3 questions to drive 'yes' in your practice

Feb 27, 2020

At the end of the day, how does a dental practice win?

I'm sure if we were all in a room right now, we'd all have our list. What I bet we could all agree that we would like are the following:

A healthy group of patients who know us, like us, and trust us
Patients who show up every time, on time
Patients who are ready to pay us
Patients who are happy to refer their friends and family

We could always tweak this list and add more. That said, is the above a fair assessment? If you said yes, great!

If that's our "why," let's talk about our "how to."

Getting our patients to say "yes" to their treatment is an essential part of that equation. I mean, I would love it if patients just walked in with all four qualities above as much as you would. However, I'm going to lean on an old adage that proves itself true every day: "We teach people how to treat us."

So let's talk about three questions and how we train practices all over the country to drive "yes."

Question 1

"Mr. or Mrs. Smith, on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the highest, how important is your oral health to you?"

Why we ask it

There is a wonderful psychological principle with this question. It states that most people want to prove themselves to be who they say they are. With that, we like to ask a patient, who is sitting in our dental practice, how important it is for him or her to be there. In essence, Mr. or Mrs. Smith chose to value you enough to come and see you. It would be counterintuitive for that patient to turn around and give you a low number. So much so that, time and time again, patients will share a number between 8 and 10.

Question 2

"Mr. or Mrs. Smith, on that same scale of 1 to 10, with 10 still the highest, where do you think you are?"

Why we ask it

First off, I really want to know. Second, again from a psychological view, most people don't like bragging about themselves. With that in mind, they inherently share a lower number for this question than they do the first question. This sets up a very powerful dynamic. Our patient has shared that he or she would like to be a 9, for example. However, the patient believes he or she is a 6.

Question 3

"Mr. or Mrs. Smith, I have one last question: How do I get you from a 6 to a 9?"

Why we ask it

We ask so patients have the opportunity to tell you and me their why. Why do the patients believe they want or need to be better than their current state?

What we hear when we ask

"I've never liked my smile."

"The last dentist I went to told me I needed something called scaling and root planing, and I never did it."

"My mouth hurts/has swelling/bad breath."

When you ask these three questions (in sequence) and then simply stop talking, you will hear the secret recipe for every single patient who sits in your chair.

Your challenge this week