Learning Center Topics: Dental Marketing

By now, most businesses have made the transfer to online communications. However, healthcare is one sector that is often still going through the process of learning how to communicate online. Patients will obviously eventually need to meet their dentist face-to-face, but their search for the right dentist starts online.

Email marketing is a highly effective digital marketing strategy, no matter what type of business you are. It is a very powerful tool that any business in any field and of any scale can use to acquire, engage and retain clientele. You need to understand, however, that there is an art to email marketing. With everyone being able to unsubscribe with the touch of a button, you need to find the fine line between marketing interesting, informative and insightful and bombarding and hassling your clientele. 

Email marketing helps you connect with your audience to promote your brand and increase traffic to your dental practice. You can actually do a lot of things with emails. Not only are they a great way to market your business, they are also a great way to sell products and drive traffic to your website and clients to your actual practice. 

Click here to read more about content writing for dentists.

Most people also try to fix their problems at home or attempt to avoid them and doing that also starts online. This is where quality content comes in. Your content needs to be good quality so that when you start your email marketing campaigns, your patients have good content to read when your emails direct them there. 

Email marketing for dentists helps practitioners to: 

• Provide quality and helpful content 
• Engage existing and potential patients 
• Increase revenue 
• Prove personalised experiences
• Advertise discounts, deals and promotions
• Increase brand awareness

Click here to read more about marketing a dental practice.

Does email marketing work?

While email marketing has a lot of competition in the marketing department, it is undoubtedly a marketing method that still works, while still being very cost effective. Companies that utilise email, and do it well, can reap the benefits that come from that market technique.

Sending mass emails to your marketing list can increase your brand awareness, keep existing patients engaged, help retain patients and promote your special offers. 

4 types of marketing emails 

We have outlined the main four types of popular email marketing campaigns and how you can use them effectively to help your business grow: 

Email newsletters

One of the most popular and common forms of email marketing are regular email newsletters. As a dental practice, you can use an email newsletter to provide your patients with helpful knowledge and updates. 

It is important to add value to all your patients’ inboxes. 

To do this, you must create engaging content, including new blogs, how-tos and announcements of new services or deals and prices. 

Send a few articles, blogs or videos out in a newsletter once a month. Maybe include a promotion or two. Behind-the-scenes stories of your team and the practice will also help build a relationship with your patients. 

Acquisition Emails

Acquisition emails can help your dental practice acquire more patients by reaching out to those who have opted to receive your emails but have not yet converted into consistent patients. 

By creating attractive offers, discounts and deals, as well as informative content, you can show all those in your email list that perhaps have missed their routine checkups or have been avoiding the dentist. Or, perhaps simply showing those who are unsure of which local dentist they should go to, the value of becoming an active patient at your dental practice. 

Acquisition emails are a great way to move all potential leads through the conversion funnel a lot faster and grow your patient base as well as drive additional revenue and target users who have expressed some interest at some point in what your practice has to offer. 

Promotional Emails 

Promotional emails are one of the greatest ways to drive new signups, sales and new service offerings for your dental practice. Promotional emails include offers that both entice and encourage your target clients to buy a new service. Use promotional emails to reward engaged subscribers with exclusive email only offers, drive new products you are selling or any new services you are offering. Cosmetic procedures that are hot and trending, such as Invisalign, are always procedures that many potential patients are always on the fence about. Therefore, offering promotions on services like this helps entice those patients into buying into that service.

Benefits of email marketing for dentists

Email marketing is a powerful tool that can be used to engage, acquire and retain patients for your dental practice. By implementing a successful email marketing campaign, your dental practice can benefit greatly. It is important to select the correct email marketing campaign to achieve your goals with this type of marketing. 

Build brand awareness

Before you email your patient list, take some time to design your email template. You need to make sure your emails are consistent in style, reflect your brand and look professional. A poorly formatted, plain email may be worse than no email at all.

Include your brand colours and logo, make your email reflect the design and look of your website. Create a consistent brand and get it out there via email.

Drive traffic to your website

Remember, when your target audience finds your email content interesting or valuable, they are a lot more likely to share it, forward it on or click on your links (make sure to always include your social media links and share buttons).

By emailing a blog, or even just a section of it, and encouraging audiences to click the link, you drive more traffic to your website. You can also increase your social media following and engagement by encouraging them to share and link them on your profiles.

Click here to read more about creating a website for dentists.

Build a relationship

As your business is a dental practice, it often means that interactions with your patients can be very limited in the sense that they will only ever see you for scheduled visits. However, this does not mean that you can’t build impactful and lasting relationships with these patients outside of these appointments.

Keep in touch 

Being a dental practice, is it quite easy to overlook the importance of keeping in touch with your patients when at best, you will only ever see them every 6-12 months. However, with the use of email marketing, you can fill the void in between those routine visits and build trust and relationships with your patients. 

