Jodena Consulting Blog

Providing exquisite customer service to your patient base is another important ingredient of successful dental practices. Customer service is absolutely a skill that can be learned. And it really is not that hard to be good at this when so many others are so bad. But I believe you need to be better than just good. Your practice needs to be extraordinary in order to separate yourself from the competition. Everyone in the practice–doctor and staff–needs to buy into the process. The commitment to maintaining and improving an exceptional customer service experience must be an integral part of the DNA of the practice. Here are some ideas for you that really work well.

• Emergencies should always be seen on the date of the call.

• Never say NO. This is a simple rule, but often hard to implement. Eight words that work well are ” the best way that I can help you is…”

• The key to great customer service is making people feel special. Nothing is too difficult. Nothing is a problem. Leave it to us to take good care of you.

• The telephone is the entrance to every dental practice. Great customer service is especially important when any new patient contacts the office. The new patient call is your first opportunity to build a relationship. That telephone call, if done well, could routinely be a 15 minute conversation. That patient should get off the phone and say “WOW – I never had that kind of experience with any office that I ever called!” The person answering your telephone just might be the most important person in your office. If anyone is interested, I have a great new patient telephone intake slip that I am happy to share.

• I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. You just can’t overestimate the importance of post-treatment telephone calls by the doctor at the end of every day to patients that have had extensive dental procedures.

My very first post in this series on successful doctors discussed the importance of having a great staff. Providing an exceptional customer service experience for your patients is obviously a lot easier to deliver when you have the right team in place. Having patients all over town raving about how well they are treated  in your office creates a huge funnel for attracting new patients. And new patients equal success.

I have always felt that the ultimate key to success in any business–more important than skills–more important than your grades in school–certainly more important than clinical acumen in a dental practice –is the ability to communicate well and to get your ideas understood and accepted. Unfortunately, communication skills are tough to teach. Superb communications skills are really a gift–and you either have them naturally or you don’t. But I do believe that communication skills can be improved, and since they are so important to success, I feel it is definitely worth the effort.

Successful doctors are passionate about dentistry and the benefits of quality restorative and cosmetic care. When you truly have that passion, it is infinitely easier to sell dentistry. There’s nothing illegal about selling. It is what we need to do well in order to be successful. So don’t be afraid of selling. I love Fred Joyal’s definition of selling: selling is communication with a purpose!

There is an old saying that says people like to buy, but they don’t like to be sold. But before you can expect someone to buy something from you, they must trust you. Nothing gains trust more than making that person feel special and taking the time to truly listen to their concerns. Then – using great communication skills which include proper body language and certainly eye contact – you explain your goals and your treatment choices (offering choices is a must) in language that a ten year old can understand. And good old-fashioned honesty and sincerity will win out every time.

In an increasingly insurance dependant environment, communication skills are more important then ever before. Confidant, articulate treatment presentations using understated laid back conversational techniques are what is necessary to let your patients understand that dental insurance is only a stipend towards quadrant and arch dentistry.

Part of the art of communication is also the ability to recognize when a patient might not be ready to make the decision to go forward with one of your recommended treatment options. It is so important to know how to back away and not be perceived  as being pushy. Allowing the patient to feel comfortable with their decision to delay for a while will more often than not eventually work to your benefit. Remember that the ultimate mission is to have people do dentistry in your office and not somewhere else down the street.

How can you expect your staff to support you in your mission if it has not been clearly articulated to them? They are not mind readers. I find that what successful practices all have in common is a doctor who is a leader. That doesn’t mean that you have to be Tom Brady or Peyton Manning. You just need to be your own person and lead by example.

Successful doctors are aware of  performance numbers for their practice. They review day sheets at the end of every day. They are looking at collections and production and accounts receivables and numbers of new patients and where these new patients are coming from. These doctors  are pretty knowledgeable about their management software, and can print out reports when needed.  They usually have an accountant who understands dentistry and has other dental clients.  These successful doctors will request and review quarterly expense reports.  You would think that this is pretty basic stuff, but you would be surprised at how many docs are not paying attention to this, and, more importantly,  not sharing this valuable information with their staff.

