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Review of DemandForce
(4 votes, average: 3.75 out of 5)
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DemandForce is everywhere these days. Events, Google Ads… almost all dentists have heard of them, but is there service worth a try?
Our Application
We signed up for DemandForce specifically for their patient review feature. We are interested in generating more reviews online to help boost up our Google ranking, and we liked their system. Basically, it works like this: you give them access to your practice management software and every time you check out a patient, they send an email to them saying thanks for visiting and requesting a review. The patient clicks the link in the email and is taken to a DemandForce page that has your logo, where they can rate their experience. About once a month, DemandForce updates it’s feed for Google and some of those reviews end up in Google’s Map pages.
This is the ONLY feature we were going to use with DemandForce (they have others, as outlined below).
How Did it Work?
To be honest, we didn’t give it much of a chance. A handful of emails were sent out. One review came in. Then we canceled. Why? Because in retrospect, we couldn’t justify paying for the entire service to only use one feature. They offered a discount since we couldn’t use everything, but it wasn’t enough for us to maintain service. That being said, I’m impressed by the level of customer service and the features that are available. Our customer service rep was great and they handled my requests quickly. The one review we had was negative and there was some erroneous information in it, so we requested it be removed by DemandForce (they maintain legitimacy by not allowing you to remove negative reviews, but you can “challenge” them based on factual inaccuracies and a few other items).
If you check the reviews other dentists have on Google Maps, you’ll find a majority of them are from DemandForce, so they can definitely help you get more reviews in Google. On the other hand, there are plenty of patients that believe it’s “staged” because the reviews are hosted on your personal “DemandForce page”… there’s not much you can do about that and there are always skeptics out there.
The bottom line: the review portion of the service worked.
Other Features
We weren’t able to utilize every feature because DemandForce wasn’t able to sync with our calendar. However, if you use a more common practice management software, they are able to do automatic appointment confirmations (by both email and text message), as well as birthday emails and a host of other features. Although we weren’t able to utilize them all, the list of features was impressive and the management side of the software was easy to use and understand. Had we been able to fully use it, we most likely would have kept our account.
The Verdict
All-in-all, DemandForce is popular for a reason. Good customer service and a good feature set that actually works when you need it to.
9:49 am
Demandforce looks slick, but if I can’t find a posted price I am not likely to look further. I looked high and low on the site, Facebook page, etc., and there was no hint of pricing terms, or much else, really. I know they want to get you to call or email them, but it just makes it seem like they’re hiding something.
1:52 pm
Thanks for the comment Rick. Last I checked, DemandForce had multiple service offerings, so printing a price may not be as it easy as it seems (for instance, we don’t publish the price of hiring us as a consultant for dental website development and marketing because much of what we do is custom and catered to the needs of the client).
Not trying to defend the tactic — I completely understand where you are coming from (and to my recollection, their services weren’t cheap, so you better take full advantage of everything they have to offer if you sign up).
3:33 pm
Hi Dr. Hendershot, I work at Demandforce in sales for South Texas Dentistry. We have a baseline price and adjustments are made based on the number of doctors and associated working at the location. Since our pricing is all inclusive this method works best. I am not sure what state you practice in but invite you to contact us and spend a few minutes with your territory rep. Pricing starts at $299 per month. We have nothing to hide but posting an online price can cause some confusion. I have yet to find a dentist posting fees on their website for crowns, scaling and fillings for the same reason. You can call me direct if you would like me to connect me with your sales rep. Regards.
Mike Jacobsen 415-296-6890
3:39 pm
Thanks for contributing that information Mike. Much appreciated!
Jared
2:58 pm
I agree, demand force is great for reviews and boosting google status. However, the reason i found your article is because i was looking for an alternative to demandforce. The website isn’t exactly user friendly. The features, such as appointment scheduling and confirming, would be amazing if anyone could figure out how to use them. Our office gets an email that states a patient has requested an appointment, but we cannot figure out how to respond to any of them. We search for a time (that we don’t really have to spare) and call damandforce for help. But in the end, we always end up just calling the patient or shooting them a personal email. This pretty much defeats the purpose of the online convenience. Do you know of any other programs like demand force that i could look into?
