Getting Client Conversation Right

From our February 2012 newsletter:

I call around to lots of veterinary practices and it’s not too often I enjoy a fantastic client experience. I get perky, I get zeal, I even get lots of questions and answers.  What I rarely get is a person who closes the conversation confidently by making a trip to the veterinary hospital sound inviting and the solution to all my concerns.  We don’t train sales in our team members; we train information.  And  while information has its place in our training program, it can never be an end unto itself. 

I believe we never train for sales because our team views salesmanship in the veterinary practice as unfairly capitalizing on a client’s emotions and love for their pet.  Simply not true.  All veterinary team members must understand that clients have little to no insight into the passion, training and
education all of us undertake when we choose this profession.  They don’t see the effort that goes into our lunch and learns, our certifications and our licensures.  How many of them really understand the kind of nurturing care that goes on behind the scenes or the concern that we carry with us long after we lock the clinic door? To merely tell a client about a disease or quote a price about a surgery and leave the decision up to them is drastically short changing our clients and their pets.

Our client care team members must make a hard case for how our practice, services and team members directly answer the client’s needs.  We must invite our clients into our practice where they can partake of what it is we do best and experience firsthand why our work is superior.  To do otherwise is to set them loose on the web, chat rooms and online pharmacies with no experience to guide them.  Build scripts for your team members that outline strong arguments for your practice, your team and your efforts.  Any veterinary team member that believes that modesty is the best policy when it comes to discussing your practice’s services and products is seriously shortchanging your clients and leaving a door open to pet care ignorance, noncompliance, and potentially serious blunders.

Bash Halow is a veterinary practice consultant.  He is a Certified Veterinary Practice Manager, a Licensed Veterinary Technician in the State of Delaware, a Registered Veterinary Technician in the State of New Jersey and a member and founder of the New Jersey Veterinary Hospital Manager’s Association.

For more information go to
www.halowconsulting.com or
www.halowconsulting.blogspot.com

7 Tips to Get New Customers

From our February 2012 newsletter:

The economy is still sluggishly moving forward, but you want to jump start your veterinarian services and reach new clients.  How do you get started? Welcome to the world of sales.  Yes, even as a medical professional you still have to sell.  You may stop and say, “I started my practice because I’m passionate about companion animals, and I’m no salesperson.” This couldn’t be further from the truth, however, it is your product (rapport with customers, quality of services, expertise, etc.) that will get the new customers in your office.

Here are a few tips to help give you the edge over the competition and bring new folks into your practice (in no particular order):

1) Belong to your community.

Get your clinic involved with community events.  Participate in neighborhood open houses and fun days.  Costs tend to be very minimal with these types of events and your investment will render a sense of belonging to your customers.  Word of mouth travels fast and your success rate will shine through as people start to recognize your practice as the caring community clinic.

2) Competitive pricing.

It could be a tough call to drop prices, but you could gain a competitive edge if you make the right calls at the right time.  Working with distributors like PCI Animal Health for product solutions

and inventory management can help you set solid pricing and purchases.  Also, look at other cost saving measures like job duties consolidations, time management, and shared-expenses.

3) Network.

People do business with people they know, plain and simple.  Align yourself with solid industry leaders, like PCI Animal Health.  When aligning yourself with any organization or individual, don’t just think about ways they can help you, think about how you can both create an impact to generate success.

4) Create your niche.

Become the expert you always wanted to be in the veterinarian community.  Pick a specific area to excel in and tackle that concept to become the go-to-person.  This will make it much easier to focus your efforts and beat the competition.  If your focus is companion animals then take it a step further and engage specific breeds.  It will give you the marketing pull you’re looking for.

5) Why should customers go to you?

This is a question you have to answer honestly and whole-heartedly.  Use a jolt of brute realism and get to the core of the matter.  You will be able to examine your strengths and weaknesses to better develop business strategies for increasing your customer base.  Build upon your strengths and uniqueness and remedy any shortcomings.

6) Customer service - treat them right.

This is your golden rule and you would think it is the most obvious, but many organizations still lack in this.  If a customer has a bad experience word travels fast: by mouth, in blog, on a website, in a Tweet, or even a Facebook page.  It starts from when your customer calls your clinic and is met with staff member that answers the phone.  Customer experience is everything.  Train your staff to be professional, attentive, and have core abilities for troubleshooting.

7) Be social online.

It doesn’t cost you anything to get your Facebook page started or get a Twitter account.  What it does cost you is not to promote yourself on-line; especially since your customers can talk about you on-line.

-Sidney Alvarez