Marketing Monday: Don't be THAT practice

Recently came across this article (scroll down to the 8/11/13 post) in which the author goes through dentists like Kleenex because of the way he was treated at the front desk.  In what will be a series of obvious statements as I go through this, you’ve spent a lot of time and money and put your credibility on the line trying to get patients in the door.  Then, when they walk in, they are immediately turned off by the first 5 minutes of their experience.  You ever walk into a restaurant and have your entire meal be defined by your initial experience with the host or hostess?  Not a whole lot of difference here.

This gives an intro for a perfect Marketing Monday post.  How do you make sure that the patient experience is positive right from the start.  Try to think of it as your front desk person being the host or hostess of a big party.  You need to talk to everyone to make them feel good about themselves even though you don’t have a lot of time to spend with each person because you have a lot of people to which to attend.  A number of folks try to overcomplicate the process (like with a lot of things), but just like any other experience, a productive patient introduction to an office boils down to some basic, simple factors (make sure to stick around for our “melting pot” video at the end of the post):

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Marketing Monday: Monthly payment down, profits up

         Despite the occasional positive economic news out there, the world economy still is not flourishing.  Growth in the US is still slow and uneven.  Europe is getting its house in order.  Growth in China and India have generally slowed.  And if you are located in a place with a thriving economy, your practice growth is still potentially limited by competition.
  

So what can a practice do to achieve material long term growth in profit without investing funds in a potentially expensive and uncertain marketing campaign on electronic media?  Reduce your monthly fee and watch profits grow.

Marketing Monday: Bonus time!

Incentive programs take on a number of forms.  It can be something as simple as, if we knock out this afternoon load of patients by 5 pm, drinks are on me.  It can be a formalized program with rules and a very regimented distribution.  But one that generated a lot of interest for our affiliates during the summer selling season was the summer production/contract contest.  Essentially, each office had a set of tiered production goals.  Depending on the level achieved, certain or all employees were eligible for a bonus.  This was the contest that had people calling months before the start to get their goals to start preparing and strategizing to win.  During the contest, we fielded regular requests for updates and additional support to help everyone achieve their goals.  In sum, everyone was united in their focus on selling cases to qualified patients.  

As mentioned in the last post, this is the time of year when patient demand is generally the highest so everyone in the office has the opportunity to make a real difference in the results.  By contrast, during the holiday season, even the best conceived and executed plans may not make much of a difference.  The potential demand simply is not there.

Here are some guidelines on setting up a plan of your own:

Marketing Monday: The most wonderful time of the year

As you probably know, in the orthodontic business, there's a lot of seasonality.  In other words, new patient demand tends to be substantially higher during certain parts of the year than others.  And clearly, the peak points tend to come when children are out of school for an extended period and have available time to be seen for lengthier appointments like consultations and initial bandings.  And children tend to be out of school for those extended periods during spring break and summertime (there's also a bump for a lot of practices during Orthodontic Health Month in October, but that is for another day).  Even though children are out of school during the holidays toward the end of the year, household finances tend to be geared toward holiday shopping and activities are pointed toward holiday festivities.  Not good times for new patient contracts.  Not good times at all.

If we turn our focus to the summer period and examine it even further, NOW is the prime part of the prime season for signing new patients.  Usually, in early June, right after school lets out for summer, families take vacations, enjoy quality time, make divorce related-arrangements or engage in other family-related matters.  As a result, historically, we have not seen a substantial increase in June new patient contracts  when compared with other months for a given practice.  But, as June expires, so do those family obligations.  That means that the summer selling season is upon us.  Now, you may say, "Isn't this post coming a bit late?  Haven't all the patients who are going to sign a contract already made new patient appointments in June, July or August?"  The answer is no.  Remember from last Marketing Monday that patients most typically want to be seen within 14 days maximum.  Those that haven't been seen are probably looking to move on if a better offer arises.  Plus, quite a number of people haven't sat down and made that appointment yet.  Here's what you need to be doing to take advantage of the opportunities presented during this important time of year: