Archive for Successful Strategies
Aesthetic Patient’s Feelings About Their Experience with You
Posted by: | CommentsYou have (or had) patients who feel they were not treated right by your receptionist, a staff person or you. It could have been something benign such as your receptionist did not acknowledge the patient when they first walked in the door and it could be something more serious such as they believe they got a mediocre or bad result and have lost trust in you.
On the one hand, aesthetic patients have elephant memories. They may be prone to holding grudges if they are treated badly in your practice or if they “perceive” they were treated badly.
Frankly, your patient’s perception is your reality so you have to deal with their emotions. Please remember this:
Aesthetic patients won’t remember what you told them.
Aesthetic patients won’t remember what you showed them.
Aesthetic patients will remember how you made them feel.
On the other hand, patients can be quick to forgive IF they feel you value them and want to make them happy. That could mean you simply reconnect with them or it may mean you show significant remorse so they know you understand how they feel.
An Ounce of Prevention is Worth It
Obviously, the best thing you can do is to avoid bad feelings with your patients so you don’t lose them. You want to have the friendliest and most informative receptionist answering your telephones. You want to employ staff that bonds quickly with the patients and knows how to direct the patient to a decision to choose you over your competitors. You personally want to connect with the patient so they like, trust and believe in your recommendations.
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For more Free tips and videos, visit www.CosmeticImageMarketing.com. Catherine Maley, MBA is Author of Your Aesthetic Practice/What Your Patients Are Saying and her firm offers everything you need to succeed in aesthetic medicine. You can call Catherine at (877) 339-8833 or email her at info@CosmeticImageMarketing.com.
Why Aesthetic Patients Say No
Posted by: | CommentsFrankly, there are really only three reasons why aesthetic patients say no to you:
#1: They want aesthetic rejuvenation but reject your proposed way of getting it
#2: It could be price or they don’t have the ability to pay
#3: Distrust: They want rejuvenation, they accept your way of getting it but they don’t believe in you
This last one, distrust, is at least 25% of your lost consultations. The good news is you can do much to improve that percentage.
You really are in the trust business and through effective communications before, during and after the patient experience, you can greatly increase trust. Here are strategies to help:
- -Mail your patient information packet ahead of time. Fill it up with your PR pieces, pro-bono work, Meet the Doctor, procedure FAQ’s, patient photos/testimonials and a handwritten note from you
- -Have your prospective patient watch your personal, introductory video from you welcoming them to your practice
- -Allow time for them to peruse your patient photo/testimonial books, patient education videos and get a tour of your office
- -Do skin analysis and computer imaging so the patient can “see” her concerns very clearly
- -Listen to the patient’s wants, needs, fears and expectations. Have a conversation rather than a presentation
- -Follow up with a personal handwritten note or telephone call telling the patient you look forward to getting to know them better
The more professionalism, patient interaction and interest you show for the patient, the more likely they are to choose you over all the others.
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For more Free tips and videos, visit www.CosmeticImageMarketing.com. Catherine Maley, MBA is Author of Your Aesthetic Practice/What Your Patients Are Saying and her firm offers everything you need to succeed in aesthetic medicine. You can call Catherine at (877) 339-8833 or email her at info@CosmeticImageMarketing.com.
Address ALL of Your Aesthetic Patient’s Needs
Posted by: | CommentsSo many of my surgeon clients only see patients as surgical prospects. So, they spend tons of time, money and effort going after one surgery and continually looking for new patients for more 1-surgery prospects.
What a waste! An aesthetic patient who wants to look good and feel good is interested in all sorts of aesthetic enhancement – not just one surgery one time. And, I know for a fact (and from personal experience) that if you correct something that bothers an aesthetic patient, they will most likely move on to the next concern they have.
Aesthetic patients have endless needs and time is on your side. If they want to look and feel good today, they will continue to want to look and feel good tomorrow, next week, next year and year after year. They don’t just stop wanting aesthetic enhancement so if they disappear from your practice, you should know they most likely went to your competitor who was staying in touch with them, educating them and giving them compelling reasons to visit.
Please rethink the average value of one surgical patient because the surgical procedure was only the tip of the iceberg.
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For more Free tips and videos, visit www.CosmeticImageMarketing.com. Catherine Maley, MBA is Author of Your Aesthetic Practice/What Your Patients Are Saying and her firm offers everything you need to succeed in aesthetic medicine. You can call Catherine at (877) 339-8833 or email her at info@CosmeticImageMarketing.com.
