Reducing Complaints
No aesthetic clinic owner wants to receive complaints. Not only can they be challenging to deal with and damaging to your reputation, they can lead to more serious claims against your business that result in legal action and financial implications.
So, to avoid complaints all together, we’ve put together our five top tips for keeping patients happy!
1. Focus on a specific patient demographic
When you’re first starting out in aesthetic medicine, your goal may be to attract as many new patients as possible. While this may lead to initial financial success, you may find it difficult to tailor treatments to suit such a wide variety of preferences.
For example, your training might have only covered treating women aged 40+ so achieving the lips desired by a 25-year-old may be more challenging. Equally, treating men requires specific training and understanding of typical goals, so without this you may not achieve satisfactory results.
If you dedicate all your energy, training and skill to one type of patient demographic then you’re more likely to achieve optimal results with minimal complaints.
2. Say no when necessary
Take time to really understand a patient’s motivations and expectations from treatment during their consultation. This meeting shouldn’t be rushed, and you should utilise careful listening skills to assess both their mental and physical suitability before agreeing to carry out any procedure.
If you don’t think the patient’s expectations are realistic, or that you’ll be able to meet them, then don’t be afraid to say ‘no’. You can gently advise patients why you don’t feel comfortable carrying out treatment and point them in the direction of further help or a practitioner who may be more appropriate.
3. Streamline the patient journey
From the moment a potential patient finds out about your clinic, you should take them on a journey where they feel understood, respected and supported.
Ensure you respond to enquiries in a timely and efficient manner, provide details of what they will expect when they visit your clinic, give them time to consider a range of treatment options, and provide them with reliable and effective aftercare guidance.
Being responsive and informative is absolutely essential in making your patients feel safe in your hands and, even if they are unhappy about something, they won’t be able to deny your excellent service and attention to detail.
Ask your friends and family to test your patient journey and share feedback on how you can make improvements!
4. Empower and train staff
Remember it’s not just you who is responsible for minimising complaints. If you employ staff, then you should introduce them to set protocols and guidance to follow for communicating with patients and what to do if there is an issue.
Ensuring you all adopt the same approach will help maintain high standards and collaborative problem-solving.
5. Seek feedback
Of course you want to ask patients for testimonials when they’ve had an excellent experience at your aesthetic clinic, but it’s also worth seeking feedback for the not-so-great moments too.
It may help you spot trends where your high standards are slipping or allow you to recognise areas for improvement.
Keep track of all feedback and share it with your team so they can make adjustments where necessary.
Get yourself covered in case of complaints!
Unfortunately, some complaints can escalate and can’t be resolved without intervention. That’s why having insurance in place is absolutely essential.
Here at Enhance Insurance, we’re experts at tailoring packages to suit all aesthetic practitioners so get in touch for a quote today.
