How to provide experience for your dental office’s customer

To surprise the patient is to go beyond simply solving the problem. From my experience as a consultant and health management business coordinator, I can undoubtedly state that one of the secrets of success is to offer the patient more than he or she expects. It is going beyond and thus providing a true experience for those seeking their services. Obviously, many professionals still show some resistance when we say that it is necessary to go beyond technique. To clarify, I often mention that services like Dentistry are called negative demand services, that is, people usually buy because they need it, not exactly because they want it.

For services of this kind, it is essential to create positive experiences in order to reduce the inherent burden. I often find that patients are usually in an uncomfortable — and even dissatisfied — situation because they are investing in something they would not like. Thus, when we can design a care process that diminishes these sensations, we are consequently improving this experience.

How to provide experience?

Once you have your target audience well defined, the next step is to get to know them and thus prepare to meet their desires. In practice, we achieve this when working the tripod: environment, people and processes. That is, when we try to make tangible our commitment to welcome this group, seeking to exceed their expectations.

To make these concepts clearer, let's imagine that your audience is made up of seniors. You'll need to match from the reception sofas to the office music. After all, this is all part of the experience. Another good example is professionals who care for young, time-conscious, sophistication-conscious, class A entrepreneurs. Only this information makes us understand that it would be necessary to work on essentials, such as different hours of service and visual communication that extols the technological resources.

To sum up: To surprise the customer is to go a step beyond simply solving the problem brought by them. When someone looks for a dentist, of course, they expect their problem to be solved. So pay attention to the details and look at your clinic or office as if you were the patient. If you find points that need improvement, do not hesitate to take the first step towards change.

Marinho Pinheiro Teixeira: Dental Surgeon - Unicid; MBA in Health Management and Marketing - São Leopoldo Mandic; Training of Dental Auditors - Fundecto; General Coordinator of the Management Center and partner of Altera - Service Intelligence Center.

Source: Implant News Prótese News. Available at: http://www.inpn.com.br/Materia/OdontologiaNegocios/132850. Access on: 06/29/2020.