iDentistry The Journal identistry_jan_april2019 | Page 13

The Journal
Unfortunately, the cold and hard fact is that
there isn’t enough time, money, people or other
resources, all of them together at the same
time. Brainstorm a list of to-accomplish
objectives in order to know the potential impact
of each activity and then can evaluate the
likelihood of success.
Ask yourself a very simple question; "If you can
only do one thing - what would it be?"
That answer would be your priority.
It sets the context for evaluating other options;
the option which will help you reach your
objective.
> Faster? At a great pace?
> Economical? For less money?
> Successfully? With better results?
Prioritization doesn't have to be complicated
and doesn't have to take a lot of time.
Good things happen when you set your
priorities straight
~ Scott Caan
8. Never underestimate the pocket of your
patient: Your patient could be an investment
banker working six days a week, a housewife
who used to work earlier but is now dependent
on her husband’s income or a daily wager who
is struggling to make ends meet or a
businessman who has enough money but not
enough time or endeavour to spend it. Without a
fundamental understanding of where your
prospect is coming from and how he/she lives
her life, digging deeper into their needs and
motivation is going to be a challenge. Every
person mentioned above has something that
keeps them awake at night. It might be a
persistent problem – such as an inability to
smile freely in public because of
discolouration/broken anterior teeth, scathing
pain in teeth and jaws, inability to eat
hot/cold/sweet in parties or even home, afraid of
false dentures coming out publicly and many
more. Understand the predominant problem
that has brought the patients to your door that
can help you recognize
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that motivation in others and your pattern
recognition for the people that comprise your
best profitable patients will also keep on
improving dramatically.
While money doesn’t buy love, it puts you in a
great bargaining position.
~ Christopher Marlowe
9. An educated patient is a satisfied patient
and a satisfied patient is a loyal patient:
Patient retention is critical to the long-term
success of a dental practice as retaining current
patients is far less expensive also than
attracting new ones. According to Harvard
Business Review, the cost of acquiring a new
customer is 5 to 25 times more expensive than
retaining an existing one and also notable, was
that even a 5% increase in customer retention
leads to an increase in profits anywhere
between 25% and 95%. The biggest role of ours
comes in to retain the same patient and making
him our marketing tool. The most probable
reason of discrepancy in retaining patient for
the dental practitioner is lack of proper
communication. Lending a ‘patient’ ear to the
patient’s problems raises your value in their
eyes. Always strive to give a careful listening to
their concerns giving them your undivided
attention.
There are no traffic jams along the extra mile
~ Roger Staubach
10. Keep Pricing in sync with changing
times and rising costs: There is no magic
formula for right pricing especially in our field.
The biggest and the most common mistake, we
guys do in our clinic pertaining to pricing is
under-pricing. I don’t have any statistical data to
prove it, but as taught by our parents and
seniors, somewhere in early phase of our
careers at the back of our mind, we still get stuck
in that mistaken idea that startup clinics are
supposed to win by having the lowest price. I am
really sorry to say, that, it just isn’t true. Pricing is
a matter of situation, strategy,
Vol. 15
No. 1
Jan-April 2019