Dental marketingHome / Services / Patient reactivation
AI reactivation · Text · WhatsApp · Email
The cheapest patients you'll get this year are already in your software.
Ten thousand records sitting in your practice management system. They know you, they've paid you before, and most of them haven't heard from you in two years. We turn that list into booked appointments — with automated text, WhatsApp and email, and an offer worth opening.
Why nobody does it
It's not that practices don't know. It's that nobody owns it.
Reception is busy with today's patients. The recall function in your software chases check-ups and nothing else. And the list is intimidating — nobody wants to be the one who texts 10,— people and gets it wrong.
So it sits there, quietly worth more than any ad campaign you'll run this year.
- Patients who moved away, or to the practice with the easier parking
- Treatment plans discussed, quoted, and never followed up
- Consultations attended where the patient said "let me think"
- Hygiene patients who quietly stopped coming in 2021
- People who'd say yes to whitening if anyone had ever offered it
- Old enquiries who never booked and were never contacted again
The numbers
What is your database actually worth?
Start with a channel, then adjust every input using your own lawful campaign records. The defaults are illustrative assumptions, not verified typical performance.
Your list
How the message performs
What it's worth
An illustrative model, not a forecast. Repeat campaign performance can rise or fall. Treatment value is not profit: include clinical costs, fees, message costs and other relevant expenses before assessing the business case.
Market standards
What each channel actually does.
Everyone quotes email open rates. Text and WhatsApp are read by almost everyone — the question is whether they reply, and that comes down to the offer.
| Channel | Read | Respond | Cost each | Best used for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Text (SMS) | 90–98% | 4–12% | 3–5p | The opening message. Short, personal, one offer, one reply instruction. Nothing else gets read as reliably. |
| 85–95% | 8–20% | 4–8p | Conversations. Patients reply with questions rather than clicking, and you can send a brochure in the same thread. | |
| 25–45% | 2–6% | Near zero | Detail and repetition. Room for before-and-afters, prices and finance, and cheap enough to run every month. | |
| All three, sequenced | Highest | 12–25% | Mixed | How we actually run it. Text opens, WhatsApp converses, email carries the detail — across six weeks, not one blast. |
These ranges are illustrative assumptions, not verified benchmarks. Measure response, booking, attendance and collected revenue for your own campaigns.
Who to message
One message to 10,— people is a waste of 10,— messages.
We split the list first. Each group gets a different message and a different offer, because the reason they stopped coming isn't the same.
Lapsed 12–24 months
Life got in the way. No bad feeling, they just never rebooked. The biggest group and the easiest win.
Offer: complimentary check-up and hygiene assessmentLapsed 2 years or more
May have registered elsewhere. Needs a reason to come back, not just a reminder that they're overdue.
Offer: free consultation plus complimentary whitening on treatmentTreatment plan never started
They were quoted for work and never went ahead. Usually cost, sometimes fear, occasionally nobody followed up.
Offer: free review of the plan, with finance options explainedConsultation attended, not accepted
The most valuable group on the list. They sat in the chair, heard the price and said they'd think about it.
Offer: a call from the treatment coordinator, no obligationHygiene lapsed
Reliable revenue that quietly stopped. Often just needs an easy way to rebook without ringing.
Offer: book online in two taps, plus a plan optionOld enquiries who never booked
People who asked about implants or aligners months ago and were contacted once. Not patients yet — but they raised their hand.
Offer: free smile assessment, current pricesThe offer
This part is yours, and it decides everything.
We can write the perfect message. If there's no reason to reply, nobody replies. The offer doesn't have to cost you much — it has to lower the barrier to walking back through the door.
- Free consultation or smile assessment. Costs you a slot, not treatment. Highest response of anything we run.
- Complimentary whitening with treatment. High perceived value, modest actual cost, and it upgrades the case rather than discounting it.
- Free hygiene assessment for returning patients. Gets them in the chair, where everything else gets discussed.
- Existing patient rate held for 30 days. Rewards loyalty without cutting your list price permanently.
- A free review of an old treatment plan. Quietly the highest-converting offer on the list.
- Simply asking. "We noticed we haven't seen you since 2023 — is everything alright?" outperforms most discounts.
- Percentage off implants or aligners. Trains patients to wait for a sale and devalues the treatment.
- Anything with a fake deadline. Patients see through it, and pressure selling sits badly with professional guidance.
- Free consultations that aren't free. If there's a scan fee, say so in the message. Nothing kills trust faster.
- Offers your reception hasn't been told about. The patient rings, nobody knows what they mean, the offer dies.
- One offer for the whole list. A lapsed hygiene patient and an unconverted implant consultation need different things.
- Discounting the treatment you actually want to sell. Add value instead — whitening, retainers, a longer appointment.
How it runs
Six weeks, not one blast.
Sending 10,— messages on a Monday means 200 replies your reception can't handle by Tuesday. We release the list in waves, matched to the appointments you can actually offer.
- Week 0Data clean and segmentus
Export from your practice software, remove duplicates, bad numbers, deceased records, opt-outs and anyone already booked. Split into the six segments.
- Week 0Offer and capacity agreedyou
You confirm the offer per segment and how many extra appointments a week you can genuinely take. That number sets the size of each wave.