Here are some other attributes of leadership that I see in the practices of successful doctors.

• Being on time. How about even being the first one in the office. every morning?  It may be a little much to be handing your staff  coffee on their way in–just the way they like it – but you get the idea.

• Being generous and caring to your patients. When staff see the doctor exhibiting this behavior, it is not that difficult for them to follow suit.

• Being involved with your community. People can’t measure or evaluate your clinical skills, but they can certainly assess and observe your willingness to volunteer your time to worthy causes. They then make the connection that if you are a good person, then you must be a good doctor. Presto – lots of new patients come your way. I cannot overemphasize the importance of this.

• Being concerned about your patients. Post treatment telephone calls to patients every evening is a must.

• Being willing to take the time to really listen to your patients. We all know  that listening is very different from hearing. Force yourself to build  a relationship and make that person feel – for the short period of time that you are interacting – that they are the most important person in the world and that they truly have your undivided attention. This kind of personalized attention by a doctor is what gets talked about and shared at cocktail parties.

What seems very apparent to me – and I see it a lot – is that some of the most successful doctors I know are just not all that impressed with their own importance. They are quite humble and low key. Clearly in life, some people are  natural leaders. But the foremost thing for you to try to do is just to be a good leader of your own team. This is definitely a requirement for success and an area where we can all improve.

Knowledge of human resources (HR) goes hand in hand with my last blog post on staff development. The doctor or the office manager needs to understand the intricacies of hiring and firing. If you are determined to build this great team, you will need to understand employment law. I believe that part of the reason for keeping some of these dysfunctional or inept or under performing staff members around is because the doctor is fearful of being sued for improper firing.

Courses on this topic are readily available, but here are some basics:

• Keep an employment file on every employee. This file is where you document your continuous assessment of the performance of a staff member. Proper documentation gives the doctor the courage and the confidence to make the decision to terminate the services of an employee, if necessary.

• Conduct performance reviews for every staff member two or three times each year. Lead off with what the employee is doing well. Then suggest improvements to performance that you would like to see. Then ask if there is anything that you can do to help the employee achieve success. Write down what you discussed  and keep the notes in the employee’s file – otherwise you will never remember. At the next performance review, you will be prepared to continue the discussion.

• Write out clearly defined and detailed job descriptions for all staff members. These need to be continuously updated to be relevant.

• Spend the money to have a professional create a well written, current office policy manual that meets legal standards. In today’s litigious society, you will be living dangerously without this manual.

• Be sure to purchase EPLI insurance. This is an essential but relatively inexpensive insurance policy that will cover your legal costs to defend a lawsuit relating to improper firing or sexual harassment. It will–in the unlikely event of a judgment against you- also cover that cost up to–depending on the limit of the policy–250 to 500K.

• Stay current with OSHA regulations and get certified annually. It seems like the only time that OSHA even gets involved with a dental practice anymore is when there is a complaint from a disgruntled staff member.

The bottom line is that it is very expensive to stumble  and realize that you have hired the wrong person. Training is a big investment of time and effort. So it is important to do everything you can to be successful the first time around. But when you do make a mistake- and of course it is bound to happen – it is imperative to know the rules of hiring and firing. Bite the bullet. Take your medicine.  Move on and take the appropriate action. You owe this to yourself and to your other staff members.

As promised in my last post, I want to share what I have found to be the ten major reasons certain dental practices are more successful than others. The surprising thing to me is that only two are related to clinical excellence. So what better time than now, at the beginning of a new year – “resolution season” as they say – to decide to make some changes and improvements to the way you run your business.

I haven’t made an attempt to rank these ingredients for success, except for today’s topic. In my opinion, the number one biggest challenge in any business today, dentistry or otherwise, is to assemble and keep–over long periods of time–a dedicated, talented, business savvy, customer service oriented group of individuals who function well as a team.  Building this team has to be the number one priority if you want to be successful.

Now I know that many staff members read my blog posts, so I don’t want any of them to misunderstand or misconstrue the comments I am about to offer. They should know – unequivocally – that they will never find anyone more staff friendly than I am. In the course of my work, I interact with literally hundreds of staff personnel every month – and the large majority do a great job.

