TIPS TO INCREASE REVENUE
Expand Your Services. Is your dental office struggling to make revenue because of recent events? Read on to find out what you can do to turn things around.
Here are a few tips to help your dental office increase your revenue:
Increase Your Fees Annually
You must schedule a small fee increase every year to keep your dental practice successful. The increase in your fees must be more than the average 2-3% because that amount will be the same as other practices. The yearly fees must be raised around 4-5% to keep you ahead.
Do an inventory of your current fees because you may need to raise the prices for some services over others. Check how much the tools and medicine cost and increase your fees accordingly for the coming year.
Check what your services cost and what value they provide to determine the new price. Rebalancing your fees will net you more income immediately. Be sure not to overcharge as it may turn people away from your practice.
Expand Your Services
Expanding the list of services you offer will make it easier to reach your revenue goals. You won’t need as many new patients if your current patients get multiple treatments and procedures done by your practice. Not improving or expanding your services will not make your practice successful.
Offering new services such as simple oral surgery, cosmetics, Invisalign, Occlusal guards, sedations, etc. will help you keep your patients while enticing new ones. You will see more profits without needing to expand your client base by much.
Profitable Procedures
Procedures such as porcelain veneers, endodontics, implants, bridges, and crowns are very profitable. Consider getting the necessary training for these procedures. If training for these procedures is not feasible, hire a dentist that can do the procedures.
Please note that offering a profitable service does not always ensure profitability. You must check the operating cost and time consumed to make an accurate assessment of the procedure’s value.
Increase Your Case Acceptance Rate
You must increase your case acceptance rate to increase your revenue. The usual case for most dental practices is that 7-10 new patients walk out of the dental practice every month without fixing their dental problems.
You must make an effective case to convince patients to undergo treatment.
Your presentation must be strong and robust to get your patient on board for the treatment plan. It is important to work as a team to clearly explain the benefits of their treatment. Remember to include the patient in the discussion and listen to their concerns empathically. These steps can better your chances of getting new cases. Suggest only treatments that patients really need. Do not upsell to your patients to build trust.
Automation
Integrating technology into your practice may seem difficult at first, but the benefits far outweigh any reservations. Study different time-saving systems to increase your efficiency, which can translate to higher profits. Choose HIPAA compliant software to protect your patient’s personal information.
Call routing and tracking
This program links your callers to your marketing to help you find patients searching for your services.
Lead distribution and generation
This tool can help you manage your new leads and get you important information on your many campaigns.
Social Media
Using social media can make or break your practice. There are plenty of platforms to choose from for your marketing purposes. Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Snapchat, etc. have their uses. You’ll find it hard to keep up with the many platforms being made every day.
Your first step should be to pick the platform that best suits your goals and practice. The most common platforms you should use are Yelp, Facebook, and Healthygrades.
Yelp publishes crowd-sourced reviews about different businesses and also helps your customers make online reservations.
Facebook is a social media platform where people can make posts of reviews of your business and easily share it with others.
Healthgrades provides information about hospitals, physicians, and healthcare providers.
You can automate the marketing process by scheduling your posts. The scheduled posts can increase your efficiency and help you better engage with your audience. You’ll have more time to respond to comments and queries from your potential patients.
You can use Hootsuite or Tweetdeck apps to schedule your posts. Remember that social media is vital for your marketing because it’s the only cost-effective way to reach a wide audience. Automating your processes will make it easier for you to manage your practice.
Patient Portal
Patient portals allow your patients to access their history and see how much they have paid. Be sure that your portal is HIPAA-compliant because this allows you to put more patient information in the portal. HIPAA-compliant patient portals can show patients their past treatments and X-rays.
The patient portal will empower your patients by letting them access their medical records anytime. You will be saving time because patients are less likely to call your practice because of record requests and payments.
These portals accelerate your cash flow and reduce the costs of credit card payments. The convenience a patient portal presents you should not be overlooked.
Treatment Plan Reminders
Your patients must be reminded of dos and don’ts after their procedure. Unfortunately, they are likely to be groggy after finishing a procedure. The information you give your patients likely won’t sink in. To counteract this predicament, you must give them a written reminder and also send an email. The written instructions and the email ensures your patients always know what to do in your absence.
In the end, there are plenty of ways to increase your dental office’s revenue. You can start by trying to schedule a fee increase annually, expanding your services, learning profitable procedures, increasing your case acceptance rate, and automating some of your services.