What You Can Do Now to Ensure a Successful Year
Posted by: | CommentsThe media is scaring your cosmetic patients. All of this doom and gloom about the economy is paralyzing to a majority of your patients who are or could be affected by the dips and turns in the economy.
Don’t buy into it! There is much you can to ensure you float through these choppy waters safely and profitably.
I’ve put together a timely audio and visual presentation, with me personally narrating, entitled:
What You Can Do to Ensure a Successful Year
http://cosmeticimagemarketing.com/media/What_To_Do_For_Successful_Year.wmv
It’s full of simple strategies to keep your phones ringing, your patients buying and referrals coming to you.
The point is to first check your mindset. Are you buying into this pessimism? If you are, you are not going to be open to opportunities and possibilities so fix that first.
The next step is to do something. I know your first instinct is to lay low for now but that’s the worst strategy. Your aesthetic patients need more compelling reasons to invest in aesthetics so, now more than ever, give them those reasons.
Educate them on little things they can do right now to look fantastic. Motivate them to act now with a special offer and a tight expiration date. Encourage them to refer their friends so; they too, can look fabulous.
Those who strategically act now will conquer. Those who sit back and do nothing will perish.
Need more tips, tactics, strategies and resources to drive patients to your practice? Please watch my free videos by filling out the form to the right, now.
Thank You, and I encourage you to leave any comments or questions below.
Article by Catherine Maley, MBA, Author, Your Aesthetic Practice and President, Cosmetic Image Marketing
New Success Strategy #6: Grow Your Word-of-Mouth Referrals
Posted by: | CommentsToday’s fragmented media outlets have your preferred patients scattered all over the universe. There’s no easy way to get to them so you have to spend way more money trying to be everywhere they are – very expensive, tiring and ineffective.
Truly successful aesthetic practices know that word-of-mouth referrals are the life blood of their practice and worth the effort.
Here’s something interesting I learned from aesthetic patients when I was interviewing them for my book Your Aesthetic Practice/What Your Patients Are Saying. They told me they would have referred you to others if they were only asked.
…….You cannot take patient referrals lightly
As much as you think (and hope) that patients will gush about you to their friends and family — don’t leave it to chance.
It’s imperative to your financial future you set up a system that keeps patient referrals flowing so at least 70% of your new patients come from other patients.
Need more tips, tactics, strategies and resources to drive patients to your practice? Please watch my free videos by filling out the form to the right, now.
Thank You, and I encourage you to leave any comments or questions below.
Article by Catherine Maley, MBA, Author, Your Aesthetic Practice and President, Cosmetic Image Marketing
New Success Strategy #5: Reclaim Your Lost Patients
Posted by: | CommentsWant to know why your patients disappear? You thought you had a good relationship and now you realize you haven’t seen them in over a year – What happened?
The #1 reason patients leave your practice is not because of a bad result.
…….It’s because of your indifference.
They are being ignored by you so they don’t feel compelled to return.
Make your patients feel your concern for them and their welfare by keeping in touch with them and reaching out to them continually.
I promise you – they want to hear from you!
You most likely have a database full of prospective patients who came in for a consultation but didn’t book, who came in a couple of times and then wandered off and then those you haven’t seen in months or years.
I guarantee – they did not stop wanting to look good.
They just went somewhere else where they are treated better.
Where Did Your Patients Go?
- -Perhaps they were having a bad day when they visited and couldn’t connect with your staff.
- -Perhaps your staff was having a bad day and scared them off.
- -Perhaps they got sticker shock.
- -Perhaps they went to your competitor and want to return to you but are too embarrassed.
You are never going to know unless you reach out to them. Because……
There’s even a good chance they were not saying no –
They were simply saying “Not Yet” or “Not Now”.
Since it’s always faster, cheaper and easier to reconnect with patients who have visited you before than it is to attract total strangers to your practice, reconnect with these patients.
Need more tips, tactics, strategies and resources to drive patients to your practice? Please watch my free videos by filling out the form to the right, now.
Thank You, and I encourage you to leave any comments or questions below.
Article by Catherine Maley, MBA, Author, Your Aesthetic Practice and President, Cosmetic Image Marketing
New Success Strategy #4: Increase Revenues Per Patient
Posted by: | CommentsYou are leaving money on the table if your patients don’t realize everything you offer.
I guarantee if they don’t buy from you, they will from someone else.
Have strategies in place so you never hear, “I didn’t know you did that” and they had it done by your competitor.
