MSD Insider 0:00
Welcome to med shark insider with Bill Fukui, your expert host on all things medical, marketing, and SEO.

Bill Fukui 0:08
Well, welcome today to our next episode of med shark Insider. And I’m really happy to have our guest today, because she actually addresses a lot of the things US marketers want to have done in our practices, because we get held accountable for all the business that comes into the practice because of all the marketing dollars that they’re spending. But we all recognize that there is a lot that happens from the time somebody views a website, or even fills out a form or picks up the phone and calls to the time they’re having surgery. But we get, you know, held accountable for how much revenue comes as, as a result of the marketing, and what kind of ROI we’re getting. But I think the most important part of that is, you know, lead generation is always the easiest thing you can do. I’ve been in marketing for 25 years. And it’s the easiest thing to do. Today, I’ve got Ashley Cloud, who was one of the, you know, industry’s premier consultants, practice management consultants, who actually goes into practices have been in practices herself. So she has a lot of track record and hands on experience of doing a lot of these things that we’re going to talk about today. So I’m gonna go ahead and introduce Ashley, thank you for joining us today, Ashley.

Ashley Cloud 1:32
Hey, thanks for having me, Bill.

Bill Fukui 1:33
Well, it’s a pleasure having you. And we go back a few years in the, you know, digital marketing and going to the plastic surgery meetings stuff. Let’s go ahead and start off, you know, I get, and I’m gonna start from me, because I get a lot of questions from practices that are struggling a little bit. And I look at lead generation and stuff like that. And I’m asking them, how many phone calls do you generate from your marketing in a given month? And they’ll tell me, and I said, and how many of those actually turned into scheduled patients or actually surgical patients? And they really don’t know. So, you know, I’d like to maybe talk about, you know, that intake process and really kind of understand what goes on with that, you know, first call because I don’t always know that, you know, the people that are answering the phone, really understand the value of of those phone calls, and because they’re in the middle of doing all these other things. How do you consult with those practices when it comes to the, you know, to understanding the importance of that, that first call?

Ashley Cloud 2:44
Well, so thanks for having me here. I, you know, one of the biggest secrets, I guess, or the missed opportunity of any plastic surgery, aesthetic, practice, dermatology, cosmetic dentistry, you name it. But one of the biggest misses that we see the practices do is, like you said, under estimating the importance of that first phone call you you mentioned that practices spend tons of money to get the phone to ring only to what I see a lot of times have the patient just it phone rang, the patient came, you guys did your job very, very well. But the staff, again, like you said, not realizing the importance of that first phone call, lets the patient go. And usually I see it being almost like a one dimensional patients are shopping. And we know that they’re calling around asking pretty much the same thing. Do you do it? What does it cost? And we know used to be the Yellow Pages, I’m showing my age. But now it’s, you know, page one, Google or, you know, whatever it is that they’re going through, and they are calling everybody. So I think one of the first things is I always tell people do our practices don’t assume that they’re only calling you in the first place. I mean, I think we have to go into it with that foundation. When you’re answering the phone, you really need to make sure that you know, that they probably just called Dr. X down the road and Dr. Y, you know, and now with with virtual with Zoom and the pandemic and everything that’s happening, you know, the the space has gotten much bigger for patients, you know, I’ve got practices all over the country that are hearing more than ever from practices or from sorry, from patients from all over the country. So, so yeah, and you know, I think that it’s going to probably stay that way. I mean, I don’t think we’re going to be going back to just having, you know, inside consultations in the office. So but that being said, one of the things that we see is that like you said practices don’t really and I don’t think it’s that they don’t want to engage with the patient and they don’t I think it’s really just that they don’t care. know how, you know, and so we could go deep into sales philosophy and training and everything else. You know, they’re not comfortable asking for the sale or asking for the appointment in this case when the patient first calls in, and just just a lot of different things, you know, with that happened with that there are certain things that we know, that raise conversion rates pretty significantly, I would even go as far as to say massively. If certain things are covered are touched on, on that first phone call.

