The secret to achieving great referral rates: five-star service

‘We've been asked by a lot of people how we've grown so quickly, and the answer is really simple … we've aligned the entire organisation around one mission: to provide the best customer service possible. Internally, we call this our WOW philosophy.’ (Tony Hsieh, Zappos)

There are three simple rules I live by that will encourage referrals from your existing patients:

Before we consider developing a systemised new referral process, it goes without saying that you need to have excellent clinical skills in facial aesthetics as a starting point. You need to deliver the ‘Wow’ service, achieve exceptional results and leave the patient in a better place than they started. All of this, combined with the right culture and environment, will result in referrals.

Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, once described great customer service as follows: ‘We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It's our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a little bit better’ (Greathouse, 2013).