The broadcast is now starting. All attendees are in listen-only mode. Welcome everyone to the webinar on Front Office 101, How to Wow Patients on the First Call. We're so glad you could be here today to learn more about how to ensure that your front office staff has the training and tools needed to help you grow your hearing health care practice. Your moderators for today are me, Fran Dinson, IHS Marketing Manager. And me, Carrie Peterson, IHS Education Administrator. Our expert presenter today is Scott Austin, BCHIS, long-time IHS member and past president. Scott began his career selling hearing aids for Willoughby Hearing Aid Centers in Eugene, Oregon in 1984. He later relocated to the company headquarters as Director of Marketing and Training and has also served as a manufacturing rep. Scott is now president and part owner of Willoughby Hearing. Throughout his career, he has been very active in the hearing aid industry, serving as president of the Oregon Hearing Society, marketing instructor for IHS's American Conference of Audioplastology Program and much, much more. He is also a certified professional life coach with a focus on small business marketing and public relations. And recently, Scott's company was awarded Oregon's 2011 Business of the Year by the Better Business Bureau. We're super excited to have Scott as our presenter today, but before we get started, just a few housekeeping items to let you know about. Please note that we are recording today's presentation so that we may offer it on demand through the IHS website in the future. This webinar is available for one continuing education credit through the International Hearing Society. Now, we know that we do have many office staff members attending today, so please note that the CE credit is available to hearing healthcare practitioners who attend the webinar themselves and submit their CE credits to IHS. You can find out more about receiving continuing education credit at our website at IHSinfo.org. You can click on the webinar banner on the homepage or choose webinars from the professional development menu on the left side of the page. There you will find the CE quiz and information on how to submit it to IHS for credit. Also on the webinar page at the IHS site, you'll find a note-taking guide to help you gather the information you'll need for the CE quiz today. If you haven't already downloaded it, please feel free to do so now. As a special bonus, everyone who completes the 60-minute webinar and submits a CE quiz with the CE quiz fee will be sent a special download with tools to use in your practice. Tomorrow, you will receive an email with a link to a survey on this webinar. It is brief and your feedback will help us create valuable content for you moving forward. Today we'll be covering the following topics along with the Q&A within a 60-minute presentation. We'll learn how to build a frontline foundation. We'll talk about answering the phone and addressing the caller's key questions. We'll move on to handling the call and scheduling the appointment. And we'll learn how to close the call with an appointment or data gather. At the end, we'll move on to a Q&A session. You can send us a question for Scott at any time during this webinar by entering your question in the question box on your webinar dashboard, which is usually located to the right of your webinar screen. We'll take as many questions as we can in the time we have available. Now I'm going to turn it over to Scott, who will guide you through today's presentation. Scott? Thanks, Fran and Carrie. Good morning, everybody out in America and around the world in Canada, North America, and who knows, maybe somebody's dialed in from some other offshore country. We are going to learn a little bit today about learning about the frontline foundation. So what we want to learn and what we want to teach you today is how to have your practice come over as the most professional, compassionate, positive, and helpful company. We want to make sure that we clearly communicate with current and prospective patients and be the best first impression in your marketplace while converting as many calls as possible into appointments, and we want to make sure that we keep our front office staff consistent and effective. So let's talk about building your frontline foundation. Remember, first impressions are everything. They're the entry point to exchange fees or services. A good first impression will help us maximize those marketing dollars that we spend and are trying to get that return on our investment. A good first impression should also communicate to prospective customers what we're selling, and that might mean a lot of different things, like a free hearing test or a free hearing aid demonstration or possibly even a $6,000 better hearing solution. And first impressions are noted when we have best practices in how we hire and how we train our staff. So before we talk about what to do, let's talk a little bit about what not to do. And over the years, I've listened to over 300, 400 recorded telephone calls most recently, and I hear a lot of mistakes, some of them, originally, I'll admit, of my own if I try to handle it or I try to wing it. So let's talk about what those mistakes can be. Some of the frontline flubs we might have is that when a caller calls us in, the dispenser or the specialist in the office, or maybe even the owner, will just tell the person at the front desk to, just give me the call. If somebody wants any questions, just put the call through to me, I've got all of the expert answers. Well, folks, I've listened to a lot of those expert answers, and those end up usually being talking about how great the guy is, how wonderful he is, how affordable he'll make the hearing aids for you, and what a good deal he's got or she's got. It doesn't sound real professional, and it really gives the caller a bad, bad, bad message. So I suggest that the phone calls should be handled by a trained, professional front office staff and that the dispensers stay completely away from the telephone, if at all possible. If you're the only person in the office answering the phone, then you, too, should take the time to train yourself, develop a script, and follow it clearly as you get those calls. It's so easy to tell when a telephone call is handled by a winger. The other mistake we often do is we just stumble over the call. We're not prepared for that question, and there are only so many questions people could ask. You'd think we'd spend some time to think about what those questions are, and I'm going to suggest that we do that in a little bit. Another thing is that we just give vague and salesy answers. Well, how much are your hearing aids? Well, we can't really tell you that now, because we don't know what your hearing's like, so you're going to have to come in and make the appointment, and then we'll secretly disclose the information, and to a caller who's just calling to find out an answer to a question, that's not a very good answer, and they may just say, thank you very much and hang up. Another thing we'll do, and you just experienced, it was a little bit of dead air when I was switching slides. When somebody's in a steady flow, and all of a sudden the sound just goes silent, it's like listening to a radio, and they forgot to cue the next commercial, and you're wondering, is there anybody in the studio paying attention? Well, that caller might be wondering if you're paying attention, so try to avoid dead air time if you can. One of the mistakes I've listened to and heard is that this training is good. If you're sitting in this training