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Ethical Selling
To kick off my theme of Ethical Selling this week, here is an outline of how we define this term at the Dental Business Club. Ethical Selling encompasses the following:
Telephony
Becoming polished at answering FAQ’s
Selling the first appointment
Reception
Welcoming the new patient
Working with and remunerating treatment co-ordinators
Building rapport during first appointments and review meetings
Establishing the patients desired outcomes
Listening to and appreciating the patients concerns
Building and presenting the treatment plan – in layman’s terms
Discussing payment options
Overcoming concerns and objections to treatment and price
Ethically closing the sale
Creating referrals
Managing the sales performance of other fee-earners
Ethical selling case study:
Blueapple Dental and Implant Team, Northern Ireland
The process of ethical selling involves building rapport with new patients, understanding their desires and outcomes, careful treatment planning and also the successful conclusion of a conversation relating to payment options. In addition to this, it is also necessary to very carefully manage your “pipeline” of potential new patients – those who have had a treatment plan delivered to them but may not have yet reached the conclusion to proceed to treatment. Working with James and Sony Hamill and the team at Blueapple presented a unique version of this problem as a very significant proportion of their patients were actually enjoying “dental tourism” by travelling across the border from Eire into Northern Ireland to enjoy the price advantage of a currency differential. Working with James, Sonya and the team we ensured that everybody within the practice understood the ethical selling process but more importantly it was necessary to implement some sophisticated management systems so that when potential new patients left the building and travelled back across the border the practice could maintain contact with them and help them to reach a purchasing decision further down the line.