asking for referrals

Dental Office Marketing and Practice Management Tips and Ideas for April 2019
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Dental Office Marketing and Practice Management Tips and Ideas for April 2019

Hello Friends

As we prepare to start our second quarter and welcome Spring, I have a few dental marketing and practice management tips and ideas to share with you.

My goal is to help you exceed your current and potential patients’ expectations. Just as important, if not most important is to consistently exceed your employees’ expectations.

Dental Marketing and Practice Management Tips and Ideas from Betty Hayden

Just for Fun!

National Fun at Work Day: 4th   – Have a silly theme for this day. (For example, Crazy hair, silly socks, decades day, etc. POST pictures on Facebook and Instagram)

Reasons to Celebrate your Team:

Administrative Professionals Week: 21-27th /Admin Professionals Day: 24th

Dental Administrative Professionals Day Betty Hayden Consulting Dental Coach

See Employee Appreciation Ideas Here: Employee Appreciation Gift Ideas Pinterest Board

Educational Opportunities ~

Oral Cancer Awareness Month ~ An excellent opportunity for you to raise oral cancer awareness and the need for early detection in order to save lives.  See Dental Office Tips and Ideas for Oral Cancer Awareness

National Youth Sports Safety Month – All month-long promote sports safety by protecting smiles with mouthguards.

Dental Office Tips and Ideas Sports Safety

Marketing Ideas –

April is National Garden Month – 

Here are some ideas for you:

Theme: Spring Flowers

Focus: Spring into a Healthy & Beautiful Smile

Fun Give Away: Flower Seed Packets w/a label and business card attached.

Flower seed packets can be purchased at most Dollar Stores for around .20 a packet. Great deal!

The labels you attach to the flower seed packets can say:

“Your referrals help grow our practice, Thank you! “

“Our Office Blooms Because of you! “

“Please enjoy these flowers growing as much as we enjoy your referrals growing our practice.”

thank you dental referrals growing our practice betty hayden consulting

Your patients will love these little flower seed packets give-aways! Make certain the office name & info is on the packet.

For awesome ideas for flower seed packaging/presentation check out my Pinterest board HERE.

Social Media Post Ideas to Improve Engagement –

 National Fun Day: 1st

Vitamin C Day: 4th

No Housework Day: 7th

National Garlic Day: 19th

Take Our Daughters & Sons to Work Day: 25th

Sense of Smell Day: 27th

Wishing you all a productive, stress-free, and happy April!

Doctors, contact Betty at bhaydenconsulting@gmail.com to schedule your complimentary 30-minute telephone coaching session with me.

If you appreciated these complimentary ideas I  would love for you to please leave me a review/recommendation here on GOOGLE and/or FACEBOOK.

Don’t miss out on any of the ideas that I share each month! Are you receiving my complimentary Practice Management and Marketing Ideas in your email each month? If not, please start following us today. If you prefer, send me your email address (to bhaydenconsulting@gmail.com) and I will send you an invitation to follow my blog.

Yours for Greater Success,
~Betty

P.S. Please stop by and say hello to me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Pinterest

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Ten Ways to Stay in Touch with your Dental Patients

Hello Friends,

How do you encourage referrals and build relationships with your patients when the average dental patient comes in only 2 times per year for their continuing care hygiene appointment? Think about this, you get to spend 2-3 hours out of 8,760 hours per year with those patients. With all of life’s distractions and responsibilities, how can you ensure that they don’t forget about you in between appointments? Stay In Touch. Keep your name in front of them by planting little reminder seeds.

Today, I’m going to share with you 10 Ways to Stay In Touch With Your Patients. Ten easy & effective ways you can stay in touch by planting “reminder seeds”.

how to build relationships and encourage referrals betty hayden consulting dental

