AADOM DISTINCTIONcast – Dentistry Done Differently: Building a Practice Patients Never Want to Leave
Patients today want more than good dentistry. They want to feel comfortable, understood, valued, and cared for. In this webinar, attendees will learn how creating a better patient experience leads to stronger trust, higher treatment acceptance, better reviews, more referrals, and a healthier team culture. This course will break down simple, practical ways to improve the patient journey from the first phone call to the follow-up after treatment, helping practices stand out in a crowded and competitive dental market.
Learning Objectives:
- Learn what patients are really looking for when choosing and staying loyal to a dental practice.
- Understand how communication, environment, and team interactions shape the patient experience and patient trust.
- Identify simple ways to reduce patient anxiety and create a more comfortable, welcoming experience.
- Discover how a strong patient experience can improve referrals, reviews, treatment acceptance, and team culture.
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Read the Transcript Now!
Chavelle: Hey, this is Chevelle, the Director of Membership and Education with the American Association of Dental Office Management.
And we’re so excited for this DistinctionCast. We are going to be talking about Dentistry Done Differently: Building a Practice Patients Never Want to Leave. And our speaker today, whom I’m very excited to introduce, is Erika Pusillo.
She has been rooted in dentistry since 2009, starting out in sterilization as a dental assistant and working her way through every corner of the dental practice. Her journey from assistant to the CEO seat has fueled her passion for building strong teams, creating efficient systems, and helping practices thrive.
As a distinguished fellow of AADOM and a national speaker with the Bulletproof Dental Practice, Erika is known for her down-to-earth style and ability to make complex topics feel simple and doable. She loves inspiring dental leaders to grow, lead confidently, and create practices they’re proud of.
Erika, take it away!
Erika: Boy, I sound impressive, don’t I?
Well, I’m, I’m really happy to be back with you guys again. I absolutely love talking about what I do and, you know, I feel like work isn’t work to me, and I definitely hope that everybody in the AADOM network, if you already feel like that, amazing. Congratulations to you. And if you haven’t found that passion yet, you’re about to, ’cause dentistry is one of the most beautiful professions.
Returning to the Purpose Behind Your Practice
In Dentistry Done Differently: Building a Practice Patients Never Want to leave is just about that. You know, I think a lot of times, what we do, is we wear so many hats as an office manager, as a practice leader, that we get caught up in the process of dentistry versus in the why we actually are doing dentistry in the first place.
And, one of those things is that sometimes we forget why we chose this profession. Many of us have started with our doctors from the very beginning. Many of us have started when the practices were well-established, or now we’re starting to expand and we’re acquiring other dental practices, and we’ve had team members come and go and stay in all different tenured levels and experience levels.
And somewhere along the way, we get lost in translation. We kind of forget where we started back when the practice was a dream.
And I like to start there because when we talk about doing dentistry different, there was a reason why the practice owner, the people that were involved in getting the practice set up in the first place, there’s a reason why they wanted to do it, and there was something they wanted to provide to the community, to their patients, that was different than anywhere else.
And nowadays, in most areas, in most cities, especially the ones that are larger, there’s a dental practice on every corner, and sometimes a couple on the same street.
Why choose your practice? And we have to get back to why does our practice exist. And so, at our practice, Spodak Dental Group, our dream has been the same. The way that we explain and communicate that dream has evolved.
And one of the things that I absolutely love to do with our team periodically is to remind our team members, especially for those that didn’t start with us or haven’t been with the practice long enough to know what the history was, is to actually go through the history and why we created what we did, because that gives a lot of context to your team members that then they can actually share these stories with your patients even though they haven’t experienced them themselves.
And so, at Spodak Dental Group, one of our things that we like to do, our vision is to elevate the human experience with the power of the smile. And so what’s really different about that and how we’ve changed over the years is that verbiage, in particular, the human experience.
Because early on, we talked so much about the patient, the patient, the patient, that we had an aha moment a few years ago at one of our team meetings, and we were talking about this, and we said, “Well, what about us? What about the team members? And isn’t it just as fair to talk about the team’s experience, not just what we do for our patients?”
And that was a turning point for us, and to really think about what is it that our practice and our business stands for. And so, yes, it stands to be in service to patients, to provide healthcare, to get paid for doing the things that we love, to help people smile, to help people get their confidence, to help people land whatever that next big thing is in their life.
But we actually stand to provide a living for our team and to support their families beneath it. And I think if we start there, everything else falls in line.
And at the end of the day, it actually isn’t about the dentistry at all, which is kind of wild to think about, that when we talk about the patient experience and we’re in the dental business, that we actually don’t talk about the dentistry.
Every Interaction Shapes the Patient Experience
So, where does the patient experience start?
And I wanna say the most common trap, especially for office managers, again, like we’re very scientific. We’re very formulaic. We’re amazing at being able to juggle multiple things. And when you juggle multiple things, we start to become efficient. And what happens is when we get efficient, we turn process versus human.
And so, what we do is we start building processes on how to provide that patient experience on the day that they come in for their actual appointment. When they come in and they experience the team and they actually get the dentistry done.
And in reality, there’s a timeline for the patient experience and they actually start experiencing your practice well before they actually step in the door.
A lot of times we don’t even know that we’re engaging with people, that they’re engaging within our practice because they haven’t called yet and they’re not patients yet, but they know of us because they see us online, they see us through our marketing campaigns, through our social media and other various ways.
Maybe there are existing patients that are talking about your practice and so in some ways they actually hear of you and they start being exposed to what the practice is and potentially could this be a practice for them.
And so, one of the things that I wanna share with you is a quick video on what we communicate to our patients. And so one of the things that I want you to pay attention to while you’re listening to the video is that we actually don’t talk about the dentistry. We actually talk about how the patients feel being a patient within our practice.
So, take a look at that.
Narrator: Some people think life is all about the big moments. But the truth is that it’s the in-between moments we’ll remember most.
Having a smile you love isn’t just about looking good. It’s about being able to laugh with your whole body. It’s about being able to eat the foods you love without worry.
