By JONATHAN FINE
The Prime Minister tells Sky News all family doctors’ surgeries will open seven days a week from 8am to 8pm by 2020.
It’s an attention grabbing headline, guaranteed to win votes and wind up overworked GPs simultaneously. I guess it’s a fairly safe pledge for Dave too as 2020 is a very, very long way off in political terms.
However in fairness the pledge has come from a deep-rooted belief that provision of medical services must follow the same service delivery levels as the rest of the world, from plumbers to undertakers, and be available ‘on demand’ when the customer wants to access the service. After all, why should medical services be any different from getting a new hair do?
As you may be aware my career is rooted in retail marketing and when I joined Breathe four years ago I was stunned by what I thought was a total lack of understanding of customer friendly access to dentistry – back then some of our clients actually closed for lunch (I am not joking!).
What I now know is that it was not a lack of understanding of service delivery by the sector, after all, dentists are retail customers too – no – it was simply that there was no imperative to improve access because principals were earning enough and the patients kept on coming back.
To some extent that is still the case, particularly in non-urban areas. BUT (and it’s one heck of a big but) for the practices that do go seven days there is a serious first-mover dividend waiting for them. All our clients trading seven days wonder why they did not do it sooner.
This is not a new story, I know. I have been banging on about the significant opportunities available to UK dental (particularly private) practices by opening seven days for some time now, but in case you missed earlier rants here are the five key benefits:
-
at least 40 per cent more surgery capacity
-
massive stand-out from your local competitors
-
increased loyalty and referrals
-
fast track growth
-
significantly increased practice value
If you would like to talk more about converting your practice to seven-day opening please call me direct on 07860 672727.
Best wishes,
JJF
Jonathan Fine is Lead coach: sales and marketing at Breathe Business. Email jonathan.fine@breathebusiness.co.uk or connect with Jonathan on LinkedIn to see what he’s reading and talking about.
PM’s pledge for seven-day GPs underlines windfall for dentists
By JONATHAN FINE
The Prime Minister tells Sky News all family doctors’ surgeries will open seven days a week from 8am to 8pm by 2020.
It’s an attention grabbing headline, guaranteed to win votes and wind up overworked GPs simultaneously. I guess it’s a fairly safe pledge for Dave too as 2020 is a very, very long way off in political terms.
However in fairness the pledge has come from a deep-rooted belief that provision of medical services must follow the same service delivery levels as the rest of the world, from plumbers to undertakers, and be available ‘on demand’ when the customer wants to access the service. After all, why should medical services be any different from getting a new hair do?
As you may be aware my career is rooted in retail marketing and when I joined Breathe four years ago I was stunned by what I thought was a total lack of understanding of customer friendly access to dentistry – back then some of our clients actually closed for lunch (I am not joking!).
What I now know is that it was not a lack of understanding of service delivery by the sector, after all, dentists are retail customers too – no – it was simply that there was no imperative to improve access because principals were earning enough and the patients kept on coming back.
To some extent that is still the case, particularly in non-urban areas. BUT (and it’s one heck of a big but) for the practices that do go seven days there is a serious first-mover dividend waiting for them. All our clients trading seven days wonder why they did not do it sooner.
This is not a new story, I know. I have been banging on about the significant opportunities available to UK dental (particularly private) practices by opening seven days for some time now, but in case you missed earlier rants here are the five key benefits:
-
at least 40 per cent more surgery capacity
-
massive stand-out from your local competitors
-
increased loyalty and referrals
-
fast track growth
-
significantly increased practice value
If you would like to talk more about converting your practice to seven-day opening please call me direct on 07860 672727.
Best wishes,
JJF
Jonathan Fine is Lead coach: sales and marketing at Breathe Business. Email jonathan.fine@breathebusiness.co.uk or connect with Jonathan on LinkedIn to see what he’s reading and talking about.
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