  1. Social Media – Active Social Media pages are a must. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram & Pinterest are excellent ways to engage  and build lasting relationships with your patients. If you struggle with what to post on your pages, visit here for social media content ideas.                                                                                                     
  2. Freebies –  Give away free items imprinted with your office name, website and phone number to each patient at their appointment. Such as; toothbrushes, magnets, calendars, pens and lip balm. ( If you’re wondering where you can order some quality imprinted items, check out Bizarre Marketing.  I share this particular company with you because their customer service is awesome!)                                                                             
  1. Cards – Send cards to your patients, Just Because, Thank you for your referral and/or Special Occasion cards. People appreciate getting an “old fashioned” hand written greeting card via snail mail.   Make it convenient by keeping a variety of greeting cards on hand.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  
  2. Telephone – Pick up the telephone and call your patients. Here are a few reasons you may have to call: Continuing care appointment reminders, Thank you for your referral, Post-op (just checking in to see how well you’re doing), Refill reminders (due for a refill on whitening gel, toothpaste, electric toothbrush head replacement, etc), and Special Occasions.                                                                     
  3. Letters – Send out letters for incomplete treatment, congratulations on completed treatment, welcome to our practice and thank you for your referral. Tip: providers and team members should personally sign their letters. Include a  brief note or comment if appropriate.  In addition to letters, send continuing care appointment reminder postcards and text messages.                                                                                                                                                          
  4. Newsletter – Send newsletters out to your patients. Include sharable content, dental health tips, recipes, community news, office happenings, dental education and special offers.                                                                                                        
  5. Emails – Dental Hygiene Tips, Office Happenings, Continuing Care Reminders and Special Offers. Be sure to ask and record email addresses of your patients. Email communication is inexpensive, easy and effective. Just don’t spam your patients with too many emails.                                                                                                   
  6. Website – Keep your website fresh, easy to navigate and attractive. Include videos, info & pictures about the doctor(s) and team, community events, special offers, ability to schedule appts online, FAQ, dental services and education, office hours, directions, social media pages, contact information, etc.                                                                                                                                                                  
  7. Patient Appreciation Events – Host a fun event for your patients – In-office Patient Appreciation Days and Open House events. See Open House ideas. Out of office events, such as; Roller Skating, Indoor Bounce/Trampoline, Movie Theater, Public Pool, Bowling, Local Park, etc. Invite your patients to bring a friend. Be sure to have imprinted giveaways and information about your office at these events. Encourage all attendees to visit and like your social media pages.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     
  8. Community Involvement – Be involved in local health fairs, charity events, sponsor local sports teams, etc. Just a thought, when you and your team are out participating in community events, consider wearing t-shirts that clearly identify (advertise) your office and give away a lot of imprinted gifts.

There you have it, 10 ways to stay in touch with your dental patients. Doing some or all of these things will help to build lasting relationships with your patients and encourage referrals.

Of course, the very best way to ensure your patients remember to come back and to refer their friends, family members, neighbors and co-workers is to get them talking about their experience after they leave your office. How do you that? Be consistently great! Consistently exceed expectations! Plan to make sure that each and every appointment is great from the initial greeting at arrival, during their appointment, and when you say your thank you and goodbyes as they leave. (See Earn The Privilege To Serve Again)

At your next team meeting, discuss what you are currently doing to stay in touch with your patients and how you can improve in planting more reminder seeds.

Are you receiving my complimentary Practice Management and Marketing Ideas in your email inbox each month? If not, please subscribe today. Feel free to tell your dental friends all about us so they can start benefiting from these dental ideas too. If you liked these ideas, please let me know by hitting the “like” button. Thank you!!

Yours for Greater Success,

~Betty

P.S. Please stop by and say hello to me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Pinterest

 

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Dental Marketing Ideas for Teacher Appreciation and Nurses Week

Hello Friends,

“A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.”~Henry Adams

May 1st – 7th is Teacher Appreciation Week. It’s always a really busy and fun week for me as I typically help to make it a special week for all of the teachers at my children’s school.

It is also a great opportunity for dental offices to reach out to the teachers in their community.

How can you do that? Here are a few ideas for you:

teacher appreciation and nurses week dental marketing

First, let’s start with any of your patients that are teachers.

Pull a report with any patients that are school teachers and send “We Appreciate You” cards to them. Unexpected and very much welcomed.

Put together some little thank you gifts to give your teacher patients when they come in for their dental appointment during the month of May. See my Pinterest Board for a ton of ideas: Gift Ideas for School Teachers

Second, reach out to the teachers in the community that are not “yet” your patients at your office.

Host a Favorite Teacher Contest. Invite local students to nominate their favorite teacher. Winning teacher gets FREE teeth whitening and a certificate stating they won for favorite teacher. The classroom with the winning teacher gets a gift card for school supplies or pizza/ice cream lunch.

You could easily ask for donations from local businesses to add to the winning teachers prize or for the classroom.

If you prefer, the above ideas could easily be used to celebrate National Nurses day and week – May 6th -12th. Instead of the teachers and schools, you’ll be reaching out to the nurses at local doctors offices, clinics and hospitals.

There are so many ways to celebrate teacher appreciation and nurses week in your dental office. If you would like some help creating a Teacher or Nurses Appreciation marketing campaign for your office. I have lots of ideas. Campaigns that include:  ideas for special offers, patient give-aways/drawings, office fun, community involvement, cross marketing with local businesses and recare/incomplete treatment scripting, please contact me today at bhaydenconsulting@gmail.com

If these ideas don’t interest you, not to worry. Stay tuned as I’m putting together even more dental marketing ideas for the month of May, I’ll share them next week. (These last few weeks have been busy here in Hayden Consulting Land with school music concerts, science fair projects and several home improvement projects…Ugh!)

