30 Invisalign Leads Per Month?
Inside the workings of an Invisalign marketing agency – is it all it seems?
There is very keen interest in selling Invisalign treatments at the moment, seemingly across the whole dental community. With short courses now making the treatment accessible to all dentists, it seems that most practices have someone on the team who can provide Invisalign.
The challenge is to actually secure those treatments and understandably lots of marketing companies have jumped on the bandwagon in providing patient “lead generation” services, often at a significant price! You’ll likely have been spammed in your inbox, at a trade show or as you scroll your social media feeds by these marketing companies who offer guaranteed leads; sometimes also offering your money back if they don’t succeed.
All of that may sound too good to be true and you might well be right in thinking that. But how do those companies really operate and what are you actually tying into when you take up their services? Let’s take a closer look so that you are fully informed and ready to ask the right questions before you jump in.
How does the Invisalign marketing process work?
The modus operandi for all of these companies is very similar and to be frank, not rocket science. Whilst you do need experience for certain elements of the process, it’s relatively straightforward to do and much of it can actually be automated. To be fair, you are paying an awful lot for experience and a “done for you” approach, and of course this may be exactly what you want. However, it’s worth knowing what goes on and that there’s no “secret sauce” involved, despite what some of the providers imply.
In all cases, the marketing agencies will use social media ads and/or Google ads to place your adverts in front of thousands of users in and around your local area. Typically they will also try to take control of your website, often trying to sell you a new one during the process.
In conjunction with ads, the company will also use landing pages, contact forms and possibly on-line booking systems to make the process compelling but also simple for interested parties to make an enquiry. They may also use a technique known as “lead-gen” where the user can enquire direct from the ad platform (Facebook) without having to actually click through to a landing page.
Depending on the level of sophistication, enquiries will either be directed to the practice email or a CRM (customer relationship management) system such as Dengro.
The company may also offer to qualify leads for you and train your team in the best ways to “convert” enquiries into treatments – but do you really need that if your TCO and front-desk teams are already capable? They really should be.
What might you expect to pay for Invisalign marketing services?
This is where it starts to get interesting and also a little bit daunting when you realise the costs involved. Of course this should always be viewed in line with the return-on-investment as it all makes very good sense if you get a sensible number of high-paying new patients from the process. But as I mentioned earlier, it’s very important to understand the commitment before you sign up.
Most of these companies want you to commit to their fee which is often over £2k per month for a period of 12 months – so you are tied in whatever happens. Unfortunately there are lots of examples where very few leads have been generated, but dentists have still paid out in excess of £20k for the privilege – and that’s simply for the agency management fee.
That’s not all – there is also the fee for click costs which can easily exceed £2k per month, particularly in areas where competition is significant. So with the management fee and click costs, you could be looking at £40 – £50k per year; certainly something to understand before you begin.
Understanding the “30 enquiries or you don’t pay” promise
This is very important as there is a huge difference between an enquiry and an actual consultation/treatment.
The reason that the marketing companies want full control of your website as well as using very broad spectrum advertising, is that they want to capture every last “lead” – even if it’s just a passing message on social media. All of these interactions are then classed as enquiries and this is the way they get to their agreed target. So even the enquiries which would have come from your website or Google business page anyway, will be included in their target.
Of course a lot of these enquiries will be at best speculative and some will be completely rubbish. I’ve even seen some of the marketing companies say that they only expect 5 or 6 of the enquiries to actually materialise into something tangible each month. Given this, we can make a more informed assessment on the payback these types of campaigns might deliver.
What might I expect as a return on my Invisalign marketing investment?
I may sound slightly skeptical in my explanations above but with all that said, it can still be a very good marketing investment when things come together as the marketing companies would have you believe in their promotional videos. All I want readers to realise is that this isn’t always the case and that many campaigns don’t deliver what was promised. In this circumstance you could potentially be tied in for 12 months and still paying out for very limited returns.
However, where a campaign does work and let’s say that 6 enquiries do result in treatment each month, then the numbers are quite straightforward. You just need to add up your click spend together with the management fee and factor that against the profit you actually make from those 6 cases – remember it’s the profit, not the revenue!
So you could easily be a few thousand pounds ahead and remember that once you’ve reached break even, the incremental profit per case can be very attractive indeed. If the promises do materialise, then this type of marketing investment can still be very worthwhile.
Do I have to use an Invisalign marketing company?
The answer to this is “no” but then you will have a fairly steep learning curve as well as investing considerable time to set everything up and manage it. To be honest, in my experience very few dentists get this right simply because they don’t have the time to spend, not because it’s actually that difficult to do.
The other important thing is to look around for the most cost-effective 3rd party support. For example, here at Dental Media we do all of the above but our fees range from £395 to £900 + vat per month, not £2000 plus. We also only ask for a three month commitment which we believe is fair to allow us to recover research and set up costs and also gives time for campaigns to gain momentum.
Summary
Hopefully I’ve given a useful insight into how this form of Invisalign marketing works, including the benefits and the pitfalls. You should now have a good idea of whether this type of marketing is for you and also the questions to ask before you sign up. Remember that the devil is always in the detail.
If you would like to discuss in more depth or investigate getting your own Invisalign campaign up and running, please call the team at Dental Media on 01332 672548 and we’ll be pleased to help.