Bill Fukui 5:36
Okay, well, give me those trade secrets,

Ashley Cloud 5:40
I will give you the trade secrets. So first thing we know and and I’ve got a whole series that’s going to be coming out is called the I know, you experience I’m doing whenever I’m talking or training with practices, I like to use a lot of the examples of just regular general consumers, because we know that the aesthetic patient does not have to come to us because of, you know, disease, trauma, deformity insurance is making them come to us, you know, so so they do have a choice of where they’re going to go. And they are shopping. We know they’re shopping. So when I do secret shoppers, I’ve been doing tons of secret shoppers for 20 years now, when I do them, and I hear people say, you know, they hang up the phone, and they’re like, Oh, that was a shopper. I want to scream, you know? Yes, yes. Yes. It was a shopper for sure. You know, and, and so we know they’re shopping, we know they’re demonstrating more consumer behaviors than they are actual patient behaviors. And so, you know, keeping that in mind, we need to move forward with that philosophy. How do we do that? I call it the I know you experience if you think about just consumers in general. So you and I both live here in the Denver area. And I’ve got a place that we my husband and I go to every Saturday morning. Well, we used to before the before everything shut down again. But a restaurant that we go to every Saturday morning. I’m one that gets the exact same thing. Every time. I’m not fun. I’m not you know, whatever you want to call it, but I get the wife. Yeah, my husband tries something different every time and then he doesn’t like it half the time. And I’m like, well, because you try something different. The things you like you don’t try again. So anyway. But we go in now. And we you know, one of the reasons we keep going back to this restaurant, on Saturday mornings, is because they you know, we’ve gotten to know the waitstaff and we’ve gotten to know, you know, I guess we’re kind of considered regulars, if you want to call it that. And to be honest, I feel so special. And this sounds so whatever, but I feel so special when I go in and the waitress is like you still want the, you know, ranchero egg wrap? And I’m like, Yes, I do, you know, and so it just has that, that I know, you kind of feeling that keeps us coming back. Again, I’m the one that does the same thing every single time. But they also know that my husband, they’re like, What are you gonna try this week, you know, and so taking that same philosophy into the call this coming in, and even throughout the whole thread of the patient journey with us at every different stage. You know, we patients are looking for that. I know you experience. Now, the first thing that I always get when I’m doing training as well, how can we? How can we know them? When they’re just calling in asking do you do it? What does it cost? You know, and I’m like, well, that’s where you have to start the conversation. And the first place, we know that they’re shopping, so you kind of already have a little bit of knowledge, right? And the second place, we’re asking them questions, we’re having a conversation, we’re not just answering all of their questions that they have for us. And we’re actually you know, leading the call and having a conversation with the patient, figuring out what their needs are, what their wants are, what their concerns are. And then you know, just putting, putting it all together. I’m a big proponent of having a they’ve been called telephone intake records, patient call logs, patient call records, whatever it is that you want to call it, and writing down instead of typing in, you know, again, going back to all the secret shoppers that I’ve done. And I will tell you this also we have a lot of patient focus groups that we do, and when we’ve been told pretty much in every single focus group that when they hear somebody in the background typing, you know, they’re typing away on the computer when they’re asking them questions, they feel like they’re calling the DMV, you know, partment of motor vehicles and they’re just like name and you know what I mean? So, so you know, it’s really just being being present we hear being present all the time, across any industry but it’s but it’s true being present and being there for the patient. Not just answering their questions but providing information to them as well.

Bill Fukui 10:03
You know, you talked about you use the word, experience, patient experience kind of stuff, and you know, going to the restaurant, I absolutely agree with you that people have already formulated an expectation, when they hit the send button or the call button on their cell phone, and they’re calling you, they already have it in their mind what’s going to happen in this call, they already are formulating their questions in their head, waiting for somebody to give it to you. They already have that. And I agree with you, I think the things that can really help separate you from those other calls are called, you know, intake, you know, experiences is you got to do something to interrupt the experience, you got to change what their expectations were. So it isn’t just do you do breast augmentation? Do you Do you know congealed implants? How much do you charge? Is there a difference in price? And then get off the phone? That’s what they’re expecting? Right? That’s what they’re expecting. But when they get off of the phone and have a great experience with somebody who really knows what they’re doing, they get off the phone, and they have this this one of those? Well, that’s not what I expected. That’s not what I expected. But in a very good way. Yeah. And I think that’s, you know, what you’re talking about? Is that experience, you know, setting the tone, even on that first call.

Ashley Cloud 11:35
Right? Right. So some of the things that I talk about when I’m when I’m doing training with practices, especially on that first phone call. And by the way, I usually spend, like if I go on, on site to do like a practice evaluation or training. And those training days, I literally spend almost the whole whole half a day, the whole morning, just on the first phone call, it is literally that important. And I have physicians doctors tell me all the time, you know, well, you know, they they’re gonna come in because of me and my expertise and my you know, but but they really they have to get there. First, you know, and and to be honest with you, most doctors, and you said this at the beginning, don’t even know how many calls are coming in. Any leads are coming in. And so you know, that could that’s a whole nother bucket of talking about, you know, looking at conversion rates and data and all that kind of stuff. But, but we do know that there are key elements that need to happen at a first phone call. That, you know, the first of which is going to be, you know, just asking their name and not asking their first and last name, like their column, the DMV, like we talked about, you know, so we want to have a conversation, this isn’t just one dimensional. We want to be able to tell you know, the patients, we want them to feel, not just the I know you that we were talking about, but also, as you would talk to a friend, you know, and that sounds so Elementary and so basic that you would be so surprised at how many practices that I call that we literally just answer my questions and hang up the phone. And that’s a loss leader as far as I’m concerned, because that’s not who I’m going to be going to when I when it comes time for me to make my decision. So just having that warmth, you know, somebody calls in and you’re just like, you know, they say like you said, do you do breast augmentation? You know, absolutely we do do breast augmentation. Do you mind if I get your name? Okay, Ashley, you know, and then just keep using the name. authentically, you don’t want to be like So Ashley. So Ashley, tell me this? Well, you want to be very authentic with it, but use the name often. And as far as we’re talking about names, I say use everybody else’s name on your team, because you really want to show that team mentality that we have as a group within the office. So, you know, we’ve always talked about in most practices probably have heard the importance of passing the baton. You know, if they were passing it, maybe the receptionist answers and we want to get the caller over to the patient coordinator. You know, it’s so important to say, Oh, that’s great. You need to speak with Suzy, our patient coordinator. Do you mind if I place you on hold? And then this is where the the I know, your experience starts coming in? Susie, the patient coordinator then should pick up the phone and say, You know what, actually, the receptionist needs to say, Hey, I’ve got bill on the phone he’s interested in uh, you know, I’m just throwing something out. You’ve got beautiful

