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What's up! Kyle here.
I talk to a lot of dental practice owners. When I ask "How's the practice doing?" I usually get some version of "busy" or "slow" or "it depends on the week." Those aren't numbers. Those are feelings. And feelings don't grow practices.
Here are the three numbers I'd check every single Monday morning if I owned a dental practice. It takes less than five minutes. No fancy software required. Just pull these from your front desk and your phone system.
Number 1: How many new patient calls came in last week, and how many were answered?
Industry data says the average dental practice misses about 15-20% of inbound calls. That means if you got 20 new patient calls last week, 4~ of them went to voicemail. Those 4 people didn't leave a message. They called the next practice on the list. You paid for those leads with your marketing dollars and nobody picked up the phone.
Every Monday, know the number. If it's ugly, fix it before you spend another dollar on ads.
Number 2: How many appointments were scheduled from those calls?
Getting the call answered is step one. Converting that call into a booked appointment is step two. If your front desk answered 15 calls but only booked 8, that's a 53% conversion rate. Where did the other 7 go? Did the patient get put on hold too long? Did they ask about cost and the front desk fumbled the answer? Did they say "I'll call back" and nobody followed up?
This number tells you whether your front desk is a revenue driver or a revenue leak.
Number 3: How many overdue patients were contacted for reactivation?
This is the number almost nobody tracks. Every practice has a pile of patients who are 6, 9, 12+ months overdue for their next visit. They're not gone. They're just not being reminded. A simple text or call to overdue patients is the cheapest, fastest way to fill holes in your schedule.
If your team isn't reaching out to at least 10-15 overdue patients per week, you're leaving easy revenue on the table.
That's it. Three numbers. Five minutes. Every Monday.
New patient calls answered. Appointments booked from those calls. Overdue patients contacted. Track these weekly and you'll know exactly where your practice is leaking and where to focus your energy.
Print this out. Tape it to the wall behind your front desk. Make it a habit.
Talk next week.
— Kyle / Founder, Search-To-Seat™
Reminder: I’m running a Live Webinar on Tuesday, May 26th at 7:00 PM EST. You can reserve your spot for $2 (the minimum Eventbrite would let me put) and I’ll be going over our entire system on how we drive new patients using Search-To-Seat. You can reserve your spot here, I’m going to cap it at 250 people. You don’t have to interact, simply hop in the Zoom room and listen. No cameras or mics needed.
