I always wonder when I see people doing things poorly why they persist at trying to work things out for themselves, when a better way is often more easily available.

And to find that better way, all these people need to do, is ask.

The trouble is that a lot of the people who fail to ask persist on out of blind arrogance or out of stupid ignorance.

The trouble is that when people in business persist and keep getting things wrong, not only are they wasting their own time, they’re wasting their customers’ times as well…. which is really a very rude and arrogant behaviour.

To find a better way, all these people need to do is ask someone more knowledgeable… and often that more knowledgeable person is Google or YouTube?

Or it could easily be a person who has done successfully what the person is trying to achieve on their own.

There’s no shame in seeking out help in finding a better way….

As dentists…

Dentists need to talk with their patients in definitive statements, and they need to lead their patients towards making the correct treatment choices.

But a lot of dentists don’t want to “offend” their patients by appearing “pushy” or “salesy”, and they don’t want the patient to dislike them for recommending more expensive options, even when the more expensive option is the best treatment.

This is because the dentist is worried that the patient may reject them…

These dentists don’t want their patients to feel that they [the dentist] have been pushy…

And so a lot of patients never feel any urgency or concern to act immediately on treatment recommendations that actually need to be done sooner rather than later…

And that sort of delaying of treatment by these patients is never in their best interests, because we all know that the decay doesn’t spontaneously disappear, and cracks in teeth don’t heal up on their own…

Ever.

Dental receptionists…

I heard a receptionist today offering a patient who called on the phone:

“I can give you 8:30, 9:00, 9:30, or 10:00? Or 10:30 or 11:00”

 When what really should have been offered was the next available appointment.

Often when patients or callers are asked:

“When would you like to come in?”

They answer:

“When have you got available for me?”

This answer, which we hear routinely when we do call tracking analysis, just goes to show how many patients prefer to be led, rather than to lead….

Patients can be easily led to the appointment that we want them to have…

And offering the next available appointment can always be done by asking the patient/caller a two-choice close, where the caller gets told:

“The next available appointment with Dr Moffet is on Friday at 11:00am, or I have a time the following Thursday at 3:30pm. Do you prefer mornings or afternoons?”

You can steer your patients into the appointments you have as next available, by still offering them a two choice close [in the way I recommended above], rather than letting them know that the whole morning is available by reading out all the open appointment times…

The problem is…

The problem is that the uneducated don’t do a very good job at educating their team, and often this lack of team education doesn’t convey the correct message to the discerning customer.

And the discerning customer becomes the dissatisfied customer, and they leave.

And when that does happen, that’s a difficult pill for the discerning customer to swallow… in nearly every case…

Sadly, when this happens, the root cause of the dissatisfaction is rarely investigated by the business, and remains unknown, and then often the “breach” is repeated and repeated… which is never a desirable outcome for customers, businesses, and employees.

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*****

The Ultimate Patient Experience is a simple to build complete Customer Service system in itself that I developed that allowed me to create an extraordinary dental office in an ordinary Sydney suburb. If you’d like to know more, ask me about my free special report.

Email me at david@theupe.com