Unknown Speaker 14:43
at all. I made it oh, maybe

Ashley Cloud 14:47
next procedure and, and, you know, he’s, he’s thinking about having surgery, you know, whatever. A little conversation that you guys had. Then Susie should pick up the phone and say Hey, Bill, you know, Ashley tells me that you’re interested in AIX procedure. And you know, I’m very happy to help you, you know, do you have any specific questions, just kind of getting the ball rolling, and kind of going from there. So passing of the baton is very, very important. The other thing I see a lot of times on secret shoppers that I do is, you know, if it’s a male physician, there’s a lot of he, he’ll meet with you, or the doctor will meet with you or a lot of third party. You know, pronouns and everything else. And really we again need and yeah, yeah, using patients.

Bill Fukui 15:39
Oh, my god complex kind of thing there.

Ashley Cloud 15:43
Right. Right. So using their name a lot, you know, like Dr. Wonderful, you know, is, and, you know, we, of course, talk about promoting the physician, you know, Dr. Hayes, he’s so great. He does, you know, he did we were talking about breast augmentation earlier, you know, he last year did 250, breast augmentations, or he does 10 breast augmentations a week, you know what I mean? And the cool thing, the funny thing about that is when you can give specific information, so you’re not just giving the features, but you’re given that information, the patient’s like, Oh, I didn’t know that. I get asked that. So then when they start calling people after you, they’re off? Most don’t know, most people know, their numbers, we said that, you know, so. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, characteristics of the best of good first phone call, warmth, engagement, you know, using everybody’s names using the patient’s name being very authentic. So that that helps build that rapport, and then not having to make the patient repeat themselves repeatedly. You know, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve done a secret shopper call, and I’ve just done, you know, do you do?

Bill Fukui 17:01
Three times, yeah. And then

Ashley Cloud 17:03
you and then they’re like, Oh, let me put you over to our patient coordinator. And then you get to the patient coordinator, and they’re like, How can I help you? And you’re like, yeah, do you run a blessing? And then it gets worse, they actually show up for the appointment to consultation. And they’ve got to fill out paperwork that says, What are you here for today? You know, and they write down rhinoplasty? You know, I already told you that made an appointment for them. They don’t say that. But there’s, that’s what they’re thinking, then they groomed by the MA or the nurse or whoever. And they can be the nicest thing, you know, but they’re like, so what are you here for today, and then the doctor God love him, comes in and is trying to be nice. And he’s like, so what are we talking about today? And it’s just like with, and this is another thing we hear in the patient focus groups that we do, they’re just like having to repeat myself, which really goes against that I know, you experienced that we’re talking because they should never I mean, they tell us one time and that should be it, we need to have a protocol or a method to, to record that and to you know, to be able to use it and over and over again. So so there’s that that I know you. There’s also letting the patient know, you know, I think on the first phone call and this kind of gels into the consultation and it raises. So everything that we’re talking about now, the first phone call raises the conversion rate as far as the patient making an appointment, and as far as the patient actually showing up, because just because the patient makes an appointment doesn’t mean they’re going to show up, you know, but it also increases their same day scheduling, right, when they actually come in to consultation. If we’re if we’re educating them on the procedure itself, you know, Tummy Tuck, for instance, I was doing a practice evaluation, that a practice up in New York, and this lady came in and she had plenty of money, money was not an issue. She was very excited. She knew she wanted to go ahead and go with that daughter because all of her friends go with a doctor. But then when she found out that the scar was you know, for a tummy tuck is pretty significant. It’s from hip bone, which most you know, it’s fiddly beneath the bikini area and everything else that you can’t really tell it but some people you know, freak out over that. She apparently thought that you could do a tummy tuck laparoscopically. Okay. Oh, when she came in, you know, she we’d already talked about money on the phone. We talked about, you know, everything else on the phone downtime and everything else but the scar was a deal breaker. So, you know, we really want to make sure that we’re going over everything that could be an objection when the patient shows up for consultation. And by objection I always say I don’t mean I have jacked, you know, but, but if they don’t purchase, there’s some kind of objection. And you know, the top three that I can think of off the top of my head We’ve all heard is I didn’t, I need to get my finances in order or figure out, you know, I need to go home and talk to my husband or my wife. And then I need to figure out a work schedule, you know. So knowing those are the top three objections, why not go ahead and cover those on the first phone call? You know,