In doing so, you are providing a bigger service than simply taking care of their teeth every appointment. Depending on your email campaign, you can provide patients with various helpful tricks tips, and information that is useful to them, which will make them want to stay subscribed to you. Email marketing will help you create a community of patients.

Top tips on email marketing for dentists and dental practices. 

Building a subscriber list 

The only way to make full use of email marketing is to have a subscriber list. You need to build a list of contacts that you can start sending emails to. 

Create a simple contact form on your homepage, called something like ‘Sign up to our newsletter’, or ‘Special offers’. Keep the form as simple as possible, all you need is a name and an email address. You will get more sign-ups that way. 

Include requests to sign up for marketing emails in your communication with new and existing patients. Add these to your email marketing list as well. 

Maintain relationships with current patients 

Now you have your patients emails, you are able to contact your patients and you are given an opportunity to build their trust. You need to prove that you are using their contact information to send them useful and insightful emails, not useless junk or constant emails bombarding them. To keep the patients you already have, you need to keep in frequent contact with them while establishing a regular and personal connection with them. 

It is an absolute game changer for your dental business if you begin to reach out to your customers and provide them with the relevant information they need before they even realise they need it. 

While it is imperative to make a routine for when your marketing emails go out to your patients, you need to make sure that you are not overwhelming your subscribers with too many emails. That’s when you will start to lose your following!

Keep your newsletters monthly, keep your promotions spaced out, don’t make yourself blend in with the other emails. 

Targeted and personalised emails 

The content of your emails are what matters the most. The way you choose to personalise them will help you build relationships with your existing and potential patients. Segmented emails work the best, so your emails appeal to both types of patients. This ensures that each patient on your subscribers list receives content that is both relevant and useful to them. 

A great example of this is age-appropriate content. This may not mean what you think it means. For example, patients over the age of 50 are less likely to be interested in receiving information about braces like Invsalign. They may be more interested in reading about how their gums change over time and your services on dental implants. 

Offering content to your patients of all ages will make each patient feel as if you as a business cares about all of them individually and you are working to build on that relationship and trust.

Sloppy or irrelevant content can have an adverse effect as this will push your patients to unsubscribe. If they are subscribed to your email listing, it needs to be because you are providing them with something of value to them. The last thing you want is for your emails to be marked as spam. 

Personalising your emails is a must. Feeling valued is what you want your patients to feel when they receive your emails. Your goal is to make your patients feel like they matter. Your second goal is for your emails to help build your name and dental practice as a brand. Make sure your content reflects you as a business. 

Personalising your emails can consist of small things such as addressing each contact by their name instead of the vague ‘sir/madam’, sending birthday messages with offers or seasonal offers. This can be done quite simply in all mass email platforms once you link it to your contact lists. 

You can even create automated emails to specific categories of patients. For instance, you could send information on children’s dentistry automatically to only patients with children. You could also send information on gum disease and dental care to all patients who have seen the hygienist. 

All these can make an immense difference to how your patients feel about your practice and also how they view their dentist (as many are terrified). 

What is the most important about the content of your emails and all other content that you post, is your tone. It is important that you convey the appropriate tone that reflects your practice while you are addressing your patients. These details are what can leave a lasting impression on your patients. 

Click here to listen to our podcast episode about marketing to millennials.

Keep patients up to date

Your emails can often consist of special events, offers or discounts you are offering at your practice. This is the main reason why many of your patients will be interested in your emails. Lets face it, dental work is not cheap and everyone loves a good discount!

Providing updates on anything new happening in your practice, such as new equipment, new services or any new staff, anything to get your patients attention and keep your patients informed. Newsletters are a great way of doing this. 

Let patients know about life events in the team as well. This creates a sense of community and will bring you closer to your patients. Birthdays, engagements, weddings, these are all great little additions to liven up an existing newsletter.

Educate your patients

You can use your email marketing to educate your subscribers. This can be through concisely worded emails or short descriptions with links to blogs and articles on your website. Linking your blog and website content can also be personalised to specific patients and you can align them to blog posts that are most relevant to them. 

For instance, send that blog you wrote on top tips for looking after your braces to all your orthodontic patients. 

Think about what questions you get asked a lot in the practice. What problems do you keep seeing in oral health? What are the little tips and tricks you know about brushing and flossing that patients probably don’t? Tell them about it!  

Optimise for all devices 

No matter what sector your business is, you need to be up-to-date with how you promote your services online. This includes ensuring that your email marketing campaign is optimised for mobile devices. Over half of emails that are sent are opened on mobile phones, therefore, it would make sense (and be in your best interest) to have the emails you send optimised for people that are accessing their emails from either a smartphone or tablet. 

