Business Wise
Dentists must believe in their service and know-how to communicate this to their patients
By Laura Thill
Your dental customers may be excellent practitioners, but without marketing skills, their practice may not grow. "Dentists have to wear two very different hats," says Fred Joyal, a Los Angeles-based dental marketing expert and CEO and co-founder of 1-800-DENTIST®. "They must be a great dental clinician and a great entrepreneur, and this calls for two very different sets of skills."
That’s not to say every dentist is a natural marketing expert, he continues. Which is why it’s so important for them to hire an office manager who can guide them through business-wise decisions. "Some dentists may learn these business skills from the dentist who sold them the practice or from a consultant, but rarely do they come [to a practice] with these skills," he points out. In fact, Joyal so strongly believes in the importance of marketing one’s dental practice, he recently authored a book, "Everything is Marketing: The Ultimate Strategy for Dental Practice Growth."
The book offers dentists - and their distributor reps - marketing ideas for attracting more patients and growing their practice. Several topics covered include:
- Why dentistry’s unique business model is an advantage.
- Tools for boosting patient loyalty.
- Building a strong, content team of staff and dentists, whom patients find attractive.
Selling a service
Dentists generally are not salespeople by nature, and yet much of their job involves persuading patients to spend money on something they may not fully understand or were not planning on doing, notes Joyal. "Taking care of our teeth is one of the best investments people can make," he says. "Dentists must believe this and then communicate to their patients what [this involves] and why it is so necessary." This involves educating their patients and persuading them to do something they should do, he adds. "People often think nothing of putting $5,000 of chrome on their cars, yet they balk at the idea of investing $5,000 in a restorative procedure."
The premise of Joyal’s book is that "every aspect of a dentist’s practice has a marketing element," he says. "For the patient, everything they hear, see and smell" affects their attitude toward a dental practice, he points out. "This may include the way the staff is dressed [and interacts], the color of the walls or the technology they are using.
"Patients want to know that their dentist is using the best equipment," he continues. "There is great comfort in knowing that a dentist is up on the latest technology."
Happier practice, happier patient
Dentists can realistically increase the size of their practice by three or four times its current size, says Joyal. "But, they must know what message they need to convey to their patients," he explains. "My book is about dentists getting through to their patients effectively."
"Essentially, the book [intends to] convey three steps to growing a dental practice," he continues:
- How dentists should think about their practice.
- How dentists can bring marketing into every aspect of their practice.
- How dentists can use advertising to grow their practice.
"This is about a happier dental practice that [caters to] patients and [in doing so] grows," he says.
Fred Joyal’s book, "Everything is Marketing: The Ultimate Strategy for Dental Practice Growth", is available in hardcover or as an audiobook at www.GoAskFred.com, or as a Kindle download at www.amazon.com.
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