Dr Phillip & Simon Palmer, January 2013 -
With the sale in December of Dental Corporation to BUPA, an English insurance company, the 2012 year ended with a bang and another potentially huge shift in the local dental industry seems to have come out of nowhere.
Thinking back over the last 5 years, there has never been a period in my memory where there have been as many changes in the marketplace. Some of the changes that have hit the dental industry in Australia have been enormous, and their effects will be felt more and more in the years to come:
It is important to recognise that with all significant changes to an industry, come risks and opportunities. A good example that illustrates this is to look at the changes that have occurred to the music industry in the last 10-15 years. 15 years ago we would buy, tapes and CDs from music stores. Then, consumers went to ordering their music from Amazon, then downloading from Napster and iTunes and now there are subscriptions to Spotify. Music stores are all but gone. Corner video stores, book stores and travel agents are also on their way out... They are all victim of a marketplace that changed under their feet and their industries inability to adapt or keep up with the changes.
For the business person who keeps up-to-date and is fully informed of what’s happening in their industry, there are no surprises... only opportunities to take advantage of. For the music/ video shop owner who didn’t see what was coming...there was only a lot of pain as they became the business equivalent of a dinosaur waiting for extinction.
So, how do you as a dentist and business owner make sure that you are on top of and take advantage of the coming changes? How do you make sure that your business doesn’t end up being the dental practice equivalent of the music store?
1. Keep re-investing in order to keep up with the market:
a. In your practice
A dentist will usually spend a significant chunk of their waking life in their practice and yet somehow many dentists seem content to let their practice date and become tired or worn-out. Have pride in where you spend your work day.
In terms of aesthetics, it doesn’t cost a lot of money to keep a practice looking fresh and new every 5-7 years and it will reinvigorate the energy that you and your team bring to the practice every day.
In terms of equipment, a practice also needs to reinvest on a regular basis. I remember the first time a friend of mine came back from their dentist and had seen an anaesthetic wand for the first time. They were telling everyone who would listen for days afterwards how it was the first time they had an anxiety free injection. You can’t buy advertising as effective as that.
The practice that keeps reinvesting in itself:
- keeps the practice looking modern for patients;
- keeps your clinical services offered at the cutting edge;
- keeps your practice looking attractive for recruiting staff;
- keeps your personal interest going;
- keeps your practice looking attractive for possible future sale.
b. In yourself
If you want to ensure that you are always offering your patients the best possible clinical care you need to realise that clinical excellence (or even competence) is not a goal that you reach and then remain at forever more. To remain clinically excellent (or competent) requires ongoing work. It requires that you are diligent about keeping up to date with the industry on the latest thinking about conditions, procedures, techniques, materials and equipment. It’s not hard to do... but you need to dedicate the time to attend courses, read articles and go to conventions and meetings regularly.
c. In your service levels
It is a given that the practice needs to be excellent clinically. But there will be more and more demands for differentiating yourself in the non-clinical areas of your practice. Areas such as the provision of excellence in service. Be on the lookout for ways to constantly amaze and delight your patients. You can never be complacent with your patients, no matter how much you believe you have delivered good service to them in the past. Patients often have short memories, and it will only take one of their friends/peers raving about the new dentist they have been to before their curiosity will be piqued and your old patient will go and check them out.
Remember, you are probably losing 15-20% of your patients every year. See if you can cut that down to 5-10% next year. The rewards are enormous.
2. Look to the horizon, be curious and be an early adopter
a. In general practice standards
Have standards slightly above those mandated instead of begrudgingly doing things only when you absolutely have to. The dentists who are constantly doing the bare minimum or just what is mandated are not the ones that will thrive. Even though practice accreditation is currently voluntary, compulsory accreditation as in the UK may well be on the way. Even if this isn’t the case, compliance standards on things like sterilisation, record keeping, WH&S and HR management will more than likely increase in the future. Be ahead of the curve and there will be less work and investment to bring things up to scratch later on.
b. Clinically.
Many of the dentists I know who have thrived in the last 5-10 years haven’t just kept up with their clinical dentistry but broadened the scope of work that they do. There are many courses out there in clinical niches or special interests for the clinically curious dentist to look into today like: sleep issues, orthodontic cases, or implant surgery.
These clinical niches haven’t just helped keep more work in house they have helped their practices create an identity and differentiate themselves from the competition.
c. Learn about new non clinical technologies
Be curious about new technologies. The dentists who were early and effective adopters of websites, the use of email and Facebook have reaped the rewards of their curiosity. Today curious/early adopter dentists are surveying their patients post treatment (by iPad or email) and asking them for feedback about their experience to make sure that they are providing the best possible service to their patients.
Are you a dinosaur waiting for extinction or will you thrive in times ahead?
There have never been as many changes taking place in our industry. There have never been as many risks to the lead-footed dentist, nor as many rewards available for the forward thinking. Which one will you be?