3:38 pm
Hi April, we use My Appointment Scheduler in our dental practice for confirming appointments and online booking. It can also do recall. It works with a couple of practice management systems, but not a lot of them. For us it has been very reliable with great support and at a low cost. I’ll try to write up a review in the coming days.
If anyone else has other suggestions, I would encourage a dialog.
Thanks!
Jared
1:15 pm
I’m a current DemandForce customer and I feel that Demandforce did not delivered all the things they said they would. Being a new business I was really depending on being seen on Google with the reviews I was generating on Demand Force. 6 months and 9 reviews later, my demand force reviews are nowhere to be found on google. As for generating new revenue, it has not done that 4 me either. NOT ONE PT CAME IN BASED ON THE SERVICE THAT WAS PROVIDED BY DEMAND FORCE. They don’t even send confirmations to new patients. The patient has to be an active, treating patient to get an e-mail or text message confirmation. I see demand force as a fancy e-mail text messaging appointment confirmation service for current active patient only. At $299 a month that’s not worth it to me. Lastly, I’m trying to cancel the service and they keep passing me form one person to another and don’t want to cancel my service but want me to continue to pay for it. That’s really BAD business for me. If you’re looking for someone to help grow your company this is NOT the service 4 you. If you have a lot of patients and want to offer them a fancy e-mail and text message service then Demand Force is great. That’s all it will do for you.
1:15 pm
We were offered a free 60 day trial and were sold on it as a scheduling and confirmation service. We tried to get out of it for 2 weeks after starting it. DemandForce takes your client’s information and gives it to Google so they can use it to boost their review system, trying to take over Yelp. What they’re doing is by passing the Yelp algorithm and completing the circle of obtaining client’s email, address, and phone number. By obtaining it they know they are dealing with a real client review. The only downfall, is once they collect the clients information, it’s Google’s to use anyway they want. We were not told this, as we want to keep our guests information private. They are also able to find out what service your client is receiving. When we tried to get rid of it, it was like a fly to fly paper. Not only that, they charged us the $299 for the first free trial month. While we were using it they were sending clients confirmation e-mails that didn’t even have appointments. I would say there are numerous other services that will do what they do for 10 times less. Please read their fine print.
4:12 pm
John and George,
I’m sorry to hear about your experiences. Thank you for posting your comments for others to see. Unfortunately, it appears to be a common issue with Demand Force. Hopefully your comments will help other dentists before they make their purchasing decisions.
5:39 pm
I am curious what issues with HIPPA might be created by handing over patient data to a marketing firm. Do they offer a business associate agreement (as required per HIPPA)? All I found on their website was this “You acknowledge that your use of the Service may involve the transmission of private information, including potentially personal health information, via unsecure means such as email.” which is not exactly reassuring.
4:22 pm
I don’t recall any HIPAA policies, but I would assume they do have that built in. Perhaps another DemandForce subscriber can answer that question for you.
9:53 am
Our dental office used Demand Force for over two years. After July reviews stopped being posted due to Google’s new terms. Demand Force seems to have no answer for solving this issue. As well, it is almost impossible to get out of a contract. They automatically renew without you knowing it. Then when you try to cancel them you are stuck till the contract date. This was never in their service agreement…only in fine print of terms and conditions buried on their website!
