What is the final step in any good Ground Marketing encounter?
I could get sort of philosophical here and tell you that there is no final step. Once you’ve earned a patient, all your future interactions with them are ground marketing, in a sense. You keep nurturing the relationship at every point of contact, and they keep returning. Ideally, they’ll also naturally spread the word about you to their friends. So in that way, there is no “last step” other than ongoing maintenance.
But let’s narrow the focus a little - the very first time you meet a new prospect, what is the final step in that first encounter?
You leave them with something. Hopefully something more than just a good first impression. You leave them something that will make it easy for them to schedule an appointment. There are loads of options, and you probably have most of them already. Maybe you leave them with a pamphlet, or a business card with your contact information. Maybe you have special new patient discounts, or whitening coupons.
Those things are all fine, but at the end of the day, you’re still waiting and hoping that they will use them to follow up and schedule.
Wouldn’t it be better if you could take all the waiting and hoping out?
To have a new appointment fully booked into your schedule before they walk away? Of course it would.
What if you could do this:
That’s what LocalMed’s online scheduling does.
You hand a prospect a tablet with your LocalMed scheduling on it, and they can book on the spot, directly into your practice management system, just like your front desk would do it. No more “okay, I’ll look you up!” No more “okay I’ll give you a call later.” They see your real-time schedule, find an appointment time that works for them, and they book it.
That means you walk away with booked appointments instead of just a bunch of prospects. That means you don’t have to settle for brand awareness alone. You can get real patients fully booked every single time you do a ground marketing event.
I don’t know why some practices resist real-time online scheduling. Maybe it’s nostalgia for the traditional way of doing things. Maybe it’s a fear of losing control. But patients have been conditioned to expect instant convenience through things like Amazon and Uber and every other instant, contactless method of commerce out there. They expect to be able to get a dentist appointment the same way. And since you stay in control of what options patients have, control stays firmly in your hands.
Every single practice should be using this. The upgrade it gives your conversion rate is huge.
So sure. Keep the pamphlets. Keep the business cards (with all their tasteful thickness and watermarks). But give your patients and your practice something better - an appointment.
Check LocalMed out for yourself by visiting localmed.com, or calling 888 203 7531. You get special discounts with PROMO CODE: DENTALMARKETER10
Also, download our guide to see if your practice is a good candidate for online scheduling:
