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Building Partnerships: How to Earn GP Referrals by Dr. Donna Galante, DMD

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by Donna Galante


As a fellow orthodontist in a private practice, I know that consistently attracting new patients is one of the most important aspects for stability and continued growth in our practices.

Many of us who have been in practice for more than 10 years have experienced a decrease in new patients, a decline or change in general-dentist referral patterns and the overall frustration of not knowing what to do to keep new patients coming into our practices year after year.

In this article, I'll review some current statistics regarding new-patient trends as well my secret to sustained—and even growing—numbers of general-dentist referrals. I'll also cover professional partner referrals (hygienists, dental assistants, administrative staff and other dental specialists).

First, the truth about new patients and orthodontic practices. The American Association of Orthodontists and Zimmerman Marketing Research found that in 2006, the average orthodontic office in North America saw 547 new patients a year. By 2008, that number dropped to 503.

The same study found that on average, an orthodontist sees 48 patients a day. More than 75 percent of the survey respondents stated that they could easily see an additional 16 patients a day without an increase in staffing. Without a consistent flow of new patients in an orthodontic practice, we are out of business each time we remove the braces or attachments from aligners.

To cope with this instability, many practice owners have implemented an array of marketing initiatives, including hosting community events, being active on social media, updating their websites, sending direct mail and asking for referrals from friends and family. While these strategies are essential to a comprehensive marketing plan, the reality is that GP referrals are still very important for a consistent flow of new patient exams in our offices.

The AAO reports that 72 percent of new patient referrals are from general dentists alone. By not paying attention to this huge source of new patients, many orthodontic practices may fail to thrive and there will be further erosion of their new patient referrals.

Just how do we garner those valuable referrals?

Let's step back and look at what is important to our general-dental colleagues regarding the referral of their patients to your practice. What you will learn may surprise you!

A 2009 study found that 74.5 percent of all orthodontists send gifts to referral partners. However, the gifts were rated low in importance and effectiveness in regard to referrals.

So should we stop the bagel runs? Not necessarily. But maybe we need to look at spending our resources on the things that are significant and effective.

In another 2009 study, Drs. Hall, Sohn and McNamara surveyed 1,000 dentists in the Midwest to discover why dentists refer to specific orthodontists. Seventy-five percent of the respondents said that the quality of previous orthodontic treatment and patient/parental satisfaction were of equal importance in the orthodontic referral decision. In fact, these two factors were the most important to them when considering their patient referral.

Furthermore, the quality of the orthodontic result as determined by the general dentist was more important than reputation, cost of orthodontic treatment, or whether the orthodontist had a more convenient location. In other words, they were not concerned if your fees were higher, they just wanted high-quality results.

When I uncovered this study it changed how I communicated and interacted with professional partners.

Here are three of my top strategies for effectively getting more new-patient referrals and building a great relationship with your dentists and professional partners.

1. Host CE seminars
These seminars can either be in your office (ideally, if possible) or at a local restaurant or hotel. We have been doing these now for more than six years and they continue to generate goodwill in the dental community and among new referring doctors. We provide dinner, CE credits and extremely useful information that will help attendees grow their practices and provide better patient care. We do not charge for these seminars.

If your office has space, host the seminar there so you can show off your office and even your team. If you do not have the room for an event like this, no problem; a local restaurant will have a private room for you. Just make sure that before the speaker starts, you do a quick five-minute presentation on your practice, complete with PowerPoint and photos. You can then segue into the speaker and have their photo and bio as the lead-in to the presentation.

You can ask your accountant to give a talk on taxes; your financial planner to talk on retirement; or hire local outside speakers to talk about marketing, hiring, practice transitions or any of the myriad topics related to the practice of dentistry. Many clubs and organizations are happy to provide a speaker for a 90-minute presentation. Generally they do not charge a fee, or maybe they only charge a small fee.

Once or twice a year, you may speak and show your cases as they relate to a particular topic. For example, if you do a lot of Phase 1 treatment, you can put a PowerPoint together about the benefits of Phase 1 orthodontic treatment. If you do a fair amount of Invisalign, show the types of cases you treat using aligners. You definitely do not want to always have the speech about orthodontics, but once or twice a year people will be thrilled to come and learn.

Once you get in the habit of doing these seminars, you will get calls about making sure prospective attendees get an invite to the next event. Over the years we have developed many great referral relationships with current and new general dentists as part of our CE series.

Finally, make sure you have a packet of information for all the attendees. In addition to the CE credits, you should have a folder filled with referral cards, your latest practice newsletter, coupons or your special promotions as well as their CE certificate.

2. Don't just do lunch . . . Do a lunch-and-learn
Sometimes it is difficult for doctors and/or their teams to come to an evening event. Hosting a lunch-and-learn is another way to get in front of dentists and their teams. At this event you can present compelling content about your brand of orthodontics and how you can help them help their patients achieve optimal dental health.

Usually a lunch-and-learn will be no more than an hour. You provide the lunch, the projector, the PowerPoint and even a screen if needed. Have your team help you set up the presentation before arriving with your PowerPoint. While there is some work involved in creating these presentations, once they are done you have them in your arsenal for future lunch-and-learns. You can always update them in the future.

The goal is to keep it short (about 45 minutes), focus on one to three points and provide plenty of photos to illustrate your orthodontic results.

3. Organize staff-to-staff lunches
Earlier, I mentioned potential referrals from hygienists, dental assistants and even administrative personnel. When I was just starting out in my first practice, I was getting many referrals from a pediatric dental practice in my area. The referrals were tagged to the "dentist" but I quickly discovered that when a certain administrative employee left employment at this office, my referrals dried up.

Most of the patients were referred by a front-desk employee, not the pediatric dentist. In fact, the dentist was giving the parent two or three referrals to "shop," but the parents would ask the front desk staff who they should really go and see. As a result, it is important to communicate and build relationships with team members of other dental offices.

Our practice does this by having our staff bring lunch to another office.

We have found this to be an easy way for the teams to get together and know each other. Even if the dental office has a short lunch break, it is certainly a treat to have food brought in and paid for.

Our team will build a relationship and spend time answering questions about the office, the doctors and our patients. It's a great way to get the word out about you and your practice while also building goodwill. Besides lunch, our team will bring some information about the office, brochures, books, referral forms and our practice newsletter to distribute and leave at the office.

As orthodontists, we must continue to build our practices by bringing in new patients. While this may be difficult at times, the best way to consistently attract these new patients is through referrals from our general-dental colleagues and other professional partners. By hosting CE seminars, doing a lunch-and-learn and organizing staff-to-staff lunches, your practice will continue to thrive in the upcoming years.

References
  1. American Association of Orthodontists. 2008 AAO Patient and Member Census Study. 2009.
  2. Hall JF, Sohn W, McNamara J. Why Do Dentists Refer to Specific Orthodontists? Angle Orthod.2009;79:5-11.
  3. Keim RG, Gottlieb EL, Nelson AH, Vogels DS. 2009 JCO Orthodontic Practice Study Part 4. Additional breakdowns. J Clin Orthod. 2010;44(1):19-27; quiz 45.



Dr. Donna Galante is a member of the Orthotown Magazine advisory board. She owns four orthodontic practices in Northern California. She's a native of Pennsylvania and graduated magna cum laude from Albright College, in Reading, PA, in 1980 with a BS in psychobiology. Galante pursued her dental degree at the University of Pennsylvania Dental School and received her DMD in 1984 from the same institution. In 1986, Galante received her orthodontic specialty certification at the University of Pennsylvania and opened her first private practice in King Of Prussia, PA.
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