Top 10 Digital Marketing Strategies to Help You Attract, Acquire and Retain Patients

By Anna Davies, Whiteboard Marketing

Gone are the days of patients simply calling their neighborhood dentist for an appointment. If you want to thrive as a practice, you need to adjust to today’s digitally driven consumer mindset and invest in strategies across the digital marketing ecosystem to reach your prospective patients.

Here at Whiteboard Marketing, we know how to put together the right combination of strategy and services to help our dental clients succeed in patient attraction, acquisition and retention. Here’s where we start:

1.

Plan Ahead

No marketing idea will ever succeed without strategic planning. To develop a strong marketing plan for your practice, you need to dedicate the time and resources to identifying what your goals are for growing your practice and evaluate how your ideas will work together to obtain your desired outcome.

Working with a trusted marketing partner is an excellent way to start. For example, at Whiteboard Marketing, we work closely with our clients utilizing our proprietary process to ensure they have a marketing roadmap that sets them up for both short- and longterm success.

2.

Make Your Website Work for You

Your website is a window into your practice, and its look and ease of use gives potential patients their first impression. You need a website that not only looks sleek and modern but is also designed to convert new patients. This includes features like:

Clear calls to action (CTAs), so patients are prompted to take action like schedule an appointment.

Mobile-responsiveness, so patients can access your site on both their cell phone and their desktop.

A clear, cohesive color scheme and professional photos of your staff.

At Whiteboard Marketing, these are standards for each site we build and maintain for our clients.

3.

Modernize Your Patient Experience

Today’s patient is constantly online, and they expect their dental practice to be, too. We recommend implementing 24/7 conveniences on your website so it can convert new patients even when your office is closed.

Popular features that meet the needs of your modern patient include:

Online scheduling, so patients can make appointments outside of usual office hours.

Live chat to talk with patients while they explore your website.

Dental insurance checker, so patients can see if you’re in-network with their insurance without calling your office.

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4.

Get Social on Facebook

Patients live their lives on social media. Facebook alone has nearly 1.5 billion active daily users — more and more patients are finding their healthcare providers through the platform, too.

For dental practices, Facebook allows you to: Build brand awareness.

Communicate with current and prospective patients. Highlight your practice’s culture. Show up in Google searches. Advertise easily. Our team builds purposeful Facebook strategies for each client that speaks to their target audience. Posting standards include:

Services offered

Celebrations

Dental tips Patient photos Staff action shots

Team activities outside of the office

5.

Be the “Dentist Near Me”

Show up when patients search for a “dentist near me” by optimizing your Google Business Profile with essential information like:

Your name, address and phone number (NAP) Website links

Office directions

Hours Recent photos Service and business summary Forty-six percent of all Google searches are local, and here at Whiteboard Marketing, 50 percent of all our clients’ phone calls come from local searches.

Show Up on Google

With 5.6 billion Google searches made per day, search engine optimization (SEO) is essential for getting your practice in front of patients. SEO best practices we use at Whiteboard Marketing include:

Properly structuring websites in a way that is simple for both Google and searchers to understand.

Writing keyword-rich original content for websites.

Updating practice listings in online directories, like Yelp and Healthgrades.

7.

Generate Immediate Leads with Advertising

Pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is the fastest way to get new patient leads. Your practice can run ads on Google, so you show up as one of the first results when patients search for certain keywords, and on Facebook, so you show up to targeted demographics.

Google Ads are best for ambitious goals, like growing your practice by a set number of patients each month. Facebook Ads are good for promoting your practice and the unique services you offer. Determine your goals and work with your marketing partner to set up a Google Ads and Facebook Ads Manager account.

Track Your Analytics

If you’re investing money into a marketing strategy to acquire patients, you want to see your return on investment and make sure it’s money well spent. Here at Whiteboard Marketing, we track analytics for our clients by:

8.

No marketing idea will ever succeed without strategic planning. Working with a trusted marketing partner is an excellent way to start.

Closely following where new patients are coming from, like a Google Business Profile or social media.

Having their front desk team ask each patient, “How did you hear about us?”

Regularly checking web and social media analytics.

Recording and listening to phone calls from patients and prospective patients.

Reevaluate your marketing plan every month to see if you’re adequately investing enough time and money into where your patients are coming from.

Reviews Matter

Consider how many patients start their dental health journey by looking at reviews from other patients. According to Google, having plenty of positive reviews–and responding to them–has a positive impact on helping you show up when a patient searches for a new dentist.

9.

For our clients, we develop a proactive review strategy that gets practices a steady flow of patient reviews. This shows both Google and potential new patients that the practice is trustworthy and credible.

Record Your Calls for Training and Quality Assurance

Recording and listening to your calls help both your staff and your patients. You can analyze the needs of callers and the performance of your front desk staff in answering their questions. You can also identify patient trends by listening to calls, like what campaigns are bringing patients through the door and what services are most popular.

10.

Whiteboard Marketing is a full-service, nationally recognized and endorsed digital agency dedicated exclusively to dental practice marketing and based in Dublin, Ohio. Since 2005, the agency has created unique, customized solutions that deliver the results clients want.