When dentists look for help with pay-per-click, they usually fall into one of these categories:

• The Dental PPC Veteran – A dentist who types in ‘pay-per-click for dentists’ on Google because they have a campaign they’ve been running for a long time but think it could be better. Often these dentists invest heavily in Google Ads but not always.
• The Dental PPC Skeptic – A dentist who has fought the idea of running dental pay-per-click ads for a long time or maybe even tried it briefly but turned it off. Either way, this dentist is afraid of getting burned but is curious whether or not pay-per-click advertising can actually bring in the dental patients that they want.
• The Brass Tacks Dentist – A dentist who doesn’t really understand how dental marketing works and doesn’t really care to, but has heard of “pay-per-click for dentists” and wants to maybe try it out. This dentist just wants to see results. They don’t want to know how campaigns are built or about landing page optimization. They just want to get back to dentistry but don’t want to miss out on more new patients. They may have even Googled “paper clip marketing for dentists” or some variant. If that’s you- I get it. BTW, it’s ‘pay per click’ not ‘paper clip.’ 😃 It’s okay. You don’t need to be a dental pay-per-click expert. That’s our job.

Whichever category fits you best, here are some common problems you might have experienced and what you can do to avoid them.

Do You Have A High Ad Spend But Low Lead Volume?

Low lead volume may not be as big of an issue as you think. Be sure to look into what is happening with the leads you are getting. Are you capitalizing on them by following up and having an easy appointment booking system? Another common issue is not pressing forward for more leads. You might already be getting a great return on investment from your ads, but even if that’s the case, push for more opportunities if they are there. They may turn out to be more, quality new dental patient leads. We have had several offices over the years who thought they had maxed out the opportunities in their market, but with a new, more aggressive campaign that targeted some added keyword groups other companies hadn’t considered, they were able to add many more new patient opportunities per month.

If you still can’t generate more leads, look into where your ads are sending leads. We regularly encounter campaigns where all ads go to the client’s home page. That’s a poor pay-per-click ad management tactic because you require patients to make extra clicks to get the information they want. If someone searches ‘dental implants near me,’ why send them to your website’s home page? Send them to your dental implants page instead for an increase in new dental implant leads. You may also need to consider a website redesign if your dental website was launched more than a couple of years ago.

Whatever changes you make to increase your lead volume, be sure that the new leads represent truly actionable leads on new dental patients for your office.

Do You Have A High Lead Volume But Few New Dental Patients

Getting a deluge of emails that will never turn into new patients; this is the cardinal sin of marketers who decide to jump into dental marketing as another income stream. They apply marketing tactics that work great for real estate agents and car dealerships but don’t help dental practices make the phone ring. The problem is that you don’t really need subscribers.

You need dental patients.

Step 1 in solving this problem is to help the marketing company understand your business. Explain what types of patients you want to target and what process people typically go through when searching for a new dentist. If the company doesn’t understand this, they will assume a longer buying cycle and launch ads that probably don’t match your practice.

Next, look for ad targeting problems. Your ads need to be in front of the right people at the right times. If you have a lot of calls and emails but not a lot of patients coming because of them, the odds are that your current dental marketing company is doing one of these things:

• Marketing your dental practice as one that is relevant to every dental search you can think of and then some.
• Not properly geotargeting your ads, so your money is spent targeting people in your immediate area- or at least the region.
• Is using too many automated strategies recommended by Google to increase the number of clicks on your ads.
• Targeting a raw number of “conversions” rather than likely patients, using a lead generator such as a “Dental Implant Pricing Guide.”
• Doing all of the above.

You may need help diagnosing the problem with this campaign. Work with your team to look through the last month or so of leads and look for trends. Do you have emails that are just download notifications with a name or perhaps just an email address? Listen to your calls too. Are you getting more inquiries from people outside your realistic service area than inside, where your existing dental patients typically live? Do people ask for services that you don’t offer?

All of these point to problems that are, unfortunately, most easily fixed by finding a better dental marketing company that specializes in pay-per-click for dentists.

Look Out for Part Two

We know dental pay-per-click can be confusing. So marinate on this and then read our next post on more common problems that dentists have with pay-per-click advertising.