class this morning, this afternoon, wherever you are, and you're an owner or manager, and you're not committed to training the people on the things we're going to discuss, I'd suggest today be a great day to go get a cup of coffee at Starbucks and avoid this class, but if you really are committed and want to make that extra change in your office and your practice, then be committed to this program. It doesn't end at the end of this convention, or at the end of this talk. It starts when I finish speaking. A common trap we all fall into, we're all human, and we have human nature, is to fall into our old habits, so if the training that you're going to get today isn't retrained and refocused and a commitment put onto it by your owners or your managers, then we're going to go back into old habits, and we're going to start winging those phone calls again. One of the felonies we have in our practice is that when we work hard at getting a third party or a companion in for the appointment with the prospective hearing aid patient, they come in, we make it, we stress that it's important for them to be there, and then they sit out in the waiting room or sit in the corner and we ignore them. Like I said, in our practice, that's a felony, so if you're going to make the effort, which I suggest you do, to get a third party to come in and you'll learn why in a few minutes, then by all means, make sure that you are using them in the presentation and that they're included in the entire discussion. Why is it important to have a professionally trained front office staff? Well, as an owner who spends a lot of money on advertising in direct mail and newspapers and other medias, in our industry, it's typical that in order to acquire an acquisition or a new customer, that cost is on average of $400 to $500. So every time the telephone rings with a prospective caller, that's potentially a $500 telephone call, and I think $500 telephone calls should be handled as best as possible. I hope you agree. Even though it may cost you $5,000, every one of those calls could result in as much as maybe a $6,000 purchase. So I think that the importance of those calls, not just on what it costs you, but on what your potential income and the revenue from those calls are, make it equally as important to do it professionally. You shouldn't risk losing any call because of poor training. Now I know this may be sensitive. Some of you are sitting next to relatives that are working at your front desk. Some of you have family or friend members that you've hired to cover that front desk for you because answering the phone is easy, right? Well if they are the best, if they're the best you can get, fantastic. You have a loyal and dedicated employee on your hands and they want to see you be successful. But if they are not, and you're just helping them out by giving them a paycheck, my suggestions are you free up their employment opportunities and find somebody who is the best to sit in that position. I know it's delicate, but it's a tough decision and business owners today have to make very tough decisions in order for their practices to succeed in a competitive world. I hope I didn't cause anybody to stare at their neighbor as they're listening to this. But moving on to hire the best. I just did a little survey today and if you write this down, go to payscale.com. It's a great website to type in job responsibilities and benefits and areas where you're at. It'll give you a nice range to find out what's the average rate for this position, whatever the position is. So again, payscale, P-A-Y-S-C-A-L-E.com, a great site to find out what salary and benefits are in your neck of the woods. I suggest you pay above an hourly rate. That's going to provide that you get a better candidate and a better person for your job and provide them with some benefits. Remember, I feel that this is one of the most important positions that we have in our practice is that front line and the face of our business or the voice of our business when the phone rings. Then once you've hired the best, it's important to educate them, inform them. One of our protocols is we always test and we run through an entire presentation with every new hire, what the hearing test is about, what their demonstration is going to be about, a little about the pricing. We talk about the pluses and minuses of wearing hearing aids. So it's very important that that person on our end of the phone knows what that patient is going to be going through and what they're going to experience. So if they're asked questions, they have an informed answer. Show them what your business does. They're part of your business. They are the front line. So let them know every little detail about what that patient has to experience. I also would suggest offering incentives for the number of companion appointments. In a minute again, we're going to talk about companion appointments. I think that if you put an incentive of $5 for every third party appointment that comes in and maybe a little bit more if they turn into a purchase, I think that's a wonderful incentive that you can bonus your front office staff and that they will be more motivated to do a professional job answering your phone and getting that third party or that companion in for that appointment. You are the owner, you are the manager, or you're the office staff. Demand professionalism. All of the recent research has shown that patients seeking hearing aids choose the place that they do business with based on the professionalism and the professional. It doesn't matter about degrees. It matters about how they care. Is it clean? Are they comfortable? And is this a professional place? So if that's the case, they are your business. When we train our front office staff, whether you call them a PCC, a PPA, a receptionist, whatever you want to call them, today I'm just going to talk about the front office staff or the front line. The importance of their job is to help people hear. And when we train our front office staff to know how important that is, that most people will wait 7 to 10 years once they identify they have a problem before they reach for that telephone to call you to seek help. So something monumental has happened in their life, and if that telephone call is answered by somebody who doesn't really care about their job or doesn't really care about the caller, they may wait another 3 or 4 years before they seek help. So making it professional is going to encourage that caller that they called the right place and that it's time for them and it's a safe and friendly place and environment for them to go. It's also important that the front office line knows about the psychology of the hearing impaired person. There are some good manuals out there, booklets that talk about the psychology of the hearing impaired. I think it's important to spend quite a bit of time training the front office staff to know where these people are. Have they been living in a silent world? Have they been isolated? Have they been separated from their loved ones? Are they potentially going to lose their job because they don't hear well? They need to know about the feelings and the psychology of that person to better understand the people they'll be helping. And then, of course, being a patient advocate with some experience is always a wonderful message to give to those patients. You're there to help them, you have the answers, you're going to direct them in the right location because people don't know a lot about hearing aids. You're going to see in a few minutes. You know, the dispenser, the owner of the practice can't really go