When we work with dental implant marketing clients, one of the first points we emphasize is the role the telephone plays in converting dental implant leads. The phone helps you create connection with dental implant patients. It can help you convert more implant patient leads. And it can improve dental customer service all-around.
But what many practices need is actually the opposite. That’s right. They need to get off the phone to convert more dental leads. How is that possible?
Several reasons. But here are the two most important reasons.
- The market has shifted. Patients are no longer willing to come into an office based on a phone call. The phone is still an important step but it’s a smaller step than before.
- Patients want to get all of their questions answered in one interaction. Whoever they speak with from your practice must be well-versed in everything they need to know before coming in for a consult. They won’t wait for a call back to answer open questions. They’ll move onto the next practice.
So what can you do? Here is what’s working now.
1. Use virtual consultations to filter good leads in and poor leads out.
When the global pandemic hit, patients stopped wanting to visit offices unless absolutely necessary. That led to the rise in virtual consultations. Now, dental patient buying patterns have shifted, and phone-only inquiries have become less effective. When they can look someone representing another practice in the eye, see the technology they use, and get all their questions answered, they’re going to get a much better experience than a phone-only conversation.
From the practice’s perspective, it is a much better way to protect chair time, too. During your consultation, you can discuss finances, specific needs, and timelines. Only after they are prequalified do you have to dedicate chair time to them.
If you have the right person on your team who can avoid multitasking during virtual consultations, you could immediately start converting more leads using virtual consultations.
2. Convert dental implant leads by outsourcing lead conversion to a specialized and compassionate team.
As we helped more practices incorporate virtual consultations into their implant marketing campaigns, a pattern began to emerge. Practices struggled to find the right person to conduct the calls. Practices are busy. Our team members are juggling ten things at once. And we need to care for patients to keep productivity high.
That meant, it was impossible for your team to do everything they need to be doing to convert the leads you invest so much time and money into generating.
The more we dug into the issue, the more we realized, it’s not your fault. It’s not because your team doesn’t want to help. It’s just that the reality of what’s working requires more of them than they have available.
Leads need attention. And they are now demanding virtual consultations. But they can’t have a virtual consultation as easily as they could sneak a quick phone call in before. So they need to pack more into one interaction and often have to schedule those interactions outside of work hours.
After four years of doing implant marketing, our team at Driven Dental Implant Marketing implemented a better way to help dental practices. That program is called the Virtual Patient Advocate, or VPA, program. We spent weeks training and testing a team of dental industry veterans to change the way you convert leads into patients. To graduate from the training, our Virtual Patient Advocates must consistently demonstrate the seven qualities that help patients get excited about your practice and prequalify as leads.
Are you ready to convert more dental implant leads?
If you’re ready to start converting more implant patient leads, you must get off the phone and use virtual consultations to prequalify and lead them forward. But that doesn’t mean you have to do it all yourself.
The VPA program utilizes a team of highly qualified treatment coordinators around the United States to prequalify, pre-educate, and nurture relationships with dental implant leads on behalf of Driven Dental Implant Marketing’s clients using the software, Smile Virtual. We use a team of talented, professional, and compassionate dental industry veterans who are available at all times of the day, seven days a week. They will prequalify your leads to deliver a steady flow of dental implant patients who are ready to move forward with financing in place. Even better, they represent your practice well—you’ll be proud to think of them as an extension of your team. And will be able to address all financing, scheduling, and dental implant process questions your leads will have.
VPAs are the best people to help you grow your implant practice because they have specialized knowledge, abilities, and experience. In many practices, it’s unfair to internal team members to expect them to have deep knowledge outside of their area of focus. And it’s unfair in most practices to expect team members to not have ten things to juggle at once to focus on your income lead. VPAs, on the other hand, understand implants, financing, and scheduling enough to build trust and prequalify people. They’re specialists in having conversations with implant patients to prequalify leads and allow you and your team members to focus on what you do best.
If you want to find out how other offices are getting in front of new patients within a matter of days in any environment plus how we can pre-qualify them for you so they are ready to say yes by the time they are in your chair, book a strategy call before we’re full.