How an Orthodontist Rose Above All Competition
In Kansas City, Missouri, where 72 orthodontists are competing for a population of just two million, Dr. Dustin Burleson changed his marketing strategy to focus on the affluent. His average fee has gone from $4,600.00 to $6,500.00. His practice has grown from one location with one employee to five locations and 38 employees. He’s been on the Inc. 500 list twice. He’s increased his business by more than tenfold. Before using affluent marketing, he’d add a couple hundred patients a year. Last year he started 1,904 new patients.
In transitioning to intentionally marketing to the affluent, he hired a third-party research firm to survey 10,000 people in Kansas City. He discovered the number-one concern was finding a provider they could trust. Number two was convenience. To his surprise, price came in third place.
Focusing on creating trust, Dr. Burleson went to work to build his authority. He taught at the universities. He wrote a book and articles. (He’s written three books so far.) He got on the news and built his celebrity.
Relieve Your Affluent Clients of Hassles
Wanting to find out what conveniences affluent patients were looking for, he created a “patient board of directors” made up of 20 of his patients who were centers of influence. For example, they might own a business, be on the school board, or be a board member at the hospital—anyone he believed had huge referral potential. Four times a year, he invites these patients to a nice steakhouse, feeds them dinner, describes his vision for the practice, and asks them to give him input about what they like and don’t like about his practice. “At first they were really quiet,” Burleson said. “They’d never seen this before. But they all came and were good sports about it. And what a lot of them told us were then those things we implemented.” For example, he found that affluent customers want zero hassle. Burleson responded by expanding their hours to be open early in the morning, late at night, and on weekends. He added pediatric dentistry to the mix and dental hygienists so parents don’t have to go somewhere else to have their kids’ teeth cleaned and so forth. Burleson also created membership plans with different tiers where patients get VIP treatment. Family memberships run $24,000.00. For an additional $8,000.00, you can get the platinum plus plan. This includes things such as personal contact with treatment coordinators and guaranteed support no matter when you need it. They answer their phones 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. They offer after-hours support, including the promise to drive to the office at 10:00 P.M. if that is what is needed. Somewhat shocking and controversial in his industry, he added a guarantee that patients will be happy, or they get their money back. Even if they don’t wear their retainer and their teeth go crooked, they’ll put the braces back on for free. “They pretty much want a guarantee that if a kid loses their retainer, breaks their retainer, or doesn’t wear their retainer, that we have their back,” Burleson said.
Be Discriminatory on Who You Will Spend Money Marketing To
To find affluent patients, Burleson looked at his existing patient list. We said, “Who has spent the most money with us? Who has referred friends and family to us? Who was either paid in full or has come to us, not because we were on their insurance list, but because of some other reason?” Burleson explained. Using this list, he created a “look-a-like” audience to match to the national database and began using direct mail to reach these patients. “We used a company called Accudata (www.accudata.com) to help us create the look-a-like list,” Burleson said. Examining the list to find out more about his ideal patient, he identified his perfect patient as someone who is really busy, a soccer mom who works outside of the home. Now messages sent out are customized to fit this audience.
Targeting this specific niche and catering to super busy people who don’t want to take off work or school to bring their kids to the orthodontist has made a huge impact. Burleson’s lifetime customer value has almost doubled. “Obviously our price elasticity has gone up, but they easily bring the next kid and the family too,” Burleson said. “Our referrals have gone up 400 percent. We used to get about 15 percent of our patients from word-of-mouth or other patients and now it’s above 60 percent. The majority of our patients come from a mom who will find out and tell a friend, even if they had to drive past other orthodontists to get to us.” Referrals tell their friends, “He’s just open all the time, and they stand behind their work.”
Increased referrals aren’t all he’s received. Dr. Burleson has also seen increased loyalty. “Before marketing to the affluent, we took a lot of discount insurance,” Burleson said. He found with discount insurance patients, not only is he being paid less and referred less, but even if there is a strong relationship with the patient, if his practice is dropped from their insurance plan, the parents will take their next kid to someone else who is on their insurance plan.
Narrowing his niche even further, in 2017, he stopped treating adult patients altogether, choosing instead to only treat kids and teenagers. For most orthodontists, adults are about 25% of their business.
Applying the affluent marketing principles has allowed Dr. Burleson to increase his margin, allowing him to do more for his patients, which has resulted in tremendous feedback. “Patients looking at spending $6,000.00 versus $4,500.00 say, ‘It’s not that much more considering everything that you have to offer,’” Burleson said. “We hear things like, ‘Man, I wish other doctors’ offices would run like this.’” Burleson is relentless about running on time and he hires the best people he can find and pays them well. “I think everything good comes from margin and we have a significant amount of it because of this principle,” Burleson said.
DR. DUSTIN BURLESON, www.burlesonorthodontics.com, www.burlesonsmile.com