Staying in Relationship with Your Patients (E.137)

“In this scenario, your treatment coordinator could pull in an additional $30,000 per month based on treatment that you’ve already recommended.”  ~ Dr. Victoria Peterson

This episode of the Investment Grade Practices Podcast looks at the world of patient reactivation. By staying in relationship with your patients, and re-engaging those who were previously recommended treatment, practices could potentially add another $30,000 to monthly revenue. It’s all about providing your patients with options, even if they can’t say “yes” immediately.

As you listen to this episode, we want you to think about:

• What does your reactivation program look like?
• How does your team stay in relationship with your patients?
• How do you and your team eliminate roadblocks between your patients and good health?

Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Announcer: The Productive Dentist Academy podcast network.

[00:00:03] Dr. Victoria Peterson: That’s where the power of reactivation comes in. So, if it’s a third, a third, a third, and your goal is, let’s say, is to produce a hundred thousand dollars a month, you’re likely treatment planning 300, 000 per month. When you’re diagnosing three to one over what you need to fill the schedule, it makes it so easy for the team to go in and build your schedule.

[00:00:29] Announcer: Welcome to Investment Grade Practices Podcast, where we believe private practice dentists deserve to get the lifestyle today while building an asset for tomorrow. Join your host, Victoria Peterson, to design the practice of your dreams and secure your financial independence. Let’s get started.

[00:00:50] Regan Robertson: If you feel like so far this year, it’s been successful in the practice, but when you look back on it, you’re just drained. I totally get it. Staff headaches, rising overhead costs this year has been a challenge and let’s be real, oftentimes there isn’t any time to even talk with patients to build that relationship that you know is necessary. So patients will say yes to your care. Well, if you’re feeling this way, you’re not alone and at Productive Dentist Academy, we can help you re energize your mindset and your practice for 2025, head on over to productivedentist.com right now, and you can register for the 2025 PDA conference happening March 13th through the 15th in Frisco, Texas. This fully immersive two-and-a-half-day program for dentists and your team can immediately help you tap into productivity, profitability, and leadership tools. So you can create more time for what really matters most, like focusing on great patient care and experiencing the freedom to reclaim your time outside of the practice. Head on over to productivedentist.com today, and we look forward to seeing you in Texas soon.

[00:01:48] Dr. Victoria Peterson: Welcome back to another edition of Investment Grade Practices. This is Victoria Peterson, and we’re continuing the dialogue on patient-first metrics. In the beginning, we talked about what it would be like to present everything to the patient and let them make their choice and we talked about how to shift into a more automated, dare I say, more modern way of presenting financial options where they had all their options at once, not just choosing one at a time, rejection, try something else, rejection, try something else. So now you’re doing everything you can to support the patient to say yes and even at that, a third will say yes now, a third will say yes. with prompting and a third will say yes, perhaps at their hygiene visit in six months or three months. So let’s talk about that recaptured section. Sometimes, many times, patients are not in a position to, particularly if the treatment plan is over a thousand dollars, there’s going to be some type of, wow, I did not expect that. You know, the transmission of my car, the roof, the kids, whatever there’s, the life is budgeted and monies are allocated. So when we’re hit by an unexpected expense, be it a thousand dollars, 5, 000, 10, 20, 50, 000, as some of our treatment plans could be, there can be some planning. There can be some spouses to consider. There are budgets to consider. That’s where the power of reactivation comes in. So if it’s a third, a third, a third, and your goal is, let’s say is to produce a hundred thousand dollars a month, you’re likely treatment planning, 300, 000 per month. When you’re diagnosing three to one over what you need to fill the schedule, it makes it so easy for the team to go in and build your schedule.

[00:03:36] Dr. Victoria Peterson: So that gives us 200, 000 that’s available and 100, 000 of that is potential for reactivating and so when I’m defining treatment reactivation, what I’m talking about are treatment plans that were presented today up until four or five months after that, they go into hygiene and we’ll talk to them when they come in on their hygiene appointment. So if we treatment planned 300, 000, now we have a hundred thousand that your treatment coordinators can go and follow up with routinely with the patients and what if you had a goal of a third of that or 50 percent of that money was to be reactivated every month? Do you set that type of goals for your team? In this scenario, your administrative team or your treatment coordinator or your high-level dental assistant that maintains relationships could be pulling in another 30, 000 per month based on treatment that was already recommended. So whether that patient needed encouragement, you know, “Let’s check into your insurance, see what it will cover. Let me run a credit application for you to see what we can do. Let’s schedule time to review your options.” There are so many tools in your team’s toolbox to help patients say yes. Even if they can’t say yes today, and that’s your third piece that’s really part of this revenue cycle management and patient journey with the intention of how do I help my patients become healthy? And if every team member has that mindset of my job is to make sure that nothing stands between you and your good health. “Would it be okay with you if I checked on a couple of things and we talked again next Tuesday?” Terrific. “What’s the best time of day on Tuesday for me to reach you? What’s the best number for me to reach you?” It’s a simple conversation, and that’s the power of building an Investment Grade Practice because it’s all about the relationships.

[00:05:39] Dr. Victoria Peterson: It’s all about caring for patients, creating a predictable system that helps them consistently say yes. So it’s not about pestering or bothering or mandating that X number of calls have to be made every day. That’s how we measure and monitor that the system is working.  So for every 300, 000 that you put out there, if your treatment planning and case acceptance is high, guaranteed you’ll have 100, 000 booking today. There’s probably another 30, 000 that will book in the next 30 days and you keep working that for the five months and when it doesn’t, then you put it into the hygiene annuity. So what would happen then? Most often doctors say, “Well, if my team were doing that, we don’t have blocks for reactivated patients. Where are we going to put them?” It’s an intentional activity and it’s one that extends the ROI on your marketing. So let’s say that you paid 10, 000, 100, 300, 500 to get that patient in the chair. Let’s make sure that we maximize the return on investment by maximizing and educating them to what is possible with their health and their dentistry and what is possible with our financial options and sometimes that cannot be accomplished in one visit. So again, as you’re thinking about your philosophy of care and the systems that support that really work with your team on creating financial boundaries and financial options and systems that support staying in communication through automation and through picking up the phone and calling your patients. That’s the winning formula for expanding from single tooth dentistry to quadrant half mouth and full mouth. That’s the secret formula for saying we appreciate that you have insurance, but let’s not make that dictate our treatment. That’s a great form of payment and we can incorporate that as we look at your treatment planning, but let’s not let that stand in the way of your good health.

[00:07:36] Announcer: Thank you for tuning into this episode of Investment Grade Practices Podcast. If you find value in this episode, help us spread the word by passing it along to a dental friend, subscribe, and give us a like on iTunes or Spotify. Learn more about building your Investment Grade Practice at productivedentist.com today.