into that room and say, wow, you're lucky to be here, it's your lucky day, and you're lucky to see me because I'm really great and I'm the best at what I do and there's nobody in town that does as well as I do. That would be a little braggadocious and I think it would turn off a lot of people if somebody went in there to talk about how great they were. That doesn't mean the patient doesn't hear how great you are or doesn't feel what a great place they've been in. The front office staff is the practice cheerleader. If they love their job and they tell the people, hey, you are so lucky to come here, Mary is a wonderful hearing professional, she is great at listening and great at helping you find good solutions. I mean, wouldn't Mary love to have a patient come in to see her when she had built up that much? Mary can't say it, but the front desk can. So make sure that when we motivate these patients to get help that we're motivating them with empathy, not sympathy. It's not a sad day because they have a hearing loss. We may feel sorry that they've been separated and we may have some empathy about how they feel, but we're going to be hopeful and optimistic that they came to the right place and we are going to make their lives better. So when you find the best, once again, recognize who the best candidate is to be your front office staff. Hire them and only hire the best. Why do people keep calling and interrupting my busy day? Front office staff has orders to fill. They have supplies to get in. They have coffee to make. They have garbages to empty. It's a busy day at the front office, and we know that. And then that dreaded telephone rings and it's interrupting our busy day. Well, guess what? While it may be your busy day, it just could be their lucky day because they called the right place and you're the person that's going to help them with their problems. So is it important to know why they called today? Absolutely. People will say, well, at the end of the call, how did you hear about me? Well, I've been driving by here and I saw your sign and I know you were in the neighborhood and I just thought it was time I get my hearing test. I'm going to tell you, baloney. The sign's been up for 25 years. They've been driving by that sign for 25 years. Every day they see it. But what is it about today? Why didn't they come in yesterday or last year? You need to see the importance of today. There is a key salient moment that got that person when they received your advertisement or saw it in the newspaper or decided it was time and looked you up in the yellow pages. Something happened in their life. And if you can help as a front office person find out what that salient moment was, that is going to help the entire process because that's the hot button that that person is going to be focused on and making sure that they get corrected. It's also their lucky day. So we need to know why they called. But the funny thing about that is when they call us, they're going to call us not to ask two very important questions. How often do you get the phone call and they say, you say, ABC hearing and they say, can I trust you or can you help me? They're never going to ask you that question. But folks, I'm telling you, those are the two questions that are most on their mind. They are calling to ask you without asking the words, can I trust this place and can they help me? And their decision on those two answers are going to be made up in the first 20 seconds of the call. So your greeting is crucial. It's important when we answer the telephone that we answer it the same way every time. That's consistency, that's systematic and that's professional. So whether it's morning or afternoon, if you're going to greet them with that, make sure you have it correct. And if you're in a good mood, they're going to feel that. If you're in a bad mood, don't come to work. It's very simple. Make sure that your attitude, we all have the right to choose our own attitudes and I suggest when you come to work, you choose a great attitude because you're going to change people's lives today. So let's talk about that greeting. Let me break it down into a four-step greeting. The first step, before we get to the first step, sorry, let's pick up that telephone between the second and third ring. That's our goal. Professional telephone people say that that's the best time to answer the telephone is between the second and the third ring. Why is that? Well, if the phone rings four, five, six, seven times before you get to the phone, the caller may just say, you know what, they're really too busy to care to get my call today, so I'm going to hang up and call the next person down the list. Or if you pick it up on the half a ring, as soon as you hear the phone ring, you answer the telephone, the message you're giving that caller is that maybe they're a little too eager for my business, or maybe they're just not busy enough to trust. So we suggest you answer it between the second and the third ring. Now let's talk about what those four steps are. The caller gets answers before they get questions, all right? Most people are going to call with a question. So they're going to have these questions in the back of their mind, they may not ask them to you either. When you greet with, thanks for calling, that answers the question, can I trust this place, do they appreciate me calling them? Right off the bat, the first thing they hear from you is thanks for calling. The second thing you say is the name of your practice. This confirms that they didn't misdial and they got the place that they were trying to reach. It's important to establish a friend at your practice, so give them your name in the greeting right away. This is Scott. That makes it personal, and now they know somebody at the practice. The final part of the greeting is to ask them, how may I help you? This gives them permission to ask you whatever question they have that they're dying to ask. So let's run through that again. The telephone rings, you pick it up, on the second, between the second and third ring and you say, thanks for calling ABC Hearing. This is Scott, how may I help you? Now, when do people call? Some people will call you with no knowledge of hearing aids at all. Some people will call you and they've been previous hearing aid users, or maybe their family or fathers or friends or uncles have had hearing aids, so they have some information about what hearing aids are, but they still don't know it all. So regardless of whether they're an informed or non-informed caller, it's less important what the question is than how you answer that question. Don't get too focused on that first question. Think about it. If you were going to call a business about a widget, and you'd never know what a widget was, but somebody said you should get one, what would be the most common thing you would do when you called up, besides say, what the heck is a widget? Your first question might be, well, how much are your widgets? Because you might want to shop widgets, but you don't have a lot of information, so you've got to come up with something just to get the conversation started, and I'm telling you that's what these people are doing when they call you. How much are your hearing aids? Does insurance pay for hearing aids? What if I don't like what I buy from you? How much is your hearing test, and how long is it going to take, and how long do batteries last? Well, these are questions, if they ask about batteries, they probably are thinking they need hearing aids, or they already have them, and they want to know why. Why would somebody who doesn't think they