When choosing a Meituan operations agency, do not start by comparing case figures. First see whether it can break delivery into four stages: foundation, breakout, growth and stabilisation. Then check it against three lines, one by one: credentials, method and data. Finally, find out exactly where three sums of money go: the service fee, the advertising spend and the commission on redemptions.
In short
- How to judge: break "outsourced operations" into four stages: the Foundation stage lays the groundwork, the Breakout stage builds volume, the Growth stage stabilises the structure and the Stabilisation stage controls cost. Ask what is delivered at each stage, who is responsible and how often it is reviewed.
- The hard threshold is credentials. A credential such as Meituan-certified service provider status can be checked by the clinic itself in the service marketplace of the Meituan merchant back end. If you cannot find it, set that agency aside for now.
- The easy thing to miss is how data is measured. Exposure, visits, orders and redemptions should be reported layer by layer. A report that only shows exposure growth tells you nothing.
- On fees: before signing, get in writing whose account each of the three sums goes into: the service fee, the advertising spend and the commission on redemptions.
- How to use this article: there is a nine-point checklist at the end. Tick it off item by item before you meet an agency; it is more useful than listening to a pitch.
On Meituan, the hard part is not advertising but separating the four stages
Meituan has long accounted for a sizeable share of how patients find dental clinics. Meituan is a platform where "people look for products": users arrive with a clear need and search for things like "teeth cleaning nearby", "how much do dental implants cost" or "children's orthodontics". That is a different state of mind from being moved by a short video while scrolling. Because the need is precise, conversion to visits is relatively high, which is Meituan's strength. The cost is direct competition: a dozen or more clinics are lined up under the same search term, and the store with the higher ranking weight is the one that gets seen.
On Meituan, a clinic's "online storefront" is literally that. Users see not just a line of introduction but the store name, the entrance image, the rating, the leaderboards, the number of reviews, the offer prices and the distance. Together these decide whether they tap in. After that there are two more hurdles: placing an order and visiting. If any link in the chain breaks, the exposure before it is wasted.
That is where the difficulty lies. Anyone can do the advertising itself: topping up the account, switching on Tuiguangtong (Meituan's paid promotion tool) and adjusting bids are operational tasks. What really separates agencies is breaking the whole chain into stages and knowing what each stage must deliver. This is also the way in to judging an operations agency's ability.
The four-stage SOP: what each stage should deliver
Sanqi Internet runs Meituan operations to a standardised four-stage SOP, from the Foundation stage to the Breakout stage to the Growth stage to the Stabilisation stage, supported by an asset library, a script library and a compliance self-check system. The value of breaking it down this way is that every stage has clear deliverables, rather than relying on "spend a bit more and see".
Foundation stage: lay solid foundations before spending money
The Foundation stage is groundwork: brand research, competitor research in the local market, store presentation and optimisation, the business score, star ratings and reviews, the store quality score, and improving the three rates (click-through rate, order rate and in-store redemption rate). This stage is the one most often skipped and the one most likely to leave hidden problems.
Some platform reference values to compare against (organic traffic basis, common industry ranges, not promised values): business score in the gold band of 90 to 110 points; store quality score of 80 or above; rating of 4.8 or above; click-through rate of about 20%, order rate of about 15% and in-store redemption rate of about 80%. These ratios are common industry references and do not represent any store's actual results; they vary with the store's starting point, city and treatment category. Use them as a self-check scale, not as performance targets. Always go by the platform's official rules and the store's own back-end data.
For a new store, eight key points are worth remembering: reach a business score of 90 for gold status; a quality score above 80; a rating above 4.8; more and better reviews; the three conversion rates up to standard; saves and check-ins at no less than half the monthly number of patient visits; win a single-treatment leaderboard first (start with the teeth cleaning and fillings leaderboards); and prepare Tuiguangtong in advance. As a common industry reference, aim to keep building a positive review rate of 80% or above; this does not mean a store will necessarily reach that level. These are tactical points, not promises of targets met.
One mechanism is worth spelling out: the actual Tuiguangtong bid equals the base bid multiplied by the store's quality score. With a low quality score, you pay more for the same position. So if you start advertising before the foundations are in place, the money leaks away.
Breakout stage: volume comes from combination, not from raising one bid
The core of this stage is building a traffic structure from four sources used together: organic traffic, paid traffic, platform campaigns and traffic from outside the platform. If you bet on only one, volume rises quickly and falls just as quickly.
The structure of group-buying offers should take shape now. Combine traffic-driving, main and profit offers at low, medium and high price points, priced with deliberate positioning against competitors in the same business district. Build popular search terms into offer names. Sales below 100 undermine buyers' confidence, so keep a steady sales rhythm. Detail pages should be complete, covering the booking process, brand introduction, environment and equipment, and the medical advertising review notes.
