All dental practices change and grow over time. They add new services, lose staff members and gain new ones, open additional locations, and experience a variety of other developments. With all of this going on, it’s absolutely essential to keep your patients in the know. At InTouch, we pride ourselves on offering premier custom on-hold programs for dental practices throughout the country. Your practice might have one of our on-hold programs playing on your phone system right now!
We can’t stress this enough–you need to keep your dental on-hold programs current. Just like how you tidy up your home regularly to keep it clean or have your car’s oil changed periodically to keep it running, you need to make sure your on-hold programs are up-to-date and giving your patients the right information.
1. Your patients will get the most up-to-date information about your dental practice.
This might go without saying, but if your on-hold messages aren’t giving your patients and prospects current (and accurate) information, they’re going to get confused. Whether it’s as simple as changing your practice hours or discontinuing a particular product or service, it’s your responsibility to keep people in the loop. Check your on-hold messages and make it a priority to get them updated!
2. Your patient retention rate will either remain steady or improve.
Say your practice hires a board-certified orthodontist or periodontist with an extensive skill set and a laundry list of credentials. They absolutely need to be promoted in your message on-hold program, because people want care and service from experienced, well-trained specialists. Both established patients and prospective patients will appreciate the value this adds to your practice.
If someone is currently looking for a dental practice that fits the bill, they’ll be more likely to choose you because they heard about your credentialed staff member while on hold, or were referred by another patient who heard the message themselves.
3. Patients will be able to take advantage of specials and promotions at your dental practice.
Does your dental practice offer monthly or seasonal specials and promotions for your patients? If you do, including announcements about your specials in your message on-hold programs can help more of your patients get involved. Everyone likes to save, especially when it comes to their dental care. Whether you’re offering discounts on products and/or services or giving out goodie bags, your patients will want to know!
Naturally, promotions don’t last forever. Good things must come to an end. And when the deadline for the promotion comes and goes, your on-hold program should be updated accordingly. If someone calls your practice and hears the message about a promotion you offered the previous month, they might mistakenly think that the promotion will apply to their visit, and be extremely disappointed when they find out they were wrong. Keeping your on-hold messages up-to-date will prevent unpleasant misunderstandings like this.
4. No one likes listening to dead air.
Being on hold with nothing to listen to can feel like being in purgatory. You can’t talk to anyone just yet but you don’t want to have to hang up, either. Everybody hates being stuck on hold. That’s why you should give your patients something that is:
- Worth listening to
- Interesting
- Informative
If someone has you in the running to be their new dentist, they’re naturally going to want to know all about your practice. Take advantage of the seconds (hopefully not minutes) they’re spending on hold to tell them about an amazing new product or service you’re offering. Promote that new dental X-ray machine, offer tips for preventing teeth staining, or shine the spotlight on your amazing team members.
Updating Your Dental On-Hold Programs is Easy
At InTouch, we make the program updating process easy, because our scriptwriters have years of experience working with thousands of dental practices, and we are well-versed in all dental specialties.
Just let us know what kind of changes you need to your on-hold script(s), and we’ll take care of the rest. If your dental practice does not currently have a custom on-hold program, you can request a FREE custom demo, or you can give us a call at 877-493-9003. We look forward to working with you!