To Tell the Tooth

There’s two things you can do when no one wants to hear what you have to say: shut up or change the subject.

Wykle Research went for the second option and cut its new customer acquisition costs by one-third. The Carson City, NV-based company – a manufacturer and marketer of amalgam, the silvery stuff dentists use in fillings – was having little luck with its outbound telemarketing program until it realized dentists prefer to talk about their practices and dentistry procedures rather than humdrum products like amalgam.

“It’s a mature product that hasn’t changed significantly since the 1960s,” says Jake Moebius, general manager at Wykle. “The biggest change for us was to stop focusingon what we do and instead focus on what the dentist does. For 12 years we used to send out lots of samples and talk to lots of gatekeepers. Now we collect information for our database by asking dentists what they do.”

Unlike most of its competitors – which market in print catalogs and online – Wykle uses outbound telemarketing as a staple of its marketing program. Three years ago, the company began significantly improving that strategy by shifting the focus away from overt sales calls to a one-to-one approach. This allowed it to reduce the number of stations at its customer interaction center from 23 to eight, while at the same time realizing on average an over 20% per rep new account increase. Acquisition costs dropped from $600 to $400 per customer.

Wykle is probably the only supplier that speaks with dentists directly, notes Michael Brown, president of Austin, TX-based Business Marketing Consultants, which helped Wykle revise its phone strategy and retrain its telereps.

Moebius says Wykle controls between an 8% and 10% share of the amalgam market. Amalgam is used for about half of the estimated 30 million tooth fillings done annually. The company maintains a database with information on 120,000 dentist practices nationwide. Purchasing histories and survey data are analyzed to select and contact about 8,000 practices by phone annually.

The supplier takes a soft sell approach to cultivate long-term relationships rather than going for an immediate sale to potentially less loyal customers who comparison shop for the best prices. Wykle targets the top tier of the market, seeking orders from dental practices that spend $500 to $600 annually on amalgam. It suppresses outbound calls to dental practices likely to spend less.

It often takes several attempts for reps dialing manually to reach a dentist. When a call gets through, the rep’s challenge is to keep dentists talking by asking open-ended questions specific to their practice and their procedures.

Telereps make suggestions to dentists to place orders or accept free samples, but their primary objective is to gather data.

“We get the kind of information by phone like one would get by standing there and observing the practice,” says Moebius, “like head counts, the roles people play in a particular practice, the number of chairs and procedures done in them.”

During calls lasting an average of 1.75 minutes, phone reps slip in survey questions and inquire about any recent problems, concerns or changes at the practice. Professional jargon like “anatomical restoration” is included in scripts to learn how much amalgam or alternative materials are used.

Buying patterns are identified with the data. Some dentists buy amalgam as a commodity, while others behave like speculators and buy large quantities because the silver it contains is subject to wide price fluctuations.

Database information is used to customize phone dialogues. For example, says Moebius, phone reps may inquire about how a dentist resolved a previously self-identified problem. Data is also used to encourage dentists to disclose additional information about changes mentioned by the dentist, such as a new partner joining the practice.

Wykle tracks sales performance, but monitors reps to gage their success at engaging a dentist in a clinical discussion. Moebius says it takes about five contacts by phone to achieve a 50% conversion rate when prospecting for a new customer. “Most of our calls,” he says, “don’t have a specific revenue goal.”