Dentistry isn’t just a way to get your patients’ teeth sparkling. It’s also one of the most lucrative and fastest growing professions worldwide. You can attain significant success as a dental practitioner through word-of-mouth publicity, but you’re bound to hit a plateau if you don’t look for alternative marketing strategies.
Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are great for catching up and connecting with your friends. The online portals you’re active on also can boost your practice by helping you network with a much larger number of people than you ever can hope to associate with otherwise.
Social media marketing is currently one of the most popular ways to grow your business, and organic social media marketing is even more so because of the zero investment involved. Organic social media marketing refers to the use of free tools and services offered by a social media forum.
Do Dental Practices Need Social Media Promotion?
Social media means connecting to a vast consumer base without actually meeting a single one of them in person. A dental practice serves patients’ dental needs but also has a business end that requires active marketing and networking to grow and sustain itself. Take a look at the top five reasons why every dental practice must use social media marketing to drive growth:
- Many prospective patients are likely to be using social media on a regular basis. An online presence on a popular social media site can get you in touch with hundreds of potential patients with minimal effort and money spent.
- You can develop an online presence and branding through frequent posts and by establishing a community of followers. Regular patients are consolidated through blogs and posts, and new patients are encouraged to visit your practice.
- Regular updates can simplify oral hygiene reminders and appointment scheduling.
- You can create an engaging environment for your patients before they step into your practice by detailing your unique style, benefits, and services online.
- Engage with your target audience and connect to their needs by initiating conversations and polls and by asking for patient feedback through social media marketing.
Organic Versus Paid Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing involves gaining promotional leverage by engaging with a group of “friends” and “followers.” Paid social media marketing is a strategy to increase your visibility to others using the platform by paying the social media host to display your ads.
Organic social media marketing refers to the unpaid advertising of your business posts or content. In other words, people view your post organically when they visit a particular social media forum. So what are the pros and cons of organic versus paid social media marketing?
Organic social media marketing does not require a budget or expenses. It is free advertising and lets you put up as many posts as you like without a dent in your pocket. You can build a brand presence for free through regular tweets on Twitter or updates on Facebook.
Social networking sites such as Facebook reach billions of people. By sharing and regularly posting content, you can build a significant following of loyal patients. On the other hand, paid social media advertising requires you to outline a specific budget and pay for advertising.
However, organic posts need more surveillance and more effort to reach the target audience. Paid updates can be customized to particular audiences, which offers a huge advantage for businesses. Prospective clients such as patients for dental practitioners can be sent regular updates to help build up practices by targeting potential customers by demographic or age.
Organic social media promotion can be a handy tool for dentists if it is used effectively. You can harness the power of social outreach without spending a penny. Here’s how you can make the most of organic social media marketing for your dental practice.
Optimize for Success
When you write a blog for Google, search engine optimization (SEO) tools are called into play to enhance the visibility of your post. Similarly, a post on a social media site can be optimized to stand out against other similar posts. Here are a few tips:
- Create a brand image or logo and use it frequently in each post.
- A catchy username or practice name helps patients remember you.
- Add links to your website.
- Use keywords in the title and body of your posts.
Use Emojis to Enhance Connectivity
A single emoji is much easier to interpret than a wordy description of emotions. An emoji can help you connect with your audience and generate interest quicker than written content. Avoid overusing them, though, since that will confuse your readers!
Content is Crucial
Engaging content that makes the target population read the entire length of your post is essential to developing a loyal fanbase. Ensure that each post you put up on a social media site is appealing and makes the reader look forward to more updates. Take a look at a few tips on creating engaging content:
- Post accurate and well-researched content.
- Include surveys and opinion polls.
- Ask questions or spark conversations to engage the audience.
- Competitions offering treatment discounts as prizes can attract new patients.
- Include live and interactive videos.
Hashtags Help Drive Traffic
Buffer Marketing Library suggests that hashtags (words or short phrases introduced by a number symbol or #) can be valuable if used judiciously. Hashtags help engage users differently on various social media sites. On Twitter, using up to two hashtags per tweet can double your audience engagement. Instagram hashtags can be used more frequently, with 11 or more hashtags per post, so feel free to make the most of them.
Facebook works differently from Instagram and Twitter, though. In general, hashtags do not drive traffic to Facebook posts, so you need to avoid using them because they won’t help you achieve a positive impact there.
Take Aim and Shoot
Targeted posts garner much more business than those that are random. Practices can focus on a specified patient population based on age, gender, or other specifics to enhance their patient base.
Facebook allows you to selectively target an audience based on gender, age, location, language, interests, and more. You can use personalized segmentation strategies to maximize customization of your followers and customers.
Takeaway
Organic social media marketing can help your dental practice stay ahead of the competition and generate new business. Promote your dental practice by using all of these organic outreach tools alone or blended with paid social advertising to stay connected and engaged with your patients!
Mr. Arulrajah is president and CEO of Ekwa Marketing, a complete Internet marketing company that focuses on SEO, social media, marketing education, and the online reputations of dentists. With a team of more than 180 full-time marketers, ekwa.com helps dentists who know where they want to go get there by dominating their market and growing their business significantly year after year. If you have questions about marketing your practice online, call (855) 598-3320 or email naren@ekwa.com.
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