subject: Facts About Successful Dental Marketing [print this page] Successful marketing is the key to any business. If anyone is aware of how to market the services offered by his/her business, he/she will surely succeed. Dentists also run business known as practice and so they also need clients like other businesses. They try attracting new patients to their dental practice by dental marketing.
Patient referrals are the best source of having new patients. So, it is important to encourage the patients to refer their family members and friends about the positive dental experience that they had had with the dentist in the office so that more patients visit the office for dental care.
Here are some steps to get started with successful referral program for the practice. You can have about 1000 referral cards for your business with some free service or discount offered on the card for new patient. After the cards get printed, call a meeting to tell the staff to have knowledge about the way of running the referral program in office.
Then, write all the names of your patients who had been pleased with your dental treatment. On every such patients charts attach a referral card so that you dont forget to give them while they come for the next appointment. After visiting your clinic and being treated by you, if the patient comments about his/her satisfaction with your practice, you can ask him/her to tell his/her friends and family about the dental services practiced by the dentist so that they come and visit the clinic to get rid of their dental problems.
Find from your patient if there is anyone who needs a dental care and inform him/her that most people do not visit dentist on regular basis which results in most people having severe dental problems that can be costly in long run. You can hand your patient the referral card and dont forget to mention about the free service or discount that you are offering. You should also let him know that there is simply no obligation for further treatment after first visit. By this, new patient wouldnt have anything to lose in real terms.
However, the patient must make the appointment within 2 weeks after getting the referral card. The card must be brought to office if the patient wants a free service or discount. The referring patients might also request you for more cards; ensure that he/she gets the cards to give out to other people who need dental treatment.
On the chart of the patient, write down the number of referral cards he/she has been given with the note of the person the patient plans to present the referral card so that information is tracked easily. When a patient may arrive with referral card in his/her hand, staff member who actually initialed the referral card must be given 20 dollars bonus.
It is essential to do something unique and special for a patient who presented the referral card to new patient like you can present a personalized coffee mug, send flowers if the patient is a woman, give complimentary cinema tickets and many such things.
