Each year, Amazon Prime subscribers look forward to Prime Day, the annual online shopping holiday with great deals, new products, and excitement surrounding special offers. This year it fell on July 15, and Amazon’s strategies paid off. The energy, promotion, and engagement brought in more orders during Prime Day than sales from last year’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined.
So what can a growing dental practice learn from a retail giant like Amazon? Below are a few takeaways from Prime Day and how you can apply them at your dental practice.
Pursue Patients with a Personalized Approach
As an Amazon Prime member, when I logged into my account on Prime Day, I was greeted by a unique homepage with items to browse based on my previous shopping trends and purchases. This personalized approach streamlined my shopping experience to help me quickly find exactly what I needed (and plenty I wanted). Use this strategy in your dental practice and pursue each patient with a personalized approach.
We’ve all experienced the scenario when someone calls your practice to ask about insurance coverage or pricing for a particular procedure, but does not make an appointment. This new patient opportunity will be lost if your team doesn’t make a concerted effort to obtain that patient’s information and conduct a follow-up call to recapture the appointment. Be intentional about recording these patient conversations and reasons for not scheduling. If you understand why these patients didn’t schedule an appointment in the first place, your team can personally reach out to them to follow up with services that suit them.
Be considerate when calling these patients back. If a patient didn’t schedule a cleaning due to a price objection, make sure to address this specific concern, reach out, and let him or her know about specials and seasonal discounts, or share that financing is available that could fit his or her situation. Address this patient’s unique concern and show that you value the relationship. This will earn his or her trust and long-term loyalty.
Expand Your Services
On Prime Day, I shopped for a variety of goods from kitchen cleaner to stereo speakers. I turn to Amazon for all sorts of everyday needs, but am constantly impressed by things it offers that I wasn’t aware of. Similarly, in your dental practice, expanding the variety of services offered will increasingly attract new patients and grow the production of current ones.
Schedule specialist and follow-up visits on the spot, and prioritize making this a seamless experience for the patient. Spodak Dental Group, for example, is home to a team of 10 general dentists and specialists. Due to the diverse nature of its team, patients are referred to specialists on the spot and often even meet these dentists chairside during their initial visit.
Task your front desk team with calling patients to invite them in when they’re due for an exam or to tell them about new services your practice offers. While you have the patient on the phone, take the initiative to invite family members into the practice. If your practice caters to children as well as adults, make this known. Personally reaching out to patients in this manner builds rapport and trust. Make sure to measure the volume and outcome of these outbound pursuits to build a lasting feedback loop that continually brings patients back into your door and facilitates regular visits.
Go Above and Beyond Industry Expectations
Amazon has delighted its Prime customers for years by offering two-day shipping. It has built a tremendous following by consistently delivering on this promise. But recently, Amazon upped the ante and promised to start one-day shipping. The company continuously delights its customers.
In the dental industry, frontrunners set themselves apart by recognizing the importance of a patient’s first impression of a practice. The front desk has one opportunity to make a great initial impression on the phone. When new and existing alike patients call a practice, it is imperative to make sure that they have the best experience possible. Avoid immediately putting patients on hold, and ensure that they are connected with a representative who can confidently answer their questions. Make your practice stand out by being intentional on the phone.
Leveraging these strategies, you’ll drive a consistent pipeline of new patients to your practice. When you pursue patients with a personalized approach, expand your services, and go above and beyond industry standards, patients feel valued and heard. Be intentional and you will earn the loyalty and build a valuable relationship with each new patient.
Mr. Johnson is a senior account executive at Call Box. Doctors and owners call Corey to increase their bottom line through enhancing the patient experience over the phone and converting more opportunities. Corey earned his MBA from the University of Delaware and graduated from the University of North Carolina, where he studied how the power of data can affect organizational change. To learn more about Call Box and our innovative tools to help your practice leverage the phone, visit callbox.com/dental or call (833) 259-9484.
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