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Anything But Dentistry

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11 Things Every Practice Should Have and 1 Thing to Avoid

Oct 7, 2019

Episode 3
 
11 Things Every Practice Needs and 1 Thing to Avoid
 
  1.  A Fully Optimized Google My Business [GMB] page.  - Your business listing on google is becoming more and more like an actual landing page for your business.  They are incorporating many of the features that, in the past,  people would go to your website to find.  The newest feature "offers" is a way to update your listing with time sensitive or more detailed informative posts.  Most dental practices don't fully utilize their GMB page - don't be left out!  The more you use it, the more effective it will be at converting leads into actual patients.
  2. Consistent NAP Data -- NAP stands for Name, Address and Phone.  It's important that this information about your practice be listed very consistently.  Most businesses have some variation, and some businesses have a lot of variation.  This has been one of the more challenging parts of taking over a practice that has been in business for 40+ years.  There have been several phone numbers, several addresses, several everything...  I had to break this down into a few different steps to improve ours.  First, identify all of the inconsistencies.  I did this by performing searches -- for any phone number that the practice has ever used, for any name the practice has ever used, for any providers that had worked in the practice [dentists or hygienists], and any addresses that the practice has been at.  Then I searched for any combination of these bits of information.  Once you find inconsistencies or errors, the next step is to fix what is listed, or have it removed.  I recommend using graph paper when you work out exactly how you want your NAP data to look.  Graph paper allows you to see every character, down to the punctuation.  Some of our errors took months to finally resolve.  After that, you should build out additional listings that are relevant. 
  3. An Email List [That's Used Correctly]  - We all have email lists in our practice.  Mostly, they are used only for appointment reminders.  I think this is a missed opportunity.  Instead of using them on such a limited basis, why not send out more informative emails?  When dental products end up in the news, or when there's something exciting happening at the practice, shouldn't we take the time to update our patients?
  4. Proper Analytics Code -- Both Google and Facebook have designed a way to give you feedback about how people are interacting with your ads and with your website.  If you don't have this code installed on your website, you're completely missing the chance to evaluate how you are doing.  It's not that hard to install on your own, but if you need help, your webmaster should be able to take care of this for you.
  5. A Content Calendar -- Electronic or Paper, a Content Calendar will totally help you plan your marketing from week to week.  This will help you create some of your posts in bulk, and save you tons of time!
  6. A Marketing Assets Folder -- Have you ever tried to update a profile online only to struggle to remember exactly where you saved the photo you wanted to use?  Keeping all of our marketing materials - photos, ad copy, graphic design, letterhead, business card mock-ups - in one place has been invaluable to me.
  7. Adobe Spark -- If you use lightroom or photoshop you probably already have an upgraded adobe spark account.  If you haven't used it, I really recommend trying it.  To have the ability to keep the consistent color scheme and logo we are using on our website - and easily create social media posts and flyers for the office is amazing.
  8. Online Feedback -- In this section of the podcast I share the script that I was taught by Mary Osborne.  This is the number one reason we have over 100 reviews on google, it's easy and it works.
  9. The Ability To Text Patients -- Everyone like the ability to communicate with our office using the same tools that they use to communicate with their family and friends.  Though it isn't great for extended conversation about selecting complex appointment times - for simple communication and emergencies, it's been invaluable.
  10. A Good URL -- This is something that is going to be a little controversial.  Most dentists have a website that looks like drname.com or drnamedds.com.  I would recommend that you change your URL if this resembles yours.  Why?  Because it's limiting.  This type of an address, although reflects the practice at the moment, can't honestly accomodate another doctor very well.  If dentistcityname.com or citynamedentist.com is taken, or too spammy for you, go with something that reflects your brand, or mission.  A change in URL can cause your traffic to drop by 50% - for most dentists, this won't outweigh making your URL future-proof, but it should be taken into consideration.
  11. A Mobile Friendly Website -- In today's world, this is so important.  People are browsing and shopping on their phones more than ever - our mobile visitors account for 40% of our website traffic.  I also recommend using googles site speed tool to evaluate how you're doing in this area.  https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/
 
  1. Avoid Having a Guest WiFi - Call me a conspiracy theorist.  I don't care.  I think that the reason some of our patients google reviews haven't shown up on our GMB page is because Google is getting hyperlocal and has determined that they were in our business.  I also think that Google is then assuming that their review was solicited in violation of their user agreement, and is therefore suppressing them.  We dropped our guest network, and I think you should too.
 
Here are the people that have helped me the most with learning and executing this stuff!
 
 
Sam Howat and everyone at avelient.com
 
Mary Osborne - maryosborne.com