The hopeful me hopes we can get business to resume as normal and that this post won’t actually be needed.
However, we now know that we should be prepared for everything.
We also know that operation costs are now higher and we should be looking for ways to bring in additional revenue or cut costs.
And even if we don’t go into a recession, these tips can help you increase production and grow your practice.
So definitely worth a read. Here I present:
5 Ways to Recession Proof Your Dental Practice
#1 Make treatment accessible
If your patients are going through financial hardships, they are likely to put off treatment if they can’t afford the lump sum.
Breaking their payments up into smaller, more affordable, monthly payments usually helps in these situations. The patient can afford these payments and get the treatment that they need.
But with a possible recession looming, you should not offer these payment plans unless you have a guarantee that you are going to be able to collect that money in some way.
We partnered with Varidi to bring you guaranteed financing AND guaranteed payment on treatments.
It is easy, your front desk emails or text the application directly to the patient. The patient fills out the short application and they are guaranteed to get the financing.
To learn more information head to Varidi.com.
#2 Finally stop worrying about dental insurance
If we go into a recession, your patients could lose their insurance benefits. Instead of losing those patients all together, offer them an in-house insurance plan through your office.
Sure, you can try to do your own plan, but those are time consuming to develop and very hard to keep track of. Companies like DentalHQ allow you to quickly develop your membership plan and keep track of member’s used benefits and payments.
Another bonus of a membership plan is residual income. The patients on your plan, make monthly payments, just like they do with their insurance, so you get to enjoy that guaranteed income.
To find out more about the benefits of having an in-house membership plan, click here.
#3 Make yourself very accessible
Teledentistry was all the rage during the first few weeks of the COVID-19 shutdown. But now that your practice is back up, it doesn’t mean it has to go away. Patients are still going to be worried about going into your practice and there are some that just want to make sure the trip to the dentist is absolutely necessary.
So keep offering Teledentistry services. Being signed up and available to take online consults on apps like Dentulu will help drive patients to your practice.
They even have a super cool plug-in for your website, where your current and potential patients can schedule an online consultation and meet with you before their live appointment.
What a great service to offer! If you want more info on Dentulu, email us with your inquiries and we will be happy to help.
#4 Be cost efficient in your hiring process
When you need to hire, it can be expensive and time consuming. DirectDental realized this and has been working hard to improve the hiring process for our dental practices.
Now you can request unlimited temps, post jobs on DirectDental AND ZipRecruiter, hire permanent staff and a whole lot more all for as little at $19/month with our Essential Plan.
We are also offering a Boosted Plan, which gets your job posted on all the major job boards including ZipRecuiter, Indeed, Google Jobs, Facebook and more to give you more candidates to choose from.
And a Full Service Plan where we work closely with our office as your personal recruiter to screen candidates.
Click here to quickly choose which plan is right for you.
#5 Make sure you stay up to date on your accounts receivables
Don’t let yourself fall behind on connections.
Stay up to date with your receivables with these 7 simple steps.
- Dental Insurance Verification
- Treatment Plan accurately
- Collect at the time of treatment
- Submit claims same day as treatment
- Run AR daily and have an in-house and 3rd party working on AR.
- Send out patient invoices as soon as the insurance check comes in.
- Never write off small balances.
Read more on these 7 steps by reading Take Control Of Your Accounts Receivables in 7 Steps.
Now, DirectDental has partnered with these companies and we do get a small payment for referring you their way. But please note, we did a lot of research and picked the companies we felt would help your practice grow.
Even if you chose not to work with these companies, I still feel you should do your research and implement these strategies into your systems as they will help build, grow and recession proof your practice.
If you want to see more of the resources DirectDental is offering, head to our resource page. There you will find companies to assist in HR, can build you an awesome website, do background checks on new employees and more!
Keep Smiling,
Holli