It’s showing up and being yourself, no matter how big or how small the moment. One smile at a time.
Erika: Awesome. Hope you guys enjoyed that video.
And one of the things I actually really love about that is that it just focuses on what it’s like to be a human being. It just focuses on, like the smile aspect of it, but what it actually means to have full total body health, what it means to actually be able to chew and be out in public and not worry about having a toothache, having a tooth break, having your teeth fall out.
That is a whole other level of confidence and experience that we want our patients to feel. And that is something that we communicate.
Why Consistent Branding Matters More Than Ever
Step two. Okay, so now maybe they saw some of the marketing, they heard about you, they know your name, they know of your brand, and now they wanna do a little bit more research to say, “Is this practice for me?”
And so now they start to do some research. They go onto your social media, your Instagram, your Facebook, you know, any of the other platforms that you have, your website.
Nowadays, people are using AI, and I’m absolutely one of those consumers, so I kind of skip all the traditional research altogether, and I’m right on there. I’m on my ChatGPT, I’m on my Grok, I’m on my Claude, I’m on my Manus, and all the other different things, trying to figure out what’s the best fit for me because these AI bots know me. They know what I look for. They know what I value. And so, I don’t have to waste any time.
I just kinda say, “Hey, what’s the, the best dentist near me based off of what I value?” And then it starts to rank them, and it starts to suggest, and it starts to give the links to the website if you happen to wanna do some of your own investigating.
And so what does that look like for our patients nowadays and their experience with your brand? Everything matters in being consistent in your messaging and your branding and what you’re telling your patients because what AI does is it kinda sweeps the entire—everything out, that’s out in the internet, and they take all that information, and they try to find matches with what people are looking for and what they’re searching for.
Ensuring Your Brand Matches Reality
So, here’s what we’re gonna take a look at here, your online presence.
Does your online presence actually match what you’re doing in your office?
A lot of times what we see is that people think marketing is so disconnected. They think it’s a way to say, “Hey, let me capture somebody’s attention to get them to call the practice, to get them to come into my business.”
And it’s the gimmick, and it’s not actually meeting the reality of what you’re providing. And in some ways, it’s almost like a, a bait-and-switch that people can feel because they come in having the impression of one thing and then they get something different.
And so making sure that everywhere you’re communicating to your patient, it’s consistent in the type of messaging that you wanna communicate that actually represents the type of experience that you’re providing in your practice.
Messaging’s everything, especially if you’re a more luxury-facing practice or if you’re more family-oriented, if you’re a larger practice, if you’re a smaller practice. All of those things matter. And the one thing that I think is so beautiful about dentistry is that there is no best model. Every single practice is like a snowflake. There is no good, better, best.
It’s patients have different values like we do, and they find the practices that suit them. And so, making sure you are communicating what your unique value add is so that the patients that already value what you have, you’re attracting those people and you’re ultimately going to be providing the best experiences for them.
Social media, of course. Your website needs to be aligned and your reviews. So more and more people are understanding the importance of the reviews. Not only is it a mechanism for you to have real-time feedback, how are patients actually experiencing your practice so that you know what are you doing well and what do you need to improve on.
The really cool thing about reviews is that you can actually go onto your Google My Business, you can take all of your reviews, and you can upload them to what’s called the Word Cloud, and that’s what I have, um, over here.
And so what the Word Cloud does is it takes all of the words from your reviews that your actual patients are writing, and it will bold and highlight and enlarge the words that are used most commonly. It’s a quick way for you to understand in a snapshot what your patients value, what they care about, how they’re experiencing your practice.
And it gives you an opportunity to say, “Does that match what I designed it to be? Does that match what I hoped it would be?” And maybe if it’s something different, that could give you an opportunity to say, “Maybe I wasn’t going for that, but that’s really cool and maybe I need to double down and make sure that we continue to provide that.”
The other thing that it does is it’ll tell you what you need to work on, right? Most commonly, that’s always gonna be the billing, and I think we might have in a little small print billing in there somewhere. But all feedback is great feedback, and it’s an opportunity to learn, and it’s an opportunity to then pivot if you need to.
But one thing I think people don’t really pay so much attention to are the team reviews. What is your online presence in regards to the team experience that you’re providing? Because all of this information is out there, and again, when we mention AI, all of these things matter because now it’s taking all of those things in consideration, especially if you’ve heard of Glassdoor. Glassdoor is a great resource to know what people are saying about working at your practice.
Interestingly enough, you know, one of our—well, we had several team members that weren’t, you know, a fit. But one in particular, we call it a toxic achiever.
And toxic achievers, what they do is they’re amazing to the people that they serve, and in this instance, to our patients, and incredibly damaging, hurtful, toxic, mean, rude, to the people that actually support them. This was a provider. It was a dental hygienist.
And the reason why that I say that is that it matters because when patients walk in the door, there’s a vibe, there’s a feeling that’s unsaid. And so, you can say you’re all these things and do all of these things for your patients, and if they sense you don’t do the same for your team, if you’re not caring for your team as much, if not more, that’s a disconnect. And people will feel that and sometimes not even say it and leave your practice because that bedside manner matters a lot.
And so, one of the things that we also like to do in our practice is that we like to be intentional with the things that we reward. And so at the end of the year, we have our team holiday party, and we do team awards.
The team awards are so fun because it’s just fun to be publicly acknowledged. The family and friends and spouses are there, and so it’s nice to have, you know, our loved ones kind of appreciate and see how meaningful we are at work. These awards are all voted by the team. So myself and the doctor, we don’t just choose who we think it is. The team actually chooses who they believe should win these awards.
And so one of the awards is the Patient Choice Award, because we want to recognize the people that are actually providing amazing experiences to our patients, and we also want our team to know that we’re positively reinforcing that behavior.
And so the team knows that we have this award at the end of the year, and it actually incentivizes them for the ones that like the achievement, for the ones that like to go above and beyond to do more of the things that actually matter.
