Saturday, October 13, 2012

Dental Marketing - What to do between November 15, 2012 and December 31, 2012

What to do between November 15, 2012 and December 31, 2012

In the previous edition of this newsletter, we explained how to get set up for 2013.

In this installment of the newsletter, we will explain how to promote your dental practice between November 15th and December 31st this year.

Shut down your external promotion
Statistically, for the majority of dentists in the US, there is a very distinct increase in risk promoting dentistry to the dental consumer between November 15th and December 31st every year. Since one of our jobs is to help dentists minimize risk to their marketing dollar - you've been warned. The only reasonable and statistically justified exception to this rule is if your dental practice is in a "snow bird" area with a population that is predominantly above the age of child bearing years. Some of you may be in areas of Florida (to use a recognizable example), where you may or may not want to promote to the consumer between those two dates. For the rest of you, shut it down!

Ramp UP your internal promotion
As drastically as you shut down your external promotion, in an equally drastic fashion, you should ramp up your internal promotion. Let's explore some marketing projects that should be scheduled during the last quarter of 2012.

Use it or Lose it
For those patients with dental insurance, it is certainly a time to let your patients know that their anniversary date is looming and they will lose this year's benefits if they don't come in. Many dental practices send some variation of this concept to their patients once at the end of the year. Why are you only sending it once? If we were to guide you, we would send this piece (either through the mail or electronically) a minimum of three times. The right times would be the third week of October, the second week of November, and the end of the first week of December. We don't know why dental practices only send these once, but most make that mistake. Don't think for a second that ALL of your patients read or listen to anything that you send them once. Don't assume that everyone is just choosing not to respond. It is FAR more likely that they were simply too busy to pay attention the ONE time you sent them the message. Send it multiple times.

Charity/PR
The holiday season is the season of giving. OK. So give!
Run an overdue re-care list (or labels, or emails if you have them) of every patient in your database that was due for their re-care up to Jan 1 2012. In other words, the literally hundreds or thousands of established patients that you would really, really, like to re-activate! Tell them if they come in for their cleaning and exam between November 15th and December 31st, that you will donate $20 on their behalf to a locally recognizable local charity. For instance, Alex's Lemonaide Stand is really popular here in the northeast. You may have a different local charity that everyone recognizes within your market area. We are SURE the females in your dental practice know of a locally recognizable charity that will resonate positively with the majority of your patient base. Reactivating established patients for $20 a pop is an absolute win-win-win. Charity wins, patient wins, you win. If we are managing your website and your social media, get our internet department the information for your charitable event. We will blast it all over your various social media outlets.

Pedo - or Pedo/Ortho
Mom is home. Kids are home. We almost don't want to mention this because quite frankly, it can work gangbusters in some markets, and in other markets all you hear are crickets. But it is worth mentioning. Any time the kids are not in school (like winter recess, spring recess, summer), it's a good time to reach out to your patient base and offer them premium appointment times (convenient ones) to get little Jane and Johnny to the dentist for their checkups. We know some of you are wincing right now. Who in the heck wants to work on a bunch of kids the week between Christmas and New Year's Day? Well, we understand. But (you knew it was coming), mom is going to have to bring Jane or Johnny. Mom may need work. Dad may have never seen you before. Mom may have a mother or father nearby, or a friend that is looking for a great dental practice. Treating children is an important consumer demand. Children are the gatekeepers to the rest of the family and everyone the rest of the family knows. Ignoring it is certainly your choice. But those who embrace this consumer demand will be that much better off down the road.

As always, if we (NPI) don't handle your promotion for you, you can learn the most effective ways in our latest book. We also have 7 hours of online CE for you to learn from. Of course, if you'd like us to build you a marketing plan for your practice, at no cost or obligation to you, we can do that as well. Just click this link and share information about your dental practice. You will get your marketing plan emailed to you in 4 to 5 work days.

Got questions? Want to learn more? 

You can reach Mark & Howie at:
Howie: whh@newpatientsinc.com

Website: www.newpatientsinc.com

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