The recipients are more likely to open and actually read the content of the email if the email is formatted in the right way for them to view it. 

While doing this, there are a few things to consider. Be sure to understand that the screen sizes are different. A laptop screen and a smartphone have very different screen sizes which is what you need to consider. You need to make sure that the content of your emails are clear and visible and not cut off around the screen. 

Include Call-to-actions (CTAs)

With any content that you write, at some point you need to encourage a call-to-action. A call-to-action (CTA) is simply a button like ‘call now’ or ‘further information’. Calls-to-action are a great way to create a relationship with your audience and get them to take an action you want. 

They are also a great way of pushing traffic to your website.

The point of your email marketing campaigns are to get your subscribers to come to you in some way to get you more business. This is why calls to action are so important. It allows your message to be read, then it gives your clients a way to come to you and create some form of contact. In essence, it is a technique that can make your patients become more responsive and engaged with your practice. 

Calls-to-actions can be a very useful technique helping customers along the purchase process and it can also be helpful in attracting new patients to your practice. 

Having a CTA, like a referral system, in place alongside the emails that you send will be helpful in monitoring how well the emails are doing and how effectively they are working. 

Monitor progress

There are various ways to monitor and track the progress of your email campaigns. These powerful analytics are able to track how many of your patients are actually opening your emails and clicking through the links. 

Monitoring the progress of your email marketing allows you to make any necessary tweaks and changes if they are necessary. This ensures that you are getting the most that you can from using email marketing for marketing your dental practice. 

There are some great ways to measure the effectiveness of your newsletter. You need to analyse whether your content helps build a relationship with your patients and subscribers, increases retention and engagement and strengthens patient loyalty. 

Does your content (like blogs and videos) get shared or liked on social media? Does your engagement on social media or your website traffic see a noticeable uptick after sending out a newsletter? Are recipients opening the email and clicking the link within? 

Email marketing for dentists FAQ

With millions of articles and blogs being written and published on the internet daily, you need yours to stand out. For your business to succeed, you need your written content to have these three key aspects. You need to write the type of copy that is readable, relatable, and shareable. 

Why is content writing so important? 

Content writing is an essential part of the web design process. Consistency with creating content is key to determine the growth as well as success of your business. Unfortunately, simply writing a few short blogs about foods that are bad for your teeth will not gain you the exposure or traffic you need for your business. 

Quality matters when it comes to content writing. With search engines like Google always only one click away from blacklisting your site for keyword stuffing, quality content is absolutely imperative. It isn’t as easy as stringing a few hundred words together, throwing a few keywords in there and hoping for the best. Coming up with SEO driven, insightful and riveting copy can often be quite a challenge. 

Content writing allows your brand to create cohesive pieces of information. It’s quite simple, if your content is not up to standards, then it will not bring in the patients you need through the door. The content you provide has to reflect your company as a brand. The more engaging, reliable and consistent your content is, the more likely it is that someone reading your blogs is likely to book an appointment at your dental practice. 

Here are five things that will make your content writing stand out:

Study other writers

If you are going to create good content you need to begin with being aware of what kind of content is already out there. The more you read, the better you will know what kind of content you should and should not write. Keep a special eye out on the type of articles that personally hook you. Doing this also works as a bonus as it may inspire your writing and will also help teach you even more about the topic at hand.

The best thing about doing this is that it will inspire you in more ways than you know, reading good writers will help you become a better one. What draws you in? Pay attention to the way the writer draws you in with their voice and style. 

Looking at someone else’s ideas and improving on it will help your website significantly. You should also keep an eye out for what websites rank highly on Google. These are the websites that pop up first after the ads, whatever they are doing, they are doing it right!

Optimising SEO

Search engine optimization is a very big topic and can be the absolute bane of many copywriters and content writers everywhere. The algorithms are always changing and this article will not be a deep dive into all the specifics you will need to know about SEO practices however, it does not have to be a mystery. The most important part of SEO is keywords. SEO best practices are something any content producer should study. Here are a few basics:

Fresh content is critical: Copying another website’s content that is already doing well will never work for you. Original, well written content is what will work best. Be sure to keep all your articles and blogs updated. This includes updating old blogs as well as writing new ones.

Structure is pivotal: The flood of information on the internet has retrained all of us into scanners rather than deep readers. You have probably noticed that yourself, the art of a well curated article is one that is skimmable. Not only that, but placement of subheadings are important for placing SEO-friendly keywords.

Titles will make you: The title of your article is key to attracting people and getting your article seen, read and shared. You want to aim to create a good title with competitive keywords.

You can find out more about SEO for dentists here.

Mix up your words and your jargon

Mixing up your words is hard for any content writer. You won’t realise it but every writer has words they like to use over and over. When we edit our own words, it’s hard to see what your overused words are, but when we use them too often, our writing sounds redundant and the words that you overuse, although you may not notice, Google does and it does not like it. 

