Sometimes we get so caught up in trying to do things differently in our efforts to grow and thrive that we might actually neglect the fundamentals. So today I want us to get back to the basics and make sure your dental practice is following the dental marketing fundamentals that every thriving dentist uses.
Marketing fundamentals
When you think of marketing what do you think of? If you’re like most people you probably think of someone trying to sell you something, but this is not dental marketing. Dental marketing is less about selling your services and more about helping your ideal patients find and choose you. This means that the fundamentals of dental marketing are unique, so the essentials we are going to look at today involve being found on Google.
How do patients find you?
When someone makes a search, Google uses certain criteria to sort through millions of possible results to match the search to the best options. In order to make sure your practice is one of the first results that is found when prospective patients make a relevant Google search, you need to have a few basic things in place.
NAP – NAP stands for Name, Address, Phone number. Your practice is likely listed on hundreds of online directories, but in order for Google to recognize your practice on all these listings, you need to have a consistent practice name, address, and phone number across all these directories.
EAT – This stands for Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness. These are the three primary factors Google is looking for in a website in order to determine that it will be useful to direct people’s searches to that website.
Lighthouse – This is a scoring system Google uses based on hundreds of factors including speed and optimization to determine your website’s ranking in search results.
Backlinks – Google also takes into account whether or not other content on the internet recognizes or links to your website.
Cialdini’s six principles of influence
Once you’ve got these basics down, the next part of dental marketing involves persuading the patients who find you to choose you as their dental partner. In order to do this, I recommend following Robert Cialdini’s six principles of influence so that you can create a moment in which people will be three times more likely to say yes to you. Cialdini’s principles are:
- Reciprocity
- Consistency
- Social proof
- Liking
- Authority
- Scarcity
By using these six principles along with the dental marketing fundamentals, you will be able to help your ideal patients find and choose your dental practice.
Find out more details by listening to the full podcast here.
