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Having worked with hundreds of practices over the last 17 years, almost every patient conversion challenge can be traced back to one thing – confusion.

Confusion about:

• Price
• Value
• Different procedures
• Their best course of action
• Safety
• When to have a procedure
• Why to have a procedure

You can think of dozens of others. Behind every objection or road block, there is some level of confusion.

What can we do about it?

It’s easy to jump to the assumption that if someone’s confused, it’s because they lack information. So the solution would be to give them more information, right?

Problem is this rarely works to clear the fog of confusion. More information over-complicates. It adds more variables into the situation. It gives them more to think about. It adds clutter to their already jam-packed mind.

Think about it – if you drop 10 new pieces of information on the prospect in an effort to give them “more information”… well, maybe one of those pieces of info actually applies to their root concerns. The other 9 are just extra information that creates more questions and more confusion.

So how do we determine the one piece of information or education that they need right now?

Rather than taking the lead and throwing a bunch of information on them, we take the lead when we ask questions. Like…

👉 Which of our payment plans best fits your budget?

👉 What did you friend say about his experience with us?

👉 What did your doctor say when he referred you to us?

👉 How long have you been thinking about doing this?

👉 What did your husband say when you told him you were coming in for a consultation? Was he so excited for you?!

👉 What made you come see us now?

👉 What’s most important to you when choosing a surgeon?

Obviously there are different questions you could ask, depending on the situation. But your goal is to pinpoint the underlying causes of the confusion, and then specifically addressed those.

(One of the three Es in our E3 Conversion System program is Education. And we talk about this concept in depth.)

Here’s the added bonus when you go this route:

At first, many of our students automatically think they need to go into “information overload” on their prospects. They think they need to have memorized an encyclopedia worth of medical information, so they can answer every question.

Not only is this wrong, but it also creates anxiety in your staff, and hurts your conversions.

When we teach this “Ask Questions First” concept and the simple tactics that go along with it, there’s always a collective sigh of relief. “You mean I don’t have to answer every single random question I get on the phone or in a consult?!”

You sure don’t. In fact, don’t even try. There’s a much better way to serve your prospects than the “20 Questions” game.

IN CONCLUSION – Ask questions to identify the specific underlying concerns. Those are creating the confusion. Then educate your prospects on those specific issues, and clarity shall arrive.

– Troy “Clarity” Cole
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PS – Our E3 Summer Camps are rocking. Already having teams experience breakthroughs and get a new-found confidence in their conversion skills. And unlike a lot of training programs, it’s actually a ton of fun for the teams that go through it. We have all the gifs, all the memes, sports analogies, Star Wars analogies, music videos, pop psychology experiments, movie quotes, and more.

“Should I care about all that, Troy?” YES because when you can tie into pop culture and your teams’ own personal experiences, knowledge transfer becomes much easier. And activities that are enjoyable improve the learning experience.

Everything we have built is centered around getting your team to REMEMBER and APPLY what they learn. 👍🏻

So if you want to fill your consultation schedule, or want to train up new team members on your phones, or want to give your team a refresher on how to communicate your 5-star patient experience, or if you just wanna get out of the massive discounting game (because you’re better than that), shoot me a message.

 

One of the most common mental roadblocks we see during our sales training bootcamps: students who don’t want to “bother” their prospective patients.

This desire from good place – of course we don’t want to be bothersome in life; we generally want to be helpful. Problem is, the two are easily conflated.

The result: we lose patients we could have otherwise helped had we not been so concerned with coming across as bothersome.

I want to share a simple yet powerful reminder that will give your bookers, counselors and doctors the confidence they need going into interactions with prospective patients. And for my marketers out there, you can use this to great effect when formulating your prospect nurture strategies.

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Having worked with hundreds of practices over the years, this is one of the most simple yet useful concepts we return to time and time again.

And it’s simply this:

Your Prospects Raised Their Hands First.

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Have you ever received a dinner-time cold-call trying to sell you an extended vehicle warranty? We all have. And what do you do when that happens? Politely(?) ask them to take you off their list, then hang up.

Why? Because you didn’t ask for that information.

Your practice is nothing like cold-call warranty salesmen. Everyone you connect with has raised their hand in some way and asked for help. They called, filled out your web form, got referred by their doctor, found you on Google, slid into your Instagram DMs.

However your prospects found you, they found you.They reached out and asked you for help. And this is useful to remember next time you think you’re bothering someone by following up with another call, dropping another text message or sending another email.

Call them once and they don’t answer? Don’t just leave a message and hope they call back. Call again later. And tomorrow. Twice. And text them.

Sound overbearing? Too aggressive? Bothersome? It’s not. Because they asked for your help.

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You literally can’t bother someone who asked for your help.

Consider this exchange:

“Yeah hi there, fire department? Can you please rescue me from this burning building?” OK but I wouldn’t want to impose. Are you like, double-sure you want our help?

Sound ridiculous? Because it is. Someone asks you for help, you help them. That’s it. That’s the whole thing.

If you feel like you’re imposing… if you feel like you’re bothering your prospects… if you feel like you don’t want to be too assertive… that’s in your imagination. It’s literally a fake feeling that you’re projecting onto yourself. Remember they reached out to you. They asked for your help.

