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Podcast: 09 – Do These 5 Unscalable Things to Earn Patients for Life

We tend to want to be as efficient as possible in our businesses. But sometimes, it helps to be *inefficient* and do the unscalable things that turn prospects into patients, and patients into evangelists for your practice.

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Transcript

It’s time to do things that don’t scale.

What is up, my friends? It’s your boy, Troy, welcoming you to a fresh piping hot episode of the Practice Growth Machine podcast, where we teach you the persuasion tips and tactics you can use to command higher prices for your premium procedures and fill your surgery schedule.

Today we’re talking about inefficiencies. Normally when you hear that word it’s in a negative light, because we want to be more efficient, right? Speed, automation, trimming the fat, stretching our time and money, we want to be efficient.

But today we’re actually talking about the good kind of inefficiency. To put it a different way, we’re going to cover why and how you need to do unscalable things in your practice that can make a huge difference to your patient’s experience.

Paul Graham is the founder of the uber-successful Silicon Valley incubator Y Combinator. He’s got a great essay on this called Do Things That Don’t Scale.

We’ll use that as the backdrop for why you should do unscalable things, which unscalable tasks you should focus on in your practice, and how they can benefit your practice as you grow. All right, let’s get into it.

First of all let’s talk about why you should do certain unscalable things because it seems counterintuitive, especially as you grow you want to be more efficient, you want your activities to scale. So why even go down this road?

Well, think of all the noise that’s out there in the marketplace, and I’m not just talking about your other competitors, but think about all the marketing messages and everything that is hitting your prospects from every single business out there that’s trying to get your prospects’ attention and get their money. It’s a jungle out there.

Now you hear me talk a lot about getting attention, and yes, you absolutely must get someone’s attention before you can even start to turn them into a patient. If somebody doesn’t know who you are, they certainly won’t end up in your surgery suite. That’s a given.

But once you have attention, you want to show your prospects that you’re different. You want to stand out and ultimately you want to make a connection. Maybe you’ve heard the quote that people don’t do business with companies, they do business with people. That’s where all this unscalable activity comes in.

Remember we don’t just want to take care of our patients, but we also want to turn them into evangelists for the practice. So how do we create that wow factor that really takes it over the top for your patients?

In Graham’s essay, he talks about the need to surprise and delight customers as a major reason to do things that don’t scale. So let’s take a second and talk about some examples of unscalable things you can do to surprise and delight your patients.

When we work with our consulting clients we map out every decision point along the patient journey and then we script and systematize the different touchpoints, the nonscalable engagements, and the automation, all of it. We build the whole thing out.

Today I just want to give you a few examples of unscalable tasks that you can do that make a huge impact in the relationship with your patients to surprise and delight them. Now look, you might be inclined to say, “Troy, we don’t have time to do these things.”

I promise you the benefits of doing these unscalable tasks in your practice are well worth the few extra minutes it takes to make them happen.

Example number one, call your patients the night of surgery just to check on them. Yeah, it’s going to take a few minutes to do each call, but when you consider the amount of care and concern that’s conveyed by your two-minute phone call, it’s totally worth the time to do it.

Example number two, take pictures with your patients after surgery. Now look, this only takes a few extra seconds, and you’re going to need to have somebody else there to take the picture, but this signals that surgery day is a day to be celebrated and commemorated. You hear me talk a lot about celebrating and creating these special moments, and that’s huge when you take that photo on surgery day.

Not only that, but you’re giving your patients an asset that they can now go and share on their social media pages. They’ve got that picture. They can share it. They can tag you in it, and that’s free publicity, free marketing for your practice. Who doesn’t want that?

Example number three, sign thank you notes to your patients. You don’t have to write the thank you notes out. You can have these pre-printed if you want to do that but just sign those.

Take a few minutes to sign a stack of them and then have your team send those out. It’s a nice touch that shows how much you value them putting their trust in you and your practice.

Example number four, have live human beings answer the phone. This isn’t something that you individually have to do as a doctor, but your team should be doing it. Maybe that means you need an extra phone person to accomplish this. Is it worth it?