Using the same words is a habit and is one that is really hard to break out of. We all have our habits, but when it comes to keeping visitors and you audiences interested, vocabulary variety is key! 

The web is for everyone, not just dental experts or adults, you don’t know who will come across your content, so make sure your information is easily understandable. Avoid insider language, spell out acronyms on first reference and be sure to explain complex or niche terms. Also provide hyperlinks to other articles to rank higher for SEO, Doing this will also allow readers to get more background information on the topic at hand.

Incorporate multimedia

As previously mentioned, your website visitors are unlikely to stay on your page and read the entirety of your article. So, it helps to throw in some pictures or videos that will help explain your article or give the audience more information. It is shown that 90 percent of the information transmitted to the human brain is visual and more people process this visual information 60,000 times faster than text. 

When it comes to online blogs and articles, heavy text is usually not what your audience is looking for. Images will help break up the text, making your page easier to read. It is also great for SEO, we recommend having at least one image on each page of your website.  

Leave them wanting more

For content writing, good websites tend to end each page with a strong call-to-action. It could be either a way for the reader to contact your business or subscribe. Maybe even an interesting video they should watch? A link to another related blog? This strategy is integral to direct readers to your business and other areas of your website. It also encourages readers to promote your content to their friends, family or social media.

Keep these calls to action succinct, they should all start with action verbs such as ‘share’, ‘sign up’, ‘join’, ‘download’ or ‘watch’. And do not forget to include a hyperlink that will actually allow readers to follow through the action you are asking them to take. 

Should You Use Social Media in a Dental Practice?

The internet, especially social media, is a great way for businesses worldwide to talk to their customers and make their brand more popular. But some dentists still aren’t sure if using social media is a good idea. Well, it is! Social media helps dentists spread their brand awareness, talk to their current patients and attract new ones. Dentists can use social media to show how good they are, give helpful dental advice, and even talk to patients online. Since many people (especially the younger generations) use social media, dentists can reach lots of people and get closer to them.

Like any business, if you are running a dental practice then you cannot afford to ignore the strength of social media marketing. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn provide you with the opportunity to connect with current patients, new patients and other dental professionals. This connection allows you to promote and help to grow your dental practice with social media.

In this post, we’ll explain why social media is good for dentists and give some tips on how to do it right.

The Power of Social Media in a Digital Age

In today’s digital world, social media has changed the way people connect and find information. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn are a big part of our daily lives, connecting lots of people worldwide.

For dentists, using social media has many benefits. It lets them talk to their current patients, get new ones and show off their dental skills, which builds trust and spreads their practice’s brand. Social media can reach a huge audience, making it easy to share dental advice and updates with both current patients and people looking for dental care.

It also lets patients ask questions and share their experiences, making existing relationships stronger. Plus, it’s a cheap way to advertise and reach specific groups of people, getting more for your money. Social media also gives dentists info about how well their online presence is working. So, in short, social media is a must-have for dentists in the digital age. It helps them connect, engage, and look good online.

Benefits of Social Media for Dentists 

It’s important to note that you cannot just rely on social media. Using social media platforms should form a significant part of your marketing strategy, but not all of it. Having said this, you can get some impressive benefits from using channels such as Facebook, if you do so in the right way. These benefits include:

• Making it easy for people to find your practice.
• Telling people what you can help them with.
• Targeting your presence at local people.
• Maintaining relationships with current patients, to keep them engaged.
• Allowing you to build positive relationships with other professionals.
• Giving audiences the chance to contact you easily.

Which Platforms Can Grow Your Dental Practice 

In order to make sure that your practice benefits as much as possible, you need to plan your social media activity carefully. You need to think about who you are trying to reach. This list will usually include current patients, new patients and other dental professionals.

Once you have this information, it’s time to look at which platforms these people use and what type of content they are most likely to engage with. People are continuously scrolling on their phones for hours per day, with the right type of marketing, you’re going to get some people’s attention. There are some specific options you can consider, depending on which platforms you choose to use.

Facebook

Facebook is often first on the list when it comes to using social media for dentists. This is because more than 3 billion people use Facebook globally; in the UK around 78% of Internet users use Facebook. Quite simply, it’s a potential market place that you cannot ignore. If you are wondering what to post on Facebook; here are some tips:

• Advice about oral hygiene routines.
• Comments and advice about new dental techniques.
• Community announcements, especially details of any community work you are doing.
• Special offers; although this type of content should not be used too often as you do not want your Facebook page to look too sales orientated.
• Videos and images that allow people to have a better connection with your practice.
• Team videos and profiles – audiences want to know the people behind the business.

