Dental offices usually get a lot of calls from patient inquiries and appointment bookings. But when the clinic receptionist gets too busy receiving calls, it’s very hard to determine where the calls are coming from; if the calls are from your Google Ads, Facebook Ads, SEO, Billboard, etc. For potential patients on your website, use dental chatbots to help book more appointments. You can maintain a dental blog to promote your business and get more calls.
Your website might be getting a lot of clicks, but how would you know if those clicks are getting converted if customer actions aren’t being tracked? In this article, we’ll share with you the importance of using call tracking for dental offices along with some tips on how to use CallTrackingMetrics.
What is Call Tracking?
Call tracking is designed to help you analyze phone calls such as the specific keywords that cause you to gain or lose patients, improve customer experience, how your marketing campaigns are performing, and most importantly, provide you a better understanding of how you can drive more patients to your clinic.
Aside from that, you can figure out which among your marketing strategies are profitable and which ones are not. It sorts out inbound and outbound calls, forms, and even multiple activities on your website. All of those functions and more are in one place!
Why is Call Tracking Important for Dental Offices?
Some of the reasons why you should consider call tracking is that most receptionists are either too lazy or just aren’t capable of doing outbound calls (they are usually used to doing inbound calls). Aside from that, you have to track calls to resolve issues like why calls aren’t converted to appointment bookings so that you don’t lose the opportunity of getting more patients to your clinic.
Investing in call tracking software offers a lot of perks in your dental practice. In fact, 96% of consumers say that the way a business handles its customers is a huge factor in terms of being loyal to a specific brand. This means that the key to retaining patients in your clinic is a combination of providing excellent dental and customer service.
Benefits of Implementing Call Tracking for Dental Offices
Now that you know the importance of tracking calls for your dental clinic, here are some of its benefits:
- It tracks if you are getting a return on your investment
- If you are getting a lot of clicks and at the same time, getting a decent amount of conversions, you don’t have to worry about the return of the ad spend. However, if you are getting a lot of clicks but getting very few to no conversions at all, that’s when you should start taking action.
- Without call tracking, you’d never know if every dollar that you spend is worth it.
- For example, in every dollar that you add to your ad spend, the number of calls and booking appointments also grows. So, if you notice that increasing the budget for your ad results in a boost in the number of patients you get for your dental clinic, you’ll keep on adding more money because you can see that there’s a good result in raising your budget.
- It lets you know which campaign is more effective in attracting new patients
- If your dental practice is linked to several advertising platforms, it takes a lot of time and effort before you know where every call comes from but with Call Tracking, you will have an idea of which among these marketing strategies work and which do not.
- Aside from that, you can focus more on the strategy that is effective in attracting patients.
- For example, in every phone call that you receive, you have to ask the patient where they saw your dental clinic’s phone number. Sometimes, the receptionist forgets to ask this question and take down notes. When that happens, you don’t know what encouraged them to call unless you call them back.
- This scenario won’t happen in call tracking as it does the job for you. They will easily sort out the sources of calls to your clinic.
- It provides detailed reports on which marketing strategy results in conversions
- Call tracking gives you valuable information that your dental clinic needs. This includes reports that are readily available in just a few clicks, which will help you understand which strategy is driving a lot of calls and which ones are not. It also gives you an idea of what to do to improve the customer experience.
- For example, let’s say that most of the phone calls that you receive are asking about the price range for dental implants.
- This could mean that the prices for dental implants are not indicated on your website’s landing pages. From there, you generated this idea that there’s something lacking in your website that’s why you are getting a lot of calls or the reason why you are not getting a lot of bookings is that potential customers cannot see the price range for your dental services or most calls are just inquiries and not bookings.
- It makes it easier for you to provide feedback to your clinic’s receptionist
- In call tracking, dentists can listen to calls on how their receptionists handle patients through a recording and transcription feature. This is very useful as it lets you hear both sides and let you know what went wrong on a call (if there is any) so that it won’t happen again.
- For example, your dental clinic is receiving a lot of calls from new patients but most of them are not booking an appointment. Then, you start to wonder what could be the reason behind it. By listening to previous call recordings, you will be able to know which among your staff are using phone scripts properly, and which ones need further training.
- Issues like this should be solved early so that you won’t keep on losing patients.
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Call Tracking Metrics
Call Tracking Metrics is an online call tracking platform that allows you to monitor where every call that your dental clinic receives. It is one of the best call tracking software out there.
Why? Because aside from helping you understand what drives patients to book an appointment in your dental clinic, it also provides you with valuable data that is useful in comparing things such as:
- New vs repeated calls
- Repeat calls by source
- New vs. returning visitors
- Visits by source
- Average call duration by source
- Calls by source
Here’s a sample of what your dashboard looks like once your start tracking calls using CallTrackingMetrics:
It also gives you insights into what keyword triggered the call to occur, the duration of a call, and where the call came from (Google My Business, Google Ads, Website, Ad Extension, Landing Pages, or Google Organic).
Like in the example below, it shows that based on the graph, a huge percentage says that most of the calls came from the client’s Google My Business Profile. This means that whenever someone searches for your dental clinic, it is the first thing that they notice. Therefore, your Google My Business is performing well when compared to your other marketing tactics.
How much does CallTrackingMetrics cost?
Their monthly subscription rates vary depending on the call tracking features that you are looking for. Also, you get to use CallTrackingMetrics in your first month for free!
Find it hard setting up CallTrackingMetrics on your own?
How to use CallTrackingMetrics?
Choosing and buying numbers based on a specific area code for the number of your dental office is possible with CallTrackingMetrics. Let’s say you want to buy a number that starts with 408 (which is an area code for an area in California).
All you have to do is:
- Go to CTM’s menu
- Click “numbers“
- Under “management” click “buy numbers“
- Then, it’ll lead you to a page that looks like this:
- Just type in the number beside the search button, and a list of phone numbers based on your preference will appear.
- Choose your preferred phone numbers by clicking the “+” sign.
- Lastly, select “confirm & purchase.”
There are instances when numbers in a specific area aren’t available, but that’s okay, you can send a request form by clicking the “request a number” button.
Once you are done purchasing a number, it’s time to set up your numbers.
Here’s how:
- Assign a number for your tracking source. You can choose from Google Ads, Website, Landing Pages, Ad Extension, Google Organic, or Google My Business.
- Type in the client’s original number in the “Receiving number” and “Web Target Number” if you are going to track “Google Ads“, “Website“, “Google My Business“, and “Google Organic.”
- If you are tracking “Ad Extension” and “Landing Pages“, type in the client’s number in the “Receiving Number.”
- When you’re done, don’t forget to click “save and continue.”
Need help setting up CallTrackingMetrics?
Want to know how you can integrate Google Ads with CallTrackingMetrics? Check out our blog on How to Set Up CallTrackingMetrics with Google Ads to learn more.
Key takeaway
By using a call tracking software like CallTrackingMetrics, you can easily monitor how calls are being handled in your dental clinic, what your patients are usually looking for (e.g. if treatments are covered by insurance, budget-friendly rates, etc.), and most importantly, it helps you make informed decisions such as adjusting the budget for the marketing strategy or making certain improvements is it isn’t getting a lot of conversions. If you are not using it now, you have no idea how many patients you are losing over your competitors.
