Awareness

The patient becomes aware of the treatment options to his/her problem or area of concern. Proactively addressing patients in this stage makes a huge difference in both the quantity of consultations you will attract, and in the quality of those consultations. Social media posting and advertising of educational and introductional content is highly effective.

Search

The patient searches for available solutions in their area. Did you know that 75% of people don’t look past the first page on Google? If your website isn’t ranking highly in search results, new patients likely aren’t finding it. But that isn’t enough, in 2022 you need a substantiated online presence to be considered. Get in front of prospective patients by maintaining a lively and engaging social media account, by ranking highly on local Google Maps, and by taking advantage of online listings including Google My Business, WebMD, Yelp, DocFinder and more.

Consideration

Congrats, you've got patients to find your website. Now what? Having a beautiful, fast-loading and high converting website is the first step. Having a positive online reputation is the next. According to autoPatient data more than 88% of patients researched their doctor and clinic before considering booking a consultation. More so, 82.9% consider a positive online reputation to be very or extremely important. When surveyed, over 70% of patients responded that they will not consider a practice with an average star rating of 4.0 out of 5. So if your practice doesn't have many, any or recent patient reviews; or worse has many negative reviews, this is likely driving patients away. With autoPatient, you can automatically send smart filtering review requests and patient satisfaction surveys that will drastically boost the number of your reviews for your practice and their star rating. Patients rarely check only one online directory such as Google for reviews, but check other directories like Facebook, Yelp and more to help influence their decision. So make sure to regularly optimize these profiles and reply to reviews in a timely manner. Using the autoPatient reputation hub, you'll have your entire online reputation in one convenient portal.

Lead

This next stage depends on many factors but is a typical touchpoint for most aesthetic practices. The prospective patient at this point makes his/her first contact with the clinic. This can be in the form of a message, email, phone call, information/appointment request on a website contact form, or a newsletter sign up. Optimizing your website for the generation of leads is crucial. autoPatient enables you to collect leads from your web traffic for free using our multi-platform chat widget. Additionally, it’s easy to lose leads by getting stuck in the mess of too many modes of communication (SMS, Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger, Instagram DM, Email). Get rid of the clutter with our unified inbox including all platforms and keep track of all patient communication in his/her contact profile. Track phone calls as well to make sure no information gets lost between the cracks.

Conversion

At this stage the patient books a consultation. As patients have different preferences, it is important to offer them multiple methods of appointment booking to ensure the easiest and most convenient process for them. These include conversational booking through phone, email and instant messaging; self-booking using an online booking tool; and booking request forms. autoPatient powers your practice with custom booking request forms, a sleek self-booking tool and an AI conversational booking bot.

Pre-Consultation/Appointment

For autoPatient users, sending automated pre-appointment reminders increases show rates by 32% on average while drastically reducing no shows and last minute cancellations. Save time and reduce in-clinic waiting times by automatically sending patients intake or other pre-consultation forms before their appointments. Make your consultations more efficient by automatically sending procedure-relevant FAQs and information beforehand as well

Consultation/Appointment

Other than quality care, did you know that being a good listener is the top most important quality of a good doctor/treatment provider? (according to over 700 surveyed patients). How can you let patients know you’re a good listener? Adding the simple question: “Have I answered all your questions today?” lets the patient know you’re listening and prompts them to surface any other question or concern on their mind. It also increases your chance of getting positive feedback from the patient in a satisfaction survey. Other than being a good listener, patients prioritize short waiting times and appointment availability, a kind and welcoming staff, prompt responses to questions and concerns, flexible/late hours and the option to book appointments online. 73% of patients would switch doctors/clinics to get the qualities listed above. With autoPatient, you can gain the edge by easily keeping track of patient questions and concerns throughout every touchpoint before the consultation including phone call recordings, SMS messages, emails and social media comments. Being well prepared for the consultation will keep consultations shorter yet more effective and converting. It will free up time throughout your busy days so you can shorten the waiting times for patients. The phone call recordings, all-in-one messaging inbox and automated satisfaction surveys enable you to easily review staff communication, get feedback on the service, care and experience in your clinic, and make improvements accordingly. Your staff spend too much time answering the same questions and handling online communication? autoPatient will free your front office by automating responses to repetitive questions, and the necessary follow-up communication with interested prospective patients.

Post-Consultation/Appointment

The majority of aesthetic clinics leave a great deal of money on the table by stopping their patient communication after the consultation/appointment stage. On average, autoPatient users have 15 patients or more at any given time in a post-consultation, not ready stage. This stage refers to patients that have come in for a consultation but have yet to make a decision to undergo a procedure or treatment. By stopping the communication at the consultation stage, the majority of these 15 patient opportunities are often lost forever. But by automating personalized post-appointment communication based on the patient’s treatment of interest and concerns, autoPatient users see a conversion increase of as much as 230%. For Dr. Kish (link) this means an additional CHF 20,950/month on autopilot that would have otherwise been lost. The patient has gone through the 8 stages and is now at the procedure/treatment stage. Your clinic becomes a highly effective and remarkable clinic by taking control of the next 2 stages in the patient journey. These are:

Advocacy

At this stage, we want patients to become advocates of our clinic. Properly taking advantage of this stage means more 5 star reviews, testimonials, social sharing, recommendations and referrals. autoPatient makes this effortless for you to achieve by automating review requests to patients at the ideal time after their treatment. Our smart filtering review platform will increase your 5 star reviews on Google, Facebook, Yelp and more while keeping possible negative reviews internal. Send surveys to patients to show them you care while improving your service. Automatically request testimonials from patients that you can post on your website and social media accounts. Incentivize patients to share their experience on social media with our smart coupon campaigns that both make your patients your greatest salespeople, and encourage them to come back for repeat treatments.