Dental Memberships Strengthen Loyalty & Compliance in Uncertain Times

If anything, the Great Recession has taught us that we can expect nothing from the free market but constant change and financial insecurity. The economic uncertainty hit almost all types of businesses and industries, but the dental industry was particularly hard hit. Dental practices felt the squeeze on their patient income as people cut back on discretionary spending to save their homes from foreclosure and unemployment claims.

The gradual loss of business forced dental practitioners to find new routes to success by reinventing their practices. Dental membership is one such strategy that came into existence to complement dentists' practices. The best thing it has to offer is the discounted prices it offers members on several dental services. Consequently, it helps solidify the loyalty and compliance of patients by rewarding them.

Advantages of Dental Memberships

Here's how dental memberships can benefit both dental practitioners and consumers:

The provision of membership plans has several advantages. A membership plan increases recurring revenue, attracts uninsured patients, develops patient loyalty, and decreases your clinic's insurance dependency.

Monthly Recurring Revenue

Signing up with a dental membership enables dental practitioners to generate recurring revenue that can be used for business growth and/or to pay for overhead expenses. Monthly recurring revenue eliminates the need to wait for an individual patient to pay the bill at their next appointment. Additionally, it simplifies the cash flow for the practice and keeps the money "in-house." The monthly recurring revenue model also allows consumers to receive treatment at a lower price than traditional dental fees, making it more accessible to the average consumer.

Improving Patient Loyalty and Compliance

Patients who are committed to the practice and open to receiving more care are the ones most likely to sign up for membership programs. Patients who join your clinic in exchange for a membership discount anticipate receiving such service in the future. A smart long-term investment is to sell membership plans in a marketplace that spans many categories. Despite receiving less money per service, your net productivity will rise because members of your plans will use those services more often than those of pay-per-service customers. These patients will visit your office more frequently, boosting compliance rates across the board.

Automated Payment and Collection

Keeping track of payments manually may be a tedious and time-consuming process for clinics that don't use the software. PlanSplit is membership billing software that automates the process of collecting payments. Once the patient's billing information is entered, the patient will be automatically billed according to the selected payment plan. PlanSplit's auto-renewal option is a valuable tool for keeping your customers around. Customers can take advantage of split billing, particularly when charging upfront is troublesome. A monthly billing option allows users to collect predetermined charges for usage-based service plans, packages, memberships, and subscriptions. Payouts in excess of costs will be credited to the provider's bank account.