I feel quite strongly that it is the responsibility of the doctor to create an environment where staff truly love to come to work. Your patients will absolutely feel this karma. You need this kind of staff because it is impossible for a doctor to achieve success on his or her own. It is hard enough just to try to get through each clinical day. You need to surround yourself with people who can do their jobs extraordinarily well. These people in fact want to be held accountable for their performance. They do not need or want to be micromanaged.

I sometimes  see situations where one or two staff people hold back everyone else. They poison the atmosphere. I’ve had doctors tell me they hate coming to work knowing they have to deal with this toxic environment. And often these offending staff members have been employed for years and years. They feel empowered. They truly feel that the practice would crash and burn without them, when in fact, when they are let go or dismissed, a huge weight is lifted off everyone else’s back, and the practice begins to grow again.

I also see many instances of talented staff members leaving because the doctor just will not get rid of the bad apples. It is really interesting to realize–and this is one of my favorite sayings–that the way you feel about someone is usually the way that most people do. Patients, as well as staff, will vote with their feet. They may not tell you why they leave – they often just disappear –but a lot of times it is because of the behavior or attitude of a staff member. Repeatedly I will hear that when a staff member is finally let go, so many patients now say to the doctor, “why did it take you so long to take this action.”

To summarize, I feel your number one resolution as you enter 2014 is to commit to building a great team one person at a time. You should hire for attitude and train for skills. Pay them well. Compliment them often. Tell them how much you appreciate their efforts, and that you couldn’t do what you do without them. This process of team building could take months, but the effort will be so incredibly worth it.

Next month – January 2014 –  I am starting my  eighteenth year of working full time as a coach and advisor to dental practices, and I have just gone by the 600th  separate dental practice mark. So that is a pretty good size sampling from which to draw conclusions of why certain doctors and certain practices are more successful than others. Why do some dental practices become so much more profitable than others? Why do some practices grow exponentially, and why do some doctors seem to get so much more satisfaction than others? Are there commonalities, and are there predictable ingredients to add to the mix that can create a successful outcome? Or is it all serendipitous? Is it all good fortune? Is success only related to God-given clinical abilities, or can mere mortals with a great work ethic achieve just as well?

What I found from my analysis surprised me. I concluded  that of the top ten strategic areas of focus that I feel are barometers for success–however you might want to define success in a dental practice–only two are actually related to the clinical ability of the doctor.

So over the next few months, I plan to share my findings and observations with you, my readers. Hopefully these insights might be able to help you evaluate the way you currently are operating your business in order to potentially make some changes that will allow you to achieve greater success and happiness. Stay tuned!

My wife and I flew out to Las Vegas a few weeks ago to attend the Madow Brothers TBSE. As always, Rich and Dave put on a great show and we had a wonderful experience. We flew Southwest, as we always do whenever possible,  because they are almost always on time, their  personnel are friendly and upbeat and funny, and their boarding procedures are so much faster than other airlines.

I recently learned that Southwest has a published credo of how and why they  stand out from their competition based on what they expect from all of their employees: a fun loving attitude, a warrior spirit, and a servant’s heart. I love it! And I’ve got to tell you – when I reflect back on my travels with Southwest over the years – those three attributes sum up why the experience is consistently pleasurable. So I’m thinking why not turn your practice into Southwest Airlines?

• If Southwest can board 150 people on a plane about 3000 times per day – and 95% of the time leave the gate on schedule – your dental practice certainly should be able – with rare exception – never to keep a patient waiting. So please make it a top priority to get together as a team and figure out the roadblocks that are not allowing you to stay on schedule. This is of utmost importance because as I’ve said many times, your patients will respect your time in direct proportion to the way you respect theirs.

• I have a big secret to share with you: people have many other places they would rather be than to come to the dentist! How many times have you heard “I’d rather have a baby than a root canal.” So try to fill your office with fun loving, friendly, upbeat staff to enhance the dental experience. I always advise that you hire for attitude and then train for excellence. Take that approach and your office is a winner.

