“Satisfied” Patients Can Cost You Money

If your patients are satisfied, your practice is operating at “status quo“ and satisfied patients are not sources of word-of-mouth marketing for your practice. Your satisfied patients walk out your doors after their appointment and they forget about you, because nothing was bad and nothing was good about the experience with you and your staff. They have nothing to talk about to their circle of influences.

Simply put, patients that are satisfied are costing you money. Because your patients are simply satisfied, you have to reach out through marketing and advertising dollars to attract new patients on your own, you are not increasing your word-of-mouth marketing efforts. This costs your practice in marketing dollars, but also in missed opportunities to gain new patients through referrals from your current patients.

It’s time to think about creating WOW patient experiences at your practice–experiences that will have your patients talking about you long after their appointment. These talking patients are the best form of marketing for your practice and they increase your referral numbers! Just imagine creating a unique outstanding experience for one of your patients who then goes back to their office and tells five of their co-workers about you and your practice, all while costing you nothing in marketing dollars. And, these unique experiences differentiate you from your competitors, as a premier choice for healthcare services because of the level of servie you provide.

At (e)Merge, we specialize in evaluating medical practices and assisting them in creating WOW patient experiences that increase patient referrals and revenues. We are pleased to be presenting on this topic at the MGMA-St. Louis, MO Chapter meeting on November 11th, 2009 and sharing more tips and strategies on how to implement these experiences for practice growth.