At ProspectaMarketing, we help dental practices succeed by providing them with a customized team of SEO specialists, bloggers, and digital experts. Once we have assigned you a team, they will help manage all aspects of your digital advertising campaign. This includes training you and your team members to use specialized analysis tools and keep track of your website activity. Another core part of our process is optimizing websites through unique copy and visual media. However, too much of either of these can mean that your website is incomplete and fails to engage your audience.

So, how to balance these two core concepts of website design? That’s what this article focuses on! Our team has put together a list of tips and tricks that you can follow to ensure your visual media and website copy text complement each other and work well on their own.

Visual Content Is The Hook: As far as catering to a new generation of consumer – one that uses the internet often and expects quick, easy-to-access results – visual media is king. This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t strive to strike the right balance between text and media; only that this perfect middle point between the two types of content has shifted over time. Though massive walls of information might have worked for print publications, and in spite of the practice still persisting and thriving in certain eras of the internet (think: e-mail newsletters), the balance has definitely skewed toward visual media in recent decades. We encourage you to view this as an opportunity. Employ the use of large, easy to see images to “hook” your website visitors. Place them above and behind headers to make them the centerpiece of the page. Make sure to keep the images diverse and varied, both in size, style, and content. For more information, check out our article on the core tenets of visual media.
Text Is What They Are Looking For: As ironic and contradictory as it sounds, those same consumers and digital travelers who flock to pretty pictures and immediately scatter at the sight of a large wall of information, are actually looking for information, not pretty pictures. However, they want that information to be short, accurate, and precise. So keep your copy short and to the point, making sure to fill the negative space on the page left by the images, but not going overboard. Focus on the accuracy of your content; is your copy relevant to your services? Finally, make sure to use precise language; the last thing you want is your message being muddled by awkward verbiage or inconsistencies in grammar. If you do all this, you have a higher chance of establishing authority in your digital community. Read our previous article to find out more about the importance of engaging website copy.
How Much Is Too Much?: It might seem like, based on what we have previously stated, you are better off filling every page on your website with hundreds and hundreds of images, right? Well, no. A barrage of textless images can still be overwhelming to a visitor, and it can be ultimately useless in terms of converting a lead into a patient. So, both with images and with text, the answer to this question varies. A website with 10 or 20 thumbnail images and a little flavor text might make sense for a smile gallery or a blog. However, for a landing page with important subject matter about your services, it might be more effective to limit yourself to 2-3 images and a few informative, easy-to-read paragraphs. The balance is different depending on what you want the focus of the specific page to be. It is also important to consider load speed. If your images are putting too much of a strain on it, it might mean your potential visitors leave before they see text OR images. The same applies to website copy. Make sure that the overall information on your page isn’t massive, and that your load speed stays between 1-2 seconds.
SEO and the Google Index: Optimizing your website for SEO is crucial. Make sure to use popular, relevant key words throughout your copy, purge any duplicate content (text or visual), and avoid generic content. These practices will ensure that your page remains unique and that the Google crawler bots find it and index it. If your page is indexed, it has a higher chance of showing up on search engines and being associated with the right keywords, whether those be location or service-based. For more information on concepts like the Google Index, read our article on advanced digital marketing strategies.

Striking the right balance between visual and text-based media has never been more important; and we can help! ProspectaMarketing manages the advertising campaigns of hundreds of dental practices the nation over. We are an experienced Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices and the tools of Internet marketing. We help you reach key prospects who are looking for what your practice has to offer. Our unique and thorough approach provides visibility, financial accountability, and ongoing refinement and improvement. You can find out more by contacting Lane Anderson toll-free at 1-877-322-4440 Ext 101, by email using the form on our Contact Us page, or online at ProspectaMarketing.com.