If you think about the theme we have been covering over the past several weeks, you should be coming to the conclusion that you are totally in control over your practice growth, if you want to be.
That is because if you have embraced my core principle of focusing on the diagnostic value of your practice for the future treatment you are putting into motion and you have honed your systems to focus on cultivating it every day inside of your buckets (production income streams) then you will automatically continue to compound just like interest in a bank account does.
This is why I can’t ever emphasize enough that you must keep patients in your practice so you can reap what you have sowed in patient education, diagnosis and overall relationship value.
I have long been an advocate of creating a real membership within your practice so your patients have pre-determined benefits and appointments in a given year whereas they hold you in high regard in their schedule as part of their overall commitment to their own wellness and health.
If their coming to your office based on ‘when they think about it’ or ‘get around to it’ or suddenly ‘have a reason to’ then these are all reactive events of which you have no control over and they have no value over.
The idea should be, if you have a general practice, solidifying the value of proactive and preventative care – even so much so as a ‘warranty’ style agreement with your patients that they have made a commitment to you and themselves that they will honor and the benefits of following through on this are known and the consequences of breaking it are also conveyed.
For our specialty practices and doctors doing big cases with no real intent on growing hygiene for the future, your key moves are slightly different in that you must keep the patient engaged with your practice by never letting them leave the overall initial sales/treatment experience until they have accepted the plan because you have no way of getting them back or keeping them for the long term with some other maintenance type visit.
It’s one thing to be build on new patient flow because you ‘have to’ but an entirely different thing to need new patients feeding your monthly numbers because you have been negligent in either diagnosing or even keeping patients in your practice.
You can’t go back in the past but you can move forward with the right structure in place to propel your practice into the future with an orchestrated assurance that will lead to a certain level of guaranteed growth year after year.
Even for our specialists who are reliant on getting new patients again and again and again they do not need to rely on “new patient sources” having to start from scratch every month if they treat their referring doctors like patients of record and nurture them just like our general dentists nurture their patient base.
Plus there is still the focus that should be put on your “patient get a patient” methods and systems to build perpetual new patient referrals flowing into your practice regardless of your type or size or structure from your existing, past and present patients.
One of the big Achilles heels of growth are emergencies and same day dentistry. This is because it teaches patients to wait until they ‘need’ to come in and then you pacify them with the work and send them back out into the world without setting them up for future success and in turn you sabotage your ability to grow.
Much like spending money instead of investing money. With one it’s gone forever; with another it’s put to work for you and will come back more valuable.
Here’s what we know… you’ll never get 100% case acceptance and if you are doing truly comprehensive diagnosis you’d be lucky to ever get more than say 30% of the total dollar amount and usually a lot less (comprehensive I’m talking about – across the board of every patient stream and diagnostic opportunity in your practice).
So as long as your patients stay… you get 30% today of daily diagnosis and then when those patients cycle back through you get another shot at them to get another 20-30% of treatment and then it continues to compound.
Therefore for the first round of people coming in you get your baseline met with the initial diagnosis and then each six months or year thereafter you continue to reap the rewards from the diagnosis / treatment you put into the bank to grow and compound and be ready to be cashed out.
That gives you a baseline of 20-30% of growth per year AFTER you have elevated your practice to its actual potential. Most of my doctors double their practices within the first 6-9 months because there is so much hidden potential and they are getting the lowest common denominator of treatment that is available.
Once we find your practice potential, as it is today, firing on all cylinders then we can predict and literally create the consistent growth of the future without any further or additional effort. Just working the system. As any and all businesses should eventually reach this point.
There are other ways to grow and multiply that we will dive deep into in the coming weeks and then I have great news… because I know no matter what I tell you to focus on, you will always want and (unfortunately) need – new patients.
We are going to be working through the secret sources of new patients that probably no one has ever told you before. I will unlock the much hidden and overlooked ways to bring the best quality new patients into your practice so that you can do more with less or keep piling them.
Remember this: the most expensive part of dentistry is and will always be getting the patients in the first place. So please do everything possible to take care of them, keep them and cultivate treatment from them once you do.
