Well\u2026Your Luck is coming early. Think about it, Friday the 13th and St. Patrick\u2019s Day all in one month, how cool is that.<\/p>\n
Actually I love St. Patrick\u2019s Day, it\u2019s just fun. I don\u2019t drink green beer or even go out to goofy parties, not that I judge you if you do either of the above. At the same time I just like having fun and I think you and your staff and your patients should be having more fun too.<\/p>\n
Do you know the best way to get more referrals\u2026GIVE YOUR PATIENTS SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT!!! Make visiting your office FUN!<\/p>\n
That\u2019s right, today, I\u2019m here to blast you outside of your box and share with you some obvious and some major unobvious breakthroughs that will help you accelerate the growth of your Practice.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve promised this for weeks and now will deliver.<\/p>\n
This week’s Profit Report: your 7 opportunities for growth of untapped potential in your Practice, and even if you ARE doing these, I\u2019d wager to say that you could do more to optimize these 7 accelerators and you would quickly reap the benefits.
\nHere we go\u2026<\/p>\n
Practice Growth Accelerator Number 1: Increasing Hygiene Production<\/p>\n
Of course this is a no-brainer. Here is the thing, Hygiene is NOT a highly profit-producing area of your practice, it is however a CATALYST for higher production and it is always under utilized very very seldom optimized.<\/p>\n
If you\u2019re Hygiene Department isn\u2019t producing $2,000 a day per Treatment Room you aren\u2019t maximizing your investment.<\/p>\n
Look, you are already paying your Hygienist and even if they are on straight percentage, you are using up the space.<\/p>\n
The three ways to grow your Hygiene is to a) provide a more complete experience for your Patients, depending on your philosophy (which we can debate I suppose) on perio treatment you should at least have time blocked, set aside, and some realistic stated expectation of how your Hygienist handle each of the services.<\/p>\n
I work with my clients to ensure there is a FORMALIZED \u201cideal Hygiene visit Checklist\u201d; that way there is strict accountability and performance driven results on a visit by visit basis.<\/p>\n
b) Really the key however is Patient Education and setting up \u201coptions\u201d for expanded treatment without the Doctors involvement.<\/p>\n
You have standard ops talk with the Dentist, Patient, and Hygienist and then you have Hygiene induced \u201cinterests\u201d that can move the Patients from Hygiene into the Consult Room or Operative side of the Practice. They should be helping facilitate this.<\/p>\n
c) lastly, Hygiene is the second most important place where efficiency can be gained or lost, if you aren\u2019t scheduling for optimization and managing your checks with your desired flow or work, you are doing yourself a disservice and starting the day in the one-down position.<\/p>\n
Have fun with this, put someone in charge of this, get out of the way of this and make something happen. It\u2019s important for your patients and it\u2019s important for the profitability of your practice. Hygiene in and of itself should more than pay for your overhead completely if done probably and set-up proactively.<\/p>\n
Practice Growth Accelerator Number 2: Selling More Comprehensive Treatment, Bundle, Present Big Picture<\/p>\n
Yes I know. This is the obvious one. But is it really?<\/p>\n
Know this, out of my Top 100 Dentists of all different styles of practice models who I track, know personally, follow every single New Patient number, treatment recommended and treatment accepted, scheduled, and paid for, and could predict their clinical answers to questions and their verbal articulation of how they suggestion treatment to their patients…<\/p>\n
None one of them (well maybe 3 of them) would say every single time they tell the WHOLE story, show the COMPLETE picture, and explain fully all that is POSSIBLE for the Patient’s mouth.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s really as simple as this, do you prejudge your patients, are you often in too big of a hurry, do you give them a fair chance to understand and buy into the personal reasons, the health implications, the physical outcomes that you can produce and provide for them through your treatment.<\/p>\n
I challenge you to start using more photos, start giving more live demonstrations and examples, start treating every patient equally and walk them through the continuum of oral health layer upon layer and do not deny any person the right to know what a functional mouth, a beautiful smile, and overall optimal oral health is and why it matters.<\/p>\n
You will see magical things happen when you start presenting more treatment.<\/p>\n
Up to this point no doctor, not one, has ever come to me and said “I can\u2019t find patients with work in their mouth, no one needs anything, what do I do?”