Well, think about how many phone trees and automated phone systems that you encounter on a regular basis. The phone is your first one-on-one impression with a patient. Greet them with a vibrant, happy live voice, not a robot recording. It makes a difference.

Example number five, take time to find out why patients chose you and why they chose you now. The best marketing messages come straight from the mouths of your patients. Now this might mean longer conversations with patients, but the benefit is that you get so many insights into the reasons why your patients chose you over lower-priced competitors in the marketplace

When you know that you have better marketing, you have better-talking points, you have better ways of understanding the obstacles that keep people from making the decision that’s right for them, which in most cases is having a procedure with you. All right, let’s recap.

To wrap up, these are just a few examples of the unscalable things you can do in your practice to surprise and delight your patients and create a truly magical experience. All the stories that you hear about big companies who have legendary customer service – Zappos, Nordstrom, Ritz Carlton, is because they go above and beyond for their customers and go to great unscalable lengths to care for them.

Become known for legendary patient care by doing things that don’t scale and your practice will continue to prosper as more patients come to trust you and refer their friends and family.

That’s it for today and we’ll see you on the next show.

For more persuasion tools and scripts visit the Free Resources tab at troycole.com.

Do You Really Respect Your Patients’ Time? Then Avoid This Common Mistake

This is not an essay about long wait times. (In case you thought that’s where I’m going with this…)

Yes, long waits are a signal to your patients that you don’t value their time. And since time is our most precious asset, long waits are a particularly egregious offense.

But I’m not telling you anything you don’t know. Which is why this short essay isn’t about that.

This is about unnecessary repetition.

People don’t like to repeat themselves. It’s a waste of their time. It’s an indicator you aren’t listening. Repeating makes your patients feel invisible.

I recently had a 20-minute phone call with AT&T to set up a new internet connection at my house. I’ve had solid interactions with AT&T support over the years. This was not one of those.

After typing my personal info into the prompts of the auto-attendant (phone number, zip code, etc) , I was transferred to a human… who asked me all the same things. Then this person sent me over to a sales person. And guess what? I had the pleasure of repeating myself for a third time.

You’ve probably had an experience like this. You know how frustrating it can be. It’s a pain for your patients as well.

Personal info, medical history, what they do for a living, their hobbies, reason for the appointment, and more. It’s not uncommon that a patient repeats this info several times between the phone call, initial paperwork, in-office exam and even among multiple members of your team during the appointment.

It’s unnecessary, a waste of time, and completely avoidable.

What’s the easiest way to gather info once (and only once)?

This may sound dead simple… because it is. Here’s your 3-step solution to this common frustration.

Take notes. Every team member should be taking notes through the process. From the phone to the consult, we should be building a dossier about the patient that has all this info in it.
Add notes to file. This is pretty straightforward, but if you take notes that don’t end up in the patient’s file, then the notes are useless.
Use notes. Again, pretty obvious, but you might be surprised how often this doesn’t happen in your practice. Once you’ve taken notes and added them to the patient’s file, everyone needs to use the notes in patient interactions.

Once you go through this process, you no longer have to ask “So, what do you do for fun?” You can be the one to start the conversation – “So you’re into scuba diving? That’s awesome! What’s the most beautiful place you’ve been?”

That’s all there is to it. Do this, and you’ll find yourself having more engaging conversations with your patients. You also signal to them that you care and you are listening.

People need to know you hear them, then you are able to truly connect with your patients.

The 3 Ways to Leverage Bad Reviews

Your email alert dings. You’ve Got Mail! (remember when that was a thing?)

Ah look at this! A new Google review.

Let’s open it right up and see what praises someone has digitally heaped upon us…

You click the message, and much to your horror, you see one single, glaring star almost glowing on your screen.

Someone has bestowed you with one of the greatest insults in the history of the internet – the infamous one-star review. What in the heck-fire is happening here?

Yeah it’s frustrating. Of course you don’t want it. BUT here’s the thing – Bad Reviews aren’t the worst thing in the world. In fact, there are actually some benefits to having some bad reviews.

“So you’re saying I should be happy about 1-star reviews, Troy?! That’s bananas!” Of course it’s bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S. And no, that’s not what I’m saying.

