Oh yes there is… an Art and Science to this. No different than dentistry itself.
In fact, one of the best things you could ever do is correlate your approach to new patients to the way you approach any specific (preferably a more complex or complicated) clinical procedure.
Certain instruments.
Specific protocols.
Exact order.
Value resources.
Controlled training.
Deliberate systems.
I could go on with combo buzz words here – the point is – no different than your dentistry is how you create an amazing A-Patient.
I’d bet, right now, you believe you do not have enough A-Patients in your practice and/or that most of the patients you are getting are not A-Patients.
A-Patients, by my definition, are people who generally know what they want, acknowledge some deficiency and realize there is an available life-benefit to be had from receiving dentistry.
They may not know what it is, but they value customized, individual, personal, concierge like care and will both appreciate and comply with the guidance and expertise you and your team will provide them.
They are looking for relationship and expertise; and they are willing and expecting to invest accordingly.
As the saying goes, champions are not born they are made…and that is no different than A-Patients. You can certainly have different degrees of A-Patients. Famous sports stars who appear to have innate ability from birth, but it would have been wasted had it not been honed, conditioned, and mastered.
If you are expecting A-Patients to just show up on their own, identify themselves as they walk in ready to go, writing you a five figure check – you are going to be like a starving artist sitting on the corner waiting for someone to appreciate your work without even knowing what it is or what message you are trying to convey.
Sure, you’ll get a few here and there, once in a while; but you’ll never get what you are hoping and expecting unless you take control of it.
First of all, most patients are capable of being A-Patients to a more or lesser degree; not all full mouth cases $30,000 or $50,000 or more but certainly $5,000 or $10,000 or $15,000 even multiple times in their life.
Anything, as I often say, is going to be better than what usually happens…the national average for new patient value is under $500. “Good practices” doing anything more than just cleaning teeth and placing fillings will usually be around $1,500 per new patient. Closer to $3,000 and you’re doing something. Average, you understand, there are outliers of course in both directions.
Smart practices, Dentists I work with, they see A-Patients in three tiers. We’ll call them A+, A, and A- Patients. They don’t expect a patient to walk in and ‘be’ one of these. They and their teams take responsibly to help create, cultivate, nurture and guide a patient to become one of these valuable Patients.
Today, I’m going to walk you through 6 very different steps to the psychological side of the New Patient Experience. I’ve actually never shared this with you before.
I will today, right here. Can you believe that? Free of charge. That’s what you get when you choose to be ambitious and curious enough to stick around here with me; by being a doer, by reading and involving yourself in real business-of-dentistry principles – not searching for the next charlatan’s bright shiny objects designed to waste your money and get you on the hook for another wannabe solution that you know will never work.
Instead, let’s talk about reality…of New Patients…of A Patients. If you really want to get more of them, then you will take this seriously and you (and your team) will work to master this experience to nurture and cultivate A-Patients who already exist in your Practice…
Emotional Connection and Differentiation
Value Perception and Education
Positioning and Conditioning
Trust and Transparency
Vision and Possibility
Deserve and Consequence
Oh you thought I was going to give you all the information about how to do each one. Heavens, we can only do so much at any one time. I’d say I’ve given you enough to consider, contemplate and assess through your patient engagement in all phases before, during, and after their visit.
Remember, I did say three different tiers, actually distinctively different and your ability to sift, sort and corral patients into their appropriate category of “A” will make a dramatic difference on your practice and profitability. Like dramatic; you may not even believe it.
A+, A, A- Patients can range from $5,000 to $25,000 to $50,000 plus and they are all inside of your practice, coming in every day, week and month – whether they raise their hand to tell you or you notice them at all or take the time and effort to polish them up like a diamond in the rough to see just how bright they shine – is entirely up to you.
Most practices are mediocre at getting even A- patients when they fall into their laps. They then default to B and C patients where you quickly plateau and find limited growth opportunities without driving up volume (no fun) and increasing overhead (not smart) and having to expand capacity (without any real experience or expertise in doing so strategically, healthfully, and profitability).
Next week, I’m going to walk you through each tier of A Patient and show you exactly how to integrate this into your practice to make sure you are serving each patient in as comprehensively way as possible in order to maximize both their life-changing benefits of the dentistry you can provide and of course your ability to profit and optimize your value driven production in your practice.
It’s going to be eye opening for most and a much needed reminder for a select few. A-Patients, as with many things in life, the value is in the eye of the beholder. In other words, the treatment value in the mouth of the patient is in the eye of the dentist…the patients have little control over the value of the case they accept, remember that, it’s all about the experience and conditioning you’ve taken them through in the first place.
The art and science of creating A-Patients…your journey with me has only just begun. Stay tuned.