- Week 1Wave one — textus
The first segment only. Short message, one offer, reply to book. We watch the response rate before anything else goes out.
- Week 1–2Replies handledyou
Your team answers within the hour, using the script we've written. Everything logged in the CRM against the segment it came from.
- Week 2WhatsApp follow-upus
To everyone who read and didn't reply. Conversational, answers the obvious questions, brochure attached.
- Week 3Email with the detailus
Before-and-afters, prices, finance and the offer again. Cheap enough to send to everyone still on the list.
- Week 4–5Remaining wavesus
Next segments released, with the message adjusted for what worked in wave one. This is why we don't send it all at once.
- Week 6Last call and attendance sequenceus
Final message to non-responders, plus reminders and directions for everyone booked — free appointments no-show more than paid ones.
- OngoingIt becomes automaticus
Once the campaign's run, the rules stay on: anyone hitting 12 months since their last visit gets the sequence automatically, forever.
What we do
- Export and clean the data from your practice software
- Segment the list and write a message per segment
- Set up the text, WhatsApp and email platforms
- Write the reply script for your reception team
- Release the list in waves and monitor response daily
- Handle opt-outs, bounces and data hygiene throughout
- Report on bookings, attendance and treatment value by segment
- Leave the automation running so it never needs doing again
What you do
- Give us access to the patient list, or an export
- Decide the offer for each segment — the part only you can do
- Tell us honestly how many extra appointments a week you can take
- Brief reception so nobody is surprised by the offer
- Answer replies within the hour during practice hours
- Hold appointment slots open for the campaign
- Record outcomes so we know which segment paid
Done properly
You're messaging patients about health. The rules are stricter.
How we keep you on the right side of it
Existing patient records do not automatically permit marketing. Check consent or every applicable soft opt-in condition, and assess any health-data processing separately. Both the practice and agency have responsibilities.
- Every message carries a clear, working opt-out, and opt-outs are honoured immediately and permanently
- Clinical details never appear in a marketing message — no treatment names against a patient record in the messaging platform
- Records suppressed where consent is absent, unclear, or was previously withdrawn
- Deceased and moved-away records removed at the data clean, before anything sends
- Separate handling for email and messaging — one opt-out doesn't automatically cover the other
- A data processing agreement between us, with the export deleted at the end of the campaign
- Offers worded so they can't be read as misleading or as pressure selling
We're a marketing agency, not your data protection or regulatory adviser. Your practice remains responsible for its UK GDPR and PECR obligations and for professional guidance on advertising. We'd always have your compliance lead approve the messages and the offer before the first wave goes out — and we build the campaign expecting that review.
Prices
Priced on list size, published like everything else.
Message costs are paid by you directly to the platform — usually 3–8p each. We don't mark them up.
| Service | Price |
|---|---|
| Reactivation campaign — up to 3,— recordsData clean, segmentation, messages written, platforms set up, waves released and managed, reporting by segment. | Quoteone-off |
| Up to 10,— recordsAs above, with six segments and a six-week wave schedule. | Quoteone-off |
| Over 10,— records or multi-siteLarger lists, or several practices each with their own list and offer. | Quotefrom |
| Ongoing recall automationThe rules stay on permanently — anyone reaching 12 months since their last visit enters the sequence automatically. Monitored and adjusted monthly. | Quoteper month |
| WhatsApp path from advert to booking setupBusiness account and verification, templates written and approved, opt-in wording and auto-replies. One-off, if you don't already have it. | Quoteone-off |
| Data health checkWe look at your export and tell you how much of the list is genuinely usable, before you commit to anything. | £0free |
Straight answers
What practices ask before running this.
Won't patients be annoyed?
Very few, in our experience, if the message sounds like it came from their dental practice rather than a marketing department. Expect a small number of opt-outs — that's healthy, and it cleans your list. The bigger risk is a message that reads like spam, which is why they're written properly and sent from your practice name.
How many appointments should we expect?
Use the calculator above, then halve it if your list has never been contacted and the data is old. We'd rather you were surprised upwards. We'll give you a proper range after the free data health check.
Can we do it without an offer?
An offer is optional. Test clear, respectful wording with appropriate permissions. A free consultation still uses staff and clinical capacity; response improvement cannot be assumed.
What if we can't handle the volume?
Then we send less. Tell us how many extra appointments a week you can genuinely take and we size the waves to that. Filling a diary you can't service damages the practice more than doing nothing.
Does it work more than once?
Yes, but the first campaign is always the strongest — you're harvesting years of neglect in one go. After that, the ongoing automation catches people as they lapse, which is steadier and much less dramatic.
Will this work with our practice software?
We work with exports from Dentally, Carestack, Agilio, Pearl, Dentrix and Curve among others. If your system can produce a CSV of patient records, we can work with it.
Who sends the messages — you or us?
They go from your practice name and your number, through a platform in your account. Replies come to your team. We build it and run the schedule; the patient relationship stays entirely yours.
Free
Send us an export. We'll tell you what's really in there.
How many records are contactable, how many have lapsed and for how long, and which segments are worth the most. No charge, and no obligation to run anything — most practices find the data health check useful on its own.
Sitting on a patient list?
Usually the cheapest patients a practice will find all year. Tell us roughly how many patient records you hold.
Prefer to write? Send us a message instead.