8:05 pm
I am a pediatric dentist in St. Louis and I signed up with Demandforce in May of 2011 during the AAPD meeting. Two months into the project we noticed what the Demandforce sale person had told us at the meeting is different than what the Demandforce program can actually perform. We finally got hold of Demandforce president, Rick Berry, and shared our frustration about his program and his staff. He made a lot of promises to me to correct the problem. At every turn we were given the following excuses: 1) nobody else has made any complaint about this feature, 2) this is just a glitch, 3) this has never happened before, 4) our office is the only one who has this problem, etc. etc. etc.. I gave Rick Berry and his company another chance and they failed over and over. Their customer service is very poor. They have different levels of customer service providers. We were getting different answers from different customer service providers to the same problem/question. We finally found out that the Level 1 providers have been with the company for no more than 6 months and they are WITHOUT any dental back ground. As the result they do not understand the operation of a dental office. They were either in the real estate or mortgage business before working for Demandforce. Once they were pushed hard and only then they agreed to push our questions and concerns to the level 2 customer providers. During my multiple phone conversations with Rick Berry, I kept asking him to make sure that his people do not tell us one thing when they can not deliver their promises. During this period of time I contacted 5 other dental offices in St. Louis who have been with the Demandforce for at least one year. None of them had anything good to say about Demandforce. I shared this information with Rick Berry, President of Demandforce, and he got very upset with me that I should not contact other dental offices and I should not talk to my colleagues. We could not believe what we were hearing. I know for fact that one of these dental offices has changed from Demandforce to a different company (Lighthouse 360) in December of 2011.
I just got back from Chicago Midwinter Dental meeting. I went to the Demandforce desk to listen to their sales people pitch to the other dentists. Once again, I was hearing things that I knew it was incorrect. With the exception of one of the sales rep. the other 6 sales rep. were with the company for less than 1 year. One of them was with the company for only 4 months and none of them had any dental background. Based on my past experiences, I was able to see through their sales pitch. The other dentists were not asking the right questions because these dentists were new to this kind of program. Once again, what the sales person was saying was different than what they can deliver. This was very disturbing to me to see that this company is taking advantage of my colleagues. So, I started to talk to my colleagues away from the Demandforce table about my office experience with the Demandforce. A sales person noticed this and next I know the company’s V.P. was following me to prevent me from talking with my colleagues. This V.P. called the security asking them to remove me from the exhibit floor so I can not talk to my other colleagues about Demandforce. My conversation with the other dentists was far away from the Demandforce table and security did not do anything about this matter. The V.P.’s complaint to the security was that I should not talk to the other dentists about my experience because they are going to lose potential clients. I found this V.P’s behavior unacceptable. FYI- During this meeting I met two dentists who were very unhappy about Demandforce company. So, I was not the only unhappy dentist with Demandforce as what Rick Berry or the V.P claims.
PLEASE FEEL FREE TO SHARE MY EXPERIENCE WITH THE OTHER DENTAL OFFICES. IT IS MY OPINION THAT THE DENTISTS SHOULD SHARE THEIR EXPERIENCES WITH THE OTHER DENTISTS DURING THIS KIND OF DENTAL MEETINGS. THANK YOU and TAKE CARE,
1:29 pm
Our front desk signed us up for a trial of Demand Force. I was not aware of it until $299 was taken from my credit card. Yes, during the “trial” you are billed $299 per month. If you do not bail by 60 days you enter an iron-clad 12-month contract at the same rate. (Due to taxes, that rate will soon be increasing). I was able to cancel before the 2 months passed but shortly after I cancelled, I began noticing negative reviews on a number of sites – such as Yellow Pages. I was chatting with a rep from Demand Force and noting my dismay at the recent spread of those negative reviews. She then boldly stated that Demand Force was responsible for that. She said we share all of our reviews and post them to a number of sites, positive or negative. I then asked, “So you are responsible for those reviews on other sites where the reviewer did not even submit a review?” She said yes. She also said that there was no way to get them removed even thought they were more like character assassinations than reviews. Wow, $299 for Demand Force to spread the reviews of a disgruntled former employee across the internet. Unbelievable.
1:46 pm
I found Demandforce to be the worst investment I have made this year. I spent $3,600 for reviews. We preschedule 30 plus appointments a week and see maybe a handful respond to the appointment request.
I do not recommend wasting money on Demandforce!
11:36 am
I will start off by saying my company has all of the benefits of DemandForce, plus some (including, REAL TIME SCHEDULING)….all for only $100 a month!!!!!! give me a call if interested. 631-767-6549
4:46 pm
Keith can you post a link to your offering. Thanks.