And so, we change the award year over year, but what people tend to like is this little clear paperweight type of award.
And so how they get the Patient Choice Award is the team member that gets their name mentioned the most in the Word Cloud, according to our reviews, is the person that is chosen. Because in theory, the patients that are actually naming—first of all, that are actually writing a review. I mean, how many people do that nowadays? It’s actually incredibly difficult.
But the fact that they’re taking the time to write the review, the fact that they remembered that person’s name that was impactful and that they wrote that in the review actually matters, and so we reward that.
Turning Phone Calls Into Meaningful Connections
Step three is the appointment request.
This seems a little bit unusual, right? How do we even think about providing an experience to the patients that are calling into the practice, especially when they’re not a patient yet? They haven’t seen your practice. They haven’t met anyone in your practice.
And this is actually the first live interaction, live engagement with the practice, and this actually solidifies the impression they originally got from your marketing.
Is it consistent with the way the actual team members are engaging in business over the phone? This is absolutely one of the most pivotal pieces in the patient experience because if this doesn’t go well, nothing else happens after that.
If they don’t get past the appointment request that actually ends with an appointment scheduled, the clinical team actually doesn’t have an opportunity to provide the dentistry.
So this is Lisa. I’m gonna tell you a little bit about Lisa. So Lisa answers our phones. She is a part of our patient relations team. She does not check out patients. She’s not in a patient-facing position. She does not engage in any other way other than on the phone with the patients.
And so why that matters is she only has the opportunity to build relationships in one of the most impersonable positions because you don’t see the face, you don’t see the reactions, you don’t see the body gestures and that type of communication, which is 80% of communication. And the only thing they have to go off of is what she’s saying and how she’s saying that.
And so, Lisa, she has been with us for several years, and one of the most incredible things that I have ever witnessed is that patients, when they come in the door, oftentimes will actually ask to meet Lisa. This was huge.
The first time that I started, you know, hearing about this or, you know, being aware that our patients are coming in saying, “Hey, I would love to meet Lisa. I had an amazing phone call with her.”
It’s just so unusual because me, myself, I’ve called many dental practices. I’ve called many medical practices for myself, and never once had I had a positive phone experience that was so great that I was like, “Oh my gosh, I must meet this person.” And so it was happening within our own practice.
Patients would bring her flowers. Patients would bring her gift cards, Target gift cards, cakes, chocolates, all sorts of things, gifts after having a phone conversation.
And this wasn’t like gifts because, you know, it was a birthday, it was a special occasion. They were gifts because they were returning patients, and they love Lisa, and she’s not only the person that answers the phones and checks them out and does all the other things.
This is like a complete cold call in all the ways that you can define it, and patients had such an amazing experience that not only did they make the appointment, but they thought about, “How can I actually add value back to Lisa and provide that same experience that she gave me and come in with something?” That’s incredible!
I’ve literally never done that in my life, so maybe rude for me, but incredible. And so, I said, “Lisa, how do you do it?”
She says, “First thing, you have to be a guide.”
And so, it’s interesting because a lot of times what we do is we actually wait to answer questions that patients have. And the issue with that is that patients don’t know how to speak like us. They don’t know the information that we have. They don’t know the best questions to ask. So they’re just trying to communicate to us in a language that they don’t speak.
And in some ways, we’re kind of trapped because we’re just answering very literally and maybe missing the message. And so when you become a guide, what you’re doing is you’re turning this into a conversation, which is actually two-way.
It isn’t just what the patient is saying, and then we’re just getting information back, meaning, you know, “What’s your name? What’s your demographics? What are your insurance information?” But we’re actually learning about what matters to the patient.
And so we have to ask more questions versus assume we know what the patient means.
And, for example, we have a patient calling in saying, “I need a root canal.” At face value, we can assume the patient knows they need a root canal, so therefore we believe someone must have diagnosed that. So they must have a referral. So the next thing coming out of my mouth is, “Do you have a referral?”
And, a lot of times, and what we have found is that especially with WebMD, especially now with AI and people saying, “I’ve got a toothache and I’ve had it for this long, and here are my symptoms,” right? They’re coming in with a diagnosis that they found themselves, not necessarily that was done at a dental practice.
And so, when we stop to ask more questions, in that instance to say, you know, “Oh, okay, Mrs. Jones. You know, give me a little bit more information, please. Were you recently diagnosed, you know, to need the treatment for a root canal?” You know? Or “How do you know that you need the root canal?
Give me a little bit more information.” And it opens up the space for the conversation for the patients to then, then have that, because potentially we could lose the conversation or lose the patient because we assume they’ve gone through the process that we know that they don’t know.
And so what we do is we make business incredibly hard for people because we have so many rules for them, and we assume again that they know exactly what we need. So ask more questions and not assume and fill in the blank.
Focus on Solutions, Not Limitations
The other thing is that sometimes they request things that we just simply can’t do. But at the end of the day, we should always focus on what we can do versus what we can’t, even if the end of the day, the answer’s still no.
And so what I mean by that, if a patient says, “I can only come in, you know, tomorrow at 9:00 AM,” and maybe we’re fully booked at that time, so we can certainly say, “The soonest appointment that we have is Wednesday at 2:00 PM. And if our schedule happens to open up, would you prefer I send you a text or give you a quick call to offer you that time?”
And so what we do in that instance, instead of saying, “No, no, no, no, I can’t do 9:00 AM on Tuesday,” what we say is, “The soonest availability,” right, “is this day, this time. And if something opens up, then you ask the question, “Can I give you a call or give you a text?”
Honestly, nine times out of 10 people are gonna say text. Hallelujah! It takes way too much time to get on the phone to have conversations these days ’cause nobody picks up the phone and nobody listens to voicemails.
But now you’re getting permission to reach out to the patient, and this is amazing preservation for your schedule because we know cancellations—I hate saying that word—we know they happen. And when they do, now we have a list of patients that we can actually reach out to that actually want that sooner appointment, especially make those detailed notes that they wanted that 9:00 AM and they wanted it on a Tuesday, ’cause if that happens to come up, you know with a fair degree of certainty that that person will probably take that time.