need a hearing aid or want a hearing aid ask how batteries last? Think about the questions a little bit, but don't put too much thought. These are commonly asked questions. You need to come up with the most frequently asked questions that you get in your market. Some of them may be industry related, depending upon where you live. Some of them may be weather or climate related. What you need to do is sit down, the owner, the manager, the dispenser, and the front line people, and sit down and write a list of what are the most common questions when people call. What do they want to know? What's the first question that they ask? First, make your list. The second thing you do is you write down the answers based upon the owner's approval. Because I've heard people answer the telephone, I'll give you a quick example. If you're not given what the answer should be, one of our callers called and said how much are your hearing aids? Well, without practicing, the front office staff said, well, it will be. Our hearing aids range from a few hundred to thousands and thousands of dollars. And that's not quite how it was supposed to go. The answer is a hearing aid range from a few hundred to a few thousand, depending upon someone's needs. That's the answer to that question that we use. Make sure whatever answers you have are approved by your manager and that they are written and typed up on a sheet that is kept. I say laminate the sheet, put it in a page protector, keep it by your front desk so when that question gets asked, you have the answers right there. We'll talk about continued training a little bit more in the future. So let's talk about training our staff on those answers. It's important to have consistent answers for whatever those questions might be. But remember, don't get focused on the first question. This is the key to answering it. When answering the initial question, answer it and then do not pause. Do not pause. I will tell you again, do not pause. That is the key. That's where all conversations go down the tube. When they answer that question, how much are your hearing aids, at ABC Hearing, our hearing aids range from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars, depending upon someone's needs. Are you calling for yourself or a loved one? You see how that flowed? And there's a reason that I do that. Answer their question, follow up and ask the next question. Are you calling for yourself or a loved one? That little transition is going to help take you to the next step and walk you down a properly professional handled phone script. So the key, one more time, I can't emphasize this so much. When they ask you that question, answer it and then do not pause. Go right into your question, are you calling for yourself or a loved one? Here's what happens when you pause. How much are your hearing aids? Well, they're a few hundred to a few thousand dollars. Okay, thank you very much. Goodbye. They call XYZ Hearing Aid Company and ask the same question until they get somebody that's been trained and stops them in their tracks and gets the conversation controlled because those who ask the questions controls that call. If you're asking the questions, you're controlling the call. If they're asking all the questions, they're controlling the call. Whoever's controlling the call gets to decide when that call gets ended and that usually ends up with a thank you, goodbye. So stay focused on your script and that caller's question, but keep moving down our caller's answers, okay? When you have a script and you're asking these questions, and I'll go through some of the questions that we recommend you ask, I want you to make sure you're listening as well. It's important to be an active listener. We call it 911 listening. You call 911, those people are trained to answer and to listen and ask questions to get facts. They need data, they need information, and they need to get it from you. So become an active 911 listener. Here's an example when you're not listening. The first thing they say, hello, I received an offer from your company in the mail and I was wondering how much are your hearing aids? Well they just told you how they heard about your business, right? So at the end of the call we always ask them, you know, how did you hear of us? If they tell you it's the first thing out of their voice, you need to jot down to your script and you need to write in that they got something in the mail, they received a direct mail piece. Don't ask them again. That's not very professional. So this is just an example of active listening and thinking a little bit about that telephone call. So the flow of the script starts out by saying, are you calling for yourself or a loved one? Or are you calling for yourself or someone else? Once they ask that, you could say, are you or are they experiencing any pain in your ears? Because this qualifies you as the medical professional that is first going to find out do we have an urgent problem that needs urgent medical care. No, I'm not experiencing any pain in my ears. Do you currently wear hearing aids? No, I've never worn hearing aids. That tells you something. Well tell me, what kind of hearing challenges are you experiencing? And they're going to go on and they're going to tell you what's going on and you may ask them how does your spouse feel if they're married, how do your kids feel if they have children, grown children around. Talk a little bit about what the hearing challenges you're experiencing. And once you find out that they've got some issues with their hearing, it's fine to confirm that they're looking for answers. So if they're looking for answers, you need to let them know that in order to give them the accurate and professional answers, you'll need to perform a hearing evaluation. So let's go back, give them your name again, and say, my name is Scott, may I have yours? Any way to get someone's name, give them yours, ask it for them. Now, it's also important to explain the importance of a companion and getting their name as well. We say that it's crucial that someone accompany you to your appointment. Who would that be? And they'll give us their name. And then you need to find out what the relationship is today. So once you're done with that, now we set the time for the appointment. We get an accurate spelling of their name. One caution, if their name is Jones or Smith, don't ask them how to spell it. Doesn't sound really bright. Get their telephone number in case you need to call them. And then finally ask, how did you hear about ABC Hearing? Do you know where we're located? And if they don't know where you're located and the appointment is a few days away, offer to send them something in the mail, that's going to give you their address, another good thing that you're going to want at the end. And ask them if they need any directions, but also know where a landmark is near to your office. So if you're next to the McDonald's or behind the Walgreens, let them know that. So when they get close to your office, they know they're in the right vicinity and they'll just keep looking a little harder. Most of our clienteles in many of our practices are older. They don't like busy streets. They don't like a lot of cross-traffic things. So make your directions very simple. My suggestion is you have at your front desk a type sheet with written directions from every location, from the north, south, east, and west. You have all of these directions written down, so if you ask them where they're coming from, you can go right to that spot and give them that answer all the time. And consistency. Mary, we're going to see you