Eric White, O.D., reveals how this simple act begets a tremendous competitive advantage + unveils his own template

as I write this column, I am returning from a wonderful meeting at the Optometric Management Symposium in Orlando at the Yacht Club at Walt Disney World. I was pleasantly surprised at the first-class speakers—they were so relevant to what optometry stands for and how to improve the way we practice.

I was on a speaker panel moderated by Eyecare Business on how to survive and thrive over the next five years in practice. The panelists had great thoughts and ideas.

In this Practice Innovators column, I wanted to touch on one of the thoughts I presented on the panel as a competitive advantage—the Personal Thank-You Note.

The Note: Simple + Fast

It’s such a simple concept—but so important. This is something I’d like every private-practice optometrist to consider doing. I can tell you that the results are well worth the time spent.

At the end of each workday I send a personal thank-you note to each of my comprehensive eye exam patients. This may sound like a lot, but it takes only 15 minutes to send one to all my patients examined that day, and the return on investment is 1,000 times.

Let me share the details with you. In the memo of my personal email address I put “Personal Thank-You Note.” I have a template that I use, and I just cut and paste.

I have shared that template—in copy-able form—below so you have an example.

After my note’s opening “Thank you for coming into the office…” sentence, I also add in a personal statement about something the patient and I talked about, such as a planned vacation or something about their family. You want to make this personal. You want to make sure the patient knows this is from you and not a third party.

The personal thank-you note does a couple of important things:

1. Confirms Email Addresses. This lets me know if their email address is good. Internal marketing is so important nowadays. So, sending this thank-you note to their email address on file immediately tells me if the email is current. Emails are essential in communicating with our patients throughout the year.
2. Resolves Problems. If there is a problem with anything during their “WOW” experience at our practice, they will let me know, because this is a personal email between them and me. If there is an issue, I immediately pick up the phone and call them and resolve whatever problem they have had.
   This alone, right then, blows them away that I would take the time to call them. Remember: This is family, and we talk to family immediately.
3. Encourages an Online Review. Asking patients to rate my practice is so important today. I see this as a way to build my practice, and I am amazed at how well this works.
   In my practice, I ask every new patient how they found me, and inevitably they tell me that so-and-so referred them, but when they Yelped me the review was so unbelievable that they had to check me out for themselves. This is what you want.

In the end, one of the big benefits of my personal thank-you note is that I share my personal cell phone with each patient in case they need me.

No one ever takes advantage of this, but if they do need me they know that I am there for them—what a concept!

Having that personal touch makes us different from the chains, the online optical sellers, and most other practices out there. This is how we are going to survive and thrive. You might also consider this—you will be amazed at what the results will be.

—Eric White, O.D.

ERIC WHITE, O.D., is the owner of Complete Family Vision Care in San Diego. He is a consultant to many advisory boards and numerous professional optometric organizations. He has lectured across the country, and is a clinical investigator for several contact lens companies and has participated in over 375 clinical studies. He was named the AOA’s first National Young O.D. of the Year in 1995. And, Complete Family Vision Care was recently named the Transitions National Eyecare Practice of the Year and earned the Transitions Innovation Award.