Many practices often prioritize getting new patients instead of focusing on their existing patients. While it is always a good idea to get new patients, if you don’t focus on the ones you already have, you’ll lose them and end up treading water, at best.
In fact, it takes about five to twenty-five times more effort to get new patients than it does to properly serve and retain your existing ones. Here are five strategies to make sure you get your dental patients to keep coming back to your practice.
Figure out what you want your practice to be known for.
This is the most important aspect of building your practice. When you know what you want to be known for, you can build your practice with that in mind and have an actual vision of your goals.
This will also help patients understand who you are as a dental practice. If you want to be known for offering high-end services and quick efficient appointments, you know you have to prioritize getting the tools and resources to make your practice high-quality and efficient.
As you're building your practice, you have this interesting and unique ability to manufacture what you want people to say.
If you want people to know your practice for being extremely comfortable and relaxing, you know it would be wise to invest in a massage dental chair and some essential oils.
Let patients know what you’re known for.
Once you know what your dental practice is known for, utilize this to your advantage. Go on Facebook Live and share on different social media platforms the unique characteristics of your office that make you “the most comfortable and caring dental office,” if that’s what you are going for.
This will not only attract new patients but also remind existing patients of what sets you apart. Make sure to explain to every new patient who you are as a dental practice and what makes your practice unique. And take the time to reinforce and remind new patients about what they get from you that they won’t get elsewhere.
Involve your patients in all of your community based marketing initiatives.
First and foremost, get involved with your community if you aren’t doing so already. This alone will get your practice’s name out there and attract new, local patients.
This could be anything from sponsoring a 5k race to volunteering at an animal shelter. When you show your local community that you are involved and caring, they are going to connect with you and likely tell others about you and your practice.
The best part is, you don't have to focus on Google ads that are $2,000 to pay Google at an agency. You don't have to worry about $5,000 mailers. You are attracting real, genuine people by getting involved.
Once you implement marketing within your community and your patients know what you're known for, and they're telling others, you can not turn that off. This is a continuous referral source that will help you gain loyal patients.
Directly communicate with your patients.
When you are about to post on social media or go on Facebook Live to share something about your practice, you should be directly communicating with your patients.
You can go to your patient email list and email everyone a link to your Facebook live. This will increase the views and visibility. And part of that is asking people when you're on Facebook live to actually share this video with everyone that they know who are their Facebook friends so that others can participate as well.
You can directly send or hand out flyers to patients. This will allow your patients to see that you're doing something great for the community. This is a great way to let patients know of any events you are having and to keep them updated and involved.
Another great way to involve your patients is by sending a monthly email. This can be photos from last month's community and campaign announcing what you're going to do in the next month or the current month, and also sharing an educational article.
Earn, collect, and share glowing testimonials.
When you are running your dental practice the way you envisioned it, you may begin to notice patients are more eager to share their amazing experiences.
If you’ve invested in making your practice uniquely good, don’t be afraid to ask your patients to honestly review their experience in your practice. If they have some concerns or suggestions, consider them, and make your practice even better. If they rave about the wonderful experience they had, don’t hesitate to ask them for a testimonial.
Once you have these testimonials, they are just yet another thing you can share on your social media platforms or in the monthly email newsletter.
Are you confident your patients will keep coming back?
It's one thing to be able to do marketing campaigns, to be able to get in front of our patients. It is much harder to learn how to keep them.
Make sure that you join us inside of our Delivering Wow Facebook group, dentalbossmovement.com.
If you are a member of Clubhouse, join us in the dentist club. We'd love to have you where we can connect, communicate and collaborate. Go into Clubhouse, start a room, and start sharing your knowledge with others.
