The average dental practice has a patient attrition rate of around 17%. If you have a patient roster of 2,000 patients, you could be losing 340 patients a year — more than 30 every month. You need to replace those patients just to break even. This means if you want to grow your practice, you need to attract more potential new patients.
While there is no shortage of dental marketing ideas to grab someone’s attention and promote your dental practice, what happens when they respond? What happens if your front desk staff is busy with other patients and is unable to answer the phone, or prospective patients contact you after hours when the office is closed? If either of these happens, there is a good chance the new patient will look elsewhere.
Making two simple changes to your dental marketing strategies can dramatically improve your practice efficiency and profitability:
- Real-time, online scheduling
- 24/7 patient support
By modernizing your dental marketing, you can achieve an ROI of as high as 20:1.
Real-Time, Online Scheduling
A recent HealthGrades survey revealed that more than three-quarters of dental patients want the ability to schedule or change appointments online. So, if your practice does not have online scheduling, you are missing an opportunity to target many prospective patients. TrueLark lets patients schedule, reschedule, or cancel appointments anytime from their computer or mobile device.
Online scheduling can also give you a significant competitive advantage. Only a quarter of dentists currently allow patients to book appointments online, but 40% of patients report they would consider switching to a new provider if they offered online scheduling.
Besides making it easier for patients to book appointments, you also free up staff time when you add online scheduling. At the average dental practice, the front office staff spends three or more hours daily on schedule management.
Online scheduling reduces the burden on your front desk staff and gives them more time to work on other tasks.
24/7 Patient Support
Adding 24/7 patient support also plays an important role in your dental marketing strategy. When patients can interact with you at any time, they can get answers to their questions immediately.
If your dental practice is similar to most others, if a patient calls your office or texts after hours, they probably have to wait until the next day to get a reply. If they contact you on a Friday and you are closed for the weekend, they may not get a response until Monday afternoon.
You can have great dental marketing ideas to attract new patients, but if potential patients are unable to get a prompt response, they can turn into lost opportunities. Nearly 70% say they judge your customer service by the speed at which you respond to their queries. With TrueLark, your patients get an immediate text response whether they texted you or called your office. For missed calls, TrueLark grabs the number and responds with conversational AI to engage patients immediately.
75% of people expect you to understand their needs quickly. This is where TrueLark can make a significant difference. Its AI feature can guide patients to book appointments and can also provide answers to frequently asked questions.
Modernize Your Scheduling and Patient Interactions
With TrueLark, you get tools to modernize your scheduling and patient interactions, including:
- Real-time, online scheduling is available day or night
- Syncing with your booking software to keep everything up to date
- AI-powered Web Chat that handles booking requests and FAQs
- Add a Virtual Front Desk Assistant to support Facebook messages
- Contact Us CTA that works across multiple social platforms
You also get powerful tools that help you better serve your patients and stay in touch.
Automated Follow Up
If patients do not complete a booking or fail to respond to your message, auto-timed responses can gently encourage them to continue.
Gauging Patient Sentiment
TrueLark understands the sentiment of conversations and lets you know whether clients appear to be happy or unhappy. This can help you prioritize and focus on the most urgent conversations.
Collect Important Information
You can automatically collect or verify important information such as payment and insurance information before appointments to save time at check-in and check-out.
With TrueLark, you will never miss another patient call. You get omnichannel communications support to answer questions, guide patients, collect information, and book appointments 24/7.
Would you like to improve the impact of your dental marketing strategy and grow your practice with a 20:1 ROI? Contact us to book a demo.
