We all know that it is much more cost effective to re-activate a past client than it is to recruit a totally new one – yet many health business owners neglect their “past client” list. According to Bain and Company, it costs 6–7 times more to acquire a new customer than to retain an existing one. When you speak to health business owners about marketing, most of them talk about how they get new clients, and rarely mention their re-activation program. Possibly because most health businesses do not have a structured re-activation program in place at all. If you need a simple and effective past patient re-activation program then here is one of my favorites - and it is guaranteed to make you thousands of extra dollars each and every month.
Step One - Get your fall off list
Lets assume for this example that we are in the first week of July. Get your office manager to print up a list of all the patients who had a treatment in the month of May - but did not have a treatment in the month of June.
Step Two - Segment your list
Split the list into segments based on the name of the therapist who treated this client last - i.e. if there are 100 names on the list: 20 may be Brians clients, 20 are Toms etc. Your computer system should be able to do this easily for you – if not I suggest you look at a new computer software system.
Step Three - Give the list to your therapists
Give the list to your therapists on a sheet with columns where they have to write the details of the call - for example: date made and the result of the call – ” patient fine” or “follow up booking made”.
Step Four - Get your therapist to call
The therapists then proceed to make these follow up calls whenever they have a spare moment in their day. Note: this is not a huge demand on them – as even if there are 50 names on the list – they have the rest of the month to complete all calls on the list.
Demand that all therapists MUST complete their full follow up call lists by the end of the month and they must present the call register to you in your end of month KPI meeting and month end review – where they are then given the next months list. Many therapists are worried about making these calls in case the patient in still in pain and has not yet experienced a great outcome from their treatment – I would argue that this is the exact client you want to be calling.
Step Five - Use this script
One of the best scripts I have heard came from one of my private coaching clients – and is simply: “Hi (clients name) – it is Paul here from XYZ health care – just following up on that knee problem we treated you for in May - as part of our service, do you mind if I ask you one simple question?” And here is the killer line: “Are you now 100%?”. You can even record the actual % given by the client as a measure of clinical outcomes post treatment - obviously you then go on and re-book the patient if they are not 100% or suggest what they need to do next to achieve a better outcome.
There are other parts ot this system and these scripts that can enhance the result of this call. However, if you do nothing else after reading this email – other than get your therapists to call past patients and ask that question - you will be far ahead of where you were. So get cracking now on your patient re-activation program. It is simply the best and most effective marketing you can have in any health business.
