Marketing Your Dental Practice It’s About Trust
Have you ever thought what it is that inspires you to buy something? You might think about these hints when you are marketing a dental practice!
I hear people saying things like the following:
- People buy on price!
- People buy a brand!
- People buy for convenience!
- People buy on impulse
Well the truth about all the above is that before they part a single penny they need to trust the person who is selling the service or product they want to buy. Even if something is very cheap, normally you still won’t part with your money until you trust the person who is selling the product you want to buy, the same goes for brand, convenience, impulse all of them depend on you trusting the person who is selling.
So when I talk to my clients and they tell me that they are struggling to get new patients do they forget the above when they are marketing a dental practice.
I want you to understand something. Recently I had a stand at the Dental Showcase in Birmingham, during the quiet periods I was talking with quite a few of the other exhibitors, many of which don’t sell exclusively to the dental profession.
Without exception their perception of dentists was this:
- They are all very rich!
- They charge well over the odds!
- They have a very easy life and don’t have to work too hard!
I work hand in hand with my clients so I know that this isn’t the case, in fact the opposite is generally true.
So when you open your dental practice door and expect people to flood to you because you are a good dentist, don’t be surprised when they don’t.
To make matters worse many dental practices also expect their patients to pay a huge premium for the first consultation.
Marketing A Dental Practice
I was recently engaged by a dentist to help him market his dental practice. This practice was in deep trouble, they were getting around 1-2 new patients per month (not per week, per month). Their average patient age was in their sixties and their numbers were dwindling. But their initial examination was £120.00.
Just think about this, people at the moment are scrutinising every penny they spend. By and large they think that dentists are rich and overpriced. There are many other dentists in the area both private and NHS, and they couldn’t work out why new patients were not joining them!
People need to build trust before they will part with their money, so why would someone part with £120.00 when they had no idea what this dental practice was like, whether they were any good or if they offered value for money!
So the very first thing I advised them to do was to lower their cost of entry into the practice. This didn’t mean they had to reduce the price of any of the treatment, just make it easier for someone to say yes to coming to the practice.
We then embarked on marketing their dental practice. In the first month we booked 20 new patients, in the second we booked 30 new patients, in the fourth month we booked 35 new patients. That is where we currently are.
Yes you could argue that they have a professional helping them get new patients and obviously I wouldn’t argue with that, but the biggest breakthrough was to lower the point of entry, so that they could show the new patients that they could be trusted, that they do offer value for money and they offer great dentistry.
Sometimes you have to go right back to basics when you are marketing a dental practice, its not all about technique and clever marketing, its all about trust.
If you would like to increase your revenues and profits, call me on 01767 626 398 or email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or visit my website