Prospective Patients: Quality vs. Quantity

When asked what they would like their advertising to accomplish, most dentists say, "bring in lots of new patients."

But that's not precisely what they mean. The problem with "lots of prospects" (quantity) is that many of them may not be "good" prospects (quality).

How does one distinguish between a good prospect versus a not-so-good one in this context?

A good (quality) prospect is someone who ...

... has a self-identifiable dental problem, and,
... is looking for a solution to that problem, and,
... has the money to pay for the solution to the problem.

A not-so-good prospect is someone who ...

... doesn't have the money to afford quality dental care, and/or,
... is only looking for the cheap solution, and/or,
... is only looking for information.

This obviously doesn't tell the entire story of who are, and are not, good prospects and patients. But for the purpose of creating successful dental response advertising, the above definition will work just fine.

The question is, how can you create your advertising so that mostly quality patients respond?

Here's a general rule of thumb: The more generalized your message and the more you feature (or infer) low-price, the higher the number of prospects who will likely respond ... and the lower the overall quality of those prospects. (Of course, if your practice is geared towards lower income patients, this approach makes sense.)

Conversely, the more specific your ad message, without the inference or perception of bargain-basement pricing ... the fewer the responses, but the higher the quality of prospect.

Full article: New Patient Quality vs. Quantity

Copyright 2007 by Galen Stilson