Sales Support Manager Michelle Hardy looks at five ways to boost your patient plan…
Share your vision
One way to help grow the plan is to share your vision for where you want to take the practice with your team. You can also set regular meetings to discuss the progress that is being made to achieve these goals.
Everyone should know the benefits
Make sure everyone in the practice knows the benefits of having patients on plan.
Also, make sure the team understand that having a patient on a plan is a win for both the patient and the practice.
When it comes to patients, the dentists need to endorse the patient plan based on the health benefits, which then needs to be followed up by the front desk team.
Know your costs
It is beneficial to make sure all your team know how much each of your plan options cost and what is included.
At Practice Plan, we can help by coming up with plan comparisons and a plan menu template for the front desk that can be shown to patients – just ask your RSM.
Be ready
You should make your plan your default option and do not just talk the talk but walk to the walk.
If a patient comes to the desk, make sure you have packs of literature ready and on hand to give them.
Do not be scrambling around looking for brochures, because that gives off the message that you do not use them very often.
Also, make sure all your team have access to online sign ups and that they know how to complete a patient application.
Set targets
Do not just say you want to grow your plan or wait for it to happen. You need to set targets and have an action plan to make things happen.
And if there are targets that are struck, then it may be a good thing to reward the team for hitting those targets.
That will provide people with a much-needed boost at a tough time.
What plan growth will look like
If you have a plan of £17.80 per month, that will bring in an income of £38,820 with 250 patients, and £77,640 with 500 patients.
When looking at the figures, break it down into chunks. If you want an extra 250 patients by the end of the year, what would it take to deliver that.
250 patients divided by 52 weeks is 4.8 per week, or one patient per day.
Monitor your progress to see if you are on or off track and act if you are off track.
Find out where in the process it falls short or if people need more training to succeed.