Bill Fukui 20:19
hey, you know, good question. And I see this, not probably not, I don’t hear it as much in the plastic surgery arena, but I hear it in the dentistry, as well as the ophthalmology and the LASIK, because those are elective just like, you know, just like having breast augmentation. But it’s fear, fear of pain, fear of, you know, the outcomes, you know, these are my eyes or whatever, I think there’s a certain fear factor. You know, I think just me personally, I think a lot of practices are afraid of dealing with, or really don’t bring it up, or wait for the patient to bring it up. Right? recommend anything in terms of any anxieties? Because I’ll tell you what, anytime you’re asking or talking to a patient, with their surgical gown on, and we’re all ready to go. And if you ask him, Are you a little nervous? Or go in a hole? Yeah.

Ashley Cloud 21:19
Yeah. So yeah, that goes back to what I was saying a minute ago, that they are demonstrating more consumer behaviors than patient behaviors, but I didn’t say all the way up until it’s time to schedule, then, you know, you start hearing, then you’re walking through a checkout at the grocery store, and you see Star Magazine, plastic surgery gone bad, or, you know, so and so lost their their teeth, because of you know, whatever. That is, yeah, that’s when I definitely start bringing in more of those, you know, patient behaviors or patient. They’re no longer shopper. Now. They’re a patient, and now they, you know, so yeah, so that definitely, and there’s ways to mitigate that for sure. One is just having that that relationship built from the very first phone call, you know, there’s just going to be a thread again, throughout their whole journey with us. And, and by the way, we’re talking for surgeries more, but really, and honestly, this is for anything that is going to have any kind of a downtime, or, or lasting you know what I mean? So even in the med spas and stuff, you know, I mean, I’ve seen I know, a friend personally, that went and just had, like, I’m not exactly sure what she had done, but it was some kind of a chemical something that are in in our hometown, in Georgia. And I mean, it lit she scarred, you know, that’s that was that spa, you know, and so, so definitely, you know, anything, I mean, this is applicable to everybody, as being are all industries is being, you know, very open, very having the lines of communication, always letting them know, the next step.

Bill Fukui 23:10
Pricing, you know, we know that everybody calls in or shopping, asking for pricing, what are your recommendations? When practices say, well, we don’t give prices over the phone, or I give ranges? Or I give, you know, I’m not the cheapest guy in town, and I don’t want you know, you know, I use it as a filtering way of filtering only good patients, whatever that may be. What do you recommend in terms of for the vast majority of practices? Who aren’t scheduling out three months? Right? So they need new patience? Right? You know, where’s the where’s that fall? Yeah, I always,

Ashley Cloud 23:53
always, always recommend given prices, it can be, you know, a price range, that’s fine. But always good prices, because here’s the thing, we know that the patient is calling everybody you know, now, if you have a full schedule your book three months out, you know, like you said, you, you know, you make can get away with doing that. But I think that the patient, so a couple of things, when I talk to doctors, one of their biggest gripes is having a patient come in there, spend an hour with them, or whatever, and then the patient leaves and doesn’t buy, you know, and so we know that this the higher the same day, this is statistically, the higher the same day scheduling rates, meaning the patient comes to consultation and schedules that day, the higher their overall scheduling rate is going to be so there’s that’s very, very huge correlation between those two. And the patient doesn’t know at least the range when they come in. That’s, you know, you’re you’re shooting yourself in the foot as a practice. So you have to have to do that. And here’s the other thing I say give it to him. Even if they don’t ask,

Bill Fukui 25:02
because, you know, a bad idea, I never even thought about that.

Ashley Cloud 25:05
Yeah, yeah, you know, just say it, you can lead into it with all kinds of different ways. You know, are you familiar with pricing on this? And, you know, do you have any questions about pricing? Because the other thing is, if you can lead into them, like, if you do, which most practices do care credit, or, you know, I don’t even know all the ones that are out there now. But, but if you have a financing program, and if you tell, so I’ve got two things to say, actually. So the first one is, if you have a financing program, and you you know, tell the patient, you’re looking at about $10,000 for a tummy tuck, and then you hear crickets on the other end, you know, they, you know, is that about what you were expecting? You know, we have to ask questions, to figure out what the patient what’s going on inside their head, right? And so if they say, well, that’s more expensive, or even worse, if they just come out and say, oh, gosh, well, Dr. X down the road. It’s like half the price, you know, so now we know that’s, that’s good. We’ve got an objection. If we don’t have objections, I’d rather have objections than not have any at all. You don’t have any at all. You’re You’re a lame duck, you know, in water, you don’t have you don’t, you’re not able to overcome the objections. So I always say, just ask, you know, do you, you know, we do have financing available, and a lot of our patients, it’s that whole feel felt found philosophy, a lot of our patients, you know, go ahead and get approved before they even come in, to the practice. So that way, they they’ve got that behind them, and they don’t have to worry about any of that, at consultation, you know, is that something you’d be interested in, I’d be happy to send you some information. The second thing that we hear, and this is funny that we hear in patient focus groups, is when they’re actually sitting in front of you like across the desk from the coordinator that’s given them the pricing or whatever. And we go, you know, would you like information on financing? They kind of have this, they sit back, and they’re like, What do I look like I need? I look like I need this. Yeah. So if you go ahead and get it out of the way on the first phone call, you know, and if you have other questions we can talk about, or you can call me back, you know, whatever it is that you have. So I always say absolutely. Offer pricing, even if they don’t