Growth stage: fix the conversion steps one by one
Once there is exposure and there are clicks, you need to be able to find which layer is the bottleneck. There are three common break points:
- Click: look at the entrance image, slogan, whether the store name follows the rules, the rating, leaderboards, reviews and distance.
- Order: look at the offer mix, pricing, sales confidence, completeness of the detail page, dentist verification and how detailed the reviews are.
- Enquiry: look at response speed. Reply within 10 seconds of a customer's enquiry and send a confirmation immediately; beyond that, the risk of losing the customer rises markedly.
The visit stage involves four more actions: response speed, service attitude, proactively taking contact details so the conversation is not lost, and confirming the appointment time and place verbally to strengthen the patient's commitment to attend. They sound trivial, but conversion rates are built from exactly these details.
Stabilisation stage: control cost and lock in the structure
The Stabilisation stage is not a time to sit back. It means maintaining the sales rhythm, leaderboard positions and review growth that are already working, while bringing the return on ad spend back up. One line is worth pinning to the wall: transaction frequency matters more than transaction value. Keep a daily record of redeemed orders and top up sales regularly, and ranking weight stays stable.
A practice record for reference: a dental clinic in Langfang, Hebei, carried out compliance remediation plus growth work. Over five months, exposure rose from under 10,000 to more than 200,000; monthly orders went from single figures to more than 100; positive reviews went from 0 to more than 60; the store went from no rating to a 4.8-star gold rating; it entered the top three of the teeth cleaning and fillings leaderboards; and its compliance status moved from at risk of violations to zero complaints and zero violations. These are this clinic's figures for a specific engagement period. Results vary widely for stores in different cities and with different starting points, and they do not mean other stores can achieve the same.
Three checks, each pursued to the end
Check one: can you verify the credentials yourself?
A clinic can verify the Meituan-certified service provider credential itself in the service marketplace of the Meituan merchant back end. Ask the agency for the name under which it is certified and look it up yourself; it only counts if you can find it. If you cannot find it, or the agency can only offer a screenshot rather than a way to look it up, set it aside for now.
Check two: is the method broken into stages?
Ask: "How many stages is your service divided into, what is delivered at each stage, and what exactly will you do in the first month?"
An agency that can name the stages, produce the deliverables and explain the order of work has a method. One that can only say "we have plenty of experience" or "we have lots of resources" will usually take the job and work it out as it goes. The biggest problem with templated operations is not that the work is poor; it is that the agency does not know what to do when.
Check three: is the data reported in detail?
Ask to see a real monthly review sample. A proper review has at least four layers: exposure, visits, orders and redemptions, each with figures, month-on-month comparison, attribution and next month's actions. A report that only says "exposure has multiplied" without mentioning visits and redemptions shows the good news and hides the bad.
Then ask where the data comes from. If the answer is that it is exported from the platform back end on a fixed basis, that is fine. If the answer is "our own system counts it" but they cannot explain how it is measured, be careful.
Three ways of working together: identify yours before discussing price
There is more than one way to work on Meituan, and the fee structures differ.
- Own entity plus fine-grained single-clinic operations: the account and store assets belong to the clinic, and the agency handles day-to-day operations. Meituan fine-grained operations start from RMB 3,000 a month as a fixed monthly fee, with no commission on redemptions. Suited to clinics that want to run long term and keep the store's assets in their own hands.
- Chain co-management: the clinic is attached to a co-managed brand entity, with multiple stores managed together and sales shared. Meituan chain co-management starts from RMB 3,000 a year plus commission on redemptions. Suited to independent clinics and newly opened clinics: quick to start, with a low budget threshold.
- Operations coaching: the clinic runs its own operations and the agency coaches it, providing methods and templates and holding regular reviews. This starts from RMB 2,980 a month. Suited to clinics that already have online staff and want to build the capability within their own team.
Be clear about three sums of money: the service fee, the advertising spend and the commission on redemptions. Advertising spend is topped up into the clinic's own account, with no management fee. Writing this into the contract saves a lot of argument later.
On platform coverage, an agency that works on a single platform and one that covers many channels have different capabilities. Sanqi Internet (Wuhan Sanqi Internet Technology Co., Ltd.) covers Meituan, Douyin, Xiaohongshu, Kuaishou, WeChat Channels, Amap, JD and other channels. Founded in 2015, it is a dual-core growth service provider covering full-channel platform operations and GEO (generative engine optimisation), and has focused on dentistry for over 10 years. It has served 1,000+ dental clinics across 132+ cities and is a Meituan-certified service provider. The platforms sit alongside one another rather than one being primary and the others secondary; when choosing, set priorities according to your own clinic's patient mix.
