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I couldn’t believe Carlos had never waited on us before.

We go to Gloria’s – a regional South American / Mexican food restaurant – probably once a month-ish.

(Their steak fajitas are on point, margaritas are the best in DFW, and our kids love love love their black bean dip…)

Gloria’s service is generally pretty good. But we’d never had Carlos serve us before. He’s the kinda guy I would remember if we had because his service was next level.

Carlos brought his A-game. Our waters, chip baskets and bean dips never got less than half empty.

He made sure to ask how we would like our dishes prepared – how would I like my steak? Aioli on top or on the side? Extra pico? Quesadillas split for the kids? Corn tortillas, flour or both? Extra plates?

And he quickly cleared any empty dishes from the table once they were done.

The dude did all of this with a happy, stellar attitude. I had to comment on it.

“Carlos, this has been great service today. We appreciate you giving us such a great experience.”

He beamed with pride. “It was my pleasure, sir,” he said, “I’ve been here 15 years.”

And then he told us, “Next time you and your lovely family are here, ask for Carlos. I have regular customers all the time, and I would love to serve you again.”

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My description of Carlos’ service may not sound life-changing. I agree.

But going back to my point from Monday’s message – strong Customer Service is at such a premium right now, someone who does great at just the basics really stands out.

What can you learn from Carlos that will help you book more surgeries in your practice?

Let’s use the Carlos example to go over how great customer service should feel if I come into your office as a patient:

It feels like you have everything under control. I don’t need to worry about it.

It feels like you are leading the process and I can follow you.

It feels like I can be comfortable asking questions or making requests.

It feels like you know what you’re doing.

It feels like you enjoy what you’re doing.

It feels like you take pride in doing your job well.

It feels like you’re more concerned about me than about you.

It feels like you know what I need before I know that I need it – and you take care of those needs.

It feels like you are confident enough in the results that you provide, that you ask for future business (either repeat customers in Carlos’ case, or asking for referrals).

It feels like it was worth every penny and then some because the experience was so good compared to most other interactions in my life.

It feels darn good.

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Is this how your prospects and patients feel when they interact with your office? When they do, it becomes much easier for them to hand over their hard-earned money for your premium priced procedures.

What Would Carlos Do? Go do that today.

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– Troy “Fajita King” Cole

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PS – If you skipped my previous email on BAD customer service, go back and read it.

PPS – Customer service is key to booking more surgeries. We’re filling our Fall Sales Training Bootcamps right now. If you’re interested, reply for more details. Our bootcamps are the bee’s knees for elective surgeons who want to book more surgeries or raise their prices (or both).

The customer service bar is so low these days…

My 3-year-old could hop over it on one foot.

Surely I’m not the only one seeing this. Have you noticed how great customer service just… isn’t really a thing anymore? Or at least it’s not common.

Quick story:

My family of 6 (did you know I have 4 kids age 9 and under?) are season pass holders at a local water park. On one particular visit a few weeks ago, we forgot our season pass cards at home.

Should be a simple enough solution, yeah? Check the computer, see that we’re members, thank us for being loyal customers, and let us in.

Nothing crazy. Not even bending over backwards. Just an opportunity to provide solid customer service.

Nope. They tried to make us buy replacement passes. Wasteful. Didn’t need em. Didn’t want em. Weren’t necessary.

But neither the employees NOR the manager could fathom the idea of just letting us in. (And we’re not talking about some giant corporate theme park with tons of moving parts. It’s a locally owned, small-time operation with a couple dozen employees).

We spend significant amounts of money there each summer – on season passes, food, birthday parties for the kids, buying tickets for friends.

And when they had the opportunity to deliver solid customer service and show us they appreciate our business…

They totally flunked.
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So that’s one example of bad customer service. But what’s even more common is mediocre customer service you find everywhere else.

All examples from my life in the last 2 weeks:

>>> Servers at nice restaurants who are just going through the motions, have no attention to detail and don’t seem the least bit concerned about providing a great date night experience.

>>> The cable company receptionist who acts like it’s the biggest inconvenience of her day to talk to me (after she’s kept me on hold for 17 minutes).

>>> The sprinkler repair man who says he’ll come Monday and just… ghosts me.

“C’mon, Troy. People are stressed. Businesses are short-handed. Don’t be an old curmudgeon about bad customer service.”

Hey, I’m not saying anything about WHY it’s happening or even if it’s justified (actually I will comment on that: bad customer service is never justified). All I’m saying is that customer service these days is SO WEAK… that it gives you a massive opportunity.
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If you just give solid customer service, you’ll be so much further ahead than so many other businesses trying to take your prospects’ attention and money.

