How staff training affects dental practice marketing

Dental practice marketing costs money. Put all the new patient leads you are paying for to good use by making sure your staff is ready to answer any calls.

From prospect to appointment

Most potential patients will want to ask a question, or two, before making the final decision to choose your practice and schedule an appointment. Your front desk team must be trained in how to properly handle new patient inquiries. Training should cover all the ways you might communicate with potential patients, including telephone, text, email and social media.

Over the phone

When answering inquiries over the phone, staff should use a friendly, reassuring tone of voice. Set up your phone system up so that no caller receives a busy signal. If the front desk is on the phone, the next call should route to someone else in the office. Write a script for your front desk team for all new patient inquiries, include basic answers to the most common questions about your procedures.

Text message or email

Text and email communication tends to be different to speaking over the phone. Keep messages concise and to the point. Additional email tips include:

• Consider setting up a dedicated email address for all new inquiries
• Use an auto-reply system after hours to inform the sender you have received their message and will respond soon
• Avoid attachments as this can cause emails to be sent to spam
• If you do not have the information requested, write back to let the prospective patient know you are gathering the details and will reply shortly

Social media

Assign someone at your practice to check all your social media accounts at least once or twice per day. Questions will come in as both comments on your posts and direct messages.

Keep your team informed

Keep your front desk team informed about any new advertising campaigns. Provide key information regarding the campaigns so they can plan accordingly. The more prepared your team are to receive inquiries from new prospective patients, the more likely it is these inquiries will convert into new appointments.