With some 25,000 dentists practicing across Canada, it’s important that you find ways to run your dental clinic as productively as possible.
Not only will this go a long way to retaining patients and staying competitive in saturated markets like Toronto, Montreal, or Vancouver, it can help boost the resale value of your practice—even if you operate outside a major economic centre.
Here are 6 ways to increase dental practice revenue through greater efficiency.
1. Increase your clinic’s capacity
The simplest way to increase production and generate more practice revenue is by treating as many patients as possible.
To bolster the capacity of your dental office, you might try:
- Relying more on your dental assistant to perform routine tasks like x-rays and cleanings
- Adding extra treatment rooms and hiring another dentist or hygienist
- Streamlining patient interactions by shortening wait times, upgrading equipment, and ensuring every team member is well-trained
You should also consider outsourcing your bookkeeping and other administrative duties to make more time for the income-producing treatments that can increase dental practice revenue.
2. Offer more high-profit procedures
Certain dental procedures tend to be more profitable than standard care treatments. It might make sense, for example, to increase your focus on:
- Implants
- Porcelain veneers
- Crowns and bridges
Bear in mind, however, that while some treatments command a higher fee, they don’t always translate into a higher profit margin. You should weigh the financials carefully before offering costly or time-consuming procedures.
3. Raise your fees
Scheduling an annual, across-the-board fee hike of 2-3% is one way to increase dental practice revenue. You could also raise the fees for select procedures intermittently.
Start by evaluating your services in terms of:
- Their cost
- The patient value they provide
- How much your competitors charge
You may find some of your fees are right on point, while others warrant a 5-15% increase right away.
Whether annually or intermittently, not only can tiny fee increases add up over time, but rebalancing your fee schedule ensures you’ll start earning extra income immediately.
4. Boost patient retention
It’s generally less expensive to retain an existing dental client than it is to acquire a new one. Plus, employing basic customer service tools like these to improve patient relations can also increase your income.
Email marketing. Automated emails with direct booking links make it easy to follow up with patients at designated intervals and encourage them to schedule their next appointment. Dental marketing emails are also a great way to promote time-limited offers on profitable, non-standard procedures.
Customer feedback. Patient satisfaction is the key to keeping more clients and improving your dental practice's success. Make sure you talk to your patients about their experience with you after each visit and follow up with a customer survey request via email.
Referrals and rewards programs. Loyal patients are crucial for both repeat business and recommendations. Consider offering incentives (like a free product or whitening services, for example) to patients who refer friends, family, or coworkers—and a membership program that rewards them for repeated visits.
Remember: Gathering input from patients isn’t just a cost-free way to discover how you can improve your dental practice management, it also plays a big role in revenue growth.
5. Offer financing options
Not every patient has dental insurance for non-standard procedures—and even those who do may have to cover certain out-of-pocket expenses themselves.
Offering alternative financing options (like internal or external payment plans, for example) can increase dental practice revenue by making your treatments more affordable for clients with insufficient insurance plans.
You should also aim to work with more providers that enable direct insurance company billing. By allowing patients with cash flow difficulties to avoid paying for dental treatment upfront (and having to wait to get reimbursed), you’ll make it easier for them to take advantage of your services.
6. Improve your financial visibility
Do you know how much revenue your practice is generating – or how profitable your dental clinic is? Questions like these can only be answered when your bookkeeping is accurate and up to date.
It’s not unusual for dentists to neglect their books due to insufficient financial knowledge or time. But doing your bookkeeping at least monthly is essential for gaining ongoing visibility into your financial data, understanding your cash flow, and making efficient business decisions.
Proper bookkeeping, for example, can show you:
- Which dental procedures yield the highest profit margins – and where you might be overspending and eating away at those profits
- Where your costs are increasing – and what pricing changes you’ll need to make to cope with inflation
- What your peak or slow seasons are – and when you can afford to upgrade your equipment, hire another dental assistant, or expand your marketing campaign
All of the strategies outlined here can potentially increase your profitability. But only timely bookkeeping can reveal whether improvements meant to increase dental practice revenue are actually succeeding.
If you need professional, outsourced bookkeeping services to optimize your time and increase your revenue, Enkel can help.
