A introduction to digital marketing for dental practices
Irrespective of how well established a dental practice is, every dentist must invest time in promoting their practice consistently. As part of the digital marketing of the practice, a strong internet presence is more important than ever.
The Internet plays an increasingly important role, particularly in the acquisition of new dental practice customers. Therefore, a successful internet presence with a practice website, social media and email marketing is just as important as classic marketing and a consistent external presentation, a uniform design and, above all, the corresponding practice interior design and equipment.
If you want to acquire patients to your dental practice using marketing, you should pay attention to the following factors.
An absolute necessity for every dental practice website
Your website represents both you and your dental practice. It reflects your attitude to patient care and shows what your patients can expect from your practice.
If you do not have a website yet, now is the time to create one! There are service providers who can help you create a website for a small flat fee.
You could also hire an online marketing agency that specialises in website design.
If you build the website yourself, you should keep the following in mind:
- Choose a simple and descriptive domain name.
- Choose a modern and fresh design. The website should be easy on the eyes, without a myriad of navigation options or large blocks of text.
- The website should match your corporate identity, existing marketing material and any other documents issued by your practice.
- Make sure that the website is easy to navigate so that users can find information easily.
- Always mention your field of specialisation, the treatments that you offer and the indications that you cover.
- Prospective patients often want to know what your office hours are, or how to contact you, so provide this information on the first page and make it easy to find throughout the website.
- Show photographs of your employees and practice – this is a much more personal way of introducing yourselves.
- Use a simple contact form with just a few fields.
- The website should also be optimised for mobile devices, so that prospective patients can easily use the website on their smartphones or other mobile digital devices.
- Enter your practice in the local Google search engine Google MyBusiness.
Search engine optimisation (SEO)
Up to 70% of patients will look for a new dentist online. Search engine optimisation, or SEO, makes it so much easier and quicker for prospective customers to find you and your website.
Take some time to think about what your prospective patients are actually looking for – do they just want a dentist in their area? Perhaps they want a dentist who specialises in a specific field or treatment procedure?
What is important for search engine optimisation and how do you ensure that more traffic reaches your website? You want as many people as possible to find your website and spend as much time there as possible once they have found it. This can be easily accomplished by providing high quality content, but that alone is not enough. You will need to correctly predict relevant search terms and search intent.
Search engines love high quality content and use it to drive traffic to a website. Informative and unique content can turn even the smallest dental practice into a powerful source of online expertise for conditions like periodontal disease.
Most people will use the Google search engine to find a dentist. Studies have shown that most people will only look at the first two results before clicking on an option, so it is absolutely critical for you to be number one.
These SEO ranking tips from KaVo will get you into that top spot:
- Define relevant search terms and phrases to use on your website and blog. These should be specific to your dental practice. A great starting point is to ask yourself: “What are my prospective patients searching (for)?”
- Place your search terms on your website strategically for maximum effect. These search terms must appear in the following areas of your website:
- The meta-description tag
- The headings (H1 and H2 tags)
- The domain name and/or URL
- At least once or twice in the website copy
- In “alt” tags for images and videos
- Any internal links that you use within the website
- Create informative, insightful and impactful content.
- Do not simply explain, show! Before and after dental images say much more than a wall of text ever will.
- Choose a clever domain name: Including SEO search terms in your domain name will boost your search ranking. Example: www.dentist-dentist surname-city.com (such as, www.Dentist-Schmid-Berlin.com).
- Use descriptive URLs: For example, Dentist-Schmid-Berlin.com/treatment/prophylaxis is far less complicated than www.Dentist-Schmid-Berlin.com/pages/ajfhiej450/xyz836
Pay-per-click advertising
Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is a dental practice marketing tool that bears considerable fruit without breaking the bank.
You can use Google Ads to place small adverts, or ads, on Google and websites of your choice to acquire new patients. This is a great way to supplement a well thought out marketing strategy.
- Give your telephone number straight away. You only pay if a prospective patient actually clicks on your ad. You don’t pay a cent if that prospective patient just decides to call you straight away instead.
- Create a special landing site for anyone who clicks on the ad. These prospective patients are already interested in you, otherwise they would not have clicked on the ad. Now they want to get straight to the juicy bits, rather than wade aimlessly through a lengthy introduction designed to get them interested. Google also rewards you for this by pushing you higher up in the rankings, because it shows how much you value a good user experience.
- Use your search terms! Online groups often revolve around a central theme or focus. Your SEO search terms will help you to gain visibility when you post them in these groups. Build your adverts around the central theme and use your SEO search terms liberally. You can also create a variety of ads to appeal to different patient needs and apply your search terms appropriately.
Social media – Social platforms
Social media is the key to driving traffic to a site, whether you are just starting out, or have been running your practice for years. You can use it to connect with existing and prospective patients.
Social media allows you to:
- Give information
- Answer questions
- Provide explanations
- Expand your network
Ideally, you should be posting on these platforms a few times a week. Don’t just share – actively look for opportunities to connect with other local companies and share their content as well. This is how you build relationships, and ultimately, how to win over new, prospective patients.
You should choose just one or two social media channels and post regularly, instead of spreading yourself thinly across all of them:
- Facebook,
- Instagram,
- Twitter,
- Linkedin,
- Pinterest.
Email practice marketing
Email is so much more than a way for us to communicate. You should always ask your patients for their email addresses and maintain these in an appropriate database. Make sure you have access to a GDPR expert to avoid any unnecessary headaches!
This database will enable you to publish an email newsletter to highlight special events, services and promotions and offers a host of additional possibilities, like surprising your patients with birthday greetings.
Emails can also be used to send appointment reminders. You can use email to easily and cost effectively stay in touch with your patients and gently remind them that you are always there for them. Always adhere to the legal provisions laid out in the GDPR.
Video practice marketing
Videos will definitely make your dental practice stand out. YouTube is a great platform for growing an audience and ensures that traffic is driven to your website.
You can introduce your team, show interviews that you have conducted, or simply ask patients for a short evaluation.
You can also describe innovative, new technologies or devices that you will use in your practice in your videos.
You do not need a lot of equipment or time to make simple but impactful videos: Record, edit, and export the video, uploaded it to YouTube, then simply embed it on your website.
Resources
As a dentist, you are the focal point of your practice, so you might find that you struggle to have time for all of this additional activity. Do not let this deter you.
You probably have at least one employee who is a social media expert – perhaps even an influencer themselves. If not, or if you would simply prefer to hire someone else, there are several online marketing agencies that will be happy to help you!