Search, Plus Your Dental World - Google does it again.

Google Plus. Are you on it yet?

NO!

Why?

Ok, I got it, I go it... here's your list of reasons why you're not on it yet:

1. It's boring
2. You don't get it
3. You think "Good grief, not another social network"
4. You're shouting "My friends are on Facebook, why do I want to join another network?"

Now let me tell you why you need to get with the Google Plus beat... do you have a dental practice website? If you do then you need to get Google Plus sorted, and here's why.

Google's customers want answers to questions, these customers type their questions in to the Google search box 400 million times every day. So if Google is to deliver quality for it's customers, it needs to deliver the exact answer to the question asked.. got it so far?

If a website is old or outdated the answer to the searchers question could be old and outdated, so Google might ignore your site, or look for a more up to date one... that's why blogs rank so highly on Google, they are up to date and current by their nature, so Google says "Hey, I'll rank a blog high 'coz I know it'll be up to date".

Now, the next level is for Google to think "OK, how do I get en even more accurate answer to that question that person just typed? How about I ask their friends what they think?"

And BOOM, socially relevant searches are born - after all, it stands to reason, if you and I are friends then we are likely to be like each other, so if YOU are searching for something online, and Google sees that I like a website that contains a possible solution for you, chances are that the website will be more relevant to you personally... so Google gives that website that I like a little nudge up the search results for you.

Manipulative? Hell yeh, but what else do you think the search results are anyway? It's only Google's idea of what they think we should see rated number 1 isn't it.

Now, the way Google knows who are friends is via Google Plus, you will have seen +1 buttons appearing all over the internet...

Here's a video that Google recently made to demonstrate what will happen when you search



Click here to watch on YouTube

The result of all this is that if you have a +1 button on your dental practice website and people click it, and if their friends do a search for say 'dentist ' your dental practice website site will get a little nudge up the rankings for those people on Google - powerful stuff.

To add the buttons to your site, hop on over to the Google website   to grab the code - or if you want more advice on the online marketing gunship then book on a course with me. The next course is on 7th February and we'll go through Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Optimisation, Email AND the whole Google Plus thing.

Please visit my website today for more information on this course

Book your place now and don't get left behind in the Google Plus Your Dental World Searches

6 Traits of The Successful Social Media Marketing Strategy

Over the years I've found there are a few traits that set the successful marketing strategy apart from an unsuccessful one - and if you want to avoid failure then I suggest you read, absord, understand then do!

Trait 1 - Think Holistically

Social Media is not the 'be all and end all' of your online marketing, it should form part of a comprehensive online marketing strategy that includes as many marketing channels as possible.

In my opinion this should include:

1. Google Plus
2. Google Places
3. Twitter
4. Facebook
5. YouTube
6. Blogging
7. Email
8. Your Website

It may also include Facebook adverts and Google Pay Per Click (No, PPC is not dead.. only doing it wrong is dead!)

The sequence of these is important and social media only seeks to widen your sales funnel. The goal should always be to drive potential patients down the sales funnel and down the list above.

Trait 2 - Use Social Media to Drive Traffic to Your Website

Your website is an integral feature of your online marketing strategy and should include visitor data capture mechanisms (like email) and the facility to request appointments online.

You can then drive traffic to your site from social media by suggesting people book online or download information - and in return you get their email address and the ability to continually build relationships with them.

Trait 3 - Engage

The clue is in the title here, it's SOCIAL media, not BROADCAST media, so engage, be personable, chat and help others. This will build rapport and trust and enable the local people to feel like they know you, making the decision to come to see you a logical one.

The key is a 2 way conversation, not one way. We buy from people we like, so help other to like you!

Trait 4 - Reduce Risk for Patients

Dentistry is not about shifting products. It's about delivering a service.

Products marketing is different, as products can be evaluated before hand and returned to the supplier if you don't like them or they don't work as you thought. Think buying a TV for example.

Services on the other hand can't be evaluated before hand and can't be taken back. Think listening to a lecture.

Product marketing often requires a shop to encourage people to make a quick snap decision - buy one get one free, buy today and save ££ss, special offer today only etc etc

Services marketing often requires a provider to reduce the risk for customers, after all they can't evaluate the service before hand (their new teeth) and can't take them back.

So shift your marketing focus on to reducing risk for patients, NOT shifting products!

Trait 5 - Know The Answer to This Question - "WHY YOU?"

When I see a new client I always go through a full marketing audit ( I majored in marketing on my MBA) and ask this question - "WHY YOU?" - it's amazing how many dental practices can not answer that question.