Making Every Caller Feel Like a Priority
Energy and tone absolutely matters, and I understand how we get into the position of not meaning to come across rushed, not meaning to come across hurry, but we wear so many hats and the people, and maybe you are one of those people that are answering the phones, we are so stretched beyond all means and the patients don’t know what we have on our plate.
And it’s not their responsibility to know, but it’s our responsibility to provide the experience as if they’re the only thing we are doing for the day is having this conversation with them.
And then, at the end of the day, every single call that comes through, the goal should be: schedule an appointment. And the biggest fail that we see time and time again, even within my team, is that we actually don’t even ask to schedule the appointment. We still wait for the patient to then say, “Okay, well, schedule me,” blah, blah, blah, and we miss out altogether. So making sure that we’re asking for that appointment and that we’re finishing up.
Putting People Before Processes
Okay, so I said the word cancellations, and I hate using that word, but I’m gonna use it just for educational purposes. When these happen and how this happens with the patient’s experience, things come up in life. They come up for me, they come up for you, and so we have to understand that this will happen for patients.
And yes, it’s a huge inconvenience for us, but the way that you handle it matters. First, thank you. If somebody is reaching out to you and they’re canceling their appointment, they could have no-showed. So I like to at least recognize that they gave me a heads-up and a notice because now I have an attempt to fill that schedule versus in the moment, what do you do when a patient no-shows? It’s incredibly difficult.
So I actually thank them for giving me the heads-up. Number two, I also don’t assume that the reason why they’re canceling is because they don’t value your appointment. I wanna ask if everything’s okay. So I wanna stop for a moment, and I wanna be human, and I wanna make sure that everything’s okay.
And that matters so much nowadays because we are so fast-paced, we are so focused on what we’re getting to next, that rarely do we take the time to check in on one another. And even as strangers as we may be, a dental office manager, the person answering the phone, and the other person on the line, sometimes you may be the only person that asks that question in that person’s life, and you don’t know how much that really matters.
And so if we take a step back and we think about for our team and the things that we communicate. And so periodically in our team meetings, I’ll stop for a moment and I’ll say, “Hey, you know, I know we’ve got this crazy schedule, and I know we’re talking about KPIs and our SOPs and our patient experience and all these things to remember and to implement and execute flawlessly.
And at the end of the day, we have to realize that the person coming through the door has a history that we don’t know. That it may have been 5 or 10 or 15 years before they came into that door because of things that have happened in their life. And because we do this every single day, we discount the meaning and what it took to come in, what it took to even get on the phone to make that call.
And it gives us a whole other level of appreciation for the patient that is in the door versus taking for granted that the patient’s in the chair. Sometimes we do. Sometimes we don’t think about it. The patient’s just magically in the chair. And on the administrative side, of course, many of you guys are, we understand what it takes to get there, but we might not understand the emotional standpoint of what it took for the patient to get there and to show empathy, love, appreciation, connection.
And for some of our elderly patients, sometimes this is the first interaction they’ve had with a human being all day or maybe all week. And so for them, the patient’s appointment in that instance is their social connection. It is their way to be human being. It’s their way to feel valued. It’s a way for them to share and to love and to, again, be human.
And so when we stop and we think about these things, and we slow down, and we focus more on the person and less on the process. We actually really connect at a whole deeper level. That’s what people come back for. People remember the things that you do for them. People remember the way that you make them feel.
And so, when we go back to the cancellations, it’s worth asking, “Is there any way that you can make it?” Because I think a lot of times that if we make it too easy for patients to get back on the schedule, that now we have trained them to not value the time that we have.
And so we’ll say, “Gosh, is there any way that you can make it? You know, Cheryl, um, the next availability that Dr. Alfredo has is not for three weeks from now, and I wanna make sure that the area there on the lower right doesn’t get any worse.”
And so now we’re making sure the patient knows the decisions they have at hand. We’re not scheduling them right away. There might be an instance where they really can’t get at it, and they can’t get out of it, and they have to book three weeks out.
And I also like to give myself an opening as well, and then I can say, “Okay. Hey, listen. I got it. No problem. If something should come up sooner, would you prefer me to text you or give you a call? And do mornings or afternoons work best for you? That way I know when to reach out to you.”
Here’s why this matters. If I don’t get the day and time that’s ideal for me, I’m still on the schedule and it might not be what I want, but that’s okay. But what an amazing experience when somebody actually calls me, remembers to call me, and to give me my ideal day and time.
It feels like such a win as a patient, and this has happened to me and I absolutely love it when it does, when I’m like a little bummed, like I really wanted to get this done but I had something come up and I couldn’t get out of it, and then somebody reaches out to me to then offer me my ideal day and time.
It feels like such a win. I’m so grateful, and that’s in the instance where the system works. And so again, it’s a great way to be able to fill your schedule in the instances that you have patients reschedule. And we, we call this our ASAP list internally, and we add them to that. Now, for purposes of what we do in our office and to my team, and we actually practice this, we actually never say the word cancellations.
We always say reschedule patients, reschedule. And even in some of the verbiage, right, I’ll say our– if our schedule opens up. I don’t say, “If anybody else should call and cancel.” Patients don’t cancel on us. They’ll reschedule, and maybe our schedule will open up, and we’ll give you that opening.
But those are really important semantics, as I think that the words that we say, all of them have meaning, even to our team, and we have to get conditioned with, again, the way that we want our team to do business and the way that we wanna do business with our patients.
Creating a Better Appointment Confirmation Experience
So now we go to the appointment confirmation. Now, we’ve spent all this time. The patient actually has not even been in the door yet. And so now they’re going to engage with our technology.
Nowadays, most people are using some sort of automated service, an automated text system, automated email. Most practices are not having to get on the phone to do the traditional phone confirmations.
And so think about what your automated system looks like, how you’re engaging with your patients. Does it reflect, again, the experience and the messaging that you wanna have,for your patients?
