Digital marketing ideas for dentists

The healthcare industry is constantly changing. Currently, it has evolved into focusing on value-based care, which prioritizes more patient engagement and involvement. Since patients are becoming more involved with their health, it’s important for dental clinics to adjust how they engage with their target audience if they want to remain relevant and grow.

Digital marketing supports this transition to value-based care by educating patients and providing superior patient service and engagement opportunities necessary to attract and retain patients for your dental clinic.

How dentists benefit from digital marketing

To engage and acquire new patients is a challenge for dental clinics. Digital marketing is today essential for clinics in the healthcare industry because many patients today first search the internet for different solutions to their problems. With the right strategies and focus on effective marketing efforts, you can reach out to these patients. By having a website that can help your patients find the information that they are looking for, will set your company up for success. You will become a trusted source that can help solve their problems and needs.

Here are some results that your clinic will obtain:

  • Lower marketing and acquisition costs to acquire new patients
  • Increase in quality leads to your website
  • Ability to retain and grow a strong relationship with your patients
  • Increase in satisfied patients

5 digital marketing strategies for dentists

1. Search engine optimization (SEO)

Over 80% of patients searching for healthcare related topics begin their search online or through social media. If they don’t search for healthcare online, they rely on word-of-mouth and recommendations from others, which can be found on online reviews.

By having an SEO optimized website, it will allow you to rank higher in search engine result pages (SERPs) so that more potential patients will visit your website and learn how your company can help them. Investing in an effective SEO strategy means that your company will become more competitive and can challenge the larger companies in your industry.

2. Web design

For dental clinics, it’s important to have an easily navigated and customer-centric website. To increase your chances of getting more leads, it’s important to think about the user experience and how you make it easy for visitors to find the right kind of content that can solve their problems.

Today we see, among other things, an increase in voice-activated search via, for example, Siri on the iPhone, Amazon Alexa and Cortana. To optimize your content for voice-activated platforms, it is good to use long-tail keywords and have a conversational tone in your content. Therefore, consider making a website that is optimized for both desktop and mobile phones to make it easy for your visitors to go through their customer journey to choose your company.

3. Content marketing & Email marketing

In order to help your visitors find what they are looking for, you need content that resonates with them and helps them make the right decision. 1% of all Google searches are related to medical symptoms, which is about 35 million searches each day. By having, for example, informative blogs that help, educate, and give advice, you can reach out to your target audience in an effective way.

Another smart tip is to create video-based content. By creating informative videos, you gain greater consumer confidence and increase your chances of appearing higher among the search results on Google. You also improve your brand exposure while helping to visually educate your audience about various medical topics.

Lastly, it’s good to send out e-newsletters to your contacts. With email marketing, you keep your audience updated with content that is useful to them based on their interests and needs. Sending out an e-newsletter once or twice a month keeps your target audience updated on what is going on within your company and the healthcare industry.

4. Social media

In order to be able to engage in a dialogue with your target audience, you need to use social media. Statistics show that 60% of users trust doctors who are active on social media and the information they share – dental clinics have the highest confidence among all groups. Make sure to consistently post, share and comment on the platforms on which your target audience is active.

5. Search engine marketing (SEM)

Having a well-optimized website is a good start but to be able to reach even more leads it is smart to use SEM; which PPC has shown to be an effective strategy for the healthcare industry. Advertising through Google Ads, LinkedIn Ads or Facebook Ads is an effective way to reach out to your target audience while increasing your brand awareness. With PPC you only pay when someone clicks on your ad, which can be a cost-effective way to reach out to your target audience. SEM gives your company quick results and statistics show that visitors who come to your website via a PPC ad have a 1.5 times more chance to convert into a patient.