Bill Fukui 27:24
I even I love the idea that you even said, you know, offer it, even if they didn’t ask because some patients, they’re almost a little reluctant to ask because I don’t want to sound cheap. So I don’t call a plastic surgery office and you know, obviously want to feel like I can afford it. So I don’t ask, you know, some people never do and then, but yet there have this expectation that we didn’t meet. And we don’t know why.

Ashley Cloud 27:52
Right. Yeah. So I tell that.

Bill Fukui 27:55
I love that. What about you, man? You talked about, you know, no shows earlier, you mentioned no shows. I get practices that do say that they have, you know, no show rates, and they charged fees for consultations and stuff like that to kind of elevate the conversions, what’s your take on what’s the best way to minimize those no show rates. But at the same time, I don’t want to create a barrier for people to come in and, you know, and meet with us because I want it fast. I want our team I want our doctor to have at bats. What’s where’s the sweet spot for that?

Ashley Cloud 28:37
Right. So I am not a proponent of consultation rates, or sorry, consultation fees. And the reason for that is the data just does not show us that it helps at all, you know, you may say we have consultation fees are less people that come actually to the practice less people that make appointments, again, go back to remember what we were saying, patients are on Google and they’re calling every single person that’s on there. So, you know, if five other people you know, in your market, or most other people do not charge, the chances of them coming to you are very, very slim. You know, unless they’ve got some like a big hook and a hook meaning maybe they’ve got you know, five friends that have gone and have the exact same procedure and she loves all of them and everything else but you know, it’s funny, even then, we know like used to and you know this better than I do but used to when somebody was referred by friend or family. That was pretty much you know, done deal. Right? Yeah. And especially in cosmetic with cosmetic procedures used to they would you know, nobody really talked about it. You know, I just had been refreshed. You know what I mean? Even when they’ve had a facelift, or you know what I’m saying, now everybody’s talking about it. So the chances that one person knows several people that have had the same procedure they’re looking for. And not only that by several different doctors, you know, so yeah, and it’s getting really more competitive within within our, you know, our industry. With with that with that happening, but to go back to, I just totally lost my train of thought, what

Bill Fukui 30:29
was I saying? On the no show stuff? What would you say? What would you say is the like, if you had a go to thing? What can practices if there was one or a handful of things? What would you say, do these things and you will have better no show rates.

Ashley Cloud 30:45
So I would say, for sure, we need to talk about it with the patient on that first phone call, we need to you know, and let them know, we’re going to be calling, you know, a week in advance or two days in advance or whatever, I like two days in advance. But if we’re way out, you know, we’re three months out before we can even get them in or even six weeks out, and we need to do more reminders. But but the one of the things that I see is always having the next steps outlined for the patient. And that’s at every stage of their journey, the inquiry, the appointment, the consultation, the surgery scheduled, let them know what’s going to happen next, and especially in follow ups to, so that way they know and they’re expecting you call, the thing that I would say is have the coordinator, whoever spoke with them. So if you have a deck designated patient coordinator, be the ones that actually make that phone call. And, and the consultation or sorry, the the confirmation call, needs to be not just hey, it’s Ashley Connor Magery point with Dr. Wonderful tomorrow at eight o’clock in the morning, be there by you know, there’s a lot of nice people out there nice thing anymore, you know, we have to really be building those relationships. So let that confirmation call be just another step, another conversation, you know, we’re so excited to meet you, you know, remind them what’s going to be happening, you know, if it’s, if it’s a rhinoplasty, you know, when you come in, you’re going to meet with Dr. Wonderful and his Nurse Sarah, and you know, and then you’re going to, we’re going to do all kinds of fun stuff that’s gonna, you know, we’re gonna do like imaging and show you what your nose can look like afterwards, or, you know, if it’s breast, breast augmentation, we’re going to try on implants, you know, you really want to get that excitement going, again, when patients are reaching out to us, they have a need, like, right then Right. But then if they make an appointment, I know it’s, you know, a week down the road or month away or something, things can change, you know, things change in people’s lives, period. But, you know, they may lose that, that, you know, I always say it’s like the beginning of every year, everybody’s gonna lose weight, you know, and if they decide that they want, every year I lose me to

Bill Fukui 33:07
be down to nothing.

