Want more new patients?

If you are looking for more new quality patients, here are two “update” ideas that depend on daily execution to be successful. I call them “update” ideas because they are ideas we have discussed before, but we have some new data that might give you some additional motivation to act or make a greater effort to put them into action. Done correctly on a daily basis, they have the potential to increase new patient flow by 20 to 30%.

Update Idea #1: Ask for another new patient.

As you probably know, we always track the number of potential new patient calls that come into a practice every day. We also track how many of those patients schedule. Our standard goal used to be an 80% success rate until late last year when one of our appointment coordinators changed the game with a 130% success rate. She developed the habit of always asking every new patient who scheduled an appointment who else in the family needed a new dentist that she could schedule today. Roughly 1 out of every 3 new patients responded with another new patient!

Since raising the bar last year, we have had an on-going contest to see who can schedule the most number of new patients out of one phone call. The record to date is held by our own ToPS Practice Advisor, Pam Peterson with a total of 6 new patients from one in-bound call! Another new record was set this week in a slightly different area when Aimee, the business assistant at The Grapevine Dentist scheduled a total of 12 new patients out of 4 new patient, in-bound calls in one day. Congrats Aimee!

So if you are not in the habit of tracking calls and scheduled appointments, start doing it today. Then make sure to ASK each patient who schedules, who else needs to schedule an appointment as well.

Update Idea #2: After hours calls
Again, this is nothing new, but not many offices do it. Done right, it can keep your schedule in tact and increase your new patient flow.

Each day we print out the schedule for the next 5 or so work days. Someone on the team takes home the office after hours cell phone to which all office calls are forwarded. With schedule in hand, the team member is equipped to handle any call that comes in including new patient calls which can be scheduled on the spot. The team member can also personally handle potential cancellations if they call after hours.

The team member responsible also gets $10 for every new patient who schedules after hours and who shows up for their first appointment. Even if it is only 3 or 4 new patients a month that may have otherwise hung up or not left a message, those numbers start adding up over a year’s period of time. Think about it. It could mean 35 to 50 new patients in a year. If your average new patient value is $2,000 for example, that is a potential of $70,000 in production that may or may not have come into the office.

Now those are two very simple, easy to implement ideas that could have a combined result of over $100,000 or more result in a year!

Now that’s something to seriously consider!