I’m not even saying you have to be amazing. I mean you should be, but even that’s not necessary to be leaps and bounds ahead of everyone else.

You don’t have to be Ritz-Carlton level (though that would serve you quite well). You don’t have to be Zappos (although you should strive to mimic their customer service in many ways).

Start by SETTING and MEETING expectations, and you’ll be ahead of 98% of the businesses out there, including all the other practices in your area.

SALES is my usual topic of discussion. Why are we talking Customer Service?

Because when you give good old, fundamental customer service – being responsive, clear communication, smiles, anticipating needs – this goes a LONG way in creating the value you need to close high ticket surgeries at higher-than-commodity pricing.

What we’re talking about is critical to growing your volume. There’s no way around it.

Take Customer Service out of the Patient Journey, and you’re left with a helluva bumpy ride.

Can you still off-road your way to your destination? Sometimes. But why not give your prospects a freshly paved fast lane to the results that they want?

Which is why we dig into these customer service concepts in all of our training programs. Heck, we have new modules coming out focused just on the front desk team members. How they can create a great first impression for patients coming into the office.

 

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In closing:

Are you giving good, consistent customer service? It’s one of the easiest ways (right now) to set yourself apart as a world-class practice.

The bar is low. Just step over it and prosper.

TOMORROW…

We’ll talk about what Solid or even GOOD customer service looks like. My dude Carlos at Gloria’s is a great example.

“A guy slingin’ the world’s best house margaritas can help me book more patients in my elective surgery practice?”

YUP. More tomorrow…

– Troy “Serve” Cole

 

I recently onboarded a new client who was complaining of people in their market “shopping around” for vision correction.

People who didn’t seem serious. Only asked about price. Didn’t want to book a consult.

This comes up fairly often when interviewing practices for one of our bootcamps. Especially when we share big wins our clients typically achieve – Conversions going up, record days/weeks/months for treatment, raising their prices while also raising conversions, etc.

Typical response: “That all sounds great. But our market is different. It’s unique. We have a lot of shoppers. I don’t know if that will work here.”

Every market has its nuances. But the big thing we’re talking about here are the laws of human nature, and those stay pretty consistent across the board.

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So how do you keep people from “shopping around” when they call your practice?

Picture a shopping mall (remember those?). You walk into a store, look around then on to the next one. And the next and the next.

Why do you do this? 2 reasons:

1. Because you are in charge of your shopping experience. You run the show.

And 2. Because most retail employees aren’t going to step up and run the show for you, so you stay in charge by default.

Think about it. You walk into a store and many times aren’t even greeted by someone. Or maybe an associate says “Hi, can I help you find anything?” That’s better than nothing I suppose. But it ain’t leadership.

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So what would take you out of “shop around” mode in a mall?

If someone else who started running the show instead of you.

Here’s what I mean:

Picture yourself walking into Nordstrom to find a new outfit for a party.

Instead of the sales associate saying, “Can I help you find anything?” It goes more like this:

Nordy: “What brings you in to see us today?”

You: “Oh just looking for something for a dinner party.”

Nordy: “Ooh, sounds fun! Let’s see if we can help with that. Are we talking formal, semi-formal, dressy-casual…?”

You: “dressy casual for sure.”

Nordy: “Great. And would you say you’re feeling more on the fun-n-funky side, or something more traditional?”

You: “Ha probably fun and funky. It’s my friend’s 50th birthday dinner, we’re doing the limo thing and probably getting ridiculous.”

Nordy: “Excellent, can I show you a few things that you might like? I’m Susan by the way, nice to meet you…”

And you’re off to the races…
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Nordstrom knows a thing or two about customer service. They know to help their customers get the result they want (look good, feel good), it takes an element of leadership.

One of the big reasons people shop around for a product/service they already know they want – they don’t have anyone leading them in the right direction.

This is especially true for something like elective surgery, where people are making a big decision they’ve never had to consider before.

They’re basically flying blind. (pun for my LASIK folks)

So they call you and 5 other practices. Ask questions about the few things they are familiar with (this is where so many of the pricing questions come from!). And they desperately try to gather enough information to formulate some kind of plan of action themselves.

Problem is, many of them never get themselves to the point of saying, “OK, here’s my next step.” Which shouldn’t surprise you. They don’t have any idea what they are doing.

Most people are bad decision makers anyway, and that goes double when we’re in unfamiliar territory.
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But is there any real harm in just answering their questions? In a word, yes.

Answering questions does your prospect ZERO favors. In fact, it’s a disservice.

If you answer every one of someone’s questions… and they leave more confused than before (which is often the case)… then you actually hurt them more than helped them.

