How Dermatology Practices Increase Premium Service Profits Without Ad Spend

By Chloe from Clearwave | May 24, 2023

Facing a low booking rate for Botox, laser hair removal, anti-aging and other premium dermatology services?

A recent MGMA Stat poll found that 90% of medical practices report their costs are rising faster than their revenues. Driving premium services is an effective way to reverse this trend, and high-growth dermatology practices are figuring out how to execute without increasing ad spend or contributing to staff burnout.

Whether you’re facing tough competition for patients or struggling to gain a return on investment from your premium service advertising — it may be time to try a new approach! 

Top-earning dermatologists and practices find cost-efficient ways to bring in more premium service patients. See how you can increase bookings without increasing costs or patient frustrations. 

Why do dermatology practices struggle to book premium service patients?

For dermatology practices, premium services like anti-aging procedures, Botox, chemical peels, laser hair removal and fillers provide a revenue stream that dermatologists are eager to promote. Here are some of the roadblocks that hinder these critical revenue streams: 

Low ROI 

Practices often invest in online, Facebook and Google ads to increase premium service awareness and interest. These options can be effective but are difficult to scale, due to increasing costs, especially when you’re competing against other dermatology practices. Additionally, traditional advertising, like billboards or print, provide the same high-cost, low-reward results. Reduce ROI by building awareness with your current patient base.

Competition 

Today’s patients are creative. Between other dermatology practices and at-home treatments, it can be difficult to source premium service leads. Patients may keep pushing off their need for premium services or find alternative solutions. In today’s environment, these external challenges and general competition between other dermatologists in your area will only increase. Compete by leveraging your existing patients! 

Patient Frustrations 

Encourage your existing patients to consider premium services, but tread lightly. Some practices see significant success, while others fall short. What’s the difference? Dermatology patients are accustomed to a spa-like experience when they handle skincare needs. It’s important that your practice promotes a calm and welcoming atmosphere, awkward staff interaction about premium services like anti-aging or Botox, can disrupt your patients’ experience. Your staff may also feel too uncomfortable to gauge patient interest, leading them to neglect to ask patients about premium services altogether. Avoid the ‘human factor’ to see results. 

Practices are successfully increasing premium service revenue, without increasing costs or patient frustration, by driving interest through patient self-registration. 

How to Automatically Drive Premium Service Awareness & Interest

Use patient self-registration solutions, like kiosks or mobile check-in, to gauge interest in a way that privately educates patients who fit the correct demographics for premium services. Take these steps: 

1. Add custom questions to your self-registration workflows

Through patient self-registration solutions, you can book more premium service patients with customized check-in questions – calling patients’ attention to relevant services at a time when you have their full attention. Simply add custom questions to your registration workflows, but don’t disrupt all your patients.  

By leveraging self-registration modalities to gauge patient interest, you can target patients who are most likely to book premium services, while reducing the risk of offending patients, since the interaction is fully private and not between your patients and staff. Your patients may feel more inclined to answer honestly or take action since the entire interaction is private and they’re already at their dermatologist’s office. No more putting off their skin care needs! 

2. Prompt premium service questions to patients who fit the right demographics 

Target patients who fit the right demographic for certain premium services by adding custom questions to your registration workflows based on appointment type, age and gender. For example, you may typically advertise Botox or anti-aging treatments to women between the ages of 30 and 50. Using a digital patient self-registration solution, when a woman who meets those age demographics checks in for her annual appointment, the system will automatically prompt a custom question of your choosing about Botox, chemical peels or whatever services you want to promote.

With custom check-in workflows, tailored by specific demographics, you can ensure that you’re not extending the check-in process for those patients who don’t fit the right demographics. 

3. Educate patients as you capture interest, to increase your chance of booking 

The check-in process provides a unique opportunity to educate patients on the premium services available to them, without coming across as a sales pitch or creating an awkward interaction.   

Consider adding a question and any educational information, and then provide your patient with the opportunity to signal their interest. For example, the custom question could share benefits of Botox, and then ask the patient, “Would you be interested in learning more about Botox?”  

By adding in the benefits, you can encourage your patients to take action, rather than once again put off their interest for another time. With the right phrasing and the privacy of patient self-registration, you can increase your likelihood of capturing bookings from your existing patient base, meaning they won’t invest elsewhere. 

4. Reduce your advertising budget 

Proven self-registration solution vendors won’t charge you to customize your patient check-in workflows in this way, meaning you can tailor the experience how you see fit and reduce your spend on external advertising.  

Create multiple, custom workflows to promote your premium services and increase your leads, without spending a dime on advertising. As you see significant increases in revenue due to this approach, consider what you can cut from your advertising budget. 

Thomas Eye Group is one example of how practices can increase premium service revenue, while actually lowering their ad spend. The practice drove $400k in LASIK revenue while dropping their ad spending by $5k. See how the practice uses free, custom check-in questions to make it happen. Read their story in detail. 

5. Follow-Up 

Once a patient responds positively to custom check-in questions about a premium service, how your practice/dermatologists follow up will become key to converting patient interest into revenue. As patients signal their interest during check-in, ensure that information is automatically captured in your patient management system or electronic health record.  

Next, make sure your front desk staff or dermatologists are alerted and can follow up accordingly, either via that same appointment or down the line. There are numerous ways you can leverage patient interest and encourage patients to take next steps. For example, Mann Eye Institute uses MDprospects to route “Yes” answers to physicians, in real-time, so those physicians can provide education on premium services to interested patients during their appointment.   

Mann Eye Institute also leverages Clearwave to run reports seeing how many patients have responded to specific intake questions and what those responses were. Using Clearwave, practice leaders can also create tasks for front-desk staff when certain responses come through via patient check-in. From there, staff can follow up accordingly by coordinating with a dermatologist or helping the patient book a premium service appointment. 

You could also use this information to fuel future patient email or messaging campaigns, to further encourage patients who’ve already shown interest to book premium services. From there, plan to continually track interest and market to those patients until they book a particular service. Effective follow-up marketing tactics include reaching out to patients via phone, two-way texting or other mass communications methods. Consider following up with an offer for a free consultation or discounts on the services that patients have signaled interest in. 

How Practices Increase Premium Service Revenue Without Added Costs

If you’re considering a self-registration solution or have one in place that you want to use to target patient interest in premium services, ensure you have a way to capture and use that data. With an intuitive and highly integrated system, the data should be there and available at your staff’s fingertips, so you can easily tap into your existing database and move those leads closer to booking premium services. 

Mann Eye Institute’s Chief Operations Officer, Guido Piquet recently shared the practice’s approach to promoting premium services, such as Botox or Laser Eye surgery, in this webinar on Driving Premium Service Revenue Without Ad Spend. You may find value in what he shares and how their practice is accelerating revenue growth as a result. 

To find out how Clearwave can help you successfully promote your premium services without ad spend, contact us today.