Thursday at 4 o'clock. We're going to see you and John at 4 o'clock, Mary. Thank you. I forgot the third party. That's important. Reconfirm the date and time, thank them for calling, and hang up. That's as simple as it goes. Now, I'm going to tell you this. We've been doing this in our practice now for over three and a half years. We record every telephone call. And I will tell you that when we do it and follow this script, the average telephone calls are three minutes long. When we wing it, the average telephone calls go up to six and eight minutes long. So by using a professional script, by being professionally trained, you're going to limit the length of time you have on the telephone call, and you're going to get better results. So let's talk about the importance of a companion. I know your dispensers and professionals in your offices have probably told you it's always good to have a spouse come or a child come with them. But let's talk about why and what that means to you. This is what we know. And most recently, I just did a research, and these numbers I can confirm, in the last year for our business, the numbers haven't changed at all. We know that less than 20% of people that come in, or solo people, by themselves to get hearing aids, only 20% or less will buy that first visit. But we also know that more than 75% of people who come in accompanied with their spouse and their loved one and their friend or their neighbor, those people, 75% of them, will walk out with an order for new hearing aids. Now if you're a business owner, where do you want to lay your odds? Do you want them coming in by themselves, or do you want them bringing somebody? I think the numbers make it pretty clear. The third party person is crucial, but please make sure that when you bring them in, that you use that third party again. That's a felony, but we don't do it here. The family and the team are the support from the beginning, which is going to help wear and use and encourage them and understand all of those questions that you explain to them in the fitting or the delivery of the hearing aids. The companion's familiar voice is crucial when demonstrating new speech technology. If you use speech mapping, it's a wonderful tool. Bring the third party in and use that voice. So if we focus on results, these are the goals of every call. The first goal we want to make, the best goal, is to make a companion appointment, getting the name and number to call back if necessary. That's the first call. I need to make a third party appointment, and we're going to do that when I answer that telephone. Now, if that person is a little hesitant about bringing somebody with them, you can go ahead and make an appointment for that solo person, but make the suggestion to bring a companion at the time of the appointment. Again, get their name and number, because when you call them, remind them about that and ask them, have you got a person to bring with you for tomorrow's important appointment? Just one more time to remind them how important that is. And if they live by themselves and their kids are clear across the country and they truly don't have anybody else, by all means, go ahead and make an appointment for the caller. Again, get their name and number. But what if the caller refuses to come in? They're just not quite ready yet. Your fourth and final goal before that phone gets hung up is to make sure that you get the name, the address, and the phone number, because you've got some really helpful information for people that are starting their search for hearing help, and you're going to send it to them. So you want to get their name and address so that you can enter that data into the database and continue to market to that prospective patient should they not come in. And you can follow up later by a phone call to see if they receive the information and have another shot at an appointment. So those are the goals of every call, and I put those in priority. When we schedule the appointment, here are a few keys. Again, to get their name, give them your name, ask them their name. Check the spelling of non-common names. But remember to use the caller's surname, Mr. or Mrs. Jones, until you've been given permission to use their first name. Now, if all they give you is John when you've given the name, then you can use John. They didn't tell you what their last name was. They didn't say, my name is John Johnson, that you want to say Mr. Johnson until they give you permission to do that. That raises professionalism. I'm going to tell you as a caveat to this, older women appreciate being called by a surname and a professional greeting like a Mrs., Ms., Mr., whatever. Women wouldn't want to be called Mr., but the women would. I live in Portland. Maybe I'd find a couple that would vary from that. So use the caller's name. Don't use their first name until they give you permission. Get the name of the companion, and then write down what the relationship is. Is this their son, their daughter, their friend? If it's a friend or a neighbor, that's the only person they can bring, then when this dispenser needs to know when they get to that conversation, that any financial discussions held with that person should be delicately handled and may be done that confidence, one-on-one with the individual. Just a little side note. So when you're making an appointment, offer a choice of days. Mary, we have an opening Wednesday and we have an opening on Friday, which would be better for you. And then offer a different, confirm an alternate time. Our mornings are afternoons better. We have an opening at 10 and we have an opening at 3, which is best for you. Then confirm the time and date of appointment. Now, if they call you and you say, when do you want to come in? We are wide open, nothing on the books this week. What kind of a message are you giving to that person? This isn't a very good place to do business with, is it? So even if your slate is clear and you don't have one appointment all week and you get a caller, your message to them should be, this is a busy place and I can see you at this time or I can see you at this time. They don't need to know it's wide open. Why tell them? Confirm the date and time of the appointment. Let them know if the companion is not available, that they need to call and reschedule when the companion can join them. And again, if the appointment is made a week away, get the address to send them a reminder with maybe a map to your office. If they have email, offer to send them the email, the directions. But inform them that you're going to call the day before as a courtesy, just a reminder of the appointment. Thank them and hang up. You've done your job. So here's some etiquette, a few tips on telephone etiquette. When you're speaking, speak with a paced, clear, modulated voice. Let your words run together. Don't eat gum or chew on the telephone. If it's lunch hour, leave the phone, go eat someplace else, don't eat at the phone and never answer the phone when your mouth is full. It's just rude. If somebody doesn't understand a question you ask them, don't repeat it back to them the same way. If they didn't hear it right the first time, change the word, rephrase it. Speak in a different way. And don't yell into the phone. We teach our front desk staff to speak slow and low. We're always saying slow and low. We've hired some younger people who have a high-pitched voice or a real fast voice and they need to get it all out there. So the only message we have for them, we listen to their voice all the time, slow and low. When you're talking on the telephone, if there's a mirror