How this Treatment Coordinator Bonusing Flaw is Diminishing your Greatest Asset - Private Practice Quick Tips Edition

Click here: Learn More & Register for NPG Iconic ... The Greatest Leadership & Culture  Event Ever Created for Orthodontists  

Click here: Schedule an Online Consultation with our Podcast Host and Founder & CEO, of New Patient Group, Brian Wright

Thank you to our Sponsors

https://newpatientgroup.com

https://wrightchat.com

If your bonus plan pays for signatures today but ignores wins tomorrow, you’re training your team to abandon your best prospects. We pull back the curtain on a costly flaw hiding in many practices: same-day-only incentives that deflate morale, raise churn, and starve the pipeline. The fix isn’t more pressure at the money moment; it’s smarter, teamwide incentives that reward consistent follow-up and real conversion over time.

We start with the anxiety every owner knows: that hollow feeling when the pending list runs dry. Then we reframe the pending list as a core business asset—inventory you can shape with thoughtful systems. You’ll hear a real-world case from a practice where treatment coordinators loved new processes yet felt helpless, because their bonus vanished the second a patient walked out without signing. We show how today’s shoppers call five offices, visit three, and need a trust-rich journey across every touchpoint, from the first phone call to the clinical handoff.

Next, we map a practical playbook for turning prospects into starts: a steady cadence of calls, texts, emails, and short personalized videos; messages that evolve from education to objection-handling; and micro-commitments that lower friction, like reserving a start date or pre-approving financing. Then we connect process to pay. Instead of isolating the treatment coordinator, we propose a shared pool that rewards overall conversion within 30 to 60 days, with a smaller kicker for same-day signatures. Reception, clinical assistants, and digital intake all share in the outcome because they shape trust long before the contract appears.

By the end, you’ll have a clear blueprint: treat the pipeline like gold, coach the team to follow through with empathy and precision, and align incentives with behaviors that actually drive starts. Ready to replace guesswork with a system that compounds wins? Subscribe for future deep dives, share this with a colleague who needs a bonus reboot, and leave a quick review to tell us the one follow-up tactic you’re adopting this week.

🎙 Welcome to The Brian Wright Show —  a podcast that transforms the lives and businesses of ALL entrepreneurs but dedicated to doctors that own their own private practice ... This podcast is the hub for all things Brian Wright, New Patient Group, WrightChat and more. This station is for all #entrepreneurs but dedicated to #orthodontists #dentists and other doctors that own their own #privatepractice. From #leadership and #culture, to #marketing, #sales #hospitality and beyond! This is where #innovation meets #execution! Through our #podcast, #privatepracticesuccess tips, consulting and digital marketing services, speaking events and more .... This is the station that transforms the lives and businesses of every #entrepreneur and doctor that owns their own private practice! 

📲 Stay connected with New Patient Group:
🔹 Website: https://www.newpatientgroup.com
🔹 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/newpatientgroup/
🔹 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/newpatientgroup1
🔹 LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/newpatientgroup
🔹 TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@newpatientgroup

🎧 Follow The Brian Wright Show:
🔹 Podcast: https://bwshow.com/
🔹 Instagram: https:/

Transcript

The Bonus Flaw Exposed

SPEAKER_01 0:00

There is a flaw on how you are bonusing your sales force that is causing your most valuable asset to slowly diminish. This flaw is actually increasing your churn rate, having the opposite effect of what you intended and demoralizing your team at the exact same time. Today we're going to be talking about this flaw, how to correct it, how to look at it differently, and the impact it can have on creating happier team members that therefore perform better. So if you're ready, let's go.

Show Intro And Audience Focus

SPEAKER_00 0:30

Welcome to the Brian Wright Show, a podcast that transforms the lives and businesses of all entrepreneurs, but dedicated to doctors that own their own practice. And now your host is a husband, father of two, founder and CEO of New Patient Group in Wright Chat, and a business consultant and speaker for Invisalign, Orthopy, and others, Brian Wright.