And so some word of advice for confirmations. It is an absolute rub, and I don’t know if you’ve had this, ’cause we have had this in our practice too, where patients get incredibly upset because we hound them to death ’cause we want them to remember because why?
We have patients that no-show or patients that forgot about it, and they have to cancel their appointment. So we feel like we will mitigate those things by just reminding people to death. But what happens is, is it actually punishes the people that do it right and that do show up. And so what we changed is that we actually only confirm 7 days prior.
Again, when we talk about business is fast, life is fast, everything is going so fast, people like, it’s so hard to keep track of nowadays. And so, 2 weeks out is too long, and most practices actually have it set to automate within two weeks. By then, oh my gosh, like I mean, I cannot remember what I did yesterday, let a-let alone saying yes to something two weeks ago.
When we shortened the confirmation timeframe to 1 week, it improved our or decreased our cancellations dramatically because it gave people enough time to confirm. It gave us enough time if it didn’t work for patients. But it also was recent enough for people to remember and to honor.
And then we do one reminder. And that is that patients are happy. Text message is the preferred method of communication, and so please make sure that you have that set up.
The other thing that I like to do is that I always do business in terms of the way I like business to be done. And so I think about that when I have other businesses or when I engage in other businesses, I don’t want you to call me. I’m at work. I can’t answer the phone. And if I don’t recognize the phone number, I’m not answering it. If I recognize the phone number and you leave me a voicemail, I’m not listening to it.
Guess what? Our patients are the same way.
So let’s make sure that we are doing things as easily as possible for our patients of communicating in the way that they actually prefer. Text message is one of those.
Delivering on the Experience You Promised
Now we’re here. This is where it gets good. The actual appointment, the dentistry. This is where we actually have to put the most intention to because now we just did all the communication. The patient, we got all through the barriers. Everything had to work perfectly for that patient to come in and to walk in the door.
So, we gotta be on stage. We can’t drop the ball now. And so patient expectations, first and foremost, they expect what you put out through your marketing is actually going to happen in your practice.
And so a failed patient experience, even if the patient’s experience in your practice was okay, if it did not meet what you marketed, it’s a fail.
They expect to be seen on time. So that is not a wow patient experience, that’s an expectation. They expect the team to be friendly. That’s not a value add. That’s not like, “Hey, we have the friendliest team in the world.” They expect everyone to be friendly.
They expect the office to be clean. That’s not anything special. And they expect great results. People believe that when you have a degree and when you are a dentist that you are qualified to provide excellent dental care.
Obviously, we’re insiders. We know. We know that varies very dramatically, but patients expect great results wherever they go. And so how do we differentiate ourselves?
Now, one of the things that we like to do here in the instance that we actually fail on an expectation, it happens, we like to at least acknowledge it. Not that it corrects it, not that it completely turns around, but we like to take ownership with that.
And so we actually have these Starbucks gift cards. This is a great idea. The value there is $10. Crazy. It used to be $5. Now you can’t get anything for $5 nowadays. So, it’s enough for essentially like a cup of coffee.
And so what we do is we take ownership if we failed an expectation. So, if we didn’t seat the patient on time, we’ll go ahead and we’ve got these, a bunch of these cards up at the front, and we’ll say, “Hey, I’m so sorry for your wait. This is not usual for us. Your next cup of coffee is, is on us.”
And so it’s just a small gesture, but really the gesture is just an opportunity for us to take ownership that we failed. And actually sometimes that just makes things so much better. People love ownership and accountability.
Creating a Space That Feels Welcoming, Not Clinical
Okay. Presentation absolutely matters when it comes to the patient experience because when we talk about cleanliness, for example, the way that things look as far as being organized matters. Because if you have a bunch of stuff on the counters, a bunch of clutter, first of all, it’s impossible to clean all of those things in the amount of time that we have to rotate the rooms.
But it also gives you a sense that things aren’t clean, even if they physically are. And so one of the things that we like to do in our practice, and you should with yours, is make sure that everything is set up with intention. The bib clip is folded in such a way. The instruments are faced down.
First of all, okay, I do have to stop here. Instruments: Most people have dental fear and dental anxiety. And if you have instruments in pouches or in a clear packaging of some sort where they can see them and they’re laying out face up, and the patient’s in that room waiting for the doctor, waiting for you, waiting for something, it gives them a lot to think about and a lot to look at super sharp looking things that look kind of super scary.
Does not put the patients in a good frame of mind. And so you wanna make sure that you have all the scary stuff concealed. And think about there’s a lot of places, okay, we used to be one of those, or we’d have skulls with the implant, you know, and you know, all the other stuff, and the crazy retracted smiles and the pictures of the tooth with the nerve in it and all the weird, like, bloody stuff.
And, you know, we do that ’cause we think we’re educating the patient on what they’re about to get or, you know, blow up this thing so that they can see and understand. And at the end of the day, they didn’t come here to learn dentistry. They didn’t wanna know the science behind it, and they’re creeped out, grossed out, all of the above.
Those are things for us, not for patients. Get rid of skulls. Patients wanna come into an in- an inviting environment, and more and more offices are actually designing them to be more like boutique hotels than dental office vibes, medical office vibes.
And so if you’re in the process of doing a redesign or potentially acquiring another practice or giving yourself a revamp, think about that. Think about creating it in such a way that it feels like you’re walking into a vacation, into a spot where you could actually hang out, be cozy, grab a cup of coffee, forget that you’re even at the dental practice.
Now, when it comes to the office presentation, how does it look really matters. How does it smell really matters.
Smell is highly, highly attached to emotion, and so certain smells evoke certain emotions with people. And so if it smells medical, if it smells like formocresol, if it smells like, you know, tooth dust and all the other unpleasant smells that come from the dental practice, you could be missing the mark right from when the patient is in the waiting room.
And so, scent machines make the biggest difference in the world. A great investment. They have very beautiful, pleasant scents. And this has also been studied very, very well in hotels again. All of the most beautiful five-star hotels, they invest in a signature scent because that scent evokes emotion, and that’s what you wanna create within the experience is that emotional component.
