Online reviews matter a lot to healthcare practice success, especially for optometry. Over 90% of patients read their reviews online before selecting a healthcare provider, so these online testimonials help drive patients to your doorstep, create trust, and improve your reputation.
Some optometry clinics and healthcare centers buy Google 5 star reviews to boost their presence online and, most importantly, get more patients through Google reviews.
In this blog, we will explore some of the best, tried-and-tested strategies to get more positive reviews for an optometry practice. After reading this guide, you will understand why reviews are essential and how they can be effectively collected.
Top Proven Strategies To Boost Positive Reviews For Your Optometry Practice
Google reviews help clinics establish trust, secure a Google ranking based on SEO, and even encourage potential patients to visit your clinic. Here are some of the best and proven tips for your optometry practice:
1. Patient-Centric Experience
Any five-star review begins with the quality of the patient’s experience. Patients at your clinic will look for care, comfort, and attention to detail.
When your patients feel heard and cared for, they will be happier to leave reviews after their visits. The little things, like greeting patients by name, flexible appointment times, and minimizing wait times, can make all the difference to their experience with your clinic.
Pro Tip:
Train the staff to focus on patients’ satisfaction at every step. From the efficient front desk reception to knowledgeable opticians, the entire team must contribute to creating a warm experience that is above and beyond their expectations.
2. Incentivize Reviews But Ethically
There are various review platforms one can write on but Google is still the most powerful. The benefit of having a good Google review is that it enhances your online reputation, and you improve your local search ranking to be found by more potential patients.
How to Encourage Google Reviews:
- Ask In-person: Do not be scared to ask the smiling patients for a review. And many times, patients are more than happy to share their success stories when asked in the right way.
- Emails or SMS: Send follow-up emails or texts after appointments thanking them for their visit and asking them to leave some feedback. And, of course, make sure that the process is as easy as clicking a link.
3. Make It Easy for Patients to Leave Reviews
Patients will review only if the process is easy and direct. Hence, you must make sure the process of leaving Google reviews is not time consuming and confusing for patients.
How To Make The Process Easy:
- QR Code: Print a QR code on your business card or hang a QR code in the office that redirects them directly to the Google review page for you.
- Landing Page: Develop a simple landing page on your site that provides a straightforward link to your review sites. It must be mobile-friendly.
- Offer Guides: If patients don’t know how to leave a review, guide them through the process of posting a review on Google or another site using small guides.
4. Time Your Request
There is a good time to ask for a review. The ideal time to request an evaluation would be following a successful visit when the last visit was fresh in your patients’ minds.
When to Ask:
- Immediately after the Consultation: Right after an uneventful appointment or procedure is the most probable time a patient will be positive about the experience.
- Follow-Up Email: If you haven’t asked in person, then send a follow-up email some day or two later. Now you’re reminding him nicely without being too pushy.
Well, asking at the right time increases the chances of receiving an elaborative thought-provoking review.
5. Answer Existing Reviews
Engaging with reviews, both good and bad, shows that you care about their feedback. This is also how you build trust with prospective patients who read those reviews.
- Positive Reviews:
Thank patients for taking their time to share their experience. Sometimes just an acknowledgment like “We’re so glad you had a great experience” is enough.
- Negative Reviews:
Defuse negative feedback professionally and constructively. Apologize to the patient explaining that their experience did not meet your standards. Present a solution. It shows that you care and are committed to improving your practice and ensuring an excellent experience.
6. Offer Incentives
You can incentivize your existing patients in exchange for the positive Google reviews, but you have to do it in the right manner. You can’t make it seem like this is a bribe.
Ethical Motivation towards Leaving Feedback:
- Offer Discounts or Coupons: You can offer discounted services on future products for honest feedback.
- Patient Referral Programs: Introduce a program where patients referred others to your practice are rewarded. This, apart from driving new business, also encourages satisfied patients to refer to the practice.
Pro Tip:
Always focus on genuine, honest reviews. Incentives must be given to patients for their time and effort, not to skew their feedback.
7. Utilize Review Platforms Beyond Google
Though reviews on Google are of significance, do not forget the other avenues where your practice can be improved. Look beyond the review sites and remember that people look for reviews on Yelp, Healthgrades, even Facebook.
Where to Look:
- Healthcare-specific sites: Register and regularly review your practice on trusted sites like WebMD, Healthgrades, and Zocdoc.
- Social Media: Incentivize reviews on your practice’s Facebook page, targeting patients who may already be following you there.
Pro Tip:
Having more platforms where patients leave reviews will further secure your reputation as a reliable service on various channels. This ensures that your practice touches a wider range of patients.
8. Track and Measure Performance
Although improvement is inevitable with these strategies, you need to track your practice’s performance in terms of patient feedback and reviews.
Tools to Measure Success:
- Review Management Tools: Leverage the analytics in a service like Podium, Birdeye, or Google My Business to track reviews, ratings, and engagement over time.
- Set Goals: Whether it’s increasing your overall star rating or the number of reviews you get each month, putting in place measurable goals will help you stay on track.
Pro Tip:
Regular review of the data drawn from these platforms will reveal the improvement that needs to be addressed. This is the key to ensuring changes are realized to boost patient satisfaction through addressing trends-for example, repeated feedback on long wait times.
Conclusion
Positive reviews are paramount for an optometry practice, as they create confidence and can be a point of differentiation for you in the ever-growing healthcare market.
You can also buy Trustpilot Reviews to accelerate the process of establishing yourself as a credible, reliable, and trustworthy optometrist in your area.
So, what are you waiting for? Start applying these strategies into action and see how, in no time, your optometry practice, through real, positive reviews, acquires an incredible competitive edge.