Aside from posting on your regular Facebook page, you may also want to consider Facebook PPC (paid advertising). You can target your Facebook ads at people in your local area or based on their interests, demographics or even simply by uploading your contacts’ emails addresses.

This means you are likely to get engagement from people who are actually looking for a dentist locally to you. Your Facebook Page will quite often be the first thing people find when they search for you. So make sure you keep it up-to-date and interesting!

Instagram

Instagram is a hugely influential social media channel, with hundreds of millions of users worldwide. It’s a great way of helping people to see inside your business, using images and videos. Connecting with people in this way helps them to see your practice as friendly and reliable. These are positive attributes that are sought by people looking for a dentist.

Set up an Instagram account for your practice and post video clips and images regularly. Instagram has a much younger audience on average than Facebook so take this into account when you post. 

The best kind of posts for Instagram are your more fun behind-the-scenes clips, team videos and your best photos. Instagram is all about image and aesthetics! Show off your successes and make sure you tell the story of your practice through your videos and images.

Twitter

You should think outside the box when you are using Twitter to help your practice to grow. It’s fine to tweet about the latest goings on at the practice and include the occasional promotion. However, using Twitter should be more about displaying your expertise. Tweet about the latest developments in the industry, or local charity events, and include your educated comments. You may also want to think about setting up a Twitter Q&A session, when you can communicate with people in real time.

LinkedIn

Social media for dentists is not just about communicating with patients and potential patients. You can use LinkedIn to publish articles and show your expertise. You can also use it to develop relationships with other dental practices which can be mutually beneficial. For instance, if you do not provide orthodontic services, you can find a local specialist to refer your patients to. This helps you to provide a better service and provides more patients for the orthodontist, for whom you may receive a referral fee. 

Building a Strong Online Presence Through Social Media

With the younger, tech-savvy generations beginning to make financial decisions, it is essential for dentists to have a good online presence through social media. Nowadays, when people need a dentist, they look for one online to read reviews and get recommendations, this is known as social proof. Social media sites like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter help dentists connect with the people they want to reach, and it lets them create a professional and interesting online presence.

This means they can show how good they are, share useful information, and even offer virtual appointments, which makes them look trustworthy and builds a personal connection with patients. The best thing about social media is that it can reach a lot of people organically, and they can choose who sees their messages through targeted ads. So, it’s easier to get the right message to the right people. If patients sing your praises on social media, it adds credibility to your brand. Additionally, social media lets dentists keep up with what’s new in their field and connect with other professionals, adding to their trust, authority and expertise.

But to do well on social media, dentists need a plan, regular posts, interesting content, and a way to answer patient questions and feedback. Being consistent and responsive is vital to keep up a strong online presence.

In short, social media is a great tool for dentists to improve their online presence, talk to patients, and grow their practice. By using social media, dentists can show how good they are, get new patients, and be seen as experts in their field. So, the answer to whether social media is good for dentists is a big “yes!”.

How to Get More Patients With Social Media

Using social media for marketing properly can transform your business. Social media is a place where billions of users spend hours a day scrolling and engaging with friends, brands and companies alike. These billions of users are not just users to your business, they are all potential customers.

If you haven’t done so already, get on every social media platform you can with a simple profile to start. It is then imperative to understand which platform is most likely to have your target audience. Social media is one of the most inexpensive ways of marketing a dental practice and can actually have a huge impact, if used correctly. Decide who your target audiences are (families, teenagers, people interested in health or cosmetics etc) and then figure out which platforms they are more likely to use and what they expect to see there.

Pick one platform to begin with 

It can be a lot to try to gain a following on so many platforms at once, try tackling one social media platform to start with, whether that be Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Instagram or Linked in. Whichever one you choose, try to gain some momentum in that channel first before moving on to other ones.

In this day and age it often seems like all social media platforms are more or less all the same. They all differ though, which is why it is important to learn about the social media channels before choosing which one is best for you and your business. They all offer different features. Linked In is more popular in the business world but as the platforms are all evolving, Instagram has become a great way to promote businesses and also shop around on various different businesses on the app.

To begin your social media journey, our experts advise that you begin by making a business profile or a business account page on your chosen social media platform. Making this type of account will unlock many more features that will be useful when it comes to your business, ads, reach, engagement and most importantly, checking your audience insights, we highly recommend this especially if you are using Instagram.

Include as many options for contacting your practice as possible on your social media channels – website, email, phone numbers, WhatsApp, direct messaging (like Facebook messenger), your address.

You need to build your brand name, but the idea is not to plaster your name everywhere. You need to post consistently but you need posts with substance. People follow and like to engage with posts that they are genuinely interested in or keep them entertained. It is a great idea to place online ads on Google as well as social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, they get a lot of reach. 

