The new year is here – time to roll out the resolutions. Top on many dental practice lists: invest in marketing.
In dental today’s landscape, marketing plays an indispensable role in the growth and sustainability of dental practices, groups, and DSOs. However, the question remains: How do you go about selecting the right marketing company and determining the most effective strategy? Should you do this yourself, find multiple vendors, or work with a program-based dental marketing company that will help you connect the pieces and maximize the effectiveness of your marketing investment? This blog post will At Dental evaluate both options and empower you to make an informed decision that best suits the needs of your practice.
The A La Carte Approach
Many dental practices will take an a la carte approach to marketing. This means hiring separate companies that might build your website, handle your search engine marketing, run a social media campaign, etc. And while it seems like you’ll have more control over each step of the process, most dentists end up missing out on their full marketing potential.
Logically, the first thing a dentist thinks about is creating a new website. In our industry, “Custom Websites” generate a lot of attention and there is a belief that custom is better. There certainly are benefits to a custom website, primarily being that they are unique to your brand and you can have precise control over the look and features of the website. One of the biggest drawbacks is the cost. An in-house developer’s time is valuable, typically ranging between $150-$250. This, in tandem with the significant time it takes to build a truly custom site, can result in fees between $7,000 and $20,000. But more than that, most website design firms don’t specialize in dental marketing and fail to align the website design with the practice’s business objectives. In other words, it does not effectively generate new patients.
Once the custom website is built and published to the internet, the design agency’s job is done and you go your separate ways. Reality usually steps in a few months later as you realize your new customer stream has stayed the same or dipped to what you had before the new website. This is the point where most dentists realize they need a marketing strategy.
In a lot of cases, this can mean hiring one or multiple companies for paid advertising, offline marketing, search engine optimization, social media, etc.
This type of fragmented approach quickly becomes challenging to manage and disconnected from the custom website. Dentists often end up feeling frustrated as they try to determine which marketing efforts are generating the best results.
The Dental Revenue Philosophy
Dental Revenue is a niche marketing company that specializes in providing flexible and scalable marketing services to groups, DSOs, and dental practices of all sizes. We achieve this by generating a tailored marketing approach that addresses your ultimate needs and goals and works backward. This is one of the main reasons new Dental Revenue clients generate an average annual return of 5-10x ROI in their first year. Our 15 years of industry success show that not only do we understand website design and online marketing – but we also understand the dental industry. Our Performance Program is unique in that it combines all of the essential dental marketing elements to accomplish the stages of marketing achievement. These Stages are defined as awareness, connection, and conversion
- Awareness – This stage focuses on creating a presence in the minds of potential patients, an audience for your messages. It involves strategies like online advertising, search engine optimization (SEO), email marketing, social media engagement, and more.
- Connection – Convincing your audience to choose your dental practice over competitors is important. You can make a significant investment in building an audience only to have your audience see you as no different from every other dentist. Connecting involves crafting a compelling message and positioning your practice as the top choice. You do this by leveraging your website and resources to create a compelling value proposition. Some resources could include videos, testimonials, smile gallery photos, or personal messages from the dentist and staff. Creating a strong brand, that effectively communicates your unique value helps you to stand out in a crowded market.
- Conversion – If your office can build an audience and encourage them to reach out to your practice through calls or form submissions, it’s essential to assess how effectively your practice capitalizes on these opportunities. How well are you converting the generated leads, and how efficiently are you following up on them? Are your team members answering the phone promptly, equipped with essential phone skills, and aware of their critical role in executing a successful marketing program?
Dental Revenue offers a comprehensive solution that enables you to monitor KIPs with the help of account managers. Through advanced tracking, patient management software integration, success coaching, and analysis, we provide valuable insights to further optimize your conversion rates, ensuring that you make the most of the opportunities generated.
What’s Missing From Your Marketing Strategy
Our base Performance Program Platform is robust with the potential to add on additional services depending on your business goals. The most important thing we recommend to clients, whether they choose Dental Revenue or not, is to make sure that your marketing agency offers an all-in-one approach to simplify your marketing efforts, maximize your potential, and help you see where you’re being most effective.
Dental Revenue rolls everything into one program including:
- High-quality, responsive website unique to your brand
- Personalized content that is specific to your business and target market
- Focus on Search Engine Optimization, Paid Advertising, and Social Media
- HIPPA-compliant new patient phone call tracking services
- Reporting dashboard with details on leads and website analytics
- Patient Management Software integration and ROI matching
- Conversion coaching and regular review meetings
No matter how great your website looks, at the end of the day, it boils down to whether or not you’re getting the results you want and need to thrive. Before you hire a marketing firm, reflect on your business objectives and then hire a company that can help you meet them.
Need Help Marketing Your Dental Practice?
Make good on your New Year’s resolution. Contact Dental Revenue for a free demo of our Performance Program.
Contact us today: 868-317-6697 or schedule a demo online.