Ashley Cloud 33:10
Right? Yeah. But they get really, you know, pumped up when they’re calling everybody and when they’re talking to everybody, but then, you know, it can kind of maybe go away a little bit. So we need to, we need to really keep them engaged. You know, a lot of times I say if you have things like that, which a lot of practices do now. And if you don’t, they need to, but we you know, if they’ve got a video that the provider did on that specific, you have to be relevant to the patient, you know, you don’t want to send as say the same thing with testimonials, you don’t want to send testimonials. The 60 year old facelift could care less about an 18 year old breast augmentation, you know, and how great she thought the doctor was, you know what I mean? So we really need to be relevant and send testimonial testimonials that are very personalized to that patient, you know, what are their concerns? And what are they talking to us about and coming to us for that we need to focus on. So if you can do that, especially if there is a long wait, you know, now if you can get somebody in tomorrow, or you know, two days or even the same week, then I wouldn’t worry about it. But you know, even then though it couldn’t hurt because you’re getting them, you’re getting them in that buying frame of mind. You know, that’s why we have we always recommend when the patient does get their console and I know I’m kind of going off topic a little bit but to have the books in the reception area, and it’s not a waiting room. It’s a reception area. We’re not making them wait, we’re receiving them. That will

Bill Fukui 34:44
one of the things that you did mention and I get this from a lot of practices because they never think about it. In terms of when they’re building their websites or they you know, once they build a website a lot of times they think I’m done. I’m done. I don’t have to do anything else my website’s done. And now it’s up to you guys to get all this business to it. Well, a website in many times, you know, I’m asking practices, when I’m doing the intake, you know, when I’m checking the intake or following up with them, one of the things I find is that they don’t send prospective prospects, you know, patients, they’ll send them an email, but they never send links to the website, or assets within the winning site. You know, so if it’s, if it’s a breast augmentation patient that called up and they’re asking for pricing. So you already know what’s going through their head, and you can talk about financing, but it would be great when they get your email, your follow up email with a link to a really good financing page. Yeah. And don’t just hope people stumble on that page. But there are certain pages, I’d say, the practices, you got to think about what can you arm your intake sales team with? What would be helpful for them? Would a page on what to expect during your consultation be a good page to have? After you’ve had the conversation? And I could link to it, you know, send them in the email? And they’ll know, and I’ll guarantee you, they’re still click on it and read through it. Right, validates a lot of the stuff that you just said, but it it cements it, that they feel more comfortable doing this. And you build those types of pages where it becomes something that they want. Yeah. What make it something that they want?

Ashley Cloud 36:41
Absolutely. I agree. I think that it does, that would do a couple of things. One, it would position the, you know, the provider and the practices experts, right? If they can go to videos and look at, you know, hear about you know, what’s going to happen, like you said at your consultation or anything like that, again, being very specific. So they’re not just having to go through, I’m looking at my computer every but they’re not on a website, you know, that says, you know, we do this, and this and this and this and this and this and this, and here’s the general thought of you know, what’s going to happen, but get very specific. I think that’s a great idea. I mean, I think patients, would I always say don’t send patients as homework. But as a, you know, to the website has homework, you know, like, I’m not going to tell you everything, go figure it out and have you figure it out, give us call back. But I think that that’s that’s tremendously valuable. What you’re saying,

Bill Fukui 37:37
too, is when you’re, you know, you said that people are shopping all the time. I know when when people do that, they’ll send out five emails, or they’ll send out chats or whatever. And then they get back to their, to their email. And now they’ve got six or seven emails, all in there from all these different practices. And he can’t remember any of them, who’s who all they see are these emails, right? And so as they’re clicking through, it’s just text. It’s just text. Yeah. And there’s no connection, this message and Ashley’s name with XYZ practice. But if I could connect the two, now all of a sudden, that message has more rapport building capabilities, and all this money you’re putting into branding a website and all these months that it took you to build this, what is your virtual you, you never send them back there. Right, this is a great opportunity for you to cement that, you know, that brand in their mind. Not just over the phone. But even in your follow up. I think the follow up stuff you kind of mentioned to make sure that you’re getting, you know, low, no show rates. I think that’s absolutely you got to have that follow up God.

Ashley Cloud 38:56
I agree. No, I totally agree with that. And I think that having those pages, you know, just keeping keeping the patient interested, and having those pages and then at the confirmation call, you know, again, it doesn’t need to be just, you know, here’s your appointment at this day in this time and see you later. Bye, bye. They need to remind them, have you had a chance to go to our website, have you? You know, and look at the video. And you know, I would even say, and this really gets more into what you guys do. But I would even say when we talk about being very relevant to what the patient wants to have pages that are specific, and I don’t know how that would happen to the patients that are specific to hey, here’s what’s going to happen in a breast augmentation. Here’s what’s

Bill Fukui 39:46
and if you’re gonna say we’re going to check your sizes, we’re going to check this. You can’t have that on every page, every procedure, so I don’t say you have to have it for every procedure, but absolutely for your bread and butter, your high priority stuff, you create them, you don’t have to have everything for everybody. But make sure you have the stuff for the ones you want, right? That you want.

