Our Call Center Is Designed to Deliver
Trained phone reps and appealing financing turn 92% of inquiries into consultations.
BY MATTHEW PRUITT

Our practice, Diamond Vision, operates six laser vision correction centers in the New York-New Jersey-Connecticut market. Competition is tough here. Many larger national competitors are well entrenched in the minds of prospects and in many cases enjoy economies of scale that make it make it hard to compete. Diamond Vision faces the problem of being a medium-size provider in a highly desirable and crowded urban marketplace.

Finding a way to differentiate our practice wasn't easy. We had to avoid getting caught up in the maelstrom of discount laser centers, claims of being the most experienced, and promises of the best technology in town.

Our answer was to create our own highly professional dedicated call center, which we did in 1998.

The call center has evolved into a major reason for our double-digit annual growth in refractive procedures. It's become more and more of an asset as we've been able to staff the center with trained personnel who earn patient trust by allaying their fears about laser vision correction, translating medical jargon and -- importantly -- removing the cost barrier by offering attractive, longer-term, no-interest patient financing to everyone upfront.

In this article, I'll explain how we've been able to train our call center reps and develop their telephone techniques so that we now convert 92% of all inquiries to consultations.

Diamond Vision call center representatives are given extensive training before being allowed to interact with potential patients.

Establishing Trust

Many call centers have a simple approach: Tell as little as possible to get the patient in. That may work for the large national LASIK organizations, but if you're like my practice, establishing a relationship with the prospect on the other end of the phone line is paramount. Differentiate your practice from the others in your market by listening, being more informed and offering products other practices don't offer, like the aforementioned longer-term, no-interest financing.

Calls are driven to our center through our ads in a variety of media. We've used radio, newspapers and direct mail successfully, and are about to begin television. Call center hours are 7:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. weekdays. The call center is staffed by one full-time manager, six full-time reps, and four college students who stagger their hours to provide additional support during peak calling times.

Most callers know someone who's had laser vision correction, or are at least familiar with the procedure to some extent. Their primary initial concern is deciding whom to trust with their eyes. Therefore, it's vital to establish a relationship based on trust immediately.

How We Train Reps

Call center staff members must be good listeners and sincerely concerned and compassionate about the patient. New call center employees undergo 2 weeks training at what we refer to as "Diamond Vision U."

Call center new hires start their training with a road tour of our laser facilities and several days of observing surgery. They need to be able to relate to the patient's experience, and there's no substitute for direct observation.

After they have an understanding of the practice, we spend almost a week covering eye anatomy and general ophthalmology. Then, the new reps are paired with veteran reps and begin listening in on calls. I also conduct two workshops: one on handling callers' objections, and the other on conducting productive telephone consultations.

With this training, we believe all of our reps are capable of both handling calls professionally and providing the necessary information to convert inquiries to consultations.

Financing Option is Key

After a relationship is established with a caller, the next hurdle is often cost. Our reps clear this obstacle by offering instant credit approval online. This can be done in cooperation with a reputable company that specializes in financing elective medical procedures. For example, we use Unicorn Financial Services. All callers are initially offered Unicorn's 24-month, no interest financing.

Financing is a huge opportunity to differentiate your practice. Unfortunately, not many practices use this tool as effectively as they could. If you want a way to stand out from all the other noise in town, try using this approach:

Offer to finance patients right on the phone during the initial inbound call. We do it for every prospect, and our conversion-to-consult has increased by double digits. Getting approval for financing before they come in eliminates the question: "Can I afford this procedure"? Because patients are already approved for a line of credit, conversions are made much easier when they come in for the consultation.

With many prospects approved for a line of credit that exceeds $5,000, cost is no longer the biggest objection to overcome. In fact, our consultants have been able to increase our custom procedure numbers by more than 40% in the last two consecutive quarters with this tool.

Technology can be a huge differentiating factor. It's also the best tool to enhance your average selling price per procedure. Charging a premium for technology has been a bit scary for many of us in ultra-competitive markets. Fear of the market's price threshold can slow practices in adopting, and promoting, new higher-cost technology to the patient. Pre-approved credit lines can overcome this barrier.

Maximize Technology

Laser vision correction is an amazing medical advance, made possible by modern technology. At the same time, practice management software has also benefited from advances in online technology.

By using the Internet and linking your practice management and patient financing software, your practice can reap immense benefits through a paperless process.

A software interface saves valuable staff time by allowing the online application to be completed at the same time the patient information is entered into the practice management software. We can then conveniently pre-qualify patients in seconds, eliminating the cost barrier for the patient, while the call center rep is making the appointment on the phone.

Here's how we do it:

When a patient calls, our rep first obtains basic personal information (name, address, phone number, how the caller heard about Diamond Vision). The rep then tells the prospect that it only requires two additional bits of personal information (employment status and approximate annual income) to be immediately approved for a line of credit.

This information is input into our scheduling system, then automatically drops into a Unicorn interface for pre-approval. The beauty of the system is that the prospect's information shows up in two places though it's only input once. This saves the call center team valuable time and is easier for the prospect. In just 10 seconds, the decision on pre-approved credit is made. Each approval is electronically forwarded to the office where the prospect makes his or her appointment. When the prospect arrives, the approval sheet is automatically generated for use during the consult.

Our technology assigns each of our offices a unique identification number, which enables us to access online reports daily, and provides a customized corporate account so we can review all offices from one easy-to-navigate screen. It allows us to track individual applications, approvals, and confirmation of payment. At the end of the month we can extract data easily instead of having to compile lists.

It turns out that our biggest competition isn't just other laser vision correction practices -- it's fear of the LASIK procedure and its cost. With our call center, financing programs and cutting-edge technology, we either eliminate or minimize these obstacles upfront. Consequently, our growth has been truly phenomenal, with call rate, capture rate and conversion rate all up by double digits.

Matthew Pruitt, vice president of Diamond Vision Laser Center, has earned recognition as an expert in the techniques of marketing a vision correction practice to produce superior results. He can be reached via e-mail at matt@diamondvision.org.