on the one-to-three tactics that consistently drive results.

Each of these small, repeatable wins builds the momentum that compounds into growth over time.

Celebrate Small Wins

Don’t wait for huge milestones to celebrate progress. Highlight daily or weekly wins—like a team member handling a tough client conversation gracefully, or hitting a retention benchmark.

Recognition reinforces the right behavior and keeps morale high.

Balance Accountability with Encouragement

One last point for leaders: don’t let your drive for excellence turn into micromanagement.

If you’re always pointing out flaws or missed opportunities without balancing that with praise, you’ll demoralize your team.

A good rule of thumb is a 4:1 ratio—for every one piece of constructive feedback, give four moments of genuine recognition.

People thrive when they feel valued, not just corrected.

Conclusion: Consistency Is the Key to Greatness

Taking your med spa from good to great doesn’t require a massive overhaul. It requires consistent attention to leadership, people, data, discipline, and execution.

Build momentum through the flywheel effect—celebrate progress, focus on what you do best, and empower your team to grow with you.

Greatness isn’t a single event. It’s the cumulative result of hundreds of small, well-executed moments.

Inspired by the teachings of Jim Collins and brought to life for the aesthetics industry by Ricky Shockley of Med Spa Magic Marketing.
For more insights, visit medspamagicmarketing.com or tune in to the Med Spa Success Strategies Podcast for weekly conversations with industry leaders.