Ashley Cloud 40:12
And we talked about the Pareto principle. And I never know if I’m saying that, right, but the 8020 principle, and I always tell practices statistically, unless you’re just really kind of all over the all over the place, but especially established page our practices, they, they start getting, you know, very niche and to like five or so stagers, usually what we see is your top five procedures are driving 80% of your revenue, and 80% of your calls that are coming in and 80% of the patients that you’re gonna see. So all of your staff needs to one be inside and out on those top five procedures. But I would say also, on the website, you know, like you said, maybe if we never do a brachioplasty an arm lift or whatever, we never do that. We wouldn’t do videos on that. But if we did, you know, breast dog, rhinoplasty liposuction, tummy tuck,

Bill Fukui 41:09
mommy makeover, whatever. Yeah,

Ashley Cloud 41:11
yeah, we, we definitely need to have that. I

Bill Fukui 41:15
also think and I talked to practices about this, too, is when you go through websites, this whole idea of customizing things for the patient. So if I’m a breast dog patient, or if I’m a facelift patient, you understand that I’m a different demographic, probably a different stage in life, and different motivations, etc, different calls to action, are going to move me to action, when I’m an 18, or 25 year old, as opposed to a 5560 year old that’s getting ready baby boomer that’s getting ready to retire, hold different, completely different motivations, and etc. So, I do encourage, because I don’t see this on a lot of practice websites, they don’t have custom calls to action, for the specific procedure, or those patients that are on there. So you, you really should have custom calls to action for breast augmentation, as opposed to just schedule a consultation, scheduled consultation, scheduled consultation on every page, customize it for your breast dog patients, or for your, you know, Tummy Tuck patients, or for your Brazilian Butt Lift patients and have unique calls to action for those particular things. Because those are the as you said, it’s the 8020 rule, investment, invest in those 20%. And you’re going to end up reading a lot more of them. But you don’t have to do it on every page, right? Look for the high priority things, you’ll get a lot of value out of it.

Ashley Cloud 42:51
I agree. I could not agree more with you on that. I mean, we know again, statistically that while using the facelift in the breast dog, breast dog is a very fast moving procedure, if you can’t get them in, within like seven days, I think was the latest that I’ve seen the chances of them there will they’re no show cancellation rate goes up. Because we’ve already been in and seen another doctor and maybe even scheduled with another doctor, but also their conversion rate goes down when they actually get there. But on the other hand, a a facelift patient, you know, and it could be a lot of different things. It’s your face, you know, if you mess up my breast, that stinks, but I put a shirt on, you know what I mean? My face? That really stinks because it’s it’s out there for everybody to see. Right. So, so right out in the first place. But so you know, if you even if you had an opening for a facelift tomorrow, we know statistically that you’re better off to put them out a couple of days, if not a couple of weeks, a week to two weeks only because they you know, again, this is we’ve done a lot of focus groups. And we’re here with them that they’re like, whoa, push back, wait a minute, why do you have an appointment? Let’s not be doing to him. You know what I mean? And so, so absolutely. But yeah, on the website, what you’re saying? I think that is actually I haven’t seen anyone that’s doing that. So I think that is a incredible value. If you can do different pages, at least five,

Bill Fukui 44:29
I think it all goes back to what you said put yourself in the shoes of your prospects. And not every prospect is the same for everyone. and customize your experience for them. Whether it’s on a web page or whether it’s on the phone, or whether it’s in the follow up information or during the console is that you tailor those types of things because you you know, for most breast augmentation patients, this is the demographics This is the interest, these are the concerns. So you can customize some of those. It’s anticipation, you have to anticipate what it is that these people are wanting? What are they fearful of? What are the barriers for those people? And you’ve got to, you know, already anticipate them and already taken steps to knock them down. Right. Right before they get there. Yeah, no, because otherwise, now we’re just like everybody else. And we fumbled cross and we’re not planning ahead. But I liked the idea. Do you do a lot of when you’re talking with your practices? And say, you know, breast augmentation is, okay, my number one thing I want to do in breast augmentation, what what do you do to make sure that those people all the way from the receptionist, all the way through to the patient, coordinator, patient counselors, that they’re all speaking the same language that they’re How do you get that, so they’re all on the same page.