So layer in the things that are unique to you, this could include:

• Unique products and services you offer
• Your education
• Your training courses
• Your materials
• Your gadgets
• The way you treat patients
• Trademarks
• Special Techniques you use e.g. Wand, Sedation, Hypnosis etc

Then come up with a simple phrase or statement that encapsulates that and have everyone in the practice know it. 

You MUST be totally clear as to why YOU are the best in your area and be able to convey this message on Social Media

Trait 6 - Patience

I find social media is slow burn marketing and often take time to build 'traction'. But once traction is achieved there really is no stopping it. So you do need to commit to the project and be prepared to look at it in the long term and keep going.

Gently hand out great advice, reduce risk for patients, help them like you, engage, drive them to your website, think holistically and I know it will work for you.

-----------------------------

So there you have it, my top 6 traits for a successful social media campaign, if you feel you'd like more guidance then why not book on my latest Social Media Kickstart Course.

James Russell - The London Smile Clinic said "Mark really knows his business! This turns social media into something really powerful - not just for playing with."

Places are booking fast, so click here to reserve your place today.

We'll go through everything above plus a ton more useful stuff too.

"This course will open your eyes to the inifinte possibilies regards social media marketing"

Martin Cox - Forndale Dental Clinic

Book your place today

How to get the new Facebook Timeline Profile

Have you heard about the new Facebook timeline?

Have you seen it yet? No well pop over to my profile and you'll see the new design. (add me as friend while you are there if you like)

Here's how the new design looks.

This is what Facebook says about their new timeline

"Back in the early days of Facebook, your profile was pretty basic – just your name, a photo, where you went to school…stuff you'd cover in the first five minutes you met someone.
Over time, your profile evolved to better reflect how you actually communicate with your friends. Now you can can share photos of what you did last weekend, and updates about how you feel today.

But since the focus is on the most recent things you posted, more important stuff slips off the page. The photos of your graduation get replaced by updates about what you had for breakfast.

Say you're catching up with an old friend – would you rather find out that they had eggs this morning, or hear about their new dream job?

The way your profile works today, 99% of the stories you share vanish. The only way to find the posts that matter is to click "Older Posts" at the bottom of the page. Again. And again.
Imagine if there was an easy way to rediscover the things you shared, and collect all your best moments in a single place.

Introducing timeline – a new kind of profile"

So how do you get the new timeline?

Simply visit www.facebook.com/about/timeline at the bottom of the page there is a green link which says "Get Timeline" all you need to do is click it!

If you don't see the 'Get Timeline' button then sorry dudes, but Facebook is making you wait just a little bit longer... sorry!

Speak again in 2012, until then stay sharp.

Mark

P.S I recently made one small change to my Facebook page that enabled me to reach a load more people, click here to find out what it was.

Is your website found on Google? The art of SEO

A large part of the work that I do is getting dentist's websites found, after all, you can have all the email/Facebook/YouTube/Twitter integration you like, but if no-one visits your website then it's all going to amount to not very much huh?

Your website should be the hub of your online marketing - this is the place that we bring it all back together and the central portal for reaching the local people - if it's not found it's like winking at a girl in the dark, you know what you're doing but no-one else does!

So how do we get the lights turned on?

How do we get a light shining on your website and optimised so that people find it?

One small word. Google.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the process by which we get your website found in the search results - mainly on Google!

I've written before about 'onsite' SEO, so this post is about 'offsite' SEO, or link building.

Google sees Link building as a referral, you know how powerful a patient referral to another patient is right? Well if another website links to yours then Google sees it as a virtual referral... lot's of links = lot's of referrals = you must be important = higher search engine results - quite simple really.

There's one more thing that we need to consider and that's link juice... WHAT I hear you cry... Link juice!

Link juice is a virtual soup of 'website power' that sloshes around the internet, think of it like this, if you place  a link OUT of your website, say to an implant company for example, your website 'leaks' link juice to that site. If you have a link TO your website a little bit of link juice flows your way. Get more link juice and your website rises in the search results. Simple really.

So, you need someone that understands optimisation to manage your online marketing to ensure as much link juice flows your way. Here's a VERY simplified diagram of a technique.

Think of your website as the centre of a target, we want as much link juice to flow in to the  bulls eye where your website sits. A technique is to link some Outer Tier (or Tier 2) websites to some Inner Tier (Tier 1) websites. This could be done by uploading articles, blogs, documents etc to the sites. The outer tier squeezes some link juice to the inner tier. And when the juice has built in the Tier 1 sites it's possible to link them through to your website with more articles, blogs and documents.