The Dread Of An Empty Pipeline

Two Topics And A Case Study

Why Most Sales Happen Later

The Pending List As Core Asset

Same-Day Bonus Pitfalls

Teamwide Impact On Conversions

Incentivize Follow-Up Excellence

Action Items And Closing

SPEAKER_01 0:59

Welcome inside the studio, everybody. Hope you are doing great and welcome into another Quick Tips edition. One of the worst feelings you can possibly imagine. Right now, I'm talking about for businesses outside of the healthcare space that are selling anything. I don't care what it is, product, service, whatever it may be, all the above. One of the worst feelings in the world is to look at your list of prospects and it be dried up, or just have prospects that you know are cold. You know you're not going to get a hold of them. Doesn't mean that you shouldn't still try, but you know you're not going to get a hold of them. It is a really horrible feeling because that's when you're begging for online submissions. You're begging for online inquiries. Where's that next sales call gonna come from? It's a really, really awful feeling that I'm gonna be talking about more here in just a minute, around why prospects and why your pending list is one of the greatest assets you could possibly have. We're also gonna be diving into, you know, today's a really, really two main topics. And I'm excited about it because I plan on doing they're really good precursors to a lot more future in-depth episodes that we're gonna do around looking at bonusing differently, why you need to do it differently, why a lot of the bonus systems you have out there are actually demoralizing your team, just like the one today. Because right now I'm currently working with a practice specifically with their treatment coordinators, and the coaching's going great. They're very coachable. We've moved the needle, things are going better. They're enjoying the new processes, the digital workflow, the exam process. They're enjoying all of it. But they cornered me one day after the training. They're like, dude, man, the training's been great. You know, we built a lot of trust together. So we trust to tell you this. Please talk to the doctors, the office managers around our bonus, our bonus plan and how it's demoralizing us. And we feel helpless because the bonus plan, we don't really feel like we have a lot of control over for a lot of different reasons. And we know we're not working as hard as we otherwise could on what you have taught us is one of our most valuable assets. And that valuable asset is what I started off with is the pending list. See, the majority, and I'm gonna I'm gonna dive into more of this today, but especially on these future more in-depth episodes. See, the the majority of all of your starts out there, your patient sign contracts or whatever industry you're in, the majority of them are never gonna come there in the moment for all kinds of reasons. And as people shop more than ever before, the same day sign contracts, you have to look at it very differently. So, the the flaw that this practice has is the bonus system, which I'm gonna talk about. And your most valuable asset, I think all of you, if you take anything away from today, I actually think this is the most important thing because the reason they're bonusing improperly is because they're not looking at what I'm about to say is the greatest asset, and that is having a pipeline full of prospects, whether that be warm prospects, hot prospects. Well, in your world out there, a lot of you ignore the pending list. You have this attitude of, well, if they're interested, they'll call us back. And it's so not true. And in this case, because the bonus system, it's only it's only bonusing the treatment coordinators on same-day signed contracts. So if you know, if mom's in there with little kid and they don't sign right then or by the end of the day, there is no bonus system anymore. So what the or what the treatment coordinators are telling me is Brian, we just don't feel motivated to get into the pending list. We know we should, but we just feel helpless and we just don't do the job and work as hard as we know that we're capable of, and the results aren't as good as we know that we're capable of. And everybody, if you look at this and you say, okay, we're gonna bonus on a same day start, a same-day sign contract, I'm not saying that you shouldn't try to get the signature now. I mean, if they can sign now and you can push a little in the right way without being salesy about it, that absolutely is the route to go because it saves you so much time down the road chasing people down. And once they're out your door, there's a lot of control that you lose. So it's not that I'm sitting here saying that you shouldn't have an incentive plan, you shouldn't have a bonus plan that incentivizes treatment coordinators to try to get that contract signed today. Of course you should. A couple mindset shifts there, though, is that what you need to understand in today's economy where people are calling at least five practices, they're going into at least three, the treatment coordinator, if that's the only team member that you are bonusing for a same day start, a same day signed contract, it means you aren't looking at it right. Meaning that your entire team plays just as big of a role as a treatment coordinator, such as your receptionist. The new patient phone call plays just as big of a role on a same-day signed contract. A same day signed contract really is a reflection on how the interaction via every chapter of that book leading up to you presenting money is going. Any team member that's involved in that, it's a reflection on how much of a high-level process do we have to get them to sign the same day. So if you're just looking at the treatment coordinator, is the person in charge of that, the mindset has to change. That is a five-year ago, 10 year ago, something the inside the industry consultants still teach. It's just outdated. The mindset has to be it's everybody. And yes, that also means your clinical assistants. And you may be thinking, especially if this is your first episode, you're new to the show, and you're not a client of new patient group, you may be thinking, Brian, what the hell are you talking about? How does my clinical assistants who have no interaction with the new patient, you know, control over a same-day signed contract? Well, that's going to be a podcast for another time that's really going to get your mind thinking because they absolutely play a part. But beyond that incentive, we've got to have incentive plans, incentive plans, bonus plans in place for people to drive to dive into what your greatest asset is, or one of them is that pending list. And these treatment coordinators, even though they know they should be, they do not feel incentivized to get into that pending list. So if people walk today and they don't sign today, the treatment coordinators are like, eh, you know, there goes my there goes my bonus plan. When the majority, like I said, the majority of your sales, your patient signed contracts will always come from your pending list. And and this is especially more and more true, the more people are shopping, the more people are tight. You know, the economy is better today than it was, but it's still not great. Inflation is better today than it was, but it's still not great. And so the tighter people are with money, the more they shop. Which means the more all of your systems and interactions have to be refined and improved. Right? So we've got to incentivize them, equally or even greater, to get into the pending list and remain consistent, hunting these people down, emailing, texting, calling, sending personalized videos. Right? And doing things in the pending list that the other three or four opinions they went to aren't. Because that's how you're gonna win. This mindset of, well, if they're interested, they'll call back. As I couldn't be further from the truth. Your treatment coordinators have to be trained how to interact with the pending list, and they've got to be bonused to want to get into that pending list. It is so critically important. So a quick review: your greatest asset or one of is having a pending list. I mean, can you imagine, like I said in the beginning, can you imagine diving into a pending list that's empty? That's a horrible feeling, everybody. Right? So having that pending list is a great thing. It's a great thing. Now, incentivizing them for a same-based signed contract, nothing wrong with that as well. But your whole team, again, is a part of that. If you're not looking at it that way, you don't understand this new economy and how an orthodontic practice and for that matter any other type of practice or business needs to be run. It's a full team impact. So the action items today. Let's incentivize your sales force, your treatment coordinators, your receptionists for overall sales, for overall signed contracts rather than just the same day signed contracts. Like I said, there's nothing wrong with the same day signed contract and bonus for that, but we've got to go beyond and bonus for conversion, bonus for starts. So you've got to incentivize your team to want to follow up with prospects and remain consistent with their outbound communication, as that is the only way you are gonna turn this great asset, your pipeline, into signed contracts. All right, we've got to look at all those things differently. Hope you enjoyed today's quick tip episode. As always, give this a thumbs up, make some comments on YouTube for a share with friends, colleagues, anybody wanting to improve and transform life, career, andor business. If you're listening on the audio experience channels out there, hey there to you too. And as always, please write us a five star review on whatever outlet you are listening to. And until next time, see everybody soon.