james, Author at The McAnally Selling System

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So far james has created 3065 blog entries.

Questions for Building Similarity With Patients

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

What questions build similarity with a patient during the exam? Weave them in while you work, and write the answers down. Where are you from originally? Almost always something similar or interesting falls out. How did you come to live where you are now? There is always a story. Do you have family, children, grandchildren? They will tell you, and you will find common ground, oh, I have that many kids too. If they work, ask what kind of work, and share a bit of yours. And do not skip this one: do you have any pets? For plenty of people, [...]

Questions for Building Similarity With Patientsjames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

What Technology You Need for Implant Case Presentation

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

What technology do I actually need to present big implant cases? Keep it simple and buy only what helps the patient see. You need digital photos so you can manipulate images and build a real report for the case presentation. A panoramic film, or a cone beam if your cases call for it, lets you show the patient their right side, left side, top and bottom, and they get it instantly. Add a large screen so everyone in the room sees the same thing, and a way to project those photos, PowerPoint or Keynote, it does not matter. A digital smile [...]

What Technology You Need for Implant Case Presentationjames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

How First Purchase Amount Affects Patient Spending

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Does the first fee a patient pays affect how much they will spend later? Yes, and the retail world has the data to prove it. The size of someone's first purchase sets the ceiling for what they will spend after. Make that first purchase tiny and the next ones stay small. Make the first purchase substantial and the additional spending climbs to match it. That is exactly why I do not want your diagnostic exam priced like an afterthought. A 150 dollar exam anchors the patient to small numbers, and then you are fighting that anchor the whole way through the [...]

How First Purchase Amount Affects Patient Spendingjames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Patient Compliance: Why Reasons Get You a Yes

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Why does giving patients a reason make them more likely to say yes? Give a patient a reason and your odds of a yes jump, even when the reason is thin. There is a famous copy machine study where people let a stranger cut the line far more often once the stranger added the word because, regardless of how weak the actual reason was. The word itself carries weight. I am not telling you to manufacture nonsense. I am telling you that humans are wired to comply when a request comes attached to a justification. So in every step where you [...]

Patient Compliance: Why Reasons Get You a Yesjames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

The Cost of Skipping Case Presentation Steps With Patients

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Why is it a mistake to jump straight to case presentation with existing patients? Because you are guessing at what they know, and you are usually wrong. With patients who have been around a while, the temptation is to skip the early steps and go straight to presenting the case. That is how good dentists bomb out. The patient has forgotten the specifics, their clinical picture may have shifted, and you walk in talking like they remember a conversation from two years ago. They do not. Skipping steps with a familiar patient makes no more sense than skipping the exam. Run [...]

The Cost of Skipping Case Presentation Steps With Patientsjames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Preparing Patients for Cost Before You Quote a Fee

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Why do I need to prepare patients for cost before the fee conversation? Because an unprepared patient hears a big number as an ambush, and an ambushed patient says no. By the time you discuss fees, the patient should already sense that real treatment carries real cost. You build that across the whole process, not in one panicked sentence at the end. Every visit gives you a chance to seed it, to hint at the scope, to soften the eventual number so it lands as expected rather than shocking. The dentists who skip this are the ones who watch faces fall [...]

Preparing Patients for Cost Before You Quote a Feejames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

How Difficult Patient Personalities Affect Your Fees

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

How should difficult patient personalities affect my treatment fees? They should affect them directly, and you need to read this at the exam, not three appointments in. Not every patient is easy. Some have difficult personalities, and a few have extremely difficult ones. The patient who talks through every visit, needs constant bathroom breaks, has postural issues that make the chair time miserable, can only come one day a week at one odd hour, all of that eats your schedule. Anything that takes more of your time has to show up in the fee. Here is the trap. If you do [...]

How Difficult Patient Personalities Affect Your Feesjames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Fee Framing: Prevent Sticker Shock in Dentistry

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

What is fee framing in a dental case presentation? Fee framing is giving the patient a realistic range, low end to high end, before you ever present the actual treatment plan and number. It is one of the most important guardrails against financial surprise, and skipping it is how dentists get ambushed by sticker shock at the worst possible moment. You do not pull the range out of thin air. You base it on reality. Tell the patient that based on other patients you have seen and treated with similar problems, care can range from this to this. Then pause. Let [...]

Fee Framing: Prevent Sticker Shock in Dentistryjames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Patient Screening Before a Big Case Exam

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

What screening should happen before a big case exam? A lot, and if you are doing it right the patient has been qualified several times before they ever sit in your exam chair. The information packet screens first, and fee information may have gone out in it. Any consultation involves an application that both qualifies them and motivates them on what they stand to lose. Fee framing happens if they ask. So by the time someone arrives for the full diagnostic exam, they have already been filtered, paid a meaningful exam fee that signals seriousness, and committed something. That layering is [...]

Patient Screening Before a Big Case Examjames2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Single Patient Consultation: Who Should Attend?

james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

Should single patients with no spouse bring someone to a big case consultation? Yes, and most dentists skip this entirely. A patient with no spouse and no partner still has people in their life who can blow up a case the moment they hear the fee. A friend, a sibling, an adult child. If that person is not in the room when the value gets built, they only hear the number later, out of context, and the deal dies. So ask it plainly. Is there anyone who has veto power over you doing a good thing for yourself? No? Then is [...]

Single Patient Consultation: Who Should Attend?james2026-06-16T00:00:00-04:00

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