Wishing you all a very happy and productive Spring! 

Have you signed up to receive my complimentary dental marketing and practice management ideas that are sent right to your email inbox each month? If not, take a second and sign up. This way, you won’t miss a single idea! Or, if you have a dental marketing idea that you need some help with, feel free to comment here or email me at bhaydenconsulting@gmail.com

Yours for Greater Success,

~Betty

P.S. Please stop by and say hello to me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and Pinterest

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Dental Practice Management and Marketing Idea’s for March (2016)

Hello Friends,

The month of March is your opportunity to end the first quarter of 2016 stronger than ever. If you haven’t done so already, put down in writing your practice management and marketing plans for March. I will give you several different idea’s to help get you started.

Note: March is an especially important month for any of you that typically struggle with your schedule during the month of September. Be sure to pre-appoint your March hygiene patients for their 6 month continuing care appointments. (If this isn’t already being done with your hygiene patients, make it your goal to schedule their next appt. while they are there in the office.)

dental marketing ideas for march

~ Dental Practice Management Idea’s ~

March is Employee Spirit Month
If you want to increase employee trust, creativity, teamwork, engagement and productivity, then it’s time to have some fun, commend more, improve communication and huddle up!  

– Have some FUN! –  Games, contests, competitions and food are all great ways to have more fun at the office.

  • Lunch: Every one bring a dish to pass or doctor orders lunch in for the team.
  • Excursion: Bowling, Dinner Out, Shopping, Painting, Spa, etc
  • Trivia Questions: Play a trivia game about procedures, office policy, telephone verbiage, etc. Winners earn prizes.
  • Prizes: Gift Cards, Cash or PTO
  • Video: Make a fun music/dance video with the team.
  • Employee of the Month: Each month, vote for team member of the month.

– Commendation – Commend a fellow team member when you catch them doing something “right”. Commendation boosts morale.  (Tip: Employers, commend & reward the behavior and actions that you want to see more of.)

– Communication – Reduce employee frustrations with excellent communication.  When new procedures or technology is being introduced be certain that every team member is made aware and educated. Employee expectations and Office changes should be clearly communicated to the entire team… no more, “I didn’t know” or “No one told me!” Share your office goals for production, collections, new patients and marketing plans. This helps to keep everyone on the same page and working toward the same goals.

– Huddle Up – The morning meeting is essential for a successful day. If you tried in the past to have a morning huddle and it didn’t work out… try again! However, this time, please follow these tried and true suggestions & tips for morning meeting success.

Hygiene Continuing Care Opportunity:

National Cleaning Week: 27-4/1 – Is it time for your dental spring cleaning?

~ Dental Marketing Idea’s ~ 

National Write A Letter of Appreciation Week: 1-7

Send appreciation cards to your favorite loyal patients, your favorite referring doctors and your favorite local businesses.

National March Into Literacy Month –
Host a book drive for your local library, schools or families in need. Ask your patients and people in the community to drop off their new or gently used books. Submit a press release to the local newspapers and TV news. Run this event for a few months.
Or check out these other ideas here: Dental Marketing Idea for your local library -1 and Dental Marketing Idea’s for your local library -2

 Educational Opportunities:

National Kidney Month – Good dental health isn’t just about preventing cavities and keeping your gums healthy. Both tooth decay and gum disease can lead to infections that can cause problems for people with  kidney disease.  A study in the Journal of Clinical Periodontology reported that people with kidney disease and those on dialysis are more likely to have periodontal disease and other oral health problems than the general population.

Root Canal Awareness Week: 27 -4/2 – How to prevent a root canal.

  There you have it… several idea’s to assist you in ending your first quarter successfully!

So what do you think you would like to do to help make March a great month in your office? Comment below, I would love to hear your idea’s. If you are interested in having me help your office create a custom marketing campaign that includes ideas for special offers, office fun, patient give-aways/drawings, community involvement, cross marketing with local businesses and recare/incomplete treatment scripting, please contact me today at bhaydenconsulting@gmail.com

Are you receiving my complimentary Practice Management and Marketing Idea’s in your email inbox each month? If not, please subscribe today. Feel free to tell your dental friends all about us so they can start benefiting from these dental idea’s too. Thank you!

Yours for Greater Success,

~Betty

P.S. Please stop by and say hello to me on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest