The Secret to High-Converting Non-Surgical Calls

Andrea (00:04):
Well, hi there. I am Andrea Watkins. And if you're listening to this, while juggling three patient calls, checking in a couple patients, taking a payment, selling skincare, and trying to catch your doctor in between procedures, you might be working in an aesthetic practice.

Blake (00:18):
And I'm Blake Lucas, and this is Practiceland. This is not your doctor's podcast.

Andrea (00:23):
Welcome back to Practiceland. Thank you for listening. Today we have front desk expert, Alli Petriella. She is back, and today we're going to be talking about the nonsurgical appointments that are quite frequently, they're scheduled by the front desk. And so we're just going to kind of talk about that flow of taking those incoming nonsurgical calls, whether it's new patient, existing patient, and really getting into how that call should go. So welcome back Alli. Glad to have you here.

Alli (00:55):
Thanks. Happy to be here. Before we get into the flow of how we think the call should go, I just wanted to start by asking you, what is your opinion on the best process or internal setup for who should be scheduling the non-surgical appointments? Do we think it should be handled by the front desk? Should we have a surgical coordinator? Should our surgical PCCs be doing the non-surgical? What do you think is best?

Andrea (01:19):
It's going to be different for every practice, of course, based upon your volume, based upon how many people you have on your team. But typically what we see and what I see across the nation and how we handle it when we were in the practice was nonsurgical in most cases would be handled at the front desk. So if you're high volume practice and do just a truckload of nonsurgical treatments and you have multiple nonsurgical providers, it's a really great idea to have a PCC just for non-surgical, but in most practices they're smaller. And our front desk, it's easier to manage having two front desk people both that can handle those non-surgical inquiries in addition to what's going on in a regular day in an aesthetic practice at the front desk.

Alli (02:12):
Yeah, I would agree. And I think definitely keeping it separate from the surgical coordinator is usually best practice so that the surgical coordinator, we can protect their energy on those surgical conversations.

Andrea (02:24):
Absolutely. Anytime you're getting above about, I don't know, it was, I have a client that's about 30 to 45 new patient inquiries for nonsurgical, and we brought in a PCC just for nonsurgical so that we could take the time away from the surgical PCC and just focus it in on someone that can focus on their minimally invasive and the past six months is the highest revenue that they've ever had in their practice because we're really able to protect the time of the surgical patient care coordinator, do surgery, and then have the non-surgical PCC, not just taking care of those new patient calls, but really re-engaging your existing patients and having someone focused on ensuring that the patients you already have for minimally invasive are coming back. And then also trying to get those surgical patients transferred over into the nonsurgical or minimally invasive side as well.

(03:21):
So depending on your volume, I really think a nonsurgical PCC can be really, really helpful and beneficial, but in most practices it's going to be done at the front desk for those nonsurgical. Perfect. So if you're answering the phone in the practice, really you get a nonsurgical call, it's a new patient to the practice. You've asked your questions at the beginning of your call. Thank you so much for calling. May I get your name and number? Is this your first time calling our practice? And they say, yes, wonderful. And how can I help you? Et cetera. They tell you they're interested in something nonsurgical. What do you think is really the end goal for this call?

Alli (03:59):
I think predominantly developing a relationship and establishing some rapport because whether this ends in a booked appointment or not, we want to be their provider. So be forward thinking in the way that whether this ends how we want it to or not AKA, did we book an appointment or not? We still want to establish a relationship with them and also on that call, we want to be determining their candidacy, so we want to be asking the right questions to understand, A, are they a candidate for this non-surgical procedure? And then B, are we offering the right treatments for what they're looking for? Because someone might call in and think, Hey, can I get Botox? But they might not have enough education to understand that what they're looking for is filler. So asking the right questions to understand are they a fit for us and is this procedure a fit for them? The ultimate goal is like we said, booking and getting them on the schedule. But again, even if that piece falls through on this initial call and we have to do a second call to make that happen, let's focus on establishing that relationship as number one.

Andrea (05:04):
And then I think a good way to, once they give you that answer of, yeah, I'm really interested in X, Y and Z, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, the next thing that we need to do is always make sure that we identify what type of patient is calling and who are they, what's their name, because we need to know people's names in order to use it in conversation, everybody likes to hear their name. Is this their first time calling our practice or not? Because an existing patient call is going to be different than a new patient call. If they're an existing patient, they're already part of the family, they already love us, that's why they're calling us back to make their maybe 90 day appointment for Botox because they didn't do it when they left last time. But if it's someone totally brand new to the practice, that's when we roll out the extra long red carpet and really start digging into building that relationship that you were talking about first. A lot of times patients say, yeah, I'm just sure, absolutely, so how much do you guys charge for a unit of Botox or how much is SoftWave or do you guys do any deals for Morpheus8 or anything like that? So what should we be doing in our response to make sure that we are giving them the right information but also that we're really serving them in the best manner?

Alli (06:18):
Yeah, I would acknowledge what they're asking and then ask another question. So if they're like, what's your Botox per unit? Oh yeah, I'd love to give you some pricing and estimate on Botox. What area of your face are you looking to treat? Or just start understanding what they think they're calling in about. And then the more that they talk about that, it will start to align in your head if that is the treatment that's for them or not. If they're like, how much is a unit of Botox? And then you're like, yeah, which area of your face are you looking to treat? And they're like, my lips just seem really dull and deflated. Okay, I don't think we're talking about Botox. So you'll be able to identify that. So acknowledge their question and let them know you're going to help them with that and then ask another question. And that conversation, people like to be asked what they're looking for and they want to know that you understand their goal fully. So it is totally okay. Don't feel scared to ask another question or you're going to upset them by asking a question. Just open the conversation like, yeah, I'd love to give that to you and question.

Andrea (07:25):
Yes, absolutely. Without understanding the patient's goals, a lot of times we totally miss the whole point of the interaction and conversation of how we can actually serve. And I'm always going to come back to how do we serve, how do we serve as leaders, how do we serve as teammates, and how do we serve in our practice to our patients? And without asking the question about what are you hoping to accomplish with this? What are your goals? What concerns do you have? Things like that. We can't really understand if this is the treatment for them or someone may call and ask for a very specific treatment that maybe we don't have that treatment, but we have something that does exactly the same thing. But instead of saying, no, we don't do profound, once you actually talk to the patient about their goals, you could say, you know what?

(08:14):
The perfect solution for you to help you meet those goals would be X, Y, and Z treatment. And you can just talk them not into something. But really what we need to keep the conversation focused on also I think is what are their goals? What are they looking to achieve and how do we help them do that? Because most people, they probably saw something on TikTok or they did some research and they're like, oh, this influencer had this treatment under their skin and now she's glowing and looks amazing. Well, depending on your ethnic background, depending on your age, depending on just your skin tone and different things, that treatment might not even be applicable for you. So you tell me what your goals are and then grab all the tools off the toolbox, what do we have here that can help you reach that goal?

Alli (09:00):
And just like you said, it's how we're serving. So it's acknowledging that by not asking those questions, you could be setting this person up for failure and later down the line when they are in the office and they find out that it's a completely different treatment, then it doesn't look so great. So know that by asking those questions upfront, you're being helpful and you're providing them with the level of service that they want when they come in. So do know that you're helping them, you're not putting them off by asking questions and trying to understand what they're looking for. You are being extremely helpful by doing that.

Andrea (09:34):
And to take that one more step further, not just helping them to get the right information about the right treatment or procedure that could help them meet their goals, but also just really helping them to optimize their time. Because if you're just going to set a consultation because they tell you that they want one thing, but you don't ask them what they're looking to achieve, you could be taking a consultation fee, having them drive across town to come meet with your provider, they show up. We don't even have anything that could really help them for what their real goals are. We've wasted their time, we've wasted their money, and we've wasted the time of our provider where our provider could be meeting with someone that we know what their goals are and we know how we're going to be able to help them achieve that.

(10:18):
So I think what's really important in this aspect is when you're at the front desk and you're responsible for helping to guide patients and lead them through, this is really knowing the treatments and the outcomes so that when patients do talk to us about what their goals are when we ask, and don't just assume, but when we ask about the goals, that when they start telling us about this, that we know what tool to grab off and to start talking to them about so that we know how we can actually help them and what provider to have the consultation with and then go into price ranges and things like that that many of the patients of course are going to be asking. So once we figure out what are their goals, we also need to figure out a little bit more to make sure. Previously you had said something about making sure patients are candidates, so what does that part of the conversation look like?

Alli (11:13):
I think it's going to be understanding what they want, so what they're hoping to see different, what their history is. If they've done something like this before, and sometimes it is somebody new moving to the area and they've had their Botox provider for several years in another state and they know exactly what they want already, okay, great. That's pretty straightforward and we can appreciate that potential barriers if it is something that's new for them. So understanding if they're taking a certain medication that we can't treat them on, or just understanding, being so ingrained with what is entailed in that procedure and what your provider is looking for in candidacy so that you can ask the quick questions to know, okay, this is going to disqualify you, this is going to disqualify you. So I think just understanding fully what they want and then if they're throwing up any red flags that would disqualify them as a candidate.

Andrea (12:07):
And then the next step I would assume to that is we learn all about them and what they're looking to achieve, make sure that they're a candidate for a procedure that can help them or a treatment that can help them with that. And then we're going to want to explain to them what Alli?

Alli (12:22):
We want to start by explaining who they're going to be working with. So let's give the accolades of their injector. Okay, well, Adriana's been with us for 15 years. She's absolutely fantastic. Just have a few fun facts set aside about her and some amazing, incredible things that she's done so they know, okay, great, I'm coming to a professional that has a great track record in this industry and then talk about the procedure itself. Is there anything they need to do to prepare for it? Is there going to be any downtime? What can they expect with their, are they going to have facial bruising? Should they plan to take a day away from work? Are they going to be able to wear makeup? So just fill them in with kind of the bulleted

Andrea (13:04):
Stay out of the sun for two weeks or whatever.

Alli (13:06):
Yeah, so make sure you schedule this at a time that you're not going to Cancun the next day, and then everything that's going to go into that appointment itself. So on appointment day when you're in the office, it's going to take X amount of time. When you first come in, you're going to fill out some paperwork and then you're going to come back and we're going to start the numbing, and then we're going to chat a little bit. So walk them through everything that they're going to experience on the day of the procedure and then go through the pricing and make sure that whatever that pricing is, make sure that that is something that aligns with them and if it's not aligning with them, we're providing them with the resources to become prepared for that alignment. So is this within the current budget? If it's not, okay, let's talk about what financing options we have and we introduce something like PatientFi so we can go into the details and discuss everything that's going to be entailed and preparing for that.

Andrea (14:02):
A couple things, just as I'm listening to what you're saying as far as the education portion is concerned, it's really important for anyone at the front desk that is helping patients with these nonsurgical procedures. If you don't know about them, talk to your reps, talk to your Galderma rep or your Allergan rep or your skin ceuticals or whatever it is that you guys have in your practice. Talk to your boss or just reach directly out to the company and say, I'm at so-and-so office. Can you tell me who my rep is? Because I'd like to do a little training for me and a couple of the gals here at the office so that you really feel confident in knowing what the different machines and lasers and fillers and Botox and all of that does, so that when you're talking to patients about it, you're really fully educated for the financing.

(14:50):
Reach out to PatientFi or have them come in and do a tutorial, do a training lesson with you so that if a patient calls and you do this education, you first of all talk to them about their goals and then you make sure they're a good candidate. Then you give them a lot of information about the procedure, the pricing, the provider and all of that. And then they say, oh, that's really out of my budget. I don't have $2,300 to spend on those three treatments for that laser or whatever. Say, you know what? We do have, for example, PatientFi available and I can send you a link. The application process is simple. It only takes two to three minutes. It doesn't even ding your credit. And depending on what you get qualified for, this could be as little as $135 a month. Would that be more palatable?

