Do you have marketing systems in place to drive business?

I was having coffee yesterday with @doclind (on twitter). We had a great, very stimulating conversation about seminars, marketing, systems and other business “stuff.”

We also talked about how distractions from our main objective can make life complicated, when it doesn’t need to be.

In this case, I’m talking about the distractions we all succumb to.

There’s the Internet, all the things that are hooked to it (banking, social networking B.S., this BLOG, email, you name it), seminars literally designed to have us part with our hard-earned money, new gadgetry that “helps” us do our jobs better but we still have to part with our money to “do our jobs better” (I’m thinking of dental gadgetry you really don’t need to be successful – like crown milling machines, tissue lasers, etc. that all put enormous pressure on you to increase your bottom line to pay for them all!).

One thing that really stuck out was the simplicity of systems and how they can keep us on task and how systems typically don’t succumb to distractions because they are sort of isolated or insulated from them by their very nature. And, systems obviously can make such a huge difference in how your practice runs.

An example might be a postcard system. Here’s what is involved with the postcard system at the SofTouch Dental office: Every week or two, 2500 postcards get mailed. I email Melody in my office with a simple note that says, “Please send 2,500 postcards today.”

I have a reminder on my calendar that triggers the email. Simple. I send one email. It’s done. And, I get confirmation from the company by way of seeing the postcard returns arrive in my mailbox and seeing the charge on my bank account and of course, the confirmation email they send.

Then there’s the newsletter, our patient contact, referral stimulation and education system. That one is on Melody’s calendar and she simply creates a newsletter every month, same time, with input on content from me, and then she mails it. Simple. I do virtually nothing in this case.

Note the PURPOSE of all these is one thing: drive phone calls to the office. That’s all I want from these systems.

Since the goal is simple, the tools can be, too. Are you using simple tools and reliable people to execute YOUR systems?

I’m sure I’ll cover more on this topic, but good ‘nuf for a Friday!

Adios.