Getting eye tests booked in a quiet week from your own list

3 days ago
3 min read

Updated: 2 days ago

Introduction

An optical practice with empty test slots on a Wednesday is not usually short of potential patients. It is short of patients who have been reminded. The practice list contains hundreds of people who are overdue, meant to come back, and simply have not thought about it since the last appointment.

That makes a quiet week a recall failure rather than an advertising opportunity. Spending on new patient acquisition while the existing list goes uncontacted is expensive and backwards.

The fastest fill for next week is a phone and a list of overdue names.

Getting eye tests booked in a quiet week starts with the recall list

The list is the asset and most practices work it far too gently.

Pull everybody past their recall date. Sorted by how overdue they are, with the most recent first — those convert best. Somebody three months overdue is far easier to book than somebody three years overdue.

Use more than one channel. A text, then an email, then a call for the ones who have not responded. A single reminder catches a fraction of the people a sequence does. Leave a few days between each.

Telephone the long-overdue ones. Anybody two years past due needs a conversation, not another automated message they have already ignored twice. A person on the phone changes the response rate entirely.

Make the reason to come specific

"You are due a test" is a weak prompt for something people find easy to defer.

Say what has changed since last time. New equipment, retinal imaging, a longer appointment. A reason that is new gets attention where a due date does not. Keep it to one sentence.

Name the health element, not just the prescription. An eye test detects conditions people care about avoiding. That is a stronger motivation than blurred vision. Say it plainly and without alarm.

Mention their own history. A patient whose prescription changed noticeably last time has a concrete reason to return, and referring to it shows a record was kept.

Fill the specific gaps rather than the week

Empty slots are not evenly distributed and should not be treated as though they were.

Look at which slots are actually empty. Weekday mornings and early afternoons in most practices. Those are the ones to offer. Do not advertise slots you do not have.

Offer the quiet slots to the people who can take them. Retired patients, shift workers, parents during school hours. Segment the list by who is free when. The data is already on the record.

Keep a short-notice list. Patients happy to come in at a day's notice fill cancellations that otherwise earn nothing.

Use the people already in the practice

The dispensing floor is a source of test bookings.

Book the next test at collection. When somebody picks up spectacles, book their recall there and then. It costs a sentence and it converts far better than a reminder in two years.

Ask about the household. Partners and children of existing patients are the easiest new registrations available, and most practices never ask.

Contact patients who bought elsewhere. Somebody who tested with you and dispensed elsewhere is still on your list and still needs testing.

Conclusion

Treat a quiet week as a recall problem and work the list before spending anything: pull everybody past their recall date, most recently overdue first, and use a sequence of text, email and then a phone call rather than a single reminder.

Give a specific reason to return — new equipment, the health check, or a change in their own prescription last time — and match the empty slots to the patients who can actually take them, since weekday mornings need retired patients and shift workers rather than a general offer. Book the next recall when spectacles are collected, ask every patient about their household, and keep a short-notice list for cancellations.