The other part is what are we communicating to our patients while they’re in the room? Hopefully they’re not in that waiting room for long because we’re gonna be seating them on time, but what are they looking at?
A lot of times people will have magazines, and in our practice one of the things we do is we have culture books because we wanna communicate to our patients, obviously we love our team.
We do a lot for our community. We do a lot of really cool awards. We go to a lot of places. We’re very charitable. And so we want to celebrate our team with our patients so that they can actually have a whole other appreciation.
Good conversations, by the way. When they look through the culture books, people are coming back like, “Oh my gosh, I didn’t know you were a part of this organization,” or, “Oh, wow, let me know the next time you do a beach cleanup. I’d love to be a part of that.”
And so this is a great opportunity in, we call it our first impressions area, but in your waiting room, your first impressions room, great opportunity to communicate why your practice is different without having anyone actually having to say it.
We have a big TV screen actually, and on that TV screen, we actually have about our doctors. We have fun quotes. We’re very inspirational, like we love inspirational things. Pictures of our team, updates on when we’re gonna be doing the next charity event, different types of services that we provide, new technology that we’ve invested in, things like where it gives patients the opportunity to kind of learn about us without having somebody to remember to brag, you know, about the practice. So a great thing to do.
Setting Expectations Before the First Visit
And so the problem that we have is that we really under-communicate what we provide to our patients, and sometimes we totally assume that they know why we’re different, but we never told them why we’re different.
And so I’m gonna show another video here. And so this video, we actually wanted the patient to experience the practice before actually stepping in the doors.
And so this video is our new patient experience video. We send this through text and through email to our new patients so that they know what to expect be- before stepping into the door. So, hope you enjoy.
Front Desk Member: Welcome to Spodak Dental. Please feel free to visit our coffee bar while you’re waiting.
Office Manager: You’ll notice our office is a little different. Our building was specifically designed with your comfort in mind. Plus, we’re LEED certified, which means we have a minimal impact on the environment
Come on, let’s meet the team.
Hygienist: As a part of your first visit, we will take X-rays, photos, and a wellness scan to properly evaluate your overall dental health.
Treatment Coordinator: At your appointment, you’ll meet with one of your treatment coordinators, like myself. We partner with most dental PPO insurance plans and offer several flexible payment options to get you the care you need.
No insurance? No problem. We also offer an in-house membership plan that provides you with all of your routine care.
Hygienist: Hey, I’m your hygienist. Follow me. Your comfort is a priority to us. If there’s anything we can do to make you feel more comfortable, just let us know. Take a look at our comfort menu.
Dental Office Manager: We utilize state-of-the-art technology to ensure your appointment is as efficient and comprehensive as possible. We reserve two hours for your appointment. If anything arises, let us know and we’ll make changes to your appointment for you.
Dentist: Our goal each day is to provide the very best patient experience possible. Thank you for choosing the Spodak Dental Group. We cannot wait to meet each one of you.
Erika: I hope you guys enjoyed that video. Got my close-up on there. Also the blue shoes, love ’em. Get, get all the compliments all day long on that.
But this is a way, again, for our patients to get excited and then talk about having value for an appointment. So how do you have value for something you’ve never actually engaged in?
You don’t. But we want our patients to start having that connection with us. When people are connected, they have value, they actually cancel less often.
And so obviously, that’s a goal of ours. The next thing is many patients believe going to the dentist sucks. They have a fear of it. It’s a very vulnerable position. It smells, everything tastes bad. It’s a medical office. Sometimes they have to take time off from work. They have to use vacation time at that. And they’d rather be probably anywhere else.
And so how can we actually make it feel better and more inviting? And so we have a relaxation menu. We actually had this designed, and it’s printed and framed in all of our operatories.
This is also on one of our slides in the TV in our front first impressions area. And these are just small little offerings that we do just to make the experience a little bit better.
Everybody nowadays has the beverage bar, the coffee station, you know, the drinks. I think patients expect that. What are the things that patients don’t expect?
And so if you hear a patient saying, “Ugh, I hate the sound of the drills,” that’s the opportunity to grab those noise-canceling headphones.
If this is an opportunity where a patient, you sense somebody feels cold, it’s not asking them, “Would you like a blanket?” It’s grabbing the blanket and having it ready anyways.
And so, what we do is we have folded blankets on the chairs as a part of the setup before the patients come in the room, and we assume they’re going to be cold, and we give them that blanket. If patients don’t want it, they’ll say no, but we have it to make people feel really relaxed and sometimes feeling just cozy.
People will even take their shoes off, which I don’t know, it’s kind of like a line in the sand for me. Keep your shoes on. But that’s a sign that people feel comfortable, and that’s exactly what we wanna do in that instance.
Why Simple Language Builds Greater Trust
The other thing is that when we communicate with patients, we like to sound fancy. We like to sound like we went to school. We like to sound like we’re the expert in our areas, and what happens is when we use dental terminology, we lose and confuse people.
Also, when we use X-rays, which we had to be trained and certified to read, as a visual for patients, they’re not getting it. Most oftentimes, what do they think X-rays are? Toes.
And so if you have a patient looking at an X-ray and they think they’re looking at a foot instead of a mouth, that’s your sign it’s a problem.
So when it comes to the experience, when you’re trying to build trust with somebody, you have to use a language they understand, and you have to speak in very simple terms, and you have to use images that they see and readily understand.
Now, most practices typically take a series of photos like this. Do not have the Hannibal Lecter photo. That is, like, the most scary, actually somewhat hilarious photo in general. You typically wanna have your close-up smile up on the screen to use as a visual, or maybe you might have one of the arches if you’re trying to show something occlusally, lingually, that sort of thing. But definitely not the Hannibal Lecter image. That is too freaky.
Engaging Your Team in Continuous Improvement
All right. Where do we lose traction with our patient experience? And a lot of times that comes down to our training. Guilty as charged. We have so much to do on any given day. We do a training once, we move on, and we never talk about it again.
