Marketing for established dental practices
Where to start?
We are currently working with several long-established dental businesses to help them bring their marketing up-to-speed and fit-for-purpose for an increasingly competitive market place. The interesting aspect of all of these cases is that the practices concerned all have large patient lists built over many years of successful trading.
However, the business owners have realised that times have changed and that new patient acquisition is becoming increasingly challenging and not keeping up with “churn” (loss) of existing patients. Rather than watch their businesses stagnate and then contract, the practices sensibly approached us for advice and to assist with establishing marketing systems to drive new patient enquiries. So what are the basic steps required to get moving?
Assessment
It would be easy to jump straight in and set up a suite of typical marketing systems, but this is rather haphazard and potentially counter-productive. For example, dumping an off-the-shelf dental marketing engine on top of a practice which is unable to support it, wouldn’t be a smart move. Indeed I often see this type of “packaged” approach espoused by dental coaches and trainers who are pulled into practices for advice. Feedback from clients who tried this approach historically but ditched it, suggest that they had been overwhelmed and often felt that the advice was formulaic, rather than specifically tailored to their needs.
So before any work commences, a full assessment must be conducted to understand the precise objectives of the practice, the target market, history and more – in fact a thorough discussion about all key elements of the business. There is no such thing as “100% done for you” marketing, so one of the key factors is to understand what resources are available to support the marketing systems and, indeed, the capability of those nominated to assist with the work.
First steps
With the initial assessment completed, a plan can be developed to establish appropriate marketing systems – where “appropriate” is the key word. There are some fundamentals which do apply to all dental marketing scenarios, for example establishing an excellent website which isn’t just great to look at, but also highly-functional and engaging. A key objective is also to gain prominence for the website in the Google search ranking as, behind word-of-mouth referrals, Google is generally the second biggest source of new patients.
Another quick-win is to establish an email marketing list, to encourage new patient sign-ups but particularly to keep regular contact with existing patients. It’s also important to review other basics, for example is the practice signage clear and prominent and is suitable promotional material available in the waiting areas? Of course, underpinning all of this is to ensure that the dental team is “on point” when it comes to understanding the need to encourage new treatment uptake and has suitable training and motivation to support it.
Those factors may well appear to be very obvious to many dentists, but be assured that there are numerous dental businesses out there which have very little in place, or at best a 5 year old website and a few shoddy leaflets left in reception. Those businesses may well be living on fat, but the likelihood is that they will falter unless they begin to recognise that times have changed.
Moving forwards
With the basics established and with appropriate resources in place, trained and motivated to perform, additional systems can be introduced to further develop the dental marketing. This could include contribution to blogging and social media to help increase “reach” on the web, pay-per-click advertising and introduction of more sophisticated email marketing systems to target specific treatments to certain patient groups. Outside of the web, other mechanisms can be evaluated and introduced, including open days, targeted leaflet drops, advertising in local magazines and potentially even radio ads.
Each of these channels requires some expertise and support and it may well not be possible to do all of them at the same time; but momentum must be maintained.
Summary
There are still many long-standing, traditional dental practices which have no, or primitive, marketing/advertising systems. Lots of opportunity exists for these businesses to relatively quickly bring their systems up-to-speed and appropriate for today’s increasingly competitive environment. However, this can’t be achieved with an off-the-shelf, “done for you” approach, and careful assessment is required before any work commences. There are some “must have” basics such as a great website and email marketing list, but other systems need more careful evaluation before they are introduced. Sustainability is fundamental.
If you are looking for a considered approach to establishing appropriate marketing systems for your own practice, please get in touch with the team at Dental Media on 01332 672548. With over 18 years of experience in the sector, we know what works, what doesn’t and what your priorities should be. Please call us now for a no-obligation discussion.