Let’s take Facebook for example. A car mechanic will surely see more visits and clicks on a platform like Facebook where there are people from every walk of life and every age range. But doing the same on Instagram or Snapchat often won’t net you the same result as the majority of the users are young teens that either just don’t own a car or simply aren’t interested in seeing anything related to your business.

That’s why although it’s a good idea to be present on every platform, focusing the majority of your efforts on one or two platforms that are going to be most beneficial and responsive to your efforts might be the better option, at least to begin with. We focus mainly on Facebook and Instagram, but you might find a different combination works for you.

Start with a social media plan

Just like your business plan, your social media plan should bear the same importance. Like any good business strategy, using social media for business success needs to start with a well laid out plan. Without a plan you will have no clear goal for what you are trying to achieve, which means your team (if you have one) won’t have any specific goals either – which results in no way to measure your results and sometimes no results at all.

Take some time to create a social media plan. Social media may seem less pressing in the list of tasks that you need to do for your business, but it is more important and harder to master than you may think. Creating an effective plan will ensure that all your social efforts support your specific business goals. 

Your social media plan needs to include all of the content you intend to produce for your platforms. This means planning the blogs and articles you’ll write, what kind of photos you need to take and what videos you need to create. You also need to specify which team members will be in charge of producing this content.

Be authentic when you post

With social media being as overcrowded as it is, the need to stand out is exponential. It sounds overrated and overused but be yourself, that is who you are selling. Don’t try and be what you think others may want you to be, in the long run that will not work in favour for your company. Dont work too hard to make everything perfect or seem perfect; if you do, you will either never put up anything or worse you will break trust with your clientele. 

Whether it is Twitter, Facebook or Instagram, people on social media are bombarded with posts that seem to emit perfection, people really just want to follow pages that are ‘real’. Uploading posts and stories that are real and truthful that your audience can relate to and understand is what will get you those loyal followers that you aim to have. 

Remember that social media is all about trends. Keeping up with relevant trends, topics and hashtags to engage a wider audience is pivotal to growing your social media network. Make sure anything you post fits your brand.

ENGAGE, ENGAGE, ENGAGE with your audiences

The primary goal for any business on social media is to build relationships and add value. This is the part where most people fall in their social media triumphant attempts. They work so hard to create content and will continuously protrude said content, but they then fail to actually engage with their audience. 

It’s anywhere from 5 to 20 times more expensive to acquire new clients than it is to keep old ones. That’s why focusing efforts to retain clients by increasing customer engagement through any number of techniques is advised at every stage.

Knowing who your target audience is great even if your target audience is a very niche group of people and thanks to the extensive targeting selections on social media, you are able to target people based on purchasing behaviours, interests and demographics.

If you know exactly who and what type of people are going to see your ads, you can cater the ads to that specific audience. The key is to make ads that resonate with your audience, rather than throwing a general ad up hoping it appeals to someone who randomly comes across it. 

The more you start using social media for marketing, the more data you will gather about your target audience. It is important to collect and learn from this data in order to streamline your target audience and spend ad budget where it makes the most sense. Don’t just focus on that streamlined audience, you can use tools within social media advertising that allow you to expand that audience. 

Simply looking at the number of likes on your post is not as strong of an indicator of its performance as you think it is. Today, businesses need to look further into their performance metric. This includes tracking comments, amount to saves, shares and story views to understand how their content performs. Talk with people and really engage with your followers, it is what will keep them interested.

Respond to comments and reviews and jump into communities, especially ones that are in the same industry as your business. Share your perspectives and point of view, if anything, it will gain you a lot more attention than you may think, especially if you are slightly controversial or especially contemporary. 

With a shift in how we measure engagement, it’s only natural that we also change how we try to improve audience/ follower engagement on our feeds. Trust us it’s not as hard as you may think. 

Engaging honestly should be just for that aim, do not dominate the conversation or push for sales. Simply getting involved with the conversation, trends or your chosen community, you will get the following you need naturally and organically. Giving advice and offering suggestions will make you seem helpful, knowledgeable and trustworthy. No one wants false claims with the congested roads of pretending on social media, most people really engage when they see something they believe is genuine, use that aspect of yourself and your business to your advantage.

You need to commit and monitor 

Signing up to any social media platform is absolutely free. In a few minutes you can be up and running but to build your business as a brand on social media it is mandatory that you commit to staying active on that platform. In the beginning at least, spend a minimum of one hour per day during your launch of your page or business engaging with the community. Use this time to not only focus on your own page but to catch a glimpse of some businesses that are similar to yours and take inspiration for what they are doing and how you can do better. 

For some, it may be easy to spend hours a day on social media, but to run a business or build a brand on social media needs commitment and it is a lot easier said than done. Effective social media branding takes time and practice, in many cases it is worthwhile to hire someone who specialises in social media to help you. 