nearby, look into that mirror and smile. It's so nice that people can hear your smile through the phone lines. It just sets off a better tone in your voice. So those are just a few tips for telephone etiquette. IHS will send you 20 tips on more telephone etiquette once you complete the CE quiz. Just a nice little handout. So we've talked a lot about the telephone. I've got a few minutes left to talk about walk-in business because that's also the front line. The front office should be clean and vacuumed and dusted. The trash should be emptied. It shouldn't be a week's trash. Emptying the trash daily, not weekly, is really bad. Coffee fresh, snacks, are they out there? Do you have magazines from 1999? Get rid of them. Don't put trade journals. The hearing review and the hearing, even the hearing professional, I love the IHS magazine, but it shouldn't be in your waiting room for your patients to see. I've seen them. I've traveled. I know they're there. Take them out of the waiting room. Have some nice, fresh magazines, but most importantly, have some brochures about your practice, maybe something about your hearing aids. And then, every morning, you should walk out of your door, take 20 steps, turn around, put on the eyes of a patient or a prospective patient with $6,000 to spend and walk back into your practice just as they will and look for later look to see if they're fingerprints on as it is everything look good is this a place i want to do business when i walk up to a front desk i want that front desk to be clean and organized and clutter-free professionalism that's the key here you want to be professional a messy desk is not the side of an organized mind is there a clock in your waiting area i'd say no if you're running late they're going to just get frustrated and frustrated watching that clock slowly go by and see how much later they are so if you have a clock in your waiting area it's your choice my suggestion is take it out and when someone comes in your front desk front desk person is busy entering an order from the last person that was in and somebody walks up to the desk and they give them a look up there and a nod they don't say a word they go right back to their work and i'll be right with you that's the rudest thing you can do everything nothing is more important than when a patient walks through that door stop what you're doing and focus on the people we say stand up and greet them greet them with a handshake or a nice smile and gesture but get off of your butt we all could use the exercise stand up and greet them that's professionalism it gives a good impression i'm going to put up some references real quick about uh... some tools that we use for training and rewarding uh... if you ever call a business and they say that this call is going to be recorded for customer service training and evaluation they probably are using one of these sources and they're recording the calls i've put the one i use up at the top source you want to write these down and i'll leave them up for a few minutes call source is the first one i've used them for about three or four years now uh... i paid up for a service they give me individual phones for every advertising piece i get i can go online and see exactly how many calls i'm getting from them and what time the calls are coming in do most calls come in after hours do most calls come on a wednesday or a saturday you know depending upon when that mail is listed that's the source i use here are several other sources i research for you write them down go online check them out ask a lot of questions many of you have been involved with the ACA class and had von hansen teach a good counseling course he talks a little bit about the patient counseling and also has done training for front office staff all over the country i've put von's email up there he has a service where he will work and train your staff coach them and continue to coach and monitor those calls for you and he has a nice little thing asking about script on a screen it takes a telephone script puts it right on your screen you enter the data and it prints a nice report out to hand to your professional at the time of the appointment so those are just a few sources i'd like to say use those sources they cost a little bit of money but if that's a five hundred dollar phone call i'm willing to spend a little money to make sure that's going to be answered correctly and consistently the entire time so i'm at that fun time of the day where i get to hear your questions and i know the staff is there and they're going to send those questions to me i hope you put a few in i want to thank you again before we end uh... this is the largest crowd we've had for a webinar and you're all participating with around the country there's over four hundred of you on this meeting right now so i'm delighted that you took the time to listen to me ramble on about something that i think is very very very important to the success of not only your hearing practice but especially encouraging and getting more people with hearing problems into our offices so that we can take care of one of the biggest problems we have in our country which is untreated hearing loss thank you for listening i'd love to hear your questions thank you scott well everyone we're very excited that so many of you have joined us today on the webinar and i do want to remind you that uh... when you do get your CE quiz we do have some great bonus materials for you including many of the questions that scott talked about i know we went through it kind of quickly but you can get those with your bonus materials as well as some other tips etc so we do have some questions already today scott and i do want to tell everyone if you do have a question please do enter it in the question box on your webinar dashboard our first question is from kevin in new york and uh... you had talked about scott the stand stand up and greet method when someone comes into the office but kevin wants to know what is the receptionist on the phone when someone comes in what's the best way to handle that uh... without being uh... you know without putting off either customer absolutely my initial reaction kevin for that is that you have a protocol in place and the front office staff is trained and knows how to handle every situation in your office so if somebody walks in off the street without an appointment the dispenser is ready and is able to help them you have a protocol on how to handle that if they come into your office and the professional is busy and they're going to be busy for the next hour you have a protocol to handle that equally so you need to have a protocol how to handle the telephone caller when somebody walks into your office and is standing there waiting for you to help them my suggestion is this you're on the telephone with mrs jones and somebody has walked up to the desk mrs jones if you could hold on for just one second somebody has just walked in i'm going to let them know we're talking and i'll be right back with you and then wait for them to say okay don't just say let me put you on hold and put them on hold wait for their permission and say yeah that's fine and then put them on hold take the phone down stand up to the caller and say i'm on the telephone with a caller right now if you'll please have a seat over there in our waiting room and help yourself to the coffee or refreshments i will get back to you as soon as i get out this important telephone call i think that that person who's walked in is going to appreciate that you've acknowledged they're there you've stopped everything you've invited them to be refreshed and wait and i don't think you'll have a wait at all just have a protocol that's the key for every situation sit down with the front office staff and think about it tell me these different situations when someone comes in somebody just bought a hearing aid two weeks ago and they come in with the box and they come in and say here i don't want these i try them i don't like them you'd better have a professional protocol or a process in place to handle that or you're going to be flustered and trying to win okay thank you scott uh... we have another question from jennifer in illinois she wants to know what if someone shows up solo even though they told you that they were going to bring a companion they just show up by themselves how do you handle that? that happens a lot jennifer uh... people do that all the time i mean it happens a lot especially if the wife has been pushing the husband to get hearing aids and it comes time for the appointment and the husband conveniently leaves the wife at home so that she can't help here's what we do we give them something they've come in we give them something so we say well we're sorry that mrs jones couldn't join you today uh... we hope we get to meet her in the future we'd love to have her input as we said before it's important her input and a familiar voice in our testing is very important giving you the best solution we can we're going to go ahead and do your hearing test today and you will just do a screening test you may do air and bone test and then stop it and say this is the point where we see yes it looks like there may be some hearing challenges here but it looks pretty promising as well so let's find a time when we can get mrs jones back in here and we'll schedule a second appointment with this person there's been research done on sales and that if you try to close that person by themselves at that time and your point is over a thousand dollars the more times you try to close them the more resistance and the less success you'll have it's better especially if we're dealing with higher end products in the two three four six thousand dollar range so maybe schedule a couple of appointments with them before they buy i know there are a lot of professionals out there they're saying you're going to i could deal with it i can close anybody is that what you're trying to do and you want to have a twenty percent success or do you want the seventy five percent success rate get the person in give them something don't just send them away without doing something give them tease them a little bit show them their hearing loss give them something to bite onto enough information they're a little dangerous with and then get a hold of the missus or mister or the third party and reschedule it have the courage trust me it takes courage to do it but have the courage to reschedule that appointment because you'll have a better success rate when that third party comes in okay great thank you scott okay we have another question we had a few people ask this question uh... and that is when you are on the phone with someone and you get off script and you can't remember the script you get derailed somehow and this is on the cd quiz so i i know a lot of people i know that's what is the best way to get back on track first of all i didn't say this earlier but you should have your phone script type dot prepared ours is on a one page you don't have to flip it over one page we see it all there are fourteen questions we do not go from question two to question seven to question four to question thirteen we go from question one to two to three to four all the way through in order because the script was designed to flow that way so people get off track because they don't have the script in front of them they're trying to memorize something it's not about memorizing things i've listened to phone calls where people were reading it off the paper and while it sounded artificial those phone calls ended in a professional appointment keep a script nearby uh... if you do get off track remember that the focus is on controlling and asking questions so if you get off track you need to have a question ready to ask them that puts you back in control of the call and so that question might be uh... you know it sounds to me like you're looking for some answers that's a good one to get you right back into the line so when somebody gets you off track with with some off branch thing or you fall you just get out out of the suit of following that script a good statement to make is it sounds to me like you're looking for some professional answers am i right they're going to say yeah and then you go right back to the question that follows that statement to give you the professional answers that you're looking for we will need to evaluate your hearing again my name is scott may i have yours and now you're right back in the flow of that script have them printed keep them by your front desk write on them put them in the file for the appointment when the dispenser the professional in your office has the information that was talked about over the telephone in front of them it's going to help them guide and direct that consultation in a positive manner great thank you scott so it sounds like you're saying then people should be as prepared as possible have their script on hand and if you do get off course just you know do your best to remember the script or get back into the script and and try to set that appointment yep can use some little segway to get right back on it again put yourself back right great great okay we have a question from anita in north carolina and and this is i mean i'm sure you can probably answer this both uh... number of ways she had a question about call waiting and what is the proper way to handle that when another call is coming through i do recommend call waiting scott do you have a process for that or should people have multiple lines or an answer machine or what do you think about that again it's a financial business decision on the order uh... i will say this if you have call waiting or you have a second line that you need to have a protocol how to put people professionally put people on the on hold go to the call let them know what you're doing with them on hold or get their number and call them right back when you're done and then go back to the first caller if you say i'll be back to you in a few seconds be back to them in a few seconds don't let it wait admitted or two you'll be able to call that but my overall answer that question is people should always get the phone answered by a live if you put it out in the newspaper or it reaches the mail on a saturday that those telephone calls should be forwarded to your cell phone where you're at i'm going to take a five hundred dollar phone call if i'm sitting at home you know watching the it doesn't matter what that's important for all to me so think about that but have a protocol how to put people on hold if the second line rings in how am i going to handle that it's a very big just be professional about people understand they can hear the phone ringing in the background or maybe hearing it click in so let them know i have another call coming in your calls important to me i'm going to be right back with you as soon as i let them know i'm talking to you thanks scott i'd love to know and i'm sure a lot of our listeners would like to know what kind of front desk person should one hire? I know you talked about that a little bit but are you looking for specific skills or experiences uh... do you do a practice script test with candidates and how do you do ongoing quality assurance and training