Morgan J. McArthur, DVM for The Veterinarian,21 August 1998

If your customers were spending $200,000 for every transaction with you would you make a big effort to apprise them of everything that was happening on their case?

Maybe. Maybe not.

I spoke at a real estate conference the other day and discovered that realtors get recurring feedback from their customers that they don’t communicate enough. Specifically, their customers want more follow-up reports from their real estate professional.

So do yours.

When people bring us their problems, their questions and their animals because we are experts they expect to receive veterinary expertise for sure but they also want service. Think about that sentence: They expect a level of expertise but they want service. There is a difference.

Expertise is competence, plain and simple. Fix broken legs. Stop the itching. Diagnose the lameness. That, in most cases, is the easiest part for us because it’s what we’re trained to do and it’s where our interest is.

Continued business growth and success stems from how well you deliver service, however.

Service is the contact with the customer about the progress of the examination and diagnostic process. It’s how the surgery went or what complications can be expected and when certain things should happen. Service is realistic and regular appraisal of what is going on in a world that is often poorly understood by the animal owner. Service is communication and there can never be too much of it. They want it and they’re willing to pay more for it.

I once worked with a horse vet who was exceptional at following-up. His clients were amazed that he cared enough to ring them a few days after the exam, or the treatment, or the surgery. With a simple follow-up telephone call he accomplished three things: he caught problems when they were pimples (and simple), not abscesses (and messes); he elevated his stature to the ‘extraordinary’ category because no vet did this as consistently and as well as he did; and, as a result, he developed competition-proof bonding with his clientele.

The world economy is becoming increasingly service-driven. The difference between extraordinary and ordinary is just a little bit ‘extra’ and whether it’s in real estate or veterinary medicine, the cost of communicating more is low but the return is high. Can you afford not to follow up?

Comments (0)

Subscribe to this comment's feed