By Roger P. Levin, DDS

After you’ve been a practice leader for a number of years, it becomes clear that your best referral source is your patients. Getting patient referrals is an inexpensive and relatively easy way to ensure that your practice has a steady stream of new patients. So what will get patients raving about your practice? From the time a patient walks in the door until they leave, you have the opportunity to impress them and make them feel great. Dentistry is a service industry and how you treat patients is crucial to your success. But providing great customer service isn’t just simply about being nice. In fact, you should start to view customer service as a management system that has a process with clear objectives, which include increasing referrals from current patients.

The 2018 AAO annual meeting is just days away, and we’re so excited to see everyone in Washington D.C.! We’ve been hard at work on some new modules at Ortho2 headquarters and can’t wait to show you the new features that will help your practice run more efficiently. Not only will you be able to see these great features at the meeting, but you’ll also be able to take advantage of our special pricing during the show. Here’s what you can look forward to seeing at AAO booth 1701!

Have you ever had that moment of panic when you realize you’ve lost all your important data? Our phones, tablets, and computers have become integral pieces of technology that hold a lot of information and data from our lives. Think about it - how many times a day do you take pictures with your phone or save important data on your computer? We depend so much on technology, however, we forget that accidents happen and all of our files can disappear due to glitches or lost or stolen devices.

Updated 3/22/2018

Anyone who owns a computer knows at some time the device needs to update to stay on top of added securities and features. While it may seem like a hassle to update, and restart, it really is for our own benefit to be on the latest version of operating system (or app, or software, etc.).

This year was my first year attending the annual Ortho2 Users Group Meeting and it didn’t disappoint! As the Multimedia Marketing Coordinator at Ortho2, I’ve spent a lot of time working on UGM email campaigns, posting on our social channels, and helping design various materials leading up to the event. It was exciting to see the hard work behind the scenes put into action.

I had heard many stories about the meeting from UGM veterans, and I was eager to experience the meeting for myself. Since returning home to Iowa, my brain is still rushing from all the excitement. For those of you who haven’t experienced a UGM yet, here are my top five reasons why you should consider going.

What’s that social media app all the millennials in your office are talking about? You know, the one where you receive a picture and frantically try to absorb it all in 10 seconds before it disappears into oblivion? This handy app is called Snapchat and it’s become a bit of a phenomenon. Forget the old days of clogging up your text message inbox with random pictures you received from a friend, and forget about having to email photos because they’re too large to send via text…you can now send photos quickly and efficiently through Snapchat. And thankfully this app has made some improvements recently that now allow you more time for viewing before the picture or video disappears into that black void in cyberspace. To make snapping even more fun, Snapchat has a variety of filters, text options, drawing tools, and stickers that help you create funny and more personal photos.

By Roger P. Levin, DDS

The last two months of the year are always a whirlwind. You’re trying to tie up all the loose ends for this year while looking ahead to the next. It’s like living in two different time periods. And, on the top of that, with all the holiday-related activities going on at the end of the year, it can be tempting to put the practice on autopilot and pick up the pieces in January.

But you don’t want to do that because then you’ll end up getting off to a slow start.

Here are four things to do now that will jumpstart your January:

Dr. Stuart Robb takes pride in keeping his office running on schedule 100 percent of the time. His schedule is worked out so perfectly that he even advertises to prospective patients that each appointment will start on time. For years, Dr. Robb relied on ViewPoint to manage his schedule. Earlier this year, Robb Orthodontics made the transition to Edge Cloud, the second time his team has done so.

Dr. Robb first became familiar with Ortho2 ViewPoint while working at the University of Chicago. When he took over his current practice – offices in both Lake Forest and Highland Park, Illinois – he had been using two different practice management systems, but chose to continue with ViewPoint.

By Roger P. Levin, DDS

According to a recent AAO survey, 27% of ortho patients in North America are adults. This begs the question… what are you doing to turn parents into patients? Imagine if you could convert 1 in 4 parents to become patients. That would be a nice bump in starts.

While not all parents are candidates for ortho treatment, many in fact are. They’re seeing firsthand what a great job you’re doing with their child. If their teeth aren’t as straight as they would like, they’re thinking about what ortho treatment could do for their smile. 

So how do you get parents to take the next step?

By Roger P. Levin, DDS

More than three-quarters of orthodontists (78%) expect to increase practice production this year, according to a recent survey conducted by the Levin Group Data Center.

The past decade has been a tough one for many orthodontists, who have struggled with flat production in face of increased competition from: