Benefits to Bad Online Reviews?

October 14, 2019
Dental marketing, internet dental marketing, Local Internet Marketing, Online Reviews

The vast majority of people use online review sites when they’re looking for a new dentist, so it follows that the reviews they find carry a lot of weight. You might think  that positive reviews and five-star ratings are critical, and you wouldn’t be wrong. But you wouldn’te be entirely right, either.

Happy senior citizen having a casual small talk with the friendly doctor

Yes, when people go to Yelp, Google My Business, and similar review sites, they read the positive things your patients have to say. But they’re probably looking for negative reviews, too. Believe it or not, there are benefits to bad reviews.

Don’t Freak Out

If someone is checking you out online but doesn’t find any bad reviews in your profiles, it can be a real red flag. They are likely to wonder if all those good reviews genuine. We all know you can’t please everybody, and seeing a few bad reviews among the good ones presents a realistic overview.

It should be needless to say that you want good reviews to outweigh the bad ones. But a few bad reviews among the mostly favorable present a realistic, well-rounded image.

To put it another way: don’t freak out if you get a few negative online reviews!

Responding

It’s always tempting to respond to a negative review by telling the writer just how wrong he or she is. Do your best to avoid a shoot-from-the-hip response.

People actually like it when they see a reasoned response to a bad review: one that acknowledges the feedback and shows a desire to improve. A calm and thoughtful reply not only shows respect for the writer, it demonstrates your integrity.

None of this is easy, but you don’t have to go it alone. ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices. We use the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

Your Online Presence

October 1, 2019
internet dental marketing, Local Internet Marketing

For a dental practice, as for any small business, nothing can ever replace an in-person meeting with a patient or potential patient. Establishing a personal, face-to-face connection cannot be beat.

dentist-evaluate-smileBut the world doesn’t always work that way. Most people rely on the Internet when they look for a dentist. Your website is the face of your practice, the first impression that anyone will see of what your have to offer.

In a digital economy, you need to drive as much new traffic to your site as possible. More website traffic means better local search engine results, and that means more patients.

It wasn’t so long ago that a commercial website wasn’t much different than an online flier. They had the name of a practice, location, contact information, and maybe a list of services.

Today, a website is much more than that. They are a networking tool, and the means by which you entrench your practice in your community. Your patients can get directions, schedule an appointment, interact with your office via instant messaging, and even call you from the Google Knowledge Panel.

That means your online presence is essential for business growth. Patients and would-be patients give great credence to online reviews and testimonials, as well as search engine rankings. These combine to form your online reputation.

You need to engage your target audience, and the principal means of doing that is through your dental practice website. It is where you present a refined marketing message that answers their needs.

It isn’t easy, but there is always help. ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices. We use the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

What To Do With Negative Reviews

September 16, 2019
internet dental marketing, Local Internet Marketing, Online Reviews

Good reviews from your patients can really help the profitability of your practice, and the more you have, the merrier. Unfortunately, it’s the dissatisfied patients who, for whatever reason, are the most likely to jump online and write a bad review.

Dentist Male_01Undoing the damage of negative reviews can be an uphill battle. Studies show that it takes about forty positive reviews to counteract a just one negative review!

Online Vendetta

There are known cases of orchestrated online attacks, in which a single user leaves a series of bad reviews in an effort to damage the online reputation of a business.

A writer described, on the SEMrush.com website, how he uncovered one such case. Using multiple profiles, this one user posted eighteen one-star Google My Business reviews of the same small business, all on the very same day.

For a while, it had the desired effect: within two weeks, the business’s GMB rating fell from a 4.5 rating to 2.8.

What To Do?

This was not an unprecedented situation, and if it happens to you there are ways of dealing with it.

In the case outlined above, the profiles and links to each negative review were documented and sent along to GMB Support. The names of the offending reviewers, links to profiles, and a note describing why it was being reported were included.

A GMB Product Expert looks at the negative reviews and determines whether further action is necessary. The entire process can take time and you’ll need to be patient. But persistence pays off, and fake negative reviews can successfully be removed.

It may be tempting to reply to negative reviews, but it isn’t a good idea. Chances are, replying would just escalate things. You’re much better off following procedure by flagging and reporting the fake reviews.

Need some help? ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices. We use the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

More Pictures!

September 2, 2019
internet dental marketing, Local Internet Marketing, Social Media

A picture, we have always been told, is worth a thousand words. But new research is telling us that lots of pictures, posted to your Google My Business profile, are worth even more.

apple-diet-healthy-eating-41282A study by BrightLocal, an SEO and local citation company, found that the more images a business has on its GMB profile – not just photographs, but any images – result in that business attracing many more prospects than it would have with fewer images.

The study looked at the GMB Insights of 45,000 businesses in three dozen industries and four countries. “It’s clear,” wrote BrightLocal’s Jamie Pitman, “that it’s more important than ever to look your absolute best when consumers are searching for businesses like yours.”

In other words, don’t just tell ’em what you’ve got – show them.

The study found that businesses with more than 100 GMB images get:

  • 520% more calls than the average business
  • 1,065% more website clicks
  • 2,717% more directions requests

The authors of the study concede that their research does not necessarily indicate a cause-and-effect between GMB profile images and new business. But they stress that GMB images do have an influence on customer behavior. The more images there are suggests the greater likelihood of taking customers “from discovery to conversion.”

The study recommends finding creative ways to encourage patients to post their own pictures. One suggestion is to create an “Instagram wall.” By that, they mean an area in your office that clients would find irresistable for using in selfies, like a model or mural.

The takeaway? Post lots and lots of great pictures of your practice to your GMB profile! That includes pictures that your customers are willing to share.

Need some help? ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices. We use the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

Star-Struck? Reviews Matter More!

August 16, 2019
Online Reviews

A four-star retaurant. A five-star movie. As consumers, those stars get our attention; they suggest a proven quality or track record. But a new study indicates that as attractive as all those stars might be, the quantity of online reviews any small business gets – and that includes dental practices – is far more important to its bottom line.

Dress for SuccessThe study by Womply, a reputation and customer relationship management company, shows just how important online customer reviews are.  They are “the new word of mouth,” Womply says. Since more reviews means more profit, you should do everything possible to generate as many online reviews as you can for your practice.

Increased Revenue

The study evaluated online review data for more than 200,000 small businesses across the United States: from restaurants to hair salons to dental practices. The most important findings include:

  • More reviews means up to 54% more in yearly revenue.
  • Businesses claiming their free listings on four or more customer review sites earn 58% more revenue than those that don’t.
  • Responding to as few as one of every four reviews can boost revenue by 35%.

A couple of the findings seem counter-intuitive:

  • Small businesses with 3.5 to 4.5 star ratings do better than those with 5 star ratings.
  • Businesses with 15-20% negative reviews earn 13% greater revenues than those with bad reviews in the 5-10% range.

We’ll get to that in a moment. First:

Reviews = Trust

Potential patients always look for a dentist with positive reviews, and they trust the reviews they find – that new word of mouth. Positive online reviews demonstrate your expertise, and will bring new patients to your office.

But, why would businesses with more negative reviews have greater revenues than those with fewer? It doesn’t add up, and Womply doesn’t know for sure why that is. But they think that when consumers research a business, they expect to find a certain number of negative reviews. Businesses that don’t have very many seem new or unproven.

Why would a 5-star business earn less revenue, on average, than one with fewer stars? There are no firm conclusions here, either, but 5-star businesses generally don’t have as many total reviews as those in 3.5 to 4.5 range. That may make consumers skeptical: maybe the business is cooking the numbers.

The More, The Merrier

The lesson from all of this is clear: the more reviews practice gets, the better. Multiple stars may look good in search engine results, but in the long run more reviews means greater profits. You should do everything you can to increase the number of online reviews your practice gets.

For dentists, the most important review sites include:

  • Google My Business
  • Facebook
  • Yelp
  • Healthgrades
  • 1-800-Dentist
  • Dentistry.com

How can your dental practice improve its online profile? ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices. We use the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

Get It Right: Your Dental Website

August 2, 2019
internet dental marketing, Internet Marketing, Local Internet Marketing, Websites

Your dental website is a reflection of your practice, and serves several important functions. It’s a showcase of your services, and tells people how to find you. It also allows you to share your expertise. But above all, your website is how you convert visitors into new patients.

