Sophie Noble shares her tips for holding an open day to attract new patients and stand out in a competitive market.
Despite a change of government, we still find ourselves in a challenging economic climate. Although access to NHS dentistry is tough, there are still many practices offering private dentistry out there. So, how can a practice cut through the noise and help themselves stand out?
According to Sophie Noble of Practice Plan’s events team, they could organise an event. Sophie is part of the team that organises Practice Plan’s hugely successful schedule of events ranging from the company’s presence at dentistry shows in Birmingham, London and Scotland, the hugely popular Workshop Tour, webinars, and regional events across the country. So, she knows a thing or two about what it takes to organise and run a successful event.
Why hold an open day?
Although experienced and accomplished at event organisation and management, Sophie feels practices can manage to hold a successful event without needing to employ an events expert.
‘You need someone with an eye for detail, who is good at preparation, timing, and sticking to a plan,’ she says. ‘So, you need the right kind of person, but not necessarily an events person. Someone with the right attributes to organise an event as well as the determination to make sure it’s all tied up at the end.’
However, before the right person can start planning the event, there needs to be clarity about its purpose. As Sophie says: ‘The basis of any good event is being clear about its objectives. That means knowing why you are holding it, and what you want to get from it.
‘For example, you may want to use it to attract new patients or to maintain your existing client base. Your practice may be celebrating a milestone, or you may have new members of staff you want to introduce. Those are great reasons to hold an event.
Clear on objectives
‘However,’ she continues, ‘as well as being clear on the reason for the open day, you also need to know what you want to get from it. Are you aiming to sign up new patients on the day? Perhaps you are hoping to get existing patients to sign up new family members or agree to new treatments. So, being clear on what you want to achieve is extremely important, both to help with your planning and so you can measure whether it’s been a success.’
Once the event’s purpose has been established, it’s important to make sure to get buy-in from everyone on the team. ‘One of the most important things when organising a practice event is making sure everyone knows why you’re doing it,’ Sophie says.
‘This is especially true in the run-up in terms of getting the word out. Whether that’s through promotions, talking to patients about it, asking them to invite their friends, their family, their clients, anyone that they know. Once the open day is underway, it’s essential the team understands why the event is happening and what they should be doing to help. That way everyone is on the same page from the very start.’
Be realistic
Although the best things in life are free, a list of those things doesn’t usually include events. This means budget is crucial. Is there a budget for your event, and if so, what is it and who will keep track of it? It’s very easy for costs to spiral unless someone takes control and manages expenditure.
While a personal appearance from Dragon’s Den star and podcaster Stephen Bartlett may draw in the crowds, as it did at Dentistry Show Birmingham, his fee is likely to be greater than a plan membership push at a rural practice would warrant. As Sophie urges: ‘Cut your coat according to your cloth. Try to have a realistic budget and do the best you can with what you have available.’
Devoting enough time to planning is essential
Events have the best chance of being successful if enough time has been allocated to their preparation. ‘Give yourself enough time to prepare for your planning, your promotion, and your run up to your open day,’ Sophie advises.
How much time should be allocated to planning and preparation will vary according to each individual event.
‘It depends on what time of day you’re holding your event, but generally I would recommend a few months to start promoting it, and to start creating a buzz,’ she counsels.
‘For your planning and preparation, if you work back from a few months out, you can decide what you need to do with your advertising, whether that’s on social media, sending out a newsletter, updating your website, and so on, and you can build your timeline and plan. You can then work out your tasks and allocate a date to them but give yourself plenty of time.’
Delegation
Organising an event can be stressful and time consuming, so Sophie advises making sure the burden of the whole event does not fall on one person’s shoulders alone.
‘Delegate tasks to everyone within your team,’ she says. ‘Don’t burden yourself with everything. Make sure people are given certain jobs in the run-up. So, someone can be responsible for food and drinks, someone else looking after any activities you might be arranging and share out the tasks.
‘Also on the day, give different colleagues responsibility for welcoming attendees, updating social media, and so on and make sure everyone has a job. All this ties back into getting people to buy-in to the event itself.’
What about after the event? Hopefully, all your careful, planning and delegation will have resulted in an enjoyable and successful event. However, once the decorations have been taken down and the recycling and rubbish taken out, it’s still not quite over as there’s the post-event follow up to consider.
Follow up
‘If your open day was by invitation only, whether that’s via Facebook or hard copy invitations, you’ll know who attended so you can follow up by thanking people for being there. At the same time as thanking them, you could take the opportunity to offer a discount, or perhaps get them onto a referral scheme,’ she suggests.
‘Otherwise, thank attendees when you next see them in practice, or if you invited them via social media, you could use a social post to say a big thank you for coming along. A lot of practices hold fundraising events for local charities, so, it’s important you post something, or put up a notice in the dental practice letting them know how much you raised and thanking people for their contribution.’
Hopefully, by following Sophie’s advice practices’ own events will be as successful as the ones she organises at Practice Plan.
Practice Plan has been welcoming practices into the family since 1995, helping them to grow profitable businesses through the introduction of practice-branded membership plans.
With over 300 years’ dental experience in our field team, if you’re looking for a provider that has that family feel but knows a thing or two about dentistry… Be Practice Plan and get in touch. Call 01691 684165 or visit www.practiceplan.co.uk/be-practice-plan/.