In fact, if your review average drops to the mid-4s or below, you have serious problems.

That said, let’s talk about three ways bad reviews actually help your practice. Seriously.

1. Bad Reviews Make You Look Legit

Patients want to see a perfect 5-star review record, right?

Actually, no. According to research, a 5-star average is actually less believable than something in the 4.5 – 4.9 range.

Think about it: If you go to research a product or service, and you see nothing but glowing reviews, you might become suspicious. Why? Because it seems too good to be true.

Today’s consumers are more educated (and thus more cynical) than ever before. If something seems too good to be true, it probably is.

“Troy, I don’t care what the data says, I want a 5-star average no matter what. Stop being ridiculous.” Hey, I hear you.

To be clear – this doesn’t mean you should go out looking for bad reviews. And it also doesn’t mean that legitimate bad reviews should go unaddressed (we’ll get to that later). But if you get one, and your review average drops from perfect 5 to 4.9, research says that can actually work in your favor.

2. Bad Reviews Give You A Chance to Reframe

I had a client who not long ago received a 1-star review from someone who wasn’t even a patient. It was actually the driver of a patient on surgery day.

This person left the negative review on the practice’s Google page, something like “I returned at the time they told me, but they made me wait another 45 minutes before I could drive my friend home.”

At face value, that sounds bad. It sounds like the practice doesn’t value people’s time, and that they don’t keep a tight schedule.

This is where the reframing comes in.

Thankfully with most review platforms, you can respond to your reviews, positive or negative. (You should respond to both for a host of reasons that I won’t get into today).

If you take one nugget away from this essay, remember this one:

When you reply to a negative review, script the reply for everyone else who will see the review, not the reviewer.

☝️ Reread that so you don’t forget it.

Remember, if the negative review stays (meaning if the reviewer doesn’t remove it, or if you appeal and the platform doesn’t remove it), thousands of people will see the review (and its reply) over the next few years.

So it’s very important that you create context and reframe the review into a positive light.

Here’s how we did it for this particular reviewer:

> “Sally, we understand how delays can be frustrating.

> “Patient care is our top priority, and this is extremely important on surgery day. What this means is never rushing any part of the process, and taking careful time and consideration through each step of the procedure and immediate post-operative period.

> “For this reason, brief delays do occur from time to time. We appreciate your patience and apologize for any inconvenience.”

Now if someone reads the review and the response, what might they be thinking?

> “Yeah, it’s kind of lame to have to wait extra time. But I do appreciate a place that puts a big emphasis on patient care and isn’t rushing people in and out at a breakneck pace.

> “We’re talking about my eyes here, so what’s an extra few minutes of that means they’re taking all the steps necessary to make sure I’m good to go?”

This is an example of scripting the reply for public consumption. And now you’ve turned a negative review into a positive message about your practice.

3. Bad Reviews Online Tell You What’s Happening Offline

You run a busy practice and can’t know about every single patient interaction that takes place each day.

As lame as bad reviews are, sometimes they shed light on under-the-radar issues with an employee or a process that you would not have otherwise known.

Maybe patients feel rushed with a certain doctor. Or they receive a cold reception from certain team members. Bad reviews can help you better understand issues in your practice and rectify them.

Here we’re talking about legitimate bad reviews and complaints. Not a random 1-star review without comment, not the goofy driver review I discussed in the last section.

This is the type of negative review that is not good for public consumption, and they can be difficult to reframe. You want these reviews removed. So how do you do that?

This answer may seem obvious to you, but I visit with at least a practice a month that hasn’t even considered it:

Reach out to the reviewer.

If you know who the person is (which you do in many cases), have your practice administrator give them a call. Apologize. Make it right.

Better yet, you call the patient, doc. You might think you have higher value things to do. You don’t.

Some of the biggest patient evangelists are those who felt slighted, but then the practice shows they care enough to make it right. Because so many businesses won’t do this, when you do, you look like an absolute rockstar.

And once you address the situation to the patient’s satisfaction, here’s another maybe-not-so-obvious tip:

Ask them to remove (or update) the negative review.