Creating the best possible site is essential to the success of your practice, so it’s critical that you get it right. How do you create an effective dental website?

Keep It Simple

Generally speaking, simple things are easier to understand. That is as true for websites as it is for anything else.

What do we mean by simple? In the case of your dental website, it should have a simple design and be easy to navigate. Its menu should be clear and concise. Remember this important fact: most site visitors decide whether they will use a site’s services within the first ten seconds of landing there.

Content

Website content is any text, photograph, and the audio and video files published there: the stuff your site visitors are looking for.

The content on your dental website should be clean and well-organized – in short, user friendly.

  • Clear headings and sub-headings. Headings and sub-headings make site content stand out, and tells visitors that something is important.
  • Well-defined categories. Don’t clutter your site with excessive information; you’re likely to lose visitors (i.e. potential new patients) if you do. Make it easy for them to find the information they’re looking for.
  • Organized. There is no need to re-invent the wheel, or the website. Have a standard placement for titles, menus, buttons, and links. Use sans serif fonts – a type of font that doesn’t use little ornaments (serifs) at the ends of certain characters. Sans serif fonts like Helvetic and Arial are easier to read than serif fonts like Times New Roman and Palatino, especially on a website.
  • Optimized for SEO. SEO, or search engine optimization, is how Internet users find you. Optimizing site content is a strategy to drive traffic to your webiste by using certain words (keywords) and title tags, to name just two, that attract search engines.

Visibility and Improvment

Your dental website should be simple, but it should also reflect the personality of your practice. That’s how you convince visitors to use what you have to offer.

ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices. We use the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

Still A Force: Your Dental Blog

July 15, 2019
Blogs, Dental marketing, internet dental marketing, Social Media

Commercial websites, like those for dental practices, have used blogs as a marketing tool for years: raising their profiles and getting online visibility. But some trend-watchers say the days of the blog are numbered, as people’s love of social media keeps growing.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

First, though, a sobering thought: there are more blogs out there than anyone could possibly count. Of course, they’ve tried. By one estimate there are 500 million blogs spread out over 1.6 billion (with a B) websites. Every day there are about two million new posts. (Glad you found this one!)

That’s a lot of stuff to read.

Your Corner of the Web

The majority of these millions of blogs, of course, are niche – like dental blogs. There is a ready market for them, too, because the number of people online is steadily growing.

Studies show that blogging as effective as ever. But you have to be smart about it; you have to offer your readers something of value. You should use your blog to answer their questions.

For dentists, a good example of this is dental implants. The market for dental implants in the United States is expected to reach $6.5 billion (again with a B!) over the next five years. You can bet there will be a lot of patients, and potential patients, asking questions about them. Take your answers to your dental website blog.

Other things to keep in mind:

  • smartphone_01Make your site mobile-ready! Your audience is everywhere. As we’ve reported elsewhere on this blog, the move toward mobile devices is probably unstoppable.
  • Blog content can co-exist with social media. If there’s a hot issue on social media, your blog is the place to really expand on it. Likewise, blog content can be itemized on different social channels.
  • Offer unique blog content. Share your dental expertise; answer your patients’ questions.
  • Try short-form content. Be concise. No need for exhaustive detail on every subject. (And yes, we’re trying to keep this post short!) Long-form posts, though, still have their place.
  • Plenty of visual content. Not just pictures, but  video and infographics. They’re all attention-grabbing.

Does any of this sound overwhelming? It doesn’t need to be.

ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices. We use all of the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

Keep It Fresh: Your Dental Website

July 1, 2019
internet dental marketing, Internet Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Websites

The Internet has steadily evolved over the years, and still is evolving. And like the Internet, the tools we use to access it are contantly changing. That’s one of the main reasons why most businesses, including dental practices, redesign their websites from time to time.

There is no industry standard for when a site needs an upgrade. That said, a rule of thumb has emerged: commercial websites are typically redesigned every two to three years.