Your prospects need a leader. A leader who is going to ask her own questions, to find out what the prospect really needs and work together to formulate an action plan that gets results. That’s why they called you in the first place, right?! To get a result?

One of the Es in our E3 Conversion System Bootcamp is “Exhibit Authority.” We re-wire our clients to think about leadership in a way that actually serves – and converts – prospects.

Don’t want people who “shop around” at your practice? Exhibit authority and give them a reason to fall under your leadership for this important decision. They cannot find the promised land on their own. They need you to lead them…

Share this with your team and go lead your patients today.

– Troy “Nordy Boy” Cole

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PS – The 2021 Fall cohort for our E3 Conversion System Bootcamp is kicking off in a couple of weeks. We only have room for 3 more practices to join.

If you would like to: grow your surgery volume, raise your prices beyond “market rate,” build a strong culture, and turn your team into true believers in what you do (because conviction trumps everything) – then your team needs the toolset, skillset and mindset to make it happen.

E3 is the way. Reply to this email with “E3 me!” and I’ll send you a copy of our Dossier that outlines the entire program.

We’re not at batting practice anymore, Toto…

A strange thing happens when a practice gets their marketing dialed in. (I’m helping a client work through this now, and it’s always a good reminder.)

For many practices who don’t market (or who don’t have effective marketing), they only get leads who are “ready to go.”

So Sally will call up and say, “Hey, my friend Sharon came over there and has LASIK. She really likes you guys, and I wanna come in and get it done too.”

Now, that’s great. Of course you want those easy wins.

But let’s look at what happens when you start marketing your practice the right way. You start to attract prospects who aren’t already sold on you and your practice.

If you have leads that take more effort to track down, or they need more persuasion to understand your value proposition… that’s a sign you’re on the right track.

Why? Because that means you’re attracting future buyers, in addition to those who are ready to go right now. You’re extending your effective reach, vs. simply taking what comes your way.

To put it on a bumper sticker: Fickle leads aren’t a bug of good marketing. They’re a feature.

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You know I like my baseball analogies. ⚾️

Your referral leads are like baseball practice, hitting baseballs off a tee. You get in a good groove, and you’re really smashing the ball. “I’m pretty good at this hitting thing.”

Well yeah, because those referred patients are often “tee’d up” and ready to book.

So you suit up for a game. You step up to the plate, thinking you’re ready to go. And then you quickly realize…

Hitting during a ballgame is a totally different deal.

The pitcher’s throwing you fastballs. Curve balls, sliders. You’re struggling to get your bat on the ball. And if you do connect with the ball, you have to run the bases in the right way so you don’t get out.

There’s more to do, more to remember, and so many more variables than just slapping the ball off the tee.

Does that mean you need to be Babe Ruth? No. You can be a great hitter and score plenty of runs for your team once you know the fundamentals. But here’s the common issue – teams get frustrated because they think hitting off a major league pitcher should be exactly like hitting off a tee.

“Well, I lined up like normal. I swung the bat like I typically do. I did all the usual motions I use on the tee. So why did I strike out again?”

Because hitting on a tee and hitting a live pitcher aren’t the same thing. We’re talking about 2 different scenarios that require 2 different approaches.

Sure, one can help with the other. But if you think, “These are the same thing, so why aren’t I performing well in BOTH of them?” that’s just a simple flaw in thinking that needs to be corrected.

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Imagine you manage a baseball team:

A few of your team members are great with a bat, have good attitudes and generally do well on the tee. But they’re having trouble hitting the ball when they’re up to the plate. Do you just give up? Throw in the towel?

No. You get someone to coach ‘em. Teach your team how to react to a pitcher. How to identify different pitches. How to put the ball in play so you have an opportunity to score.

Same goes for lead conversions. If your team doesn’t know how to convert a lead into a consultation into a surgery, you don’t just throw up your hands and say, “Well, guess this isn’t gonna work. We’re stuck.”

You train them on how to handle different situations. Teach them how to think the way you think about your patients. How to handle common objections. How to persuade when your prospects are standing in their own way and don’t want to make the decision that’s right for them. Get them excited because they work for one of the best practices in the world – yours.

This is exactly what we do in our E3 Bootcamp, and it’s precisely what your team needs on a weekly (or even daily) basis to continuously improve their game (and thus your winning percentage as a practice).

Marketing’s job is to create opportunities. On the communication/sales side, our job is to take those opportunities and turn them into consults and surgeries.

Don’t be afraid to step up to the plate. Coach your team to hit live pitching so you can win more games. And if you don’t have the time and resources to devote to coaching them, that’s understandable. But find someone who can.

That’s all I have for you today. Have an awesome Wednesday.

 – Coach Troy