Going back to Point 2, this allows the public to see how much you care about making things right with your patients.

In Conclusion: Don’t Feel Helpless When You Get a 1-Star Review.

You have options. You have ways to address and reframe dumb 1-star reviews. You have the power to be proactive and turn negative experiences into positive ones.

Now be like Nike, and Just Do It.

We actually have a software our clients use that helps capture negative feedback before it can turn into a negative review. This is super helpful when a patient is experiencing the type of frustration described on Point 3. Find out more here.

Podcast: 08 – Information is Not Enough. Your Patients Need This

We think if we give our patients enough information, they will make a good decision. But information is only half the battle. Today, we talk about the other 50% of the equation, to make your practice stand out as the Obvious Choice.

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Transcript

Decisions, decisions.

Hello, my friends. It’s your boy Troy welcoming you to a fresh episode of the Practice Growth Machine podcast, where we teach you the persuasion tips and tactics you can use to command higher prices for your premium procedures and fill your surgery schedule. The topic of the day is decision making. Specifically, your patient’s decision making.

Now, I read and study a ton about persuasion and influence. It’s one of my favorite topics because it has so many applications in marketing and in sales that most folks just overlook or they never even consider.

In episode six, we talked about how your main job on the phones, and even in consultations, is to help your patients make the decision that’s right for them. But, how do you do that? Let’s talk about it.

Helping the patient make the right decision for them comes down to helping them create a decision framework. A decision framework. Think back to buying your first car or your first house, or maybe even a smaller decision like which new cell phone to purchase.

In any of these situations, it’s common to try to gather tons of information so you can make an informed decision. But, information is only half of the equation. We need a framework to actually make the right decision.

If you think about building a house, all the bricks, the paint, the wood floor planks, all those different parts are like the information. But, you need the literal frame of the house so you have a place to put all those things. That’s the framework. Without that, you just have a big pile of stuff and you don’t know how to arrange it or where it goes.

This is how people get into information overload. Research is so easy now that we all have this supercomputer in our pockets, but then we have all this information we’ve gathered. We don’t know what to do with it, we freeze, and we don’t make a decision. Or, we decide to stick with whatever we’re already doing.

This is especially true when we’re faced with a new kind of decision, something we’ve never made before, like the decision to have a vision correction procedure or cosmetic procedure.

How can we help create a strong decision-making framework for our patients? This is something we get deep into when we do our client trainings. The mindset, the different types of patients who come see you, how to read them and their personalities, and then how to create specific frameworks for engaging and connecting with them. But, I’m going to share a few of the big concepts with you today.

Number one: Explain the why. Explain the why. This is a very simple but powerful principle, and that’s to explain the why behind what you’re doing. It’s so easy to go through the motions of your normal medical history and doing the scans and doing the tests and all that.

You may even explain to your patients, “Okay, now we’re going to look at the front surface of the cornea,” etc. But, what’s even more important is explaining the why behind what you’re doing:

Here’s why we’re looking at the corneal surface. Here’s why we want to know what your hobbies are. Here’s why we recommend procedure X instead of procedure Y. Because, most patients aren’t going to understand the science behind an orb scan, for example.

But if you can say, “Hey, here’s why we’re doing the scan,” in very plain terms, they can quickly gain an understanding of why it’s important and how it benefits them, which becomes part of the framework for the decision.

Number two: Share anecdotes of other people like them. Storytelling is a concept that comes up a lot on the podcast, and that’s because it has so many applications in marketing and sales. For creating the decision framework, you want to show your prospect that others like them have traveled this road before, they’ve made a similar decision, and they are better for it.

If you’ve personally had the procedure, great. Talk about your story too. If your surgeon has had the procedure, even better. Talk about that.

Talk about other patients like them. Don’t mention names of course, but you can say, “Yeah, I had a patient just the other day who was a young mom and she was just so excited to be able to splash in the pool with her kids.” That’s something that seems really simple, but she could never do it before with her contacts.

Stories like this are a highly effective way to get your prospects thinking about how their life is going to be different after making this decision. Again, it’s part of that decision framework.