Redesigning a website may not be a very appealing idea. A lot of work goes into it. But it’s an important part of staying competitive. The simple fact is that many dental practice websites, if you’ll pardon the pun, tend to get a little long in the tooth.

Is It Time?

A website redesign may involve anything from updating some of its elements, to building an entirely new site from scratch. How do you know when the time has come?

If you have noticed any decline in new patients to your practice, your website may be underperforming. Or maybe your site is just plain old and stale-looking.

  • New Patients. The most important function of your site is bringing new patients in to your office. That means your site must give you high visibility. Potential new patients find you through search engines like Google, so the entire site must have content that is fully optimized for SEO, search engine optimization.
  • Easy Navigation. Your site must be well-designed, so that visitors can easily find their way around. They may be looking for some specific piece of information, and you want them to be able to find it. If you’ve got something people are looking for, like your experience with dental implants or teeth whitening, visitors should be able to find that in one or two clicks. If they can’t, your site does not have an effective design. Time to fix it.
  • Up-to-Date. Websites have plenty of links. Does yours have any that are obsolete? No one wants to click on something only to get a 404 page, or one that cannot be accessed on a mobile device.

Your website is the public face of your dental practice; in many ways, its heart and soul. Is yours doing what it should?

ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm that specializes in dental practices. We use all of the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

Stand Out from the Crowd: Market Your Practice

June 17, 2019
Dental marketing

There are more than 200,000 dentists currently practicing in the United States, which averages out to about sixty dentists for every 100,000 people. Not only that, more dentists open new practices each year than retire.

Happy senior citizen having a casual small talk with the friendly doctor

So there is no shortage of dentists in the U.S., and that’s good for patients. But how does your dental practice stand out in the crowd?

The answer, in a word, is marketing. Marketing your dental practice is the most effective way for you to bring new patients into your office, especially if it’s a new practice, and it has never been more important.

How do you know the best way to get your name, and your practice name, before the public? It’s a huge task. Some of the issues you’ll need to consider are:

  • Branding
  • Website development
  • Advertising
  • Digital v. print
  • Referral techniques

As you begin to figure out how to market your practice there are some things you need to consider, such as the strengths and weaknesses of your practice.

  • Strengths. What is it that sets you apart from other practices? Is it particualr services you offer, or areas of specialty? Your background and experience? Your office hours?
  • Weaknesses. No practice is perfect, and it’s important to recognize any obstacles that may stand in your way. Have you had a lot of bad online reviews from disgruntled patients?

It’s also important to identify your target audience. Researchers tell us that women make, by far, most of a household’s dental decisions – more than ninety percent. Furthermore, they don’t make these decisions hastily. There is a lot of research involved, and plenty of dental practices to choose from.

With that in mind, you’ll need to give some thought to how you present yourself: everything from your logo to the appearance of your website. Things things and more combine to produce the image of your practice.

If it seems overwhelming, rest assured you don’t need to go it alone. ProspectaMarketing is an experienced Internet marketing firm that specializes in dental practices. We use all of the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

Market Your Dental Practice

June 3, 2019
Dental marketing, internet dental marketing

For your dental practice to thrive, you need to get its name out there where the public can see it. That is how new patients find you. In the digital age, marketing your practice means using the Internet.

How do you go about doing that? There is no one right way; in fact, there are a number of strategies available to you. Combining several of them is likely to be the most effective approach.

Have a strong and well-designed website. In this day and age, a website is a given. But is it a good one? A good website does more than list your services and contact information.

  • It must be well-organized for easy navigation.
  • It must be thorough, so visitors find what they’re looking for.
  • It should offer value, like an informative blog.

Use social media. This is a highly effective way of reaching potential patient, and current patients.

  • Your practice name is out there, year-round.
  • You can provide updated information.
  • You’re able to collect al-important patient reviews.

Concentrate on Local SEO. SEO is search engine optimization, and localizing it is effective in drawing in new patients.

  • Local search terms target your audience.
  • It works in voice search (i.e. Siri or Alexa)

Rest assured, these ideas are just the tip of the iceberg. Not sure where, or even how, to begin?

ProspectaMarketing is an Internet marketing firm specializing in dental practices. We use all of the tools of Internet search marketing to 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.

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