Exploring the Advantages of Call Tracking

Telephone calls are the first point of contact with a clinic for many patients, yet very few clinics track their incoming calls. Analyzing inbound calls can provide insight into the success of your marketing campaigns, and it also provides you with data that you can use to optimize your marketing strategies.

Not tracking your calls is like working on your marketing strategy with a blindfold on: you simply do not know what's working and what's not.

When you are using a multi-platform marketing strategy: brochures, billboards, TV commercials, social media, it is very difficult to know which platform is raking in the most leads. This means that you do not know which platforms are performing well and which ones you need to stop investing in.

As a business, you want the most out of your marketing budget. You want to spend less but still, get a lot of leads.

How do you go about optimizing your marketing strategy if you don’t have the data to analyze and work on? This is where call tracking comes in.

Without Call Tracking

If your clinic has no type of call tracking system in place, manual or software, then you are losing out on crucial data that you can use to optimize leads for your clinic.

Running a clinic without some method of call tracking is a recipe for disaster. Not only are you walking blindsided into your marketing strategy, but you also have no way to correct it.

With Manual Call Tracking Systems

It's important to know where your patients are coming in from. Are they referrals? Did they see an ad or a social media post? Sure, you can always ask your patients during inbound calls which platform leads them to your clinic. However, there are several problems that may crop up with such a type of manual tracking.

In marketing, when a company uses several platforms to advertise its services, each platform is considered a touchpoint. So, if a customer saw a billboard, then a pamphlet, and finally a social media post before they call into the clinic. Then the last touchpoint is considered the lead generator.

In a manual type of call tracking, patients may not always remember which platform brought them to the clinic. Or they might get confused between the touchpoint and provide the wrong one. Incorrect answers to “what brought you in?” can lead to skewed data.

Some data is better than no data, but no data is better than skewed data. Such data sets have a high probability of containing false data, and a decision made with skewed data sets will always be the wrong decision.

With Call Tracking Software

Software that aids in call tracking is the most efficient method a clinic can use.

Such software uses a technique called Dynamic Number Insertion (DNI); they have several phone numbers, each unique to an advertisement platform, that transfer to the clinic's main number. This means that you are getting accurate data as to where your leads are coming from.

1. Data for a Dental Marketing Strategy

When you know which advertising platforms are bringing in how many clients to your practice, you know which platforms are performing well and which are not. For the platforms that are not performing well, you can study what is making you lose clients for that platform and look into ways you can change your strategy.

You need to keep updating your marketing strategy regularly and call tracking provides all the data you might need to make necessary decisions.

2. Optimizing Marketing Budget

Knowing metrics for your advertisement platforms is half the battle, analyzing the data is the other half. Once you have your metric numbers in hand for each platform, you can analyze which platform brings in the lowest numbers.

There are two things you can do after that. One, you change your strategy to increase the number of leads, or, two, you limit the budget for that platform and redirect your marketing money to more successful platforms. Either way, you will make informed decisions on your spending based on solid numbers.

3. Keyword Searches

Call tracking can also include website searches ‌customers conduct to find your practice online. This way your front desk staff can be ready with the information they need for that particular call and query.

It can also indicate what treatments or procedures customers are looking into, and you can tailor your messaging around that. This also allows you to reassess your website's SEO.

4. Staff Training

Many call tracking systems offer to record calls which can later be used in staff training and call management education. With call recording and the subsequent transcripts, you can easily highlight the dos and don’ts with examples and real-life situations.

If your staff cannot properly answer questions about treatments and handle FAQs with a potential customer, chances are that the customer will find another clinic that will.

Reviewing phone calls provides you with an opportunity to identify what went wrong and where. With this information, you can better strategies for future calls. This means that each call is a learning experience that you can revisit when you need to.

Changing phone strategies after reviews of calls can increase bookings and revenue for your clinic. Your customers will have a better understanding of your services and it will help foster trust in your clinic as an expert. This leads to higher rates of customer acquisition, customer retention, and customer satisfaction.

GrowthPlug implemented an AI-driven call intelligence feature that enables dental and other health practices to analyze the effectiveness of their staff members on the phone, and enhance the patient experience. This also leads to converting more new patient calls into completed procedures.