Do you have a solid confirmation system in place to help maximize your scheduling opportunities? Whether you use an automated system or old-fashioned personal phone calls, take every step you can to get those confirmations!

Remember that song growing up? And the Oscar Meyer Wiener-mobile?? (It actually drove by my house one day growing up!!!! I was jacked for days!!)

Or how about the band-aid song? ♫ I am stuck on band-aids ‘cuz band-aids are stuck on me! ♫  – (remember they used to come in tin containers? and the SMELL???)

How many exams have you done in a day and felt exasperated before you had even entered the room?

Do you feel unprepared for your patient exams, like you don’t have enough information to quickly, yet thoroughly complete the exam within your given time?

What would it feel like to walk into a patient exam and know the:

Isn’t that the truth? It’s all in how someone makes us feel. Make us feel good, we’ll be back. Make us feel bad, forget about it! Make me feel good, and I’ll share it with everyone I know. Make me feel bad, and yes you can bet I will share that as well!!

Every single patient interaction in your practice should reflect positive feelings, friendly feelings, feelings of genuine caring for your patients.

“They may forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel.” Carl W. Buechner

This is so true. Think about it. Wherever  you go, your impression on that particular place of business is directly based on how they made you feel. Crappy service at the dry cleaners? They did a fine job on your clothes but the staff was rude, didn’t talk (or use your name) and didn’t thank you sincerely for your business. What do you go out feeling? Unappreciated, like you didn’t matter. It doesn’t matter that they did the actual “job” you expected them to by delivering your clothes clean, pressed and neatly packaged. You’ll go out thinking, and saying “That dry cleaners has the worst customer service ever!”.

“Most of us spend too much time on what is urgent and not enough time on what is important.”   Stephen R. Covey

In a dental office, this quote is sooo true. Urgency is the walk in emergency patient and no treatment rooms available.  The phone that is ringing off the hook. The overbooked schedule, no clean instruments and no clean rooms.  The 3 holes in the schedule from no-shows and the quick scrambling trying to fill them last-minute. We need to be always prepared for the urgent while maintaining focus on the important. Continual adjustments, shifts in our behaviors and systems to make accommodations for life. Yet the structure, and expectations, remain the same.

What questions do you have for me?

That’s it.

These 7 words are very powerful and will open lines of communication that might otherwise be absent.

What questions do you have for me? After diagnosing and recommending treatment, coming from the doc the patient fully feels on an emotional level that you care and gives the opportunity to make sure that the patient fully understands the necessity of treatment, and allows you to instill the sense of urgency with a time frame.

Patient care & consistency. Unparelled patient care and reliability. Isn’t this what your patients want?

There are over 160,000 dental practices in the United States. What sets your practice apart from the rest? Why should a patient choose your practice as their dental home?

First and foremost, patient care will set you apart from the rest. Superior patient care. “Nobody has ever treated me so well” kind of patient care.

It’s a strange world with these economic times. Some practices are thriving, new patients are flowing and it’s business as usual. Other practices aren’t so fortunate – cash flow is down, new patient flow is slow.

Is this your practice? Are you stressed out, wondering how on earth you are going to manage to keep things going, make your payroll and overhead while still somehow trying to get enjoyment out of what you do?

How’s YOUR WOW?

In Part I and Part II of our “Maximizing The Opportunities Within Your Dental Practice” series, we discussed appropriate phone coverage – from making sure you have enough availability to your patient’s throughout the week to making sure who’s answering your phone is doing it with WOW for each and every call!  (go ahead, call your office on Monday and see for yourself if the WOW comes through!)