WORKSHEET MODULE SIX
CREATING A REMARKABLE DENTAL PRACTICE
By FRED JOYAL
YOUR DIGITAL PRESENCE: PART TWO
Social Media is essential to marketing your practice. It is one of
the sides of the Digital Marketing Triangle.
VIDEO 2: FACEBOOK
Facebook is the place! 1 out of every 5 minutes online is spent on
Facebook!
35% of Facebook users post an image every day.
Facebook is where people find out what it’s like to be a patient of
yours (not clinically, but experientially).
Build and maintain an amazing Facebook page—it is essentially a
website, with most of the same information.
Timeline image: Use high quality photography in the right format,
or even video in a loop.
Set the CALL NOW button with your phone number. Eventually
you want that to be an email link or a link to your online schedule.
Your Messenger window should be set to open automatically with
preloaded questions when they reach your page.
Allow people to comment, but also set the profanity setting to
“on” in your Settings.
You can always delete anyone’s comment on your Facebook
page. (But not recommendations, which are essentially reviews.)
WHAT DO YOU POST?
Imagery and videos
Before and After Photos (Don’t violate HIPAA—use smile
close-up.)
Reviews by patients
Team and patient photos—happy patient of the week or day,
finished cases.
Team events
Holiday events
Contests
Engage in playful, human activities
Good quality information on dental care
Don’t use clinical videos of procedures
Don’t get into political stuff
Avoid controversial posts of any kind—this is your business,
not your personal platform!
Be conscious of what you post. Don’t show off your success
extravagantly.
Organic reach on your Facebook page is approaching zero,
meaning you won’t just appear on their wall when you post.
Sharing other posts increases how many of your followers will see
the post.
Live videos will increase that number significantly. Do as many of
your videos that way as possible. (You can always immediately
delete them if you’re not happy with them.)
Always save the Live video to your phone so you have it to use
elsewhere, like YouTube and your website.
Boost your posts—ideally all of them. $5 each is plenty. You
should have $100 a month budget to boost posts. If a post is
more popular, boost with even more $. This is how you defeat the
drop in organic reach.
Share other people’s and pages’ posts. Facebook likes it. It’s not
stealing. It’s how Facebook is intended to be used.
Always put some image in your post; never post just text. But
always put a heading or description. Also, use emojis as part of
the text of every post.
Set the Messenger button on each post to “On.”
How often should you post?
2 or 3 times a week, spread out evenly over the month.
Add subtitles to videos for Facebook if it’s important information,
because 70% or more watch without sound, as they start to play
automatically.
Assign a Facebook geek on your team. Make social media
someone’s responsibility on a consistent basis. Have the person
get certified on Facebook Blueprint.
Outsource social media if you can’t stay current and looking
good!
Keep in mind that some of this stuff will change and what I tell
you will no longer be accurate!
Video 3: INSTAGRAM, TWITTER, ETC.
Create practice pages for:
Instagram
LinkedIn
Twitter
SnapChat
Pinterest
Make the look consistent across all of them, and link them
whenever possible. These are all secondary to Facebook.
INSTAGRAM
Growing fast, especially among Millennial users.
Start your posts—video and photo--on Instagram and then share
them to Facebook. Use this as a parallel to Facebook.
Stories disappear, so this is not what you want to use there. Also,
they can’t be commented on.
Instagram will become useful for advertising once you have
significant followers.
TWITTER
Post your blog, and occasionally share a video.
Tag everything with relevant hashtags.
SNAPCHAT
Good primarily for orthodontics because it is primarily a teenager
site.
Otherwise it is too fleeting a medium.
PINTEREST
Good for before-and-after images and practice photos.
LINKEDIN
Only good for finding employees, and not that good for that.
Post your blog there as well, though.
Most of the posting you do on these sites will serve only get you
SEO. They are extremely unlikely to generate patients, so don’t
spend a lot of time on them.
Video 4: ADDITIONAL SERVICES
This is where your adaptability comes in. All of these require
training and often certification, and most of the time added
technology.
KEY GOAL: Become a one-stop shop.
Give patients something unique and positive to talk about by
providing services that are positive experiences or solve big
problems like snoring or missing teeth.
When adding them, focus on consumer-centric services.
Implants:
1 out of 5 Americans will be over 65 by 2020.
Many people are not aware of how advanced and fast implants
have become.
Clear Orthodontic Aligners:
It has widened the category exponentially. Essential as a service.
Sleep Dentistry:
Treat snoring and sleep apnea.
90 million people are snorers.
There are home sleep-study kits now.
Dermal Fillers and Botox:
Patients will be more consistent in recall.
They will look younger—you’ll become an enhanced lifestyle
provider.
Expand Your Specialized Treatment Skills:
Endo
Perio with laser
Limited Ortho using digital scanning or cone beam tech.
Internal Insurance Plan like Plan for Health:
42% of people will change dentists if their plan changes or you no
longer accept it.
This type of plan allows you to serve people who don’t have
insurance or who have coverage that you don’t accept but they
would like to stay with you.
They can also stop paying through their employer and pay you for
better coverage.
By 2027, 50% of the workforce will be freelancers, independent
contractors. They won’t have coverage from work, and will seek
some form of insurance.
Technology is what makes all these possible!
Get the training for these services, and adapt your workflow
systems.
Your intake form needs to ask about:
Implants/missing teeth
Snoring
Straightening their teeth
Use display information and brochures in your office for each of
these services, so patients will ask about them.
RESOURCES
Futuredontics and 1-800-DENTIST Facebook pages have daily
good sharable dental content.
Image creation for social media pages:
[Link]
[Link]
Outsource for Facebook Posting: PatientPop [Link]
CAD-CAM and Implant training: Spear Institute [Link]
Botox and Dermal Filler training: [Link]
Plan for Health internal insurance plan: [Link]