Monday, July 29, 2013
As the online world of marketing continues to explode, those once optional internet marketing and advertising opportunities are now mandatory to keep up with your competitors and find new patients.
The Marketing Shift
Marketing is everything your practice does to educate and retain current patients as well as to attract new ones. Pre-internet, facilitating a successful marketing campaign consisted of primarily traditional-only marketing. Let’s classify traditional marketing as the following: print media (magazines, newspapers, Yellow Pages), direct mail, radio, television, trade shows, brochures, and other internal/external collateral materials. From this, one could easily assume that traditional marketing encompasses everything physical, or anything not online.
These days marketing methods are changing quickly. As recently as 2005, a national study conducted jointly by Harris Interactive and the Public Relations Society of America concluded that dental professionals identified the traditional method of marketing as the best method. Contrarily, a study presented in 2012 stated traditional marketing spend is expected to decrease by almost 162 percent, and digital marketing will increase by 14 percent.1 Online advertising, social media and patient review websites are abruptly becoming the most popular forms of not only advertising, but relationship building with your clientele.
It’s Time for an Integrated Approach
While those numbers are startling, the answer is not to scrap your old way of reaching your patients, but rather to integrate that campaign into your newer, online campaign. Instead of removing the print ad your dental practice has run for 10 years in your local newspaper, cut back on the number of days you run it and add an online component to that same message and campaign. Better yet, add a tracking phone number and vanity URL to the online ad and a second phone number and URL to the print ad. After three months of running both campaigns, then you can gauge the effectiveness of the campaign by monitoring which placement brought in more calls and patients.
Thinking of your traditional marketing efforts and digital efforts as separate messages and approaches can cause your practice to lose out on cross-promoting and the benefits of reinforcing one strong message to repeat and/or potential dental patients. With all of the channels available, your influential brand message or campaign can be slightly tweaked to hit an array of patients. Reallocating your marketing dollars to multiple channels, including print, can grossly increase the number of people who come into contact with your message and the branding of your practice.
For example, a print ad can be transformed into an online advertising banner or an online version of the print piece, which can then be posted to your online social media communities such as Twitter and Facebook. Each channel reaches a slightly different audience, so mixing up promotions and tying in timely, relevant news is encouraged to brand your practice online.
Traditional advertising is a great way to hone in on a specific demographic, such as women ages 45-55 during commercials during Katie Couric. With online marketing, we have the ability to reach more audiences with fewer dollars, but the results can sometimes be less conclusive. You are able to promote more online, and get more “bang for your buck” with the same amount of money, if there is a higher return.
Video is More Important Than Ever
Watching a patient review his or her dentist, talk about an experience and how their life was affected is much more powerful than reading about it. Video is the best avenue for relationship-building and trust, and can be facilitated with the website and your social media outlets. A practice website video, in addition to patient testimonials, is an extension, reflection and testament to your profession and dedication.
Continuity
Continuity between your traditional and online marketing efforts allows for effectiveness, strong brand building and reemphasizing your message while being consistent amongst all channels. Understand your audience; know who you are targeting and which channels they are using before deciding where your marketing dollars are spent. Invest in the technology it takes to get your practice to the next level, and don’t be afraid to try different campaigns and strategies. Mix it up and see if you get more patients in the door.
1) Moorman, Christine. Presentation: Highlights and Insights. The CMOSurvery.org, February 2012