And so what we need to do is do a better job, especially with our use of team meeting times. Most offices have team meetings. I’ll tell you, most team meetings, and I have been a part of them, and I have been a facilitator of probably some pretty boring team meetings. Guilty.
How do we make team meetings more effective and worth everyone’s time is by having meaningful, engaging conversations. It shouldn’t be a monologue. It shouldn’t be anything that’s an update that you can send through an email.
And so team meetings are an opportunity for us to talk about our goals and to talk about our ideas as a team and to create them together. And so one of the things that we do, we have two long team meetings a year. We have one in January, it’s a half day, one in July, it’s a half day. We stop all production, and we actually talk about all the things that, that matter as an entire team.
And so what we do in this instance is we actually do little breakouts. We have a large team. So if you have a small office, you could probably do it, you know, as your group of 5 or 10 or maybe two groups of 5.
We have a team of 50 people. So we have multiple teams of 5 around. We actually don’t let them choose their teams because on purpose, we want people engaging with people they don’t normally talk to. And so we try to have at least a doctor, a hygienist, a dental assistant, an admin person on the team, and we pair them with people that they don’t interact with so that they actually get to learn and build more rapport with each other.
And then diverse set of perspective. That’s really what you want to get really good ideas. So we break out into groups, and I’m gonna share some of the questions that we have.
So, this is question number one that we actually have them problem solve. How can our practice improve patient loyalty? Put that—This is not for the office manager to come up with all the solutions in the practice or the doctor. Let’s put it on the team.
I give them a hint. What team members do you think does it best? Why do you think that is? What do they do? And they’ll sit and they’ll collaborate.
So we typically give 30 minutes total, 2 questions. Here’s the second question: How can we navigate the in and out-of-network conversation?
Now, this is a problem for us and probably many practices that offer in and out-of-network benefits and services to patients. And this is always a rub. It is always a way to break the patient’s experience when you talk about money and the way that insurance is just not fun to deal with all around.
But this is an opportunity for our team to problem solve how we can be better at this. Now, why? The most important thing when you talk about implementation and engagement and making sure that the team is actually doing what you say or what you need them to do is by having them create it.
Because even if they come up with the same exact ideas as you, the fact that it was their idea means they’re more likely to do it than for you to say, “Hey, now forever moving forward, we are actually going to do this thing that I say that we need to do.”
When you make it fun, when you make it their idea, it sticks.
All right. Second team meeting, couple of questions here, give you some insight. How can we do a better job implementing what we already have? That’s, oh my gosh, half the battle is we do a lot of really cool stuff already, and we forget to do it. It happens.
So now we get the team re-engaged to say, “How can we remember to do all the cool stuff we said we were going to do?
And what are some of the ways that we can elevate our patient’s experience? We should always reinvent, we should always recreate. And then give them some hints on how, how to figure that out.
At the end of the meeting, what we do is we have each group choose the leader, and the leader will actually read all of their comments from each of the questions.
And the cool thing is, is we see how they match. And most oftentimes, each group, even though they collaborated independently, actually have very similar ideas. And then we circle the most common ones that we all like, and we put those things in motion. It’s actually really fun.
Why Post-Operative Follow-Up Calls Matter
All right. Step 6, post-op call. This is something that’s gaining more and more traction, and it’s one of those unexpected things that matters.
And what that means is when you provide a service that requires an injection, giving anesthetic, getting the patient numb, when you have that provider reach out to the patient at the end of the day just to check in on them to make sure everything’s okay, oftentimes it’s gonna lead to a voicemail, right? Which you’re not gonna listen to anyways.
But they’re gonna see the missed call. And a lot of times what will happen, especially if you text, which is even better if you have a system where you can do the two-way texting, it shows that that patient mattered. It shows that you thought about that patient.
It shows that you’re getting ahead of anything, because sometimes patients are afraid to reach out if they have a simple question, if they’re feeling uncertain, if they think something’s not going quite right, but they don’t wanna like waste the doctor’s time or the hygienist and it’s outside of office hours, and so they feel some anxiety and a little nervous. If you get ahead of that and begin that conversation, it is a total game-changer.
Closing the Loop with Meaningful Feedback
All right. Last step: the review request. Did we do it?
And this is an opportunity for us to celebrate all the wins and for an opportunity for us to experience the feedback, especially if there’s something that we need to improve on.
A lot of times this is also automated, which is wonderful. We get those automated text messages. But to make this more engaging and personable for the patient, you gotta ask, you gotta let them know, “Hey, you know, Mrs. Jones, I hope you had an amazing experience today. You are such a great patient. You’re actually gonna get a link within about an hour for a review. It would mean so much to us to know what actually really mattered so that we can make sure we can continue to, to build on the experience that we provided. And if there’s anything that you would like us to know, anything you would like us to add to our experience, please pop that in there. My name’s Jessica.”
You know, so on and so forth, because people are more likely to do something if they know they are needed to help than to assume they’re automatically going to do it because they get the text message.
And then everything starts over again. Gosh, once they’ve come in, now they have this impression of what it’s like, and so we have to be like that every single time, and we have to provide this consistent experience all the time, all across the board, all across each of our departments.
Great Experiences Create Lasting Impact
So great dentistry opens the door, but great experiences earn a lifetime of loyalty, trust, connection, care. All of those types of things really matter, and at the end of the day, it’s actually being human.
And yes, we use automations, and yes, use that because it helps us keep up with the fast-paced world. But now it should buy us the time to actually really connect on the human level, which is on the emotional side and the component.
I do have one more short video to share with you guys. And this one actually really resonated because again, at the end of the day, we get paid to treat people, and we have an opportunity to make a difference in people’s lives.
And part of my journey, if you guys have followed or if you’ve seen any other of my videos or some of my, my lectures, you know that, I came into dentistry as a dental assistant and, at that time, that wasn’t my dream. It wasn’t my dream to be an office manager. You know, I didn’t wake up one day and was like, “This is what I’m gonna do as my career.”