love the question hiring is the most important thing a business owner has to do the best asset of any good business is their employees the people who work for them if you hire the best you're going to have a professional company when it comes to front office staff i was just uh... into training the other day on my own and they said would you hire a receptionist in the advertisement one of the skills that's required is they must have a good memory so i put that at the top of my list i think it's huge because i've had them with good memories and i've dealt with businesses that the receptionist have good memories and when i call they recognize my voice i love calling there or when i walk in and recognize my face i love walking in there remember the most important thing to anybody is hearing your own voice or talking about themselves good memory number one number two they need to look presentable if they have piercings tattoos whatever depending upon where you're at make sure that they have a professional look at it that they're professionally clothed you have a uniform uh... some people go with scrubs some people just have nice professional wear uh... you don't want a budweiser t-shirt on your front office staff or something a little ruder than that interviewing is important we go through at least three interviews to hire anybody one is an initial screening interview where they come in and we get to meet them face to face the second is going to be especially if they're a front line person the second is going to be a ten minute telephone interview and during this interview it's not the questions and answers that i'm listening to it's the voice the pace of their voice the tone of their voice can i hear them clearly on the telephone do they put the receiver too close to their mouth do they talk with gum in their mouth those are the things these people are going to be answering the phone so their second interview is going to be a phone interview and then the third and final interview is just to confirm that the first two people you interviewed is the same person you interviewed the third time because everybody can gear up for one good interview but after two or three you start to see the real person and i think that gives whoever is hiring a better glimpse of who they're going to have on staff if they choose that person so good phone etiquette if they have some experience is important a good phone voice a great memory is hugely important if they look the part the rest can be trained great thank you we have a question from barbara i believe barbara is from oklahoma and she wants to know what should a front desk person do if your patient comes in very late for their appointment and you're already on to the next booking uh... nice one well a protocol again every time every situation a protocol procedure you need to have it spelled out you need to talk about it in advance that's what makes a professional office professional is that you're prepared so when somebody comes in late to their appointment uh... i think politely letting them know we've had another person come in and we've had to take an advance we like to keep our appointments we would you like to wait we will have a few minutes it'll be twenty minutes or however long really a good estimate don't just say something to pacify them be accurate with your estimate of how long they're going to have to wait and then offer them some refreshments maybe you have videos that you play in your office there are a lot of things we can do in our offices these days to kill some time while we're waiting for somebody to come in but if you can see that that person you know they're late they're the one that made the mistake they got late whatever happened happened uh... and you're busy your business needs to continue to go on so maybe the easiest thing to do is just find a better time when they can come back in on time see you and give them all of your undivided attention that's the most important message is that we want to make sure we don't cut any corners or that we rush through this you are important to us every patient one at a time is the most important one we see thanks scott we have a lot of questions but unfortunately we only have time to get to perhaps one more uh... so if you can answer it succinctly we do have one other question that came in from a couple of people uh... and that is how do you uh... assess whether or not a script or a person is working do you record the calls i think you had mentioned that a little bit about in your references but but how do you work that uh... what do you do in your practice well in our practice all of our calls that come in from our marketing pieces are recorded i have a staff person assigned that listens to every call we also have a grading sheet when we listen to the calls that grades the front office staff on how they open the call how they answer the questions did they stay on the script did they get the third party did they schedule the appointment did they get the name and address all those things and they get graded in score doc so when we do employee reviews we have some data to go over how well they're doing but that's going to help us score and track keep track of the employee or not the script you know there are a lot of scripts out there that people have created i'd just say have a script that works well for you that gets you the results you're looking for so uh... the script can change over time but most of the scripts i've seen have been generic and i could have used this script twenty years ago and i could probably use it twenty years from now so the script is as important as how that person handles it remember the script is just a tool it's the hammer it depends on the carpenter on what they do with that work to make that piece a nice piece or not so the front office staff again listen to the calls you can use the sources like call source or the other ones i put on the list and uh... and it's really wonderful it doesn't take a lot of time you know i've listened over three or four hundred telephone calls uh... some might grit my teeth and some might just go way to go the training worked and when i listen to myself i cringe so that tells you i don't answer the phone all the time they do a lot better job of it than i can well thank you scott and and thank you so much for a wonderful presentation today and we also want to thank everyone for joining us on the IHS webinar front office one oh one how to wow your patients on the first call if you'd like to get in contact with scott you may email him at scott austin at me dot com or visit his site at www.willhear.com for more information about receiving a continuing education credit for this webinar please visit the IHS website at IHSinfo.org click on the webinar banner find more info on the webinar tab under professional development as a reminder you can get bonus materials from this presentation by completing a CE quiz and submitting it with payment to IHS IHS members do receive a substantial discount on CE credit so if you're not already an IHS member you will find out more info at IHSinfo.org again please keep an eye out for the feedback survey you'll receive tomorrow via email we ask that you take a moment to answer just a few brief questions about the quality of today's presentation so that we can continue to bring you more quality presentations thank you again for being with us today and we will see you at the next IHS webinar

Front Office 101

customer service

telephone etiquette

script training

appointments

companion appointment

hiring front office staff

skills

protocol

call recording