Key Takeaways
- Your existing patient database may contain significant opportunities for additional production before you spend more to generate new leads.
- Unscheduled treatment, inactive patients, and future openings in the schedule give teams specific opportunities for proactive outreach.
- Technology is most useful when it turns practice data into clear, prioritized actions rather than adding another report or platform for staff to manage.
- Accounts receivable can be more manageable when teams can distinguish collectible patient balances from amounts still owed by insurance and prioritize their efforts accordingly.
- AI and automation can support patient outreach and employee coaching without replacing the human conversations that remain important to the patient experience.
- Consistent outreach is ultimately a process and culture issue, not just a technology solution.
Dental practices spend a lot of time and money trying to attract new patients. But there may be significant opportunities sitting inside the patient database they already have.
That was the focus of a recent Beyond Bitewings conversation between host Ash and Zane of My Dental Force. A software engineer who previously served as technology director for an eight-practice dental group, Zane saw how often patients leave without scheduling treatment, fall behind on recall visits, or simply stop coming back. Meanwhile, practices may continue spending more on marketing to generate new leads.
Start With the Opportunities You Already Have
Marketing can bring a patient through the door, but that’s only the beginning. Practices still need to convert recommended treatment, keep patients engaged, and encourage them to return.
My Dental Force is designed to help practices identify those opportunities within their existing databases and give staff a prioritized list of patients to contact. That could include patients with unscheduled treatment, people who haven’t returned to the practice or patients who could help fill gaps in the upcoming schedule.
Zane said the average office his company connects with has nearly $600,000 in unscheduled treatment plans in its database. While that number will vary considerably by practice, his point is that there may be substantial potential production already sitting inside the business. And reconnecting with a patient can do more than recover one treatment plan. It can bring that patient back into the practice for future care as well.
Turn Data Into Something Your Team Can Use
Of course, identifying opportunities isn’t enough. Front desk teams and office managers already have plenty competing for their attention, including an increasing number of software platforms.
Rather than giving staff another report to interpret, My Dental Force prioritizes outreach and gives team members specific tasks. Owners and managers can then see how many patients were booked, how much production was generated, and which employees are most successful at converting outreach into appointments.
The same approach can be used for accounts receivable. Instead of handing the team a lengthy AR report, the system identifies patient balances that appear collectible, distinguishes them from amounts that may still be owed by insurance and gives staff a more focused place to start.
The common thread is simple: data isn’t particularly valuable if your team doesn’t know what to do with it.
Let Technology Support the Human Connection
Despite his technology background, Zane isn’t an advocate for automating every patient interaction. In particular, he believes phone outreach should still come from people in the practice rather than AI-powered robocalls.
A staff member can answer questions, discuss payment arrangements, remember something about a patient, or simply respond like a human being. Technology can support that interaction without replacing it. For example, My Dental Force can analyze call transcripts and give managers information they can use to coach employees and improve patient communication.
That also reflects a larger goal: creating better habits rather than adding another piece of software. Zane said implementing the outreach process is about establishing a culture in which the team consistently looks for opportunities to reconnect with patients and keep the schedule full.
For practice owners, the takeaway is worth considering before assuming slower production requires more marketing. How much treatment is sitting unscheduled? How many patients haven’t returned? What does the schedule look like a few weeks from now? How much of your AR is actually collectible? And does your team have a consistent process for acting on that information?
The next opportunity for growth may already be inside your practice.
Listen Now!