Value of Just One Patient
I conducted a case study where I went back through a plastic surgeon’s practice records and followed one of their favorite patients. I was able to piece together her history with this practice for almost 10 years.
What I found was that this one patient not only was worth $40,000 in minimally-invasive as well as surgical procedures, but she was worth more than an additional $90,000 in terms of referrals from her friends, family members, coworkers, the woman’s business group she belonged to and her hair stylist. And, I’m not even including all of their referrals.
It’s imperative you have a system in place to attract referrals……
Need more tips, tactics, strategies and resources to drive patients to your practice? Please watch my free videos by filling out the form to the right, now.
Thank You, and I encourage you to leave any comments or questions below.
Article by Catherine Maley, MBA, Author, Your Aesthetic Practice and President, Cosmetic Image Marketing
New Success Strategy #3: Attract New Patients
Posted by: | CommentsI’m sure you are feeling the urge to cut down on your marketing and advertising efforts and lay low while things are gloomy.
……Please resist that urge!
It’s actually time for you to step up your promotional efforts to avoid dips and inconsistencies in your aesthetic patient flow.
Let your competitors lay low while you actively engage in attracting new patients and re-engage with old ones.
You can even attract your competitors’ patients while they are being ignored by your competitors due to cost-cutting measures.
So, How Do You Get More Aesthetic Patients?
Your aesthetic patients go to you because they know, like and trust you. They get a consistent experience every time, a consistent result, and a relationship with you and your practice that keeps them coming back for more and bringing their friends with them.
The point here is not to see how big you can grow your database. It’s to attract your preferred patient to your practice and then nurture that relationship so you grow your practice more from within rather than from random, expensive, external efforts.
Need more tips, tactics, strategies and resources to drive patients to your practice? Please watch my free videos by filling out the form to the right.
Thank You, and I encourage you to leave any comments or questions below.
Article by Catherine Maley, MBA, Author, Your Aesthetic Practice and President, Cosmetic Image Marketing
New Success Strategy #2: Create a Great Patient Experience
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s more important than ever that every patient who connects with your office has a great experience every single time – while on the telephone or while visiting in person.
That includes a pleasant receptionist, friendly staff, smooth processes and a comfortable physical environment.
See, hear, smell, experience your office as a new patient would. Better yet, have your neighbor, a good friend or a 3-rd party stranger act as a mystery shopper and report back their findings on what they liked about your office visit and what could be improved upon.
This will help push you to be in a constant state of improvement so your patients enjoy their time with you enough to return again and again.
Do You Have the Right Team in Place?
It’s imperative every person employed by you believes in you, your services and your success in aesthetic medicine. They must represent you to the best of their ability and they must care.
The point is for them to work together as a team to provide the best service possible. That means you have a team that follows systems like a well-oiled machine – even when you’re not there.
Need more tips, tactics, strategies and resources to drive patients to your practice? Please watch my free videos by filling out the form to the right.
Thank You, and I encourage you to leave any comments or questions below.
Article by Catherine Maley, MBA, Author, Your Aesthetic Practice and President, Cosmetic Image Marketing
New Success Strategy #1: Target the Right Patients
Posted by: | CommentsA true aesthetic patient will do whatever is necessary to look and feel better. For now, they may pull back on the more extreme and expensive procedures; however, they will do something to regain what they believe they have lost to look as good as they feel.
Let’s remember there are still 76 million baby boomers getting older every day. They are not looking forward to old age or slowing down.
Many of them are experiencing new phases in their lives:
New job or a job layoff….. new marriage or divorce….upcoming wedding or high school reunion …
The point is there are millions of Americans who will do what they need to in order to enjoy a full, active life while looking and feeling good doing it.
So one of your strategies should be to target your older, more mature patients versus your younger patients. That’s just obvious because your mature patients have more concerns such as wrinkles, crepe skin, sagging body parts and sun damage. They are also more likely to have the financial wherewithal to afford your services.
More mature patients are least likely to be affected by what’s going on in the economy and the last affected by what’s going on.
Because when times are tough and finances are stretched, your aesthetic patients need to dig deeper for a reason to see you. A majority of your patients will continue to want, need and find the money for rejuvenation procedures because they want what they want.
Need more tips, tactics, strategies and resources to drive patients to your practice? Please watch my free videos by filling out the form to the right, now.
Thank You, and I encourage you to leave any comments or questions below.
Article by Catherine Maley, MBA, Author, Your Aesthetic Practice and President, Cosmetic Image Marketing
