We’ve been advocating the use of virtual consultations for obvious reasons, and some dental practices we know that are running with the idea have now noticed, happily, that they have an enhanced customer journey. Not just a temporary substitute for the “real thing”.

Others haven’t adopted this ubiquitous free technology because they feel nervous about getting it wrong, they don’t like video or they don’t have the capacity because they haven’t brought their furloughed staff back yet. One thing is obvious: the move to digital was already happening across all types of retail but it is faster and deeper than it was before Covid.

Lots of independent traders have adapted impressively to digital technology. Food and drinks retailers have developed apps and promotions to encourage take-outs, and you will have seen an annoying spike in unsolicited emails from any lifestyle company you’ve ever had anything to do with.

If that’s the lay of the land for consumers, they are expecting essential services like dentistry to be no different. They may not yet realise that there’s nothing to stop a dental consultation happening online, but soon they will. There’s been an uptake in video calls among the talking therapies during lockdown which are expected to remain a serious feature of the market because many clients and therapists have discovered they prefer the online experience, and it works.

So online consultations are here to stay. It happens that they make business sense for your practice on several levels:

• They are quicker because there’s no interaction with reception, waiting room, pleasantries, paperwork and drinks
• There is no decontamination time and PPE burden
• You can therefore do about twice the volume in the same time period
• They make valuable space available in your practice for fee paying customers
• They can be performed out of hours by staff working from home
• They appeal to nervous patients who feel safer calling from their own homes
• They appeal to patients in the at-risk category for Covid 19
• They position your practice as innovative, responsible and efficient
• Most people are now familiar with Zoom and other video conferencing platforms
• There is a spike in demand for orthodontics and facial aesthetics, which both align with an appeal to digital technology

Setting up video consultations isn’t complicated but the fear of getting it wrong may be putting you off. That’s sensible enough — you should only be using them if they work for you and your team. Then the pay-off is significant and immediate. So you’ll need individuals who are confident, well prepared and can make it a slick interactive experience.

That means one thing: you must immediately bring back your head of sales (otherwise known as your TCO) from furlough. Principals who are hesitating to do this and are not hosting online consultations themselves are holding up their production line. Your TCO is going to be most comfortable with the technology, to the extent that they can share before and after photos during calls and put patients at ease.

You need your TCO more urgently than your receptionist or hygienist because there is a shock to the economy in store when the financial institutions see the official figures on unemployment and taxes rise to pay for the government’s vast rescue packages. The coming recession will make high ticket patients scarcer, but your TCO can, from today, use online consultations to fill your autumn diary with high value treatments to offset this threat. You can offer consultations early in the morning and after work and nail this valuable part of your funnel now.

No shows

One of my clients has been getting his clinical team to do online consultations and his orthodontist has converted nine out of nine. Another clinician at the same practice hasn’t done so well, mainly because of lots of no-shows. You will experience more no-shows with online consultations than you’re used to with face to face so you’ll need to improve your follow up communications a little. Rather than simply sending automated reminder emails and texts (your patient will be inundated just as you are), give the patient a call the day before as you would for a face to face appointment. They will tell you if they’re not going to make it.

Good luck, and let me know if you need support establishing best practice for online consultations.