Not understanding the value of repeat exposure
It would be great if every time someone saw your ad, they clicked on it. And it would be even better if every person who clicked on your ad was your ideal patient and booked an appointment. Those ideas just aren’t realistic.
Different people use the internet in different ways. Some “very different people” have a need, perform a search, click on the first provider they see, and book an appointment. They don’t hesitate. They just get it done. Those people operate differently from the vast majority of internet users.
Most people hop on their phones while getting ready for dinner or waiting for an appointment. They scroll around and perform multiple searches. Then they might jump on a laptop to do some work and, while distracted, get back to researching that dental need that piqued their interest. That’s most people.
So to capture the largest segment of your desired dental patients, you need to get in front of them repeatedly. This is most feasible using ads. Google Ads are largely pay-per-click ads, meaning that you pay when people click on your ad—not just when it’s seen. But that doesn’t mean that the repeated exposure of people seeing your ad but not clicking it is not valuable.
Pay-per-click advertising allows your dental practice repeat exposure while only paying for people who click on your ad.
Usually, these people have seen your ad a number of times and are finally ready to take action and schedule an appointment.
You want your dental office to be seen all over online by your target dental patient. That requires advertising that goes beyond a cheap click and goes into brand strategy. If you don’t prioritize branding as part of your pay-per-click and overall dental digital marketing strategy, you’ll be more frustrated with the results you get. Without repeat exposure and brand recognition, you’re only getting in front of those “very different people” who don’t hesitate to make an appointment without future research. They’ll take the same approach, say ‘yes’ to treatment, and pay up (maybe) without really doing their homework. Wait- that patient sounds like a potential nightmare, don’t they?
Suffering annoying problems and wanting more new dental patients
Dentists often look for a new dental marketing company on Google. Not because their marketing is totally broken, but because their relationship with the current dental marketing company is just gone or it has been strained by annoying problems that aren’t going away. Maybe the company doesn’t have a good answer for some of your questions, or maybe they just don’t pick up the phone when you call.
If this is you, you might wonder if you are leaving money on the table by not trying other options. It’s a nagging feeling that just doesn’t go away, but you hate to start over because switching dental marketing companies is a pain.
This is a scary place. Over the twenty+ years that I’ve been in marketing, I’ve talked with more dentists than I can count who feel the same way, so you’re not alone. However, unless I can point to glaring issues in your campaign, until we start running things and have them going for a while, I may not be able to be very specific about what the other company was doing wrong. Other factors play in, too, like, a tough market or maybe your dental office has some other problems lurking under the surface.
It’s true that our team of dental marketing experts pick up the phone when you call—that’s a problem we can solve. But looking under the hood of a dentist’s pay-per-click campaign is just one component of a system that makes dental practices successful. As I said, there are many factors that plan in.
We know dentistry, and we want to craft a dental marketing strategy that promotes your priorities and helps you identify areas where you can improve. Some marketing companies will just brush your goals under the rug and assure you that their boilerplate, super easy approach is what you’ve been missing all these years. They’ll sell you no matter what. That’s not us. Switching dental marketing companies is a big commitment for you and the marketing team that we don’t take lightly. When we sign on a new Pro Member, we are serious about finding a marketing strategy that works for your practice. If we don’t feel we can make a big impact, we’ll be upfront about it.
As a stepping stone to making a switch, try our marketing evaluation tool here. This tool will help you and us decide if there are holes in your marketing that we can fix.
If that report identifies areas that need improvement, schedule a consultation with one of our dental marketing consultants. They can help you understand what other dentists have done to make their marketing more effective than ever before, including their pay-per-click advertising.