And I absolutely love everything that I do. But earlier on, I felt like such a failure because I felt like I had so much to give. I just wanted to make a difference in this world.
And I felt like a failure. There were many things that happened along the way, that made me feel that way.
And we get an opportunity to make a real difference in our practice when we approach it not in a process way but in a human way, that we get to touch lives, more lives than you think that you get to touch every single day.
Speaker: When we’re laying on our deathbed, you’re not gonna worry about how much money you had, how much power you had, how much prestige. You’re gonna see that that was all a game, that that was all an illusion. The only thing that’s gonna matter is the impact you had on other people’s lives
Speaker: We are all on a separate journey. But the beautiful thing about our life here on this earth is at my funeral, they ain’t gonna talk about my success. They’re gonna talk about who Nick was and how Nick lived and how Nick loved and encouraged.
Speaker: Success is incredibly important, but even more important than success, it’s having an impact. It’s knowing you haven’t walked the planet in vain. It’s knowing that because you’ve been here, you’ve blessed lives, you’ve developed people, and you have made the world a better place.
Speaker: The effect you have on others is the most valuable currency there is Everything you gain in life will rot and fall apart, and all that will be left of you is what was in your heart.
Speaker: Life is a mirror and life gives us not what we want. Life gives us who we are. When you were born, you cried while the world rejoiced. Live your life in such a way that when you die, the world cries while you rejoice.
Bringing the Patient Experience to Life
Erika: So hope you guys enjoyed this presentation. I have so much to say about the patient experience. I actually am a co-author of “The Patient Experience” book. It just came out a couple of months ago.
If you’d like to learn more, you’ll see a lot of the examples that I had in my presentation already, some actual things, QR codes that you can actually implement in your practice, a whole section on the team experience, on how you can elevate that. And thank you so much for your time.
Chavelle: Thank you so much, Erika. That was an amazing presentation and lots of great ways to be able to implement things that will enhance the patient experience. So thank you so much.
I do have some questions for you if you have time to answer some questions.
Erika: Yes.
What Technology Can’t Replace
Chavelle: What made you realize that the patient experience is one of the most important parts of building a successful dental practice?
Erika: Yeah. So again, with technology, you know, it really makes you think. You know, I think more and more people are feeling more unsettled about the technology, potentially technology replacing jobs.
And, you know, I was like, “What are, what are the skills that are gonna matter the most?” And that’s the customer service, patient experience skill, because nothing replaces the connection, the empathy, the love, the conversations, the touch that a human can give.
And so if we now develop human skills, that’s the only way you can compete with the an
Chavelle: Yes. I 100% agree with that. There’s always gonna be an opportunity to have that human connection that cannot be replaced by technology, so I 100% agree.
How Patients Judge the Quality of Care
What are some of the biggest mistakes that practices make when it comes to the patient experience?
Erika: I think what they do is they don’t approach it intentionally. That’s one. So they think that just the way they do things provides an experience of some sort. And I think when you don’t put intention behind it, it’s inconsistent, and you may wonder why you’re not getting the results that you want because we, at the end of the day, we do have amazing team members. We do have amazing doctors. We can get amazing outcomes.
But, the patients don’t know how to judge dentistry. They didn’t go to dental school, so they don’t know what a good margin is. They don’t necessarily know what a good result is. They know how things feel, and they know how they felt.
And so, you know, you have to approach it from that standpoint. They can only judge the quality of the dentistry by the quality of the experience.
Chavelle: Yeah. I agree with you 100%.
One Simple Question That Changes Everything
Do you mind sharing an example of a small change that has had a big impact on, let’s say, patient trust or loyalty, treatment acceptance, those types of things?
Erika: Yeah. It’s actually a question. You know, again, with my approach, I’m very scientific. I’m the office manager developing all the SOPs and things like that, and when I took a moment to say, “Wait a second. What matters most to the person that I’m developing this for?”
And it was a game changer to actually pressure test everything that I was putting in place in my practice to say, in theory, this sounds good to me, but I’m not on the receiving end of this.
And so, the question is, is what’s most important to you? Which is: What’s most important to my patient or what’s most important to, to my team member?
And, you know, they’re the ones that are going to be living out these processes or the SOPs or, you know, doing what they need to do within the framework of our practice. And does that achieve or fulfill what’s most important to them?
Chavelle: I love that. I do think by, you know, asking the question what’s important to you makes a huge difference because it gives the patient the ability to be a part of their actual patient care, versus just making an assumption that we know what’s best for the patient.
So I really do love that.
Creating Experiences That Inspire Loyalty
Thank you so much for, you know, walking us through the, you know, what’s done differently, like, in your office compared to other offices and what building a practice that patients don’t wanna leave. I mean, just from what I’ve learned at your practice, I would not wanna leave with all of the, you know, cool, like, amenities and just thinking outside of, like, the normal box of, like, what you can offer your patient to be comfortable is so inspiring and I’m sure it’s inspired a lot of other practices.
Looking to see, like, what you’ve done and what’s worked and how well received it is with your patients is amazing. Thank you so much for your expertise and being here with us today.
And thank you for everyone that’s joined in on Erika’s presentation. We appreciate you guys leaning into your education and wanting to learn more and grow within our AADOM community, and we will see you in our next DistinctionCast.
Thank you so much, and thank you, Erika.
Erika: Bye. Thank you.
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Learn About Our Presenter:
Erika Pusillo, DAADOM
Erika Pusillo has been rooted in dentistry since 2009, starting out in sterilization as a dental assistant and working her way through nearly every corner of the practice. Her journey from assistant to the CEO seat has fueled her passion for building strong teams, creating efficient systems, and helping practices thrive.
As a Distinguished Fellow of AADOM and a national speaker with the Bulletproof Dental Practice, Erika is known for her down-to-earth style and for making complex topics feel simple and doable. She loves inspiring dental leaders to grow, lead confidently, and create practices they’re proud of.