Writing down a strategy is a good place to start and having clear goals will set you a track to go on, but actually sticking to it is a whole different story. Your social media plans will always be changing. At the least you should have a good idea of the thing you would like to post daily. Strategy is key. If you are not committing to posting on a regular basis and creating new content then you will always struggle to hook your audience or build an engaged following. 

During one hour a day, at no expense out of your pocket at all, you can build a community in no time. Committing to spending time on your social media accounts is step 1, step 2 is mentoring these accounts in the most effective way. Monitor other sites, feed and pages that discuss the industry your business is in, your products or services. Look for posts that mention your company, mentoring you growth will help you reach specific goals you have.

Your social media accounts are also the best place to respond to any comments or complaints, using them as opportunities to engage with your followers, grow your brand and collect market research. If you pay attention to the right aspects of your social media platform, you can get ahead of potential problems. 

Many may think that continuously pouring out content will get you more followers, unfortunately it is not that easy. Looking at social media and posting once a day should suffice enough to engage your audience, educate and potentially entertain you from other posts within your given industry and hopefully inspire you to make more content. 

You should definitely monitor your insights but what will help you a lot will be finding out what days and times most people visit to engage with your pages. This will help notify you when is the best time to post yourself to get the most engagement from your followers. Always check your insights!

Establish a team and get expert help 

Having a marketing team in place can prove invaluable, eleven if you own a small business. Having a small team can enable you to establish a strategy with the necessary specialities for social media management. Having a team can help you keep afloat all your media marketing. Keeping up with social media posts as well as website posts and blogs can be tiresome while you are also managing other important aspects of your business. This is where your team will prove to be beneficial. 

Hiring someone who will be able to manage your content for marketing will make it a lot easier for you and their expertise will allow you to rely on someone to do what they know will work and help you reach your goals. 

This isn’t an option for everyone, sometimes it’s employing the necessary help in only certain aspects. Samera has an expert marketing team from website developers, social media specialists to content writers. Employing third party specialists to help you when you need it can prove to be more helpful than you know. They are aware of what is necessary to get you recognition and can do it effectively without having to impose any stress onto you.

Tell them how to reach you 

This seems like such an easy one but it is often overlooked. Make sure your followers know how to get hold of you. Plaster your contact details such as your web address, email address, phone numbers and social media handles. If it is possible, have them hyperlinked on any web content such as emails or newsletters and everywhere on your captions, having those details at the bottom or in the corner of web pages so it is easy for people to find you and remind them that you are available on various platforms. 

Social media ideas for dentists to engage audiences

Contests

Online contests are a great way to boost your following without opting for paid advertisements. You will have to fork out a bit for the final prize but that’s still cheaper than buying clicks and views.

Use simple, cheap treatments such as a free tooth whitening session, a dental care kit or a treatment voucher as your prizes to encourage winners to have to come to your location. 

This not only directly promotes your own product/service but also saves you from spending on another item. It’s basically free publicity. As long as your customer service is handled well, you should be able to convert the prize winner into a long-term patient once they are in the practice.

Create Partnerships

No one can do everything by themselves. Sooner or later you will need help and teaming up with another business that is in the same field can help create a symbiotic relationship where both parties benefit greatly.

Creating strategic partnerships has many advantages while doesn’t require as much work on your part. Your business is able to receive twice as much notice and partnering with an industry-relevant business will also introduce you to an entirely new audience that is looking for something in your area of specialties.

Continuing from the previous example once again, a car mechanic can partner with a car dealership and have access to an exclusive audience that would usually be out of reach. And you can even go a step further and give discounts or offer special pricing to the customers that are referred to you by the partner.

Certain businesses in the dental industry, like equipment suppliers and dental tech companies, are always happy to team up with practitioners to help grow their patient base (as this often translates into more revenue for them too). Reach out, share posts and see what opportunities are out there.

Referral Programs

Speaking of referral programs, they should not only be limited to your partnerships. Under normal circumstances even if customers like what you have to offer, they still often wouldn’t just refer to your services without a reason. So why not give them one?

You have a lot of freedom when it comes to designing referral programs, but the one thing that should be kept in mind is the reward. It has to be enticing enough for your customers to consider actively referring new clients. What you’re looking for is someone that will stick around, even after the initial purchase.

Studies have shown that referred customers have much higher brand loyalty from the get-go and larger profit margins without much work from your side. Not only this, but it would also increase the loyalty of your existing customers once they have a more vested interest in your brand.

Plus, with the dozens of different kinds of software out there that are designed for the sole purpose of setting up and maintaining such referral programs, there really is no reason for you to not at least try it out.