Number three: Arm them with questions that reinforce you as the obvious choice. When someone contacts you about booking a consultation, just go ahead and assume they are also looking at other practices around town. If someone tells you they are shopping around or they have another consultation somewhere else, this is a big opportunity for you.

You can either be the practice to build the decision framework, or you can leave it up to the patient, or worse yet, the competing practice to build that framework.

This is where folks get into a lot of trouble because they try to apply familiar frameworks to an unfamiliar decision. I’m talking about your prospects and your patients. This is how pricing can become a deal maker or breaker for folks. When it comes to the decision framework, people don’t know about technology or experience or outcomes or surgical planning. But, they know about money and they feel like they know about pricing.

In many cases, people think the best price is the lower price. If we don’t create a decision-making framework to correct that assumption and people are left to their own devices, you’re left competing on price. Which is what you don’t want, especially if you’re doing what I’m telling you to do, which is to charge a premium price for your premium procedures.

All right, remember, the most robust framework is going to win, and we want to be the ones to create that framework. This is why I encourage you, if someone is telling you they’re going to shop around, this is the time to arm them with questions and knowledge so that you are the one controlling the decision framework.

This is where I like to have a simple one page PDF quality checklist to go through with a patient. This is a very practical thing that you can create for your practice. This would have questions that your practice can answer affirmatively, but perhaps other practices cannot.

Some examples: Did my surgeon have the procedure himself? Will I meet my doctor before the surgery? Do you offer more than just LASIK? Will you work with my optometrist?

If you can answer yes to these questions, and other practices either can’t answer yes or there’s a big fat question mark as to whether or not it’s a yes for them, then these are the kinds of questions that you want to share with your prospects, and of course you want to make sure that they understand why each of these questions are important. Going back to point one, we want to explain the why behind it.

When you frame this up and you share these questions and you tell your patient, “Hey, you know what? Here are some important questions that you need to ask, you need to make sure you have the answers to these before you decide where you’re going.”

When you come from that angle, that puts you in the seat as the educator and the advocate for your patient. You are the authority. In many times, even bringing up these details and these questions can be enough for someone to say, “Yeah, you know, I can see why I should just trust you guys. You’ve got it all together.”

To recap, providing patients information is not enough to win their business. You must also help them create a decision framework. Patients need this because this is a new decision for them. You want to be sure to explain the why, share other patient stories, and arm them with questions that show you are the obvious choice.

Remember, if you don’t create the framework, someone else will. The most robust framework is going to win. Go out there and win today.

I will see you on the next show.

For more persuasion tools and scripts, click on the free resources tab at troycole.com.

The Pirate Printer Method (One of the Best Social Media Activations I’ve Ever Seen)

Practice marketing ideas can arise from unlikely places. Today’s comes courtesy of the Pirate Adventures on the Chesapeake in Annapolis, MD.

Visiting family on the East Coast earlier this summer, we booked a pirate adventure. As a father of 4 kids under 7, it seemed like the perfect scenario.

And it was! We braved the high seas, conquered the evil Pirate Pete and reclaimed our treasure.

As much fun as we had, the aspect of this that most excited me was actually before the trip even began.

When I was tooling around the Pirate Gift Shop, preparing to board the ship, this wall decoration caught my eye:

A huge X with photos attached to it. The text explained what I was looking at:

“Use the hashtag #MyPirateAdventure and put your pic up on our wall!

Your print will be waiting for you when you return from sea.”

Take a picture. Hashtag it. We’ll print it. You can have it. Sounds pretty simple, right? Nothing mind-blowing at first blush.

But this approach actually solves some of the biggest roadblocks you face in spreading your message on social media.

Here’s what I mean…

Organic social media can be big for any business, including your practice. But most practices go about it the wrong way.

How? By trying to figure out the Big Awesome Thing they can post to get a bunch of shares, likes and retweets.

Yes, you want to post awesome content on your social media pages. That’s a given. But keep in mind that the social media platforms have an algorithm that throttles how much they show your content to other people.

Let’s pretend you have an amazing megaphone and an incredible message to yell into it. That message is only going to go so far on social media if you’re the only one screaming it.