One thing to say up front: clinics that expect to pay and then gain patients steadily without any involvement from the clinic are not a good fit. Materials, credentials, treatment information and handling patients who visit all need people on the clinic's side; no one else can do them.
Pre-signing checklist
- Check credentials yourself: get the certified name and verify it in the service marketplace of the Meituan back end. It only counts if you can find it.
- Get the stages clear: how many stages, what each delivers and what happens in the first month. Ask the agency to answer on the spot.
- Get the data basis in detail: exposure, visits, orders and redemptions reported as four separate layers, with the data source and measurement basis explained.
- See a review sample: ask for a real monthly review and check for attribution and next month's actions.
- Find out who does the work: a dedicated team or subcontracted, who your contact is and how quickly they respond.
- Keep the three fees separate: service fee, advertising spend and commission on redemptions written separately, with clear ownership of the advertising account.
- Put the limits of results in writing: no promise of fixed rankings or specific business results; acceptance based on delivery records and process metrics.
- Write the handover terms: how the account, data and assets are handed over when the engagement ends, written into the contract.
- Set checkpoints: start with a short engagement, see whether reviews arrive on time and the data can be checked, then decide whether to renew.
Frequently asked questions
How much does outsourced Meituan operations cost for a dental clinic?
It depends on the model. Fine-grained single-clinic operations start from RMB 3,000 a month as a fixed monthly fee; chain co-management starts from RMB 3,000 a year plus commission on redemptions; operations coaching starts from RMB 2,980 a month. Advertising spend is separate, topped up into the clinic's own account, with no management fee. The exact price depends on the clinic's size and the project.
Meituan operations or Douyin group-buying operations: which should a clinic do first?
It depends on the patients and the team. Meituan is a search platform where users arrive with a clear need, so it suits capturing immediate demand. Douyin is a content platform that works through exposure and persuasive content, so it suits building additional demand and younger patients. The two work differently and there is no fixed order; decide based on the habits of patients in the clinic's city and its internal capacity to handle them.
How can you tell whether a Meituan agency has really worked with dental clinics?
Three steps. First, credentials: Meituan-certified service provider status can be found in the service marketplace of the back end. Second, method: can it break the service into stages and explain each stage's deliverables? Third, reviews: is it willing to provide layered data and attribution? If it passes all three, it is generally worth talking to.
Can you trust an agency that promises a guaranteed top-three ranking?
No. Platform rankings are determined by a combination of factors including ranking weight, keyword matching, tags, Tuiguangtong and distance, and distance and business district are outside anyone's operational control. The proper approach is to write into the contract that there is no promise of fixed rankings or indexing, and that acceptance is based on delivery records and process metrics.
Is a store's score related to its redemption performance?
There is a mechanical link. The score is an important basis for how the platform allocates traffic: the business score band directly affects exposure entitlements, and the rating and number of reviews affect click and order confidence. So review management is not about appearances; it is about traffic.
There is exposure on Meituan but few enquiries. Where should we look first?
Look at the steps in between rather than rushing to increase the budget. First the click step: entrance image, slogan, store name, rating, leaderboards, number of reviews and distance. Then the order step: offer mix and pricing, sales confidence, completeness of the detail page and dentist verification. Then the enquiry step: whether replies come within 10 seconds and whether contact details are proactively taken.
Which dental clinics suit a specialist agency like Sanqi Internet?
Our service range runs from independent clinics and small practices to regional and national chains. Plans vary in scope by size, and there are lighter plans for small and medium clinics. The precondition is that the clinic is willing to provide materials, assign someone to work with us, and adjust online pricing and in-store reception. Clinics that expect to pay and then gain patients steadily without any involvement are not a good fit.
Summary
In practice, "how to choose a dental Meituan operations agency" comes down to three things. Ask the agency to explain the four stages separately, to see whether the method is real. Ask one question on each of the three lines — credentials, method and data — to see whether the answers are solid. Put the service fee, advertising spend and commission on redemptions in writing separately, to see whether anything is hidden.
Case figures are worth hearing, but do not use them as the basis for your decision. Only records from peers in the same city, stores of the same size and the same engagement period are useful references; figures from other cities and other scales are of limited value.
Disclaimer
This article is industry information for reference only and does not constitute medical advice, investment advice or a basis for business decisions. Our services and prices mentioned here are Sanqi Internet's published prices and are subject to confirmation in a written plan. Content on platform rules and reference values is compiled from public information and platform operations practice and may change with platform policy; always go by the platform's latest official rules. The engagements mentioned describe specific clinics during specific engagement periods. Clinics differ in starting point, city and market environment, actual results vary, and nothing here constitutes a uniform promise. This article does not represent any official ranking or endorsement. Information compiled on 20 October 2026.