Ashley Cloud 46:04
So I like to do internal trainings, or even, you know, webinars or trainings or something like that. But basically, it goes back to the I know, you experience right, and so you have to have smooth passing of time, like we talked about. Now, once the patient actually gets there. I like morning meetings, I 100%. Hands down think that everybody needs to have a rally meeting in the morning, it can be five minutes, you know, I’ve been lucky enough to be a part of some really, really good ones. But basically, and I don’t know, I can’t, I was trying to think of it earlier today, I was doing a training and I just spacing on the term. But there’s some kind of psychology term, that when we are when something is placed in our mind, we tend to react on what was placed in our mind. And so what I’m saying is, if we know that, you know, we’ve written down all the information, we know that Susie’s coming in today, she’s our 10 o’clock appointment, she is a facelift. She’s getting, you know, going on, or something like that, you know, something celebration or whatever, we tend to get excited for her without even realizing we’re excited for her, if that makes sense. The one shot

Bill Fukui 47:23
the unknown, just removing the unknown when somebody comes in, the more you know about them. Absolutely. It is to engage with them. But if you don’t know anybody from Adam, but I love the idea of letting everybody know who this person is. We got her coming in at 10 o’clock. This is what she’s you know, wow. That’s, I think that’s, that’s hugely valuable.

Ashley Cloud 47:45
Yeah. Yeah. Because again, it gets everybody on the same page, it helps we do, we outwardly reflect what we’ve so another thing so I know, I was at a practice one time and the person coming in, was like, had been crying on the phone, she had just gotten divorced. She was which divorce is a huge reason why people come in and get surgery, but but she was just really down in the dumps. And really, you know, and so during that morning, rally meeting, you know, it’s our 11 o’clock is, you know, Suzy, she’s coming in, she’s, she was really emotional on the phone, she’s probably going to be really emotional here. And what I saw with the practice, the outward reflection was, there was a big empathy. You know, there was like, they, they were giving her emotional, not physical, but emotional hugs. It was very different than the lady going on a cruise. That was all excited, you know, did whatever is that outward reflection that I just think it’s imperative. You know, again, we’re talking about that I know, you experience and when everybody’s like, Oh, you’re, you know, you’ve got triplets. Well, must be crazy around your house, you know, and but it’s it just really makes them feel going back to what I was saying at the very, very beginning, the restaurant, you know, are you getting your, you know, a ranch here or wrap, you know what I mean? And I’m like, Yes, and I just feel so special. And, you know, they probably could care less, but, you know, but it makes me feel special. So yeah,

Bill Fukui 49:15
I think that’s great. Well, let me ask Ashley, how can people get in touch with you? I’m going to be sharing your information with other you know, with other practices that maybe need some help and some of this stuff if I run across them. How can I have them get in touch with you? Yeah, so

Ashley Cloud 49:36
they can, they can call our number is 84440808. they email me directly at info at Ashley dash cloud.com. And they can also go to my website, but I don’t love my website. I keep saying I need your expertise about

Bill Fukui 49:57
that then

Ashley Cloud 49:59
I I know you’re the best out there. I’m not just saying that because we’re here. You know you we’ve talked about it, we go way back. But so yeah, it’s and the website is www dot Ashlee sh le y, hyphen cloud Cl O ud.com.

Bill Fukui 50:14
That sounds great. Well, actually, thank you again, for all of your insights. And for your time. I do. And I do envision us having, you know, additional conversations, because the I mean, we even we talked even before we got on the on the line today, there’s so much you can be addressing in, in helping practices. And I think practices realized what they do is not easy. And I want to acknowledge what they do is not easy. It’s a challenge. And it’s why you need to have professionals helping them. Because, you know, at the end of the day, you know, an incremental increase, a 2% or 3% increase here and there, over the course of time, do the math, and we are talking 10s of 1000s of dollars, or hundreds of 1000s of dollars. Yeah. And, and that’s all we’re looking to do is is those in those events that we can help practices with, even on the marketing side, so I can, you know, increase it by this much this much tweak it here. If we get there. All of a sudden, this practice is busier than it’s ever been.

Ashley Cloud 51:31
Right? Yeah. And I will, I would like to really quickly say that, that practices are it is a hard job, you know, and the staff, and I applaud them all the time, I actually started out in the business as a patient coordinator for three physician practice in Atlanta, turned into a long story to practice administrator and, and then I went into the consulting, but that’s my favorite job I’ve ever had honestly, was as patient because I just love my patients. And you know, when I see so many great, great patient coordinators that are out there that are the same and they just need a little bit of, of tweaking, you know, it’s small steps, like you said, so. So yeah,

Bill Fukui 52:13
I can hear it in your voice because you still say our patients, even though you’re talking from a consultant, you’re talking about our patients.

Ashley Cloud 52:21
Yeah, I know. Yeah. Now they’re my practices. They were my patients, and now they’re my practices. So anyway, yeah. So thank you so much for having me on today.

Bill Fukui 52:33
Oh, my pleasure. And I appreciate all your time and insights. Yeah, well, thank you. You bet. Have a great weekend and we will chat with you soon. You to bail by by actually.

MSD Insider 52:46
Thanks for joining us for the med shark insider with Bill Fukui join us next week for another dive into all things medical marketing. All episodes can be streamed at WWW dot med Shark digital.com/med Shark Dash insider

Transcribed by https://otter.ai