\nNope. Never happened. It\u2019s always missed opportunities and not telling a complete enough story about dentistry and what\u2019s relevant and possible for this individual patients.<\/p>\n
There is a whole lot more that can be done here. But. This is a big step and it will make a major difference, it affects every area of the practice and every single point of contact, communication and interaction with your patients.<\/p>\n
Wait until I fill you in on the single greatest breakthrough of all time for any Dental Practice, it\u2019s huge, and not what you think\u2026I will tell-all in Practice Growth Accelerator #7.<\/p>\n
Practice Growth Accelerator Number 3: Increasing the Value of Your Time through Proper Scheduling<\/p>\n
I know, I have to have a lot of nerve to bring this one up because every single dentist on earth has their own ideas about scheduling and there are hundreds of people out there trying to convert you to some new method.<\/p>\n
They want you to block schedule or rotation schedule or they want you to zig zag schedule or cluster schedule and blah blah blah.<\/p>\n
Look, it\u2019s like trying to tell an artist when to paint. Hello they are the artist. They will decide. Or like trying to tell a Dentist how to treat\u2026you know what you want to do and you all have some method or philosophy that you have adopted and probably made your own.<\/p>\n
No one should dictate to you how to schedule your patients, INCLUDING your Staff \u2013 you should be dictating to them and everyone else what you want and working to an ideal schedule.<\/p>\n
The problem is most everyone is REACTIVE in their scheduling and because of this they can never get ahead.<\/p>\n
For today, I want to point out this \u2013 what is in the schedule and what happens \u2018today\u2019 is what determines your growth potential.<\/p>\n
You can either use the schedule to your advantage or you can put yourself at a serious disadvantage and be fighting an uphill battle.<\/p>\n
The principles are this \u2013 schedule everyone who has any contact with the patients and affects your income. That means you should be scheduling Treatment Coordinators, Hygiene, Assistants, New Patient Coordinators\u2026you don\u2019t want anyone wandering around daily trying to find something to do or be under utilized\u2026if you have more \u201cproducers\u201d you make more money.<\/p>\n
Next, for your personal schedule you want to, ideally, get high production goals out of the way the first 3\/5 or at worst case 2\/3 of your day and over time we can get that to \u00bd of your day being where your entire monthly goals are met.<\/p>\n
If you don\u2019t do it that way you will constantly be rushing around stressed and trying to fit in more patients and production that any one day can handle and you will never be able to fit in the goal you have with the day that is schedule.<\/p>\n
WORK BACKWARDS: That\u2019s the key, reverse engineer your schedule. You can\u2019t make changes next week or tomorrow most certainly, but you can make adjustments 2-4-6 weeks and block it out and fill it with a future oriented mindset and structure.<\/p>\n
You see what I\u2019m saying. This is critical. Perhaps my greatest work with my clients is in organizing and filling the demand of their schedule with the work they want to do and making room for profitable growth.<\/p>\n
We can often DOUBLE, literally, not overnight but in less than 60-days if you actually listen and we massage in the change with the Front-to-Back Patient flow and Team communication. We can schedule you at 2x your hourly value and this forces your success, you simply can\u2019t manipulate the numbers.<\/p>\n
Yes, there is a secret here with how we schedule and cycle New Patients through that helps to fill this very very fast.<\/p>\n
Anyhow. At least you have some things to think about. Of course same-day dentistry, emergency patients, and other things you see as \u201cgood\u201d right now can still be worked in, the key difference is we can\u2019t rely on these things to make you rich, we have to have a FOUNDATION in place to ensure you achieve your Production Goals and then we stack other things on top of it as BONUSES and that is where you get to your icing on the cake, the real profit, and what accelerates, expedites and compounds your practice growth on the fast track.<\/p>\n
Whew…I\u2019m exhausted. That was a lot to write and I can imagine even more to take in. I really think we have to stop there for this week. Chances are I should have only delivered one of these at a time for you to digest and deploy some specific actions and initiatives of change.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ll save the ADVANCED Practice Growth Accelerators for next week\u2026this is where it gets very interesting and you can start seeing the bigger picture of possibility and speed to a completely different income for you, experience for your patients, and rewards for your staff.<\/p>\n
In the meantime get to work. And if there is something you want to talk about, ask questions, or discuss further, let me know.<\/p>\n
One other thing \u2013 I\u2019m presenting my Lifestyle Practice Blueprint formula this coming Wednesday, which I\u2019ve never done before, where I walk you through the 5-steps to change and transformation in your practice. This isn\u2019t for everyone, specifically if you are looking for more by doing less, or at least desire growth without compromise on your lifestyle, it is a mindset change, it is up to you, I thought I\u2019d offer it up if you are interested. Complimentary of course…<\/p>\n