2 questions to ask patients to improve retention

You have a fighting chance to keep them engaged by appealing to their logic to help you improve retention

For most chiropractic offices, to improve retention with patients is the No. 1 factor for creating a busy, profitable and stable practice. Unfortunately, it is also the top struggle for most chiropractors.

As the emotional response to pain fades, critical thinking and reasoning begins to reemerge as the dominant driving force for behavior. Now, if you have the desire to operate a pain relief office, then patient retention is not a concern. Any practicing chiropractor will tell you that as soon as the pain is gone, the patient soon follows.

A strategy to improve retention

What does this mean for you and your desire to build a busy wellness care practice?

It means you need to have a strategy in place to overcome the natural tendency a customer has to fade away as you and your services slowly slide toward the bottom of their priority list. The good news is this in no way means they don’t still “value” you and your services. There’s just a lot going on in most people’s life.

But you still have a fighting chance to keep them engaged by appealing to their logic, rather than emotions at this stage of their care. And in particular there are two simple questions you can ask that will help you improve retention:

1. “How are the adjustments doing so far?”

2. “What changes have you noticed?”

Why ask these questions? We can answer this by looking at the common answers.

“How are the adjustments going so far?” will typically get a response of, “They are great. Love it.”

“What changes have you noticed?” will typically beget something like, “I used to have headaches every day,” or “I sleep much better since I started here.” That is just two examples, but the possible positive responses are endless.

Now comes the critical time for you.

A critical response

If you respond with “Awesome,” you just missed an opportunity that you can’t get back. Don’t miss this critical chance to appeal to their logic about the important of staying on their care plan through the corrective and into the maintenance phase.

A simple response such as, “Great to hear. You are doing a great job of getting in here and it should continue to pay off to help [fill in the blank],” can go a long way toward helping them understand the value of sticking with it.

What you fill the blank in with is up to you. It depends on your philosophy about what corrective and wellness care can help that particular person accomplish, avoid or maintain. You know their history. You know what they do for a living. You know how they came in. You know what is most important to them. Don’t shy away from including that as part of your response.

Lead patients to health

Understand this: Most people don’t want to be sold to, but want to be led. By helping a customer gain a realization of the logical benefits of ongoing care, you will help them think beyond pain relief and see the bigger picture of benefits to having you in their life.

DARON STEGALL, DC, is co-founder and COO of Express Chiropractic & Wellness. Express Chiropractic’s mission is to help chiropractors own and operate a low stress, economy-proof, cash practice that helps people in their community ‘express better health’ through convenient and affordable routine chiropractic and massage wellness care. Learn more at expresschiropractic.com.