Make Your Marketing Spend Pay Off by Fixing the Real Leak—Conversion

If you’ve been thinking, “Our marketing isn’t paying off,” you’re not imagining it. Many dentists tell us the same thing: the phone rings, visibility improves… yet the return on investment still feels disappointing.

Here’s what we see again and again:

Marketing can get you noticed. Conversion is what makes you profitable.

A marketing company can help your practice show up online and drive calls. But the biggest deciding factor in whether that spend works is what happens next—how your team handles the new patient phone call.

The hidden truth: most practices aren’t converting enough calls

In the video, we share a benchmark many practices fall into:

• Typical new patient conversion rate: 30–40%

• Our goal in our “Crush the Call” new patient phone training boot camp: 70%

If your phones are ringing and your schedule still has gaps, the opportunity often lives right here.

What “conversion” actually means

Conversion is not a complicated metric.

It’s simply: When a prospective patient calls, do they schedule—and do they keep the appointment?

If your team treats the call as an intake process, you’ll get intake-level results.

If your team treats the call as the beginning of a relationship, you’ll see a different outcome.

The goal: turn your team into brand ambassadors

Our recommendation is to coach your team to become the brand ambassadors of your practice—because that first call sets the tone for everything that follows.

In the video, we focus on three essentials:

1) Set your office apart

Patients are comparison shopping—fast. If your call sounds like every other practice, they’ll keep shopping.

2) Connect with the patient on the first call

Connection is what builds trust quickly. Patients don’t remember scripts. They remember how your team made them feel.

3) Make the purpose of the call clear

Your team’s job is to:

• Get the patient an appointment.

• Get the patient excited about coming in.

Excitement is a conversion tool. It reduces “I’ll call you back,” and it reduces ghosting.

Why speed and experience matter more than you think

We also share an important reality:

Patients may call 5–7 offices when searching for a new dentist.

That means:

• They can make multiple appointments.

• They may not call you to cancel if they get in sooner elsewhere.

• They may choose the practice that gives them the best experience on the phone.

This is why many practices think they have a marketing problem… when they actually have a phone conversion problem.

Action Steps (Use This This Week)

Here are three quick actions to tighten your conversion immediately:

1) Track your true conversion rate

For one week, measure:

• New patient calls received

• Appointments scheduled from those calls

• Appointments kept

2) Listen to 5 recorded calls as a leadership team

Ask:

• Did we sound warm and confident?

• Did we create excitement?

• Did we clearly guide the caller to an appointment?

• Did we communicate what makes this practice different?

3) Coach one consistent call flow

Consistency is the key to improving results. When every team member answers differently, conversion becomes unpredictable.

A simple mindset shift that changes everything

Stop thinking of the new patient call as paperwork.

Start treating it as the first moment of patient trust.

When your team is trained to connect, confidently guide, and represent your brand well—your marketing dollars start working harder.

Want help improving conversion in your practice?

If your marketing spend isn’t producing the results you want, we’d love to talk about what’s happening on your phones and how we can help your team convert more callers into scheduled, excited new patients.