Great Question!

Most dental practice owners do not realize just how powerful email marketing can be for the growth of their practice.  AIM’s Connections™ lead nurture sequence was specifically created to help dental websites connect with first-time website visitors who may not yet be sufficiently motivated to call to schedule an appointment.

By populating your dental website with forms offering complimentary special reports, website visitors are given the option of receiving a report on a topic of interest to them.  They are then enrolled in the Connections sequence, bringing useful bits of oral and overall health-related content, which serves to create and maintain top of mind awareness of your dental practice. 

Learn More About Email Marketing.

It’s been said that a picture is worth a thousand words.  Well, if that’s true, video is worth a million!

The power of video to grow you practice lies in its twin abilities to 1. Improve your website’s search engine ranking and 2. Connect you with your community.

When properly optimized video improves rankings by serving as an inbound link to your dental practice’s website while it encourages website visitors to remain on your website longer: time on site is an increasingly relevant factor Google’s algorithm evaluates when making its ranking decision.

Dental videos connect you with website visitors by presenting a compelling story told by real people.  One exciting way to generate authentic and compelling video content is by implementing AIM’s Patient Testimonial Video service.

It’s important that your video be original.  For example, a subscription to another service’s video will not be recognized as original content by Google, but can still help with rankings by increasing time on site (see above).

If one has a crystal ball and can state with certainty that their practice will remain successful and continue to attract new patients in sufficient numbers to achieve its Growth Plan within the desired timeframe, then it could be argued that this practice does not need to engage in digital marketing.

That said (written), few, if any, such practices exist.  Even if they did, digital marketing represents an opportunity for the dental practice owner to assert control over the rate of growth as well as the composition of his/her patient base.  Dental marketing entails identifying your desired target audience, then crafting a compelling message that resonates with that audience. The result is a steady stream of new patients matching your ideal profile.

When AIM Dental Marketing opened its doors in 1989, one could count the number of dental marketing agencies with one hand.  Since then, the number of individuals and entities calling themselves dental marketing agencies has exploded.  Organizations, including private equity and venture capital investors have been attracted to this field because of the size and projected growth of the industry. Unfortunately, many have short ‘return horizons,’ and are investing far more in marketing and sales than in developing tactics and strategies to serve dentists.  In general, one should be skeptical of, if not entirely avoid, companies and individuals who:

• Do not focus on dentistry
• Require long-term contracts.
• Cannot provide references
  and
• Offer a ‘one size fits all’ solution, as exemplified by having one flat fee regardless of the dental practice’s goals and situation.

Simply put, dental marketing help grow a dental practice by analyzing, implementing and monitoring a winning dental practice growth plan.  Winning in this context means consistently generating an acceptable return on investment (roi), which is calculated as follows:

(# New Patients x Average Lifetime Value) – Investment
Investment

A reasonable ROI is 1000% or better. AIM’s Health Partners enjoy an average roi of 1480%

Even the largest, most successful dental group practices who can afford a full time CMO (chief marketing officer) still rely on outside agencies to implement the tactics, which comprise a successful dental marketing plan.  When you compare the investment in a reputable dental marketing firm (2-10% of collections) against the cost to build an maintain an entire marketing department, the choice for most dental offices is clear.

A full service dental marketing agency (like AIM Dental Marketing) offers the following services:

• Analysis of needs and goals
• Implementation of tactics comprising your dental marketing plan
  and
• Monitoring of results

Analysis
We take an in depth look by asking questions, not preaching.  This critical phase uncovers opportunities and challenges, and confirm goals to ensure our relationship is long and rewarding for you, our valued Health Partner.  We also perform in depth analyses of your online reputation (website, review sites, directory listings, social media, and more) then share our findings and recommendations with you before proceeding to the next phase

Sound familiar? It should. That’s how you work with your patients right?

Implementation
Once we have confirmed your goals, budget, and timeframe, we implement the various agreed-upon tactics comprising your dental marketing plan.

Monitoring
Each AIM Dental Marketing Health Partner get his or her own Dental Marketing Dashboard (DMD) providing a wealth of Actionable Intelligence Marketing insight to continuously enhance the performance, and thereby the roi of your dental practice growth plan.

Your dental marketing plan budget will depend upon several unique factors, including the competitiveness of your area and the rate at which you wish to grow. As a rule of thumb, aggressive growth entails an investment of around 10% of annual collections. Moderate growth calls for 5%, while 2.5-3% should suffice to stem attrition.

Ideally, 4-6 weeks are required to create a from-scratch website. 2-4 weeks is a reasonable and realistic expectation if it is simply a dental website refresh.

Yes. We integrate with most dental practice management systems and can seamlessly integrate with them to automate scheduling and appointment reminders.

Yes. We integrate with nearly all dental practice management software.

Absolutely. AIM’s Dental Marketing Dashboard (DMD) is the most robust tracking and monitoring platform available. Ask us for a demonstration!

That depends upon the traffic source. For Google pay per click, we can target geographically. We can target both geographically and demographically for direct mail and social media. For SEO, we optimize for desired keywords and phrases. We then connect with those web visitors who click on the results.

Yes, we do. If you are a specialist, we have several tactics for achieving a steady stream of referrals from GPs.

Some key performance indicators (KPIs) will show results within the first week. Others take longer to generate momentum.