Below is the full transcript from this podcast episode. Enjoy!
Uriah: So I have a question for you today.
Tracel: Okay.
Uriah: I’m wondering if you usually respond to client satisfaction surveys from companies when they send them by e-mail?
Tracel: No, I kinda just view it like junk e-mail and would just delete it and…
Uriah: Right…
Tracel: … that’s if it even gets to my inbox to begin with and just doesn’t end up in spam, so No.
Uriah: That’s true.
Tracel: No, I don’t really take the time to do it.
Uriah: Yeah, I find that I don’t either, sometimes I feel a little guilty, but …(laughs)
Tracel: Yeah.
Uriah: … I usually only respond if it’s a company that I really like and want to support, uhh…
Tracel: That makes sense.
Uriah: … or if they offer me a some sort of incentive, like a Starbucks gift card or something like that.
Tracel: (laughs) Starbucks, that’s the way to your heart.
Uriah: That gets me going…Oh yeah, for sure.
Tracel: (laughs)
Uriah: …Oh yeah, for sure.
Tracel: (laughs)
Uriah: So one of the things I’ve been thinking a lot about is, How to increase client retention for a therapy practice, whether that’s a solo practice or group practice, super important.
Tracel: Right
Uriah: And, one thing we’re talking about today is, sending a feedback form to people after their first session. So, that’s what we’re gonna tell people about.
Tracel: Why is-why is that important? How will that help with client retention?
Uriah: There’s a couple ways it could help. I think the first one is, is to catch problems early. So…
Tracel: Mmm
Uriah: … coming from a quality assurance standpoint…
Tracel: … Mm-hmm.
Uriah: … because it’s true for a lot of customers of other businesses, but clients don’t often speak up when there’s a problem.
Tracel: Yeah.
Uriah: Or they may have some sort of a challenge with their therapist. And, so what can happen is if-if the client gets an opportunity for feedback they might speak up about that didn’t go well…
Tracel: Mm-hmm.
Uriah: … and than there’s an opportunity for them to be either matched with a different therapist or for that challenge to be resolved. So that’s really helpful.
Tracel: Right, so if they don’t have that outlet, you may never know, they just don’t show up again, right?
Uriah: They just disappear, exactly…
Tracel: Yeah.
Uriah: Right. And than the flip side of that coin is that with, uhh, a feedback form they can also give positive feedback, which is just always good to hear for-for the therapist, for sure.
Tracel: Right, cause sometimes you only hear if there’s a problem, so it’s nice for them to be able to give some positive feedback, as well.
Uriah: Right. Absolutely.
Tracel: So how does that look like? What-How would you-what is the process for that feedback form?
Uriah: So we implementing this- I would say about 6 months ago, it’s pretty simple to be honest. We have our virtual assistant, umm, send out a friendly e-mail around 4 or 5 days after the appointment…
Tracel: Mm-hmm.
Uriah: …And it’s just a nice e-mail that-that includes a link to the feedback form, so then they go to the website and fill out the form. Pretty-pretty straight forward.
Tracel: Right.
Uriah: Yeah, and then the truth is that a lot of people don’t fill it out, but we still do it. I think it’s a nice touch one way or another and then a small percentage will respond and I think it can absolutely help.
Tracel: Yeah, so even if someone is not filling it up, they probably are acknowledging, at least, to themselves that they received some contact from you, that you obviously care or you wouldn’t have gone through the effort to-to…
Uriah: Definitely.
Tracel: … to send the e-mail to begin with…
Uriah: Definitely.
Tracel: … so at least it gives them a positive view, umm, from the experience so that’s good.
Uriah: I think so,
Tracel: That’s good.
Uriah: Yeah, yeah.
Tracel: So, umm, you must have some things in place then to make it a little easier, a little more automated on your end to send those out.
Uriah: Yes, for new listeners, of course this is a new podcast so (laughs) every one is a new listener.
Tracel: (laughs)
Uriah: We do love technology, and automation, and delegation, and all those fun things at The Productive Therapist. So, whenever possible I, uhh, will use software to automate things, yes?
Tracel: Right.
Uriah: I mean you could obviously do this with a piece of paper, you know…
Tracel: Yeah, yeah
Uriah: … (laughs) hand it to them on the way out of the session…
Tracel: old school, yup.
Uriah: … but then, you know, there’s just too many problems with that. So..
Tracel: Mm-hmm.
Uriah: So, yes we use something called WP Forms, which is actually a plug-in on our website that allows us to create really simple surveys, simple forms, and than we can send a link to them. And than, there’s a lot of tools like that out there too, a lot of people will like to use Google Forms, or another one is Jot Form.
Tracel: Mm-hmm.
Uriah: Those two in particular can be HIPAA-compliant, so that’s nice.
Tracel: Mm-hmm.
Uriah: And so, that-that just makes it really easy. And than there’s the seamless experience where they click the link and they’re going to the website. So, with any of those options you can embed that form on your website, pretty simple copy and paste, with a little code.
Tracel: That’s nice so they’re not going to a third-party website, they’re staying right on your website, which is nice.
Uriah: Exactly yeah. And for people who are interested, obviously we can’t show you, cause this is a podcast, but in the show notes we will include a link to the feedback form for my group practice, so you can take a look at that, feel free to steal the questions…
Tracel: (laughs)
Uriah: … We won’t go through all the questions here, but I do like to-I’ll mention that I like to keep it very short, because…
Tracel: Mm-hmm
Uriah: … people don’t generally like surveys, like we talked about before,…
Tracel: Mm-hmm
Uriah: …and than if it’s a long survey, it’s even a little bit more intimidating and people will just not do it.
Tracel: Right.
Uriah: Yeah, yeah.
Tracel: Short and sweet, that-that’s a good-good method.
Uriah: So this is something that I highly recommend and it can be easily outsourced. Right? So…
Tracel: Mm-hmm
Uriah: … you don’t have to do it you can have your, uhh, administrative assistant or virtual assistant do it.
Tracel: Mm-hmm
Uriah: And I would say if you want to learn more about practical client retention strategies, you can go ahead and check out the checklist we created for this very purpose, called very cleverly “The Client Retention Checklist”.
Uriah and Tracel: (laughs)
Uriah: So you can go to productivetherapist.com/free to download today.
Tracel: Great.
Uriah: Thanks for doing this with me Tracel, this was fun.
Tracel: Yeah! I enjoyed it.
Uriah: Thanks for listening everybody we will see you next time, bye.
