Posted on January 21, 2021
If your orthodontics practice is suffering due to a lack of patients, you’re not alone. Patient visits have dropped drastically nationwide predominantly due to the pandemic. However, there are several steps that you can take to improve your practice and get patients back in your chairs safely. Here’s what they are:
Communication is key if you want to get more patients in your office. You should send out reminders of upcoming appointments and reach out to patients who are overdue. Be sure to update your website and social media accounts with news about your practice. In fact, 48% of internet users spend more than two weeks researching practices online before they will schedule an appointment, so be sure your online presence is a good one. Also, if you haven’t already, communicate with your patients about what you’re doing to ensure everyone’s safety during the pandemic. Your guests want to feel comfortable scheduling an appointment.
Even before there was a pandemic, you were probably adhering to strict safety measures. Now, it’s more important than ever to follow those guidelines and even increase safety precautions. Provide hand sanitizer and masks to guests, space out your seating, and perform temperature checks. You can provide online check-ins so that patients won’t have to be inside any longer than necessary. You can even perform consultations over the phone or online rather than in-office.
Orthodontic consulting can provide your practice with multiple benefits. You can rely on consultants to provide marketing solutions, financial analyses, orthodontic billing services, and orthodontic insurance collections. The right kind of marketing strategies for orthodontics can increase your visibility and procure new patients. Having someone else handle your orthodontic insurance collections and billing can allow you to focus on your practice. It also puts the difficult task of orthodontic insurance collections on someone who is specially trained to do so.
A rather simple change that you can make to ensure your patients’ comfort when they visit is to enhance your space. Switch out your waiting room seating, add a television, or put on a fresh coat of paint. Make sure you are keeping up with enhanced sanitation by cleaning the waiting area frequently. You may not realize it, but simple measures such as these can guarantee a repeat visit.
If you’re still finding it difficult to get patients to visit, you may want to consider adjusting your prices. An orthodontic consultant can help you figure out where you can make changes if you aren’t sure where to begin. Sometimes, simply offering a short-term special can increase the number of patients you see.
Many businesses are finding new ways of operating right now. Orthodontics offices can make similar changes. All of these steps can help your orthodontics practice to succeed, even during these difficult times. For more tips, rely on Orthosynetics as your dental marketing professionals.