• The warrior spirit thing is a must – another helix on the DNA molecule that defines your office. Your patients need to know that every one in the practice – doctors and staff alike – will do whatever it takes to please them and make them feel special and respected and satisfied.

Southwest Airlines and Nordstrom’s  and Ritz Carlton have all worked hard to brand an image of extraordinary customer service. Add the name of your dental practice to that list in your community. This is no easy task – it takes tremendous attention to detail. But it will be worth it. A quote I recently read sums it up beautifully: “The greatest danger for most of us is not that we aim too high  and miss, but that our aim is too low and we reach it”.

I’m old enough to remember what it was like to practice dentistry before the advent of dental insurance. I also remember when it was considered illegal or unethical or certainly questionable to advertise or market yourself or your dental practice to the public. All, of course, before the Internet, and e-mail, and Google, and Apple, and social media changed the way we share and communicate information.

When dentists first were permitted to advertise, the medium of choice was direct mail. You would print up 50,000 postcards–in order to get the best rate on printing–and send them out to your dearest and nearest friends in your neighborhood and hope for the best. It was very expensive and you never knew if your message or offer would resonate, and guessing was very costly!

Direct mail marketing programs of today are VERY different from what was the standard even ten to fifteen years ago. As different as an iPhone from a rotary phone. As different as a Victrola from an iPod. One company that exemplifies this new and modern approach is 123 Postcards. I have been following them for most of 2013, and I am quite impressed. Instead of mailing to zip codes, they break down the mailings to specific mail carrier routes. That means you can better target specific neighborhoods by proximity to your practice, income levels, median home value, average age, number of homes with children, etc.–the data gets pretty sophisticated.

123 Postcards has pioneered one of the most comprehensive marketing tracking and monitoring systems in the industry. Every mailing includes a unique, local call-tracking number that rings seamlessly into your office. Not only is each call recorded, but it is also scored, graded, and analyzed so that you and your staff know the exact results of every mailing. They can track the number of patients who called, the names of the patients, the offer they responded to, which part of town they called from, and staff performance on the telephone call. With cheaper printing costs, they can now send out mailings in smaller amounts and thus measure the response rate to different offers. This allows your message to be very current i.e. back-to-school specials or end-of-the-year use it or lose it for dental insurance.

Since there is considerably less standard mail arriving in your mailbox these days, it just might be time to consider a well-designed direct mail marketing program. I certainly feel comfortable recommending the folks at 123 Postcards for your consideration.

My wife and I recently spent a week’s vacation in Spain. We love European cities, and we had a wonderful time. Very enjoyable travel with trains, planes, and automobiles, magnificent scenery filled with architectural marvels. One potential problem for me is that most restaurants don’t even start serving dinner until 9 PM. Well I’m much too old for that! So if you want to eat normal hours in Spain – from Barcelona to Grenada to Seville to Madrid – you go to a Tapas Bar.

Tapas are a wide variety of appetizers in Spanish cuisine that have evolved into an entire culture where one can order many different tapas and combine them to make a full meal. Additionally, three or four people can all order different dishes – a la Chinese food – and share. There are literally dozens of these establishments in every city, but it seemed impossible to differentiate one from another.

That got me to thinking about the challenge that dentists face in trying to separate their dental practice from the competition. Most of you are not fortunate to own a stand alone facility with huge distinctive signage that allows you to stand out and be noticed. So the distinction must come from the heart and soul of what metaphorically “you serve” in your practice.

A caring and considerate and interested staff making each patient feel special could be the appetizer. Extraordinary customer service with attention to every detail in all aspects could be the first course. Honest, comfortable, and outstanding clinical dentistry could follow, and user friendly, affordable payment arrangements could be the dessert.

The “dinner experience” at your practice must be so amazing that people feel compelled to tell others. Seth Godin – an absolutely brilliant marketeer whom I read each and every day – eloquently summarizes and makes my point when he recently wrote that “ideas spread from person to person, not so much from you to them. So find your biggest fans and give them a story to tell.”

The rest will take care of itself.