Louise Beddow looks at how to make sure you’re providing the treatments your patients really want…
Assumption can be both the cause and effect of miscommunication. And in your business, this can result in lost opportunities to meet your patients’ needs and missed chances to generate more income.
I’m particularly talking about assuming that patients know all the treatments you can offer them. Especially, when it comes to existing patients who have been on your books for a long time.
Frustrating experience
It is not uncommon for a patient to attend your practice for years having regular check-ups and then attend another dentist for aesthetic or more advanced treatment. Often when the dentist notices this at the patient’s next appointment and asks them why they went elsewhere, the answer is ‘I didn’t know you offered that service here’.
This has got to be one of the most frustrating experiences you can have as a dentist, and a business owner.
That is a lost opportunity. Not only from an income perspective, but also from the point of view of further building your relationship with that patient.
And it is borne from an assumption that your patients understand your complete offering. It’s easy to think ‘how can they not know that?’. Often the answer is they don’t know it, because you haven’t told them.
Or rather, you haven’t told them in a way that they understood or retained that information.
Face-to-face conversations
You may well have posters and leaflets up in the waiting room detailing the treatments you offer. But this relies on patients actually reading them.
If they’re long-term, regular patients and the posters rarely get updated, they may well actually stop even noticing them as they become a familiar part of the décor.
Leaflets are often on the reception desk or given out as part of a new-patient welcome pack, probably with a lot of other paperwork. Again this relies on assuming the patient will take the time to pick it up and read through it.
The only way to be sure your patient understands everything you offer is to tell them in person, and more than once.
This doesn’t mean repeating your entire treatment list at every appointment. Make it part of your patient journey that at certain intervals you check back in with your patient about their dental health requirements or desires.
This could even be a Smile Survey that you ask people to fill in annually.
Ask more than once
A lot of the time, dentists are reluctant to ask more than once whether someone is interested in a particular treatment.
However, while a patient may say ‘no’ initially, their feelings may change over time. And they may not necessarily bring it up without any encouragement.
You don’t have to ask every time ‘are you interested in teeth whitening/straightening?’, etc. But you can ask ‘are you still happy with your smile?’, or ‘how do you feel about your oral health generally?’.
Simple questions like this can open up a new conversation and help you to meet patients’ needs.
It can also help you to identify any gaps in your treatment offering. If there seems to be high interest or demand in a particular service that you don’t currently offer, you can be fairly confident that investing in training some of your team in that treatment would be worthwhile.
The key is not to assume your patients are as well-versed in everything you have to offer. And don’t be shy to tell them about it – you could be doing yourself, and them, a disservice.