Measuring the Success of Social Media Efforts for Dental Practices

It’s essential for dental practices to monitor their online efforts to figure out what works, and what doesn’t and to direct their efforts. You can do this by looking at a few important things:

1. Growth of Your Online Community: See if more people are following or liking your pages on social media.
2. Website Traffic from Social Media: Check if social media is sending more people to your website.
3. Likes, Comments, and Shares: Look at how much people are liking, commenting, and sharing your posts.
4. Follower Demographics: Find out what kind of people are following you and use that info to make content they like.
5. Clicks and Conversions: See if people are clicking on your links and taking action, like making appointments.
6. Inquiries and Appointments: Check if people are getting in touch or booking appointments because of what they see on social media.

By keeping an eye on these things, you can tailor your social media strategy to what works best for you. Remember, not all strategies will work the same for all practices, you need to figure out what works best for you.

Tips on How to Effectively Manage Your Social Media Accounts

Here are some easy tips for dentists to handle their social media accounts well:

1. Set Clear Goals: Decide what you want from social media, like getting more people to know your brand or bringing them to your website. This will help you plan what to post and how to interact.
2. Choose the Right Platforms: Not all social media is the same. Pick the ones where your audience hangs out. Facebook and Instagram are good choices for dentists because you can share pictures and useful info.
3. Share Helpful Stuff: People like content that teaches them something or makes them interested. Share tips for taking care of your teeth, facts about oral health, photos showing changes, what patients say about you, and sneak peeks of your practice. This helps you become a trusted expert.
4. Be Regular: To stay active, post new things often. Make a schedule for what to post and when. This keeps you organized and seen by your audience.
5. Talk to Your Audience: Social media isn’t just for talking at people. Answer comments, messages, and reviews quickly and nicely. This helps you connect with people and gain their trust.
6. Reach Local People: Since most of your patients are probably local, use social media to talk to them. You can use features like location tags, local hashtags, or targeted ads to make sure your content reaches the right people in your area.
7. Work with Influencers: Team up with important people in your community or field. Find local influencers or dental experts to work together on content or host events.

If you own a dental practice, great marketing is essential to your survival and growth, just like it is for any business. You need people to know what you can provide for them. One of the best ways to make this happen is to use video marketing. Video is definitely king, when it comes to online content in the world today. Globally, we watch as many as 1 billion hours of video each day on YouTube alone.

You can begin to see why video marketing for dentists is so important. It should form a big part of any digital marketing strategy. There are several ways in which video content can be useful for helping to grow your business.

The benefits of video marketing

According to this article posted on Entrepreneur.com, “Videos are processed by the brain 60,000 times faster than text.” This is why people love to watch videos. It takes less time and effort than it does to read text online.

Video is also an excellent means of providing an accurate picture without having to use a lot of words to explain what is going on. Put simply, it’s an entertaining and informative way of connecting with people that is more likely to gain their attention and encourage them to engage with your business. It’s also a means of you competing for online viewers with your competitors. There are several ways in which video marketing makes these things happen.

Informing the viewer.

There is so much competition out there that it’s no longer good enough for you to simply pitch your services to potential patients. You need to inform them about how certain services work and about how the treatments that you offer can help them. It’s all about adding something valuable to the viewer experience, rather than going for the hard sell.

Helping with Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).

Good quality video content is regarded highly when it comes to getting that high search engine ranking that you want for your business. Video marketing should be used in conjunction with high quality text content, for the best results. Do not forget to provide a solid meta description and a good heading for each video.

Not getting left behind from the crowd.

According to Hubspot, 87% of businesses use video marketing as a tool. This means that if you do not use good quality video content as part of your digital marketing strategy, you risk getting left behind. You cannot afford for this to happen, as the dental market in the UK is currently a very competitive one.

Connecting with patients on a personal level.

One of the biggest benefits of video marketing is that it allows patients, and prospective patients, to see you and your practice in a more personal way. Seeing members of the practice on video enables this to happen in a way that text does not.

Bearing these benefits in mind, there are several different types of video that you can use, to make sure that you get the best return on your investment.

Types of video that you can use

You may be thinking that one video is pretty much the same as the next, but that is not true. Videos are made for different reasons, and with various aims in mind. You need to think about this carefully when you are creating video content for your business. Here are some of the different types of video that you may want to consider using.

Explainer videos

Make a great explainer video to educate people about your services and you can gain a lot of new fans. This type of video can also help people who are nervous of dentists to get a better understanding, making them more likely to register at your practice.

Interviews

Using interviews as part of your video marketing is an excellent way to connect with potential patients as they can see various members of the practice team answering questions, and get to know them.

Reviews by brand ambassadors.

If you can get people to provide a review of your businesses and services on camera, this can be an excellent way of encouraging people to engage with your business. They can see how you have helped others which gives them a better understanding of how you can help them.

You can see why video is such a vital part of any digital marketing strategy. It can help your business to better communicate with people and also means that they are more likely to engage with your marketing and your business.