And there’s more:

To continue the megaphone analogy (I was a collegiate cheerleader after all), you can scream your awesome message all you want, but saying “We’re the best! We’re amazing!” isn’t persuasive.

What is more believable? An athlete telling you how great he is, OR a bunch of sports commentators all talking about how great the athlete is?

We believe what people say about others more than what people say about themselves.

It’s the same reason online reviews are so influential. What other people say carries more weight, objectivity and validity than what we say about ourselves.

To reiterate: you should post great content on your social media pages – testimonials, happy patients without their glasses, office staff having fun in the office, fun photos from your events and more.

But these the megaphone metaphor speaks to your biggest opportunity on social media.

Your biggest opportunity on social media isn’t about what you post – it’s getting other people to post about you.

Not to beat a dead megaphone… but instead of you whispering your message as far as you can, why not send 1000s of evangelists out into the world – with their own megaphones – to share your message with all their friends and family?

This is why we try to get people to post about / for us on social. “Tag a friend!” “Share this post!” “Check-in at our location!”

Those are all great things to strive for, but reality is (and you know this), most people don’t take the action. So how do we activate patients to market you on social in a way they’ll actually do it?

Back to my pirate adventure…

5 Reasons the Pirate Printer Method is better than anything you’re doing right now.

User generated social content – We already talked about the importance of others promoting you vs you promoting yourself. With the PPM, it’s all about the content your patients create.
Built-in reward for participation – The physical photo is magical. You know I’m a big fan of most things digital. In this case, I like the physical image because it feels more like an actual treat or reward.
Creates digital marketing materials for your practice – Just like the pirate adventures, people posting their pics from surgery day (more details below) all over the internet creates excitement and buzz about everything you have going on in your practice.
Puts you physically in the hands (and homes) of your patients – When your patient takes their printed photo, where does it end up? On the fridge? In a cubicle? In a scrap book? Whichever the case may be, it will be in a place that the photo’s owner – and probably many other people – will see it, inquire about it, and reignite the memorable story from your patient’s experience.
Creates physical marketing materials for your practice – Here’s the funny thing: after all my excitement to try this out on the pirate ship… I totally forgot to go inside and get the picture when we were done. So had many other folks, which is why there was a wall-full of happy passengers’ photos for me to see in the first place. Is that bad? Heck no. It’s influential to anyone who may come in for a consultation at your practice. Your patients are creating physical marketing materials for you! I’ll take it.

So how did they do it?

I asked Pirate Smee to give me the rundown on how they logistically pull this off. It’s actually pretty simple.

The app – They use an app called HashPrinter, which I’ve linked here. Using this, you can set up alerts for certain hashtags, and even have them print automatically.
The printer – They had a basic photo printer, like this one, that they used to print the images.
The process – It was pretty straightforward. They had the display on the wall (that I described above) to get people to take photos and use the hashtag. Then they would print them while the Pirate Ship was out to sea, so the pics are ready on the wall when passengers returned.

How could you apply this in your practice?

You’ve heard me talk about the celebration aspect of the patient journey. The Magic Moments that should be commemorated in the same way you would a birthday or graduation. (so many parallels between those events and what you do for patients every day!)

Surgery day is one of those Magic Moments, making it the perfect time to activate the Pirate Printer Method for your patients.

In the patient prep area, have a table topper that explains the gist of the program (just like the sign on the wall at the pirate place).

Have someone on your team mention it to the patient during their prep time. This could be a patient counselor, or a special greeter / concierge who stands by on surgery day for just such an occasion.

This is where the pirate folks dropped the ball. If I hadn’t been walking around a certain part of the Gift Shop, I might have missed the X. They needed more signage and awareness around the promo to get more of their passengers engaged.

Position the picture itself as a commemoration. For example, you could say “Let’s take the last photo you’ll ever snap in glasses!” Or a simple “Let’s commemorate your big day!” works fine as well.

This is just one way you can activate the Pirate Printer Method in your practice. Get creative and take action!

For just a few hundred dollars, you now have a strong, simple social media activation you can leverage to turn your happy patients into evangelists. They promote your practice to their friends and family, and they walk home with a souvenir of their big day. Big wins all around. AHOY!