The scary words that are costing your practice big time

By Angus Pryor, MBA (Marketing)

Some words can be scary, can’t they? It’s strange that mere words can create such a strong emotional reaction... yet they can.

In this article, I’m going to unpack some of the scarier words in dentistry and reveal the benefits of overcoming them.

What are you scared of?

When I was about five, I was really scared of letting out the plug from the bath. No joke.

When you first let out the plug, it’s okay. But after a while, an ear-piercing squeal starts to emerge from the plug hole - quiet at first, but ever louder as each moment passes. As a five-year-old, I really hated this sound and would do anything to avoid being in the room during the squealing.

It got to the point where I would make sure I was 100% ready to leave the bathroom, then at the last second, pull out the plug and run to my bedroom. Anything to avoid the horrible sound! Fortunately, as an adult, I no longer have a fear of that sound - I now know it’s just a product of water going down the drain as air is trying to come up.

At age 7, a family member of mine was fearful about monsters under her bed. When she needed to get off her (rather tall) bed, she would look underneath to check for monsters, then literally leap off and ran to the door so she could avoid them.

Given no monsters were ever found, this family member no longer has this fear either - and there’s a theme here.

While we could easily brush off these examples as misconceptions of a child, it wouldn’t be true to say we don’t have fears as an adult. Like the examples above, it’s possible with further knowledge to overcome the fears and live unaffected by them.

Fears in dentistry

All of the above leads me to this. At dental practices, there is one fear that I see holding back growth - big time. There are significant implications for patients, practice staff and practice owners alike.

So, what’s the fear? It’s the fear of selling and sales.

Without me even saying another word, I wonder what your reaction was to the last sentence. I’ll say it again now - check your reaction. Most dental practices are scared of selling and sales? How about you?

Before we unpack the fear a little further - lest you think this doesn’t apply to you - let’s talk about sales at its most fundamental.

If your practice stops selling any service, you’re out of business and everyone is out of a job. I think we can all agree that “selling” at this level is fine.

Yet, I’m certain, even though we agree that some level of selling in dentistry is essential, there is a fear in most practices of the most basic sales components - and it happens every single day.

In particular, the fear of selling in healthcare relates to not telling your patients about the services that you offer. This seems so simple and hard to believe it’s real, but I can assure you it’s alive and well in dental land.

As a case in point, among the 10+ dentists that I’ve been to in my life (I’ve lived all over the world), I have never had a single dentist ask me about my interest in any form of cosmetic service including orthodontics and whitening. This is even though I have some obvious crowding of my teeth (fixable with braces) and I have stained teeth from drinking tea, coffee, wine, etc (fixable with whitening).

Not one dentist ever mentioned anything about a fix for my dental problems. This non-asking is not the exception in dentistry, it’s the norm.

But I hate selling!

To overcome our fear of sales and selling, we need to understand what type of “sales” I’m talking about. Let me say upfront, I have NO interest in you being “salesy”. None, zero, nil.

The main problem with salespeople being salesy is that they are pushing their agenda instead of yours. They’re not listening to what you want and are only pushing what they want.

Curiously, if a salesperson does their job properly - i.e. help you clarify your needs and find what you want - you won’t feel like you’re being sold to at all.

Perhaps this example will help: You want to buy a new car. You walk into a car lot and interact with the salesperson. You discuss a petrol model and an electric model. You express reservations about 100% reliance on electricity, but you’re also alarmed by increasing petrol prices. He just nods and smiles. You leave the car lot and you don’t buy.

What if I told you that that company also had a hybrid car, but the salesperson didn’t mention it to you because he was worried about being “salesy”. That would be madness and worse, unhelpful.

Yet what I have just described is what happens in practices daily. There is often no discussion with patients about their options for a range of services that are available - that they might actually want.

If zero out of 10 is doing no selling at all and 10 out of 10 is being overly salesy, I would say most practices sit at a 1 or a 2. But I’m not asking you to be a 10 out of 10; just make it easier for people to get the services they want from you - a 4 or 5 out of 10 on this scale would be fine.

You are not serving anyone by not telling people about their options.

“The main problem with salespeople being salesy is that they are pushing their agenda instead of yours. They’re not listening to what you want...”

A conversation between neighbours

Consider the following discussion between two neighbours in a suburb near you.

Alison: “Hi Mary, how are you?”

Mary: “Hi Alison, haven’t seen you in a while, how are you doing? You look great by the way; I love what you’ve done with your smile.”

Alison: “Thanks! The dentist that I’ve been going to told me about a few different treatment options that could really give my smile a boost. I took the plunge and I have to say I love it; I can’t stop smiling.”

Mary: “That’s great! Which dentist do you go to?”

Alison: “ZZZ Dental, why do you ask?”

Mary: “ZZZ Dental? Really?! I can’t believe it! They never told me about those options...”

As you can see in the example above, your existing patients could get annoyed if they find out that you didn’t tell them about the range of services that you offer.

To avoid this situation, a simple question to ask is something like “I’ve noticed that you’ve got [problem], would you like to hear about the options?” This kind of questioning is non-salesy and totally appropriate. Patients come to you for professional advice and here is your chance to give it.

Summary

Being scared of sales or selling helps no one at your practice. The irony is, the very thing you’re trying to avoid (patients feeling unhappy - from too much selling) can lead to another form of patient unhappiness... when they discover you had services available that you never told them about.

No one wants you to adopt a “salesy” approach, however, there is a price to pay for simply not telling patients about the services that you offer. The choice is yours.

About the author

Winner of the ADIA 2020 Marketing Award and Australia’s number one Google-ranked dental marketer, Angus Pryor is a #1 Amazon bestselling author, marketer and international speaker. For help with any of the issues discussed in this article, visit www.AngusPryor.com and book a free call.