Marketing 101 – KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE… and the same can be said for dental professionals; KNOW YOUR PATIENTS. A common mistake seen with dental practices is they try to cater for every type of patient, and whilst this is noble to hear, the result tends to open doors to “bad patients” that can negatively impact your performance and the business side of running your practice.
So how do you qualify your new Patients so they end up not wasting Chairside hours or give you unnecessary stress?
Create your “Best Patient Avatar”
Imagine if you were able to invite 100 of your best and most profitable patients together at the same time in your practice, and you were able to sit down and talk with them all and find out everything about them that makes you feel so happy that you’re their dentist (and not your competitors)… and you notice many similarities amongst them all?
Similarities like Age range, Gender, Ethnicity, Marital status, Employment sector, favourite Social Media platforms, favourite Music, Movies and Books… if you could capture all of their characteristics into data-form, you could create a “mould” of them all, and effectively you now have your “Best Patient Avatar”.
How to obtain the data from your best patients
There are 2 ways for you to immediately start capturing important data from your new and existing patients; you can email your existing patients with an incentive to fill out a survey (incentive could be a free treatment, or a discount on their next treatment), and for new patients, they can fill out the same survey whilst they are sitting in your Waiting area.
What digital Survey tool can you use?
It is entirely up to you which digital Survey you wish to use, but the 3 most popular providers we can recommend are Clinipad, Google Forms, Typeform and SurveyMonkey, all of which are great to work with, especially on an iPad.
Okay, I have their data… now what?
This is the fun part! Let’s begin creating your Best Patient Avatars and making them more realistic by personifying them as if they were real people. Get your entire team to join you on this, as their contribution and performance can align with your Best Patient Avatars.
Okay, we have our Avatars… now what?
Now with your Best Patient Avatars in place and your entire team all aware of their objectives that involve your Avatars, then you can start with adjusting your Lead Generation process to include your Survey (or some of the survey questions), and their responses will help qualify your Leads, thus filtering bookings that are more likely to convert.
Target new Patients that fit the mould of your Best Patient Avatars
Share your Avatars with your Marketing Agency, so they will be able to shape your marketing approaches so that they only attract viewers that share the same characteristics as your Best Patient Avatars, which will help reduce your Ads being shown to viewers that may not be a good fit or aren’t interested.
Conclusion
Having a Best Patient Avatar could help refine your working approach, as well as spot red flags from potential “bad patients”. In effect, you’re qualifying new prospects to ensure there is a mutual benefit, as well as sustain the level of service your whole practice provides.