In our last post, we ruminated on some of the issues involved with using daily deals sites to promote dental and orthodontic procedures. At the top of that post, we promised to discuss some results that we’ve had with using them so this post is dedicated to that subject.
Before diving in, note that as believers in quality advertising, we are willing to try a number of new avenues to keep marketing diversified and in front of as many people as possible. You may have found the formula that works for your practice and do not want to change things. That makes perfect sense. But if you ever want to experiment with something without having to affect your delicate balance, we might be willing to try it (if the cost and setup are reasonable) in one or more of our offices for you and then provide full feedback on how things went. This gives you a “live fire” test without deleteriously impacting your results if things don’t go according to plan.
With that, on to the case study:
DATELINE – Mexico City
The situation: We have 3 multispecialty offices in an area of the city which had experienced substandard results. The offices offer a full range of dental services, but we were most interested in the orthodontic and general dental portions since those tend to be the most profitable in those offices.
The offer: For the orthodontic side, we offered the first 3 payments on a contract for a deeply discounted 50% off the normal fee. If the patient was unable to make payments after that date, we would simply remove the braces and part ways amicably. No additional funds due. On the dental side, we were offering a 50% cut in the price of cleanings. The deal ran beginning in late September.
The thought process: On the orthodontic side, we figured that patients would like the opportunity to start treatment and then be able to make a determination of whether or not they wanted to continue after seeing how things were going. The assumption was that after getting braces and observing our staff, the patient would enjoy the experience enough to stay. On the dental side, the hope was that patients would do their cleaning and then become long term patients, whether or not it was only for regular cleanings or more involved procedures.
The results: The coupon attracted 113 potential new patients for either dentistry or orthodontics. The newest office in the bunch saw its new patient contracts go from an average of 6 per month to 15. Office 2 jumped from an average of 7 per month to 21 in October. Office 3 stayed essentially flat. For the dental side, all experienced material jumps in the number of patients being treated. On average, we saw a 46.7% jump in non-orthodontic revenue as some patients had just the cleaning while a few were referred for more involved treatment. This contributed to the higher than expected dental revenue.
So how did it work: In my opinion, the jury is still out. We need to understand why the third office results were flat on the orthodontic side – meaning basically nothing from the coupon. And, more significantly for all practices, we need to see whether or not the patients of all types will be retained. So far, none of the orthodontic patients have discontinued treatment, but we are still in the discount payment period so time will tell. On the dental side, we need to see what happens when we follow up. Obviously, retention will be the key to determining whether or not this endeavor is ultimately profitable or another lesson learned.
Reviews have generally been favorable to this point so that is encouraging for possible future participation. Of course, we’ll keep you up to date.
While this is just one example, we can take away that these deeply discounted coupons do provide access to a segment of the market that may not have been previously accessible with other advertising channels. The big issue is how you handle them when they use that coupon.
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