(15:42):
And so when you have those tools, like this is one time when we're talking about the non-surgical, this is one time we're talking about financing at the front desk is absolutely critical because if people do not have those funds readily available, we want to be able to educate them about that as well, not just about the provider, the procedure, the recovery, and the pricing before making the appointments, we are ensuring that we can help them meet their goals, that they're candidates for the procedure that can help them, whether they're taking a medication in the sun all the time, whatever the case may be. And then we're really talking about those accolades of the provider. Will you tell me a little bit more, because what I hear all the time is people are like, I don't want to be salesy. How do I talk about how awesome my provider is without making it sound like this dissertation that I'm just trying to sell, how incredible this provider is, where of course we want to talk about how great our provider is, but how do you suggest that we make that more conversational rather than check, they did this, they went to school here, they've been doing this, they've been doing that. Could you give us an example?

Alli (16:54):
Yeah. I would say the key of this is being genuinely excited about it. So if you're working for a provider that you don't genuinely believe in, that could be a problem in the way that you're presenting their accolades.

Andrea (17:07):
Go someplace else.

Alli (17:09):
Yeah. So you want to be someone like, you want to be genuinely excited that you're connecting this person with this provider because this provider is the best of the best. So you're enthusiastically presenting these things like, oh, I love that you are looking for X, Y, Z, because Bunny our injector absolutely loves doing this procedure. So you guys are going to get along great. She's been doing this for more than 15 years and she's done this particular procedure X amount of time. So make it customized or personalized to the actual procedure. So really get to know your injector and really have different facts for different procedures. Don't just say, okay, so she's been an injector for 14 years and she first got her esthetician license and then decided we don't want to give a biography. We want to give the pertinent information for this particular patient, what might excite them? And then make it just different every time. So don't just get in the habit of saying the same thing over and over again because you're right, that can kind of sound like salesy and a little boring.

Andrea (18:19):
So, takeaway, this has been really, really informative for the nonsurgical side of things. So what do you think is really just one of the most important things that you want us to take away from today and put into action if we are at the front desk and we're scheduling these nonsurgical appointments?

Alli (18:35):
Yeah, I would just say in summary, when you're getting on these calls and someone is interested in nonsurgical procedure, have a timeline of steps in your head. So you want to listen, you want to learn, you want to educate and then next steps. So listening to everything they're saying, don't just have bulleted questions that you're going to ask every single person that's calling in for a nonsurgical procedure. Ask relevant questions on what they just shared with you about their goals, affirm what they've shared with you, so repeating back to them what they're telling you. So make it conversational, make it unique and authentic to each conversation. Share the correct education based on what we are going to be able to offer for them, and then establish those next steps, whether it is scheduling an appointment, connecting them with financing options, whatever it is, establish what the next step is.

Andrea (19:28):
I would add probably the other next step would just be if they're not ready to book an appointment, always, always, always when we get off the call, make sure that we have a plan of action with the patient that we've agreed upon. So we just don't say, okay, well do your research and maybe see you never maybe see you tomorrow. We don't really leave things like that. We want to just establish wonderful, I'm so glad if they say, yeah, I'm not really quite ready to make an appointment yet, just kind of doing some research. Absolutely, not a problem. We're totally here to help. Is it okay, while you do your research, is it okay if I reach back out maybe next Thursday just to see if you have any additional questions. And then depending on what software you're using, of course you can set yourself a reminder, call that person back on Thursday. This is Alli. We spoke last Tuesday. I know you were doing some research about X procedure. Did you come up with any more questions that I might be able to help you with? I sent you over that financing link. I see that you were able to apply and you got approved for $5,500. That'll cover X, Y, and Z. So make that action plan before you hang up so that both know that we're going to talk again even if you haven't already booked your appointment.

Alli (20:42):
Yeah, love that.

Andrea (20:43):
Alright, well thank you so much, Alli for being here again. A plethora of information to share with our listeners. We really, really appreciate it. So where can we find you online again for more?

Alli (20:54):
Connect with me on LinkedIn. It's Allison, A-L-L-I-S-O-N, Petriella, P-E-T-R-I-E-L-L-A.

Andrea (21:02):
Fantastic. And for anyone out there listening, if you have a question that you want us to tackle, please go to practicelandpodcast.com. You can put in any question that you want and we are happy to tackle that for you here.

Blake (21:16):
Got a wild customer service story or a sticky patient situation? Send us a message or voicemail. If your tale makes it into our "She did what?" segment, we'll send a thank you gift you'll actually love. Promise, no cheap swag here.

Andrea (21:28):
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