And so if you’re not pursuing them… if you’ve left the ball in their court to reach back out to you… then it’s your failure. Because all you’re supposed to do is help them.

Your job is not to cold call and interrupt people’s dinner. Your job is to connect with folks who have reached out for your help, and assist them in getting their problem solved.

You can be assertive. You can ask the hard questions. You can call more than once. You can text. You can follow up with a 2nd or 5th or 15th email. And you should.

Why? Because until they say, “I don’t want your help anymore,” we’re going to assume they are still in trouble. Because they told us as much when they reached out in the first place.

They’re stuck the burning building. They called 9-1-1. You’re the fireman. Get em out.

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– Troy “Helpy Helperton” Cole

 

I’ve learned so much in the first few months coaching my oldest (age 9) in his first year of kid-pitch baseball. One of the most rampant challenges among athletes of this age – Overthinking.

As a coach who works with elective surgery teams to convert more leads, I also see how overthinking can have negative affects among team members who are scheduling consults.

Today we’ll get into 3 ways overthinking may be impacting your team, and simple Mindset Shifts to address each.

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Overthinking on the Baseball Field

Up until this point in their young baseball careers, our boys haven’t had to worry about kid pitching. They started hitting off a tee, and then played a couple of years of coach pitch (your own coach pitches to you, with the goal of giving you a good ball to hit).

But now they have to hit a baseball thrown by another kid who is trying to strike them out. A whole different dynamic.

In talking to our team about what they’re thinking when they step up to the plate, it’s a range of thoughts racing through their heads:

• This guy pitches fast.
• I hope I don’t get hit by a ball.
• I wonder if he’s gonna throw me a strike?
• Should I have swung at that pitch?
• What if I swing at a bad pitch?

And on the flip side, for our kids taking the mound to pitch, they have plenty of thoughts bouncing around in their heads too:

• I hope I throw a strike.
• I hope I don’t hit this guy.
• Oh no, I just threw two bad pitches in a row.
• What happens if I walk this kid?
• Should I try to pick off the runner at first base?

As you can see, tons of overthinking going on. Which ultimately leads to them being in their own heads, focused on their own worries, stewing on potential negative outcomes. Rather than simply playing the game and doing what they know how to do.

For many novice (and even experienced) appointment schedulers, this same type of overthinking creates conversion challenges. Here’s how (and how to fix it):

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1. Fear – We think they need to know the answers to any question we receive from our prospects.

This is one of the most common concerns among appointment schedulers. They think they have to know all the answers, and they’re afraid of receiving a question they might not know the answer to.

MINDSET SHIFT: Yes, we want to be well-informed about our practice and solutions. But remember, those of us scheduling your appointments aren’t doctors. We cannot and should not try to practice medicine on the phone.

On top of that, 90% of the questions we receive can’t even be answered until the prospect has a consultation and knows what they qualify for.

For these reasons, we shouldn’t fear receiving a question we might not be able to answer. It’s the perfect opportunity to say, “Great question! Once we’ve done all the scans and your doctor has reviewed them, he/she will be able give you an exact answer to that, and prescribe next steps based on your needs…”

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2. Lack of presence – When we’re in our own heads, we can’t be present with our prospects.

If we’re overthinking – worried about what questions we’ll get, or worried how someone might react to something we say – It’s impossible to be “present” and actively listening to the prospect.

MINDSET SHIFT: Prospects give us clues as to why they’re calling. Their pain points, frustrations, desires, hobbies, goals. So let’s put on our detective hats. We need to make sure we’re listening so we can pick up on those clues, ask our own questions, and figure out how we can best serve them.

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3. Lack of empathy – If we’re overthinking, it’s nearly impossible to empathize with our prospects.

Empathy is essential to set ourselves apart in the mind of the prospect. Are we focused on talking about us, what we do, what we offer, how we’re amazing? That’s what every practice talks about, leaving the prospect confused and unprepared to make a decision.

We need to focus on them, identifying their problems and concerns, and leading them down a Patient Journey that will result in a better life. So how do we do it?

MINDSET SHIFT: Our prospects aren’t thinking about us. They’re thinking about themselves. The pressure is off, my friend! When we know this, it’s easier to think less about ourselves and more about them. Then we can determine the best next step to solve the problem that drove them to reach out in the first place.

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In Conclusion: Every engagement with our prospects is like stepping into the batter’s box.

No need to overthink, worry and become self-focused. Just do what you know how to do. Sure, you’ll get some curve balls from time to time. Weird questions, prospects who are frustrated, interesting responses. That’s fine. It’s part of the game.

But if you’re 1. Unafraid, 2. Present in the moment and 3. Empathizing with your prospect’s situation, you’ll be prepared when they throw a ball right down the middle of the plate.

Think less and just play the game. This is how we hit home runs for our patients.

Make the most out of every play,

– Coach Troy Cole

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PS – We’re gearing up for our E3 Conversion System Summer Camp sales coaching program. If you want to empower your team to book more consults for your premium procedures, this fun summer session may be exactly what the doctor ordered. If you want more details, shoot me an email and let me know…