The Dental Marketer

There were three articles in the Chicago Tribune about Americans heading south of the border for dental care. See them here: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-border-dentists_boxmar24,0,5556110.story .  

Americans use dentists in Mexico for one reason – cost. Even after accounting for travel expense, you probably can’t compete with a Mexican practice on cost. If you can, you need to raise your rates. Where you can compete is value, of which cost is just one component.

The value perceived by the dental patient is established by balancing your fees against two things – the quality of the dentistry and the quality of the service. Many factors contribute toward the patient’s perception of the service quality, including how easy or difficult your team makes the whole process. Was the process, from booking the appointment through exiting the building, easy or complicated? How was the initial phone call handled? Was it easy to set up an appointment?  Was the patient greeted with a warm smile, or just barely acknowledged by your front desk with a point towards a chair, during the middle of a phone call?  Was there a lot of waiting in your reception area or was the patient seen promptly? Is the office comfortable? Were questions answered? Does the patient have to repeatedly fill out forms or give the same information again and again?

At an American practice, patients expect that they will receive top-notch dental care, that the office will be clean, and that equipment will be sterilized. If you deliver these things and also make it easy, comfortable, even a little pleasant (all things considered) to come to your office, people will see the value in your higher cost.