How Often Should a Dental or Chiropractic Office Update Their On-Hold Messages?

Since we specialize in dental and chiropractic on-hold recordings, I am often asked how many updates I'd recommend for these types of practices. The short answer - any medical office should get a minimum of 3 recordings per year.

Now, I understand that medical practices don't have that many changes going on, and may not run promotions or sales like other types of business do, but there are other reasons to update your on-hold recording:

Changes happen more often than you think. Even a dental office has staff changes which can be promoted, welcoming a new staff member or associate. New services are offered periodically, such as teeth whitening. For chiropractors, there's always new technology, such as decompression, which is hot right now.

The script should be updated to be more effective. Even if nothing has changed in the practice, the script should be edited and reworded so it sounds new. There's no reason to promote every aspect of the practice on one recording - use the updates to emphasize different things at different times.

Holiday recording. Everyone loves those Christmas and "Holiday" (for more PC people) on-hold messages!

Change that music. Something as simple as updating the background music can make a difference.

While 3 recording per year is a good starting point, many of our clients really utilize their on-hold recordings as a big part of their marketing - many do monthly or bi-monthly updates and have great results. Patients inquire about their services more, and they get lots of great feedback. Remember, it's way less expensive to keep a patient coming back than to get a new one, and that's where on-hold advertising can be powerful.