This has the effect of 'concentrating' the juice at the outer level, so by the time it hits your website it is really valuable link juice - this is a time consuming process but fairly simple to do, although one needs to be careful as there are a few pitfalls to be aware of.

Getting your website to number 1 on Google is not a case of hoping or wishing, it needs a structured approach that uses Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Blogs, Articles, Directories plus others.

If you think your website is not performing as well as you'd like give me a call and I'll give you an honest appraisal of what I can do for you 0845 259 1232

Stay sharp,

Mark

Patient Testimonials - What to Ask For

Patient testimonials are a brilliant way of demonstrating to potential customers that you are good at what you do. They provide something we marketers call Social Proof - and we all like proof of what we are reading, don't we?

It's simply not good enough to say you are the best dentist in town, or that your crowns are the best - you need to prove it, and the best way to do this is for a satisfied customer to prove it for you!

What I have laid out here is a summary of the questions I think you should ask your patients. Questions 1-3 are to do with 'motivation' if a potential customer can identify with the motivation for solving a dental problem they will feel more 'in tune' with the testimonial and it will be more powerful.

Questions 4 & 5 are to do with the 'decision' itself - we all use different strategies to make a decision, again this will help the reader to feel more at ease with the testimonial.

Question 6 & 8 are to provide comparisons between the emotional state before and after treatment - we make purchasing decisions based on emotion, then justify with logic - so eliciting some emotion in the testimonial will help the reader to make a decision.

Question 7 is to do with the treatment itself.

Question 9 latches on to the 'post purchase' feelings, people often have what we call 'buyers remorse' - with products one can take it back, but with services like dentistry one can not do that, so the purchase decision is much higher risk. If we can demonstrate that a previous patient had no remorse and could do more things afterwards it shows the reader that the decision to buy was a good one.

Question 10 Is a simple command telling the reader what to do - this ought to be a 'call to action' along the lines of "I would suggest anyone that feels like I did contact the practice straight away"

Here are the questions I suggest you ask your happy patient:

1. What was your initial dental problem?
2. What did this dental problem prevent you doing?
3. What made you decide to do something about your dental problem? In other words, why do it now?
4. How did you chose which dentist to go to? In other words, what selection criteria did you use?
5. Why did you pick XYZ Dental Practice?
6. How did you feel about your teeth before you went to XYZ Dental Practice?
7. What treatment did you have done?
8. How did you feel about your teeth after treatment?
9. What have your new teeth allowed you to do now?
10. What advice would you give other patients in a similar situation to you?

Using a structure like this will allow you to get better testimonials that are more useful to you and your business.

What would you add? Or indeed take away?

Facebook Phishing - You Are Full of Crap

This email was sent to a client of mine this week, it looks like an official Facebook email and implies that someone has made a comment "you are full of crap" on their wall.

Yet if you click on either the 'See this comment thread' link or 'Unsubscribe' link in the message it does not go to Facebook but to a phishing/virus site.

I suggest that whenever you click on any link that is sent to you in an email that you ensure it is genuine - most email programs allow you to hover over a link and see the destination and this is a good habit to get in to in order to protect yourself.

Have you seen this email, or similar?

A Facebook Experiment - my Results

People say that you need to post on Facebook pages frequently in order to build your fan base, but is this true?

I've no idea, so I decided to run an experiment.

For the first 2 weeks of November I posted relatively frequently, typically 2 posts per day to my Facebook fan page. Then on 9th November I stopped altogether and didn't post anything until 21st November - you can check these dates out by scrolling down on my page to see when the posts were made.

Now, if you have a proper business page on Facebook you can check your stats (with a personal profile you can't do this), and here's my result.

You can see a MASSIVE drop in total fans reached, right up to the point where I started posting again and fans started to be reached again. It's kind of obvious really, if you don't post anything people won't see it, but these are all missed opportunities to build your brand and create exposure for your business.

This also seems to show that people don't go visiting your Facebook pages after they have 'liked' them (or fans reached would remain constant) - so it's not like a website where people might go back time and time again - the only way on Facebook that you keep fans interacting and seeing your page is by posting content - period.

So, based on these findings I've introduced a new Auto Managed service for dental practices on Facebook and Twitter to help you guys out with content - it's an automated service that will keep your content fresh and relevant. Please do visit the page now and take a look through what is possible.

You've seen the results of what happens when you don't post, so it's vital that you do - so take action now!

Twitter Followers

Are you on Twitter yet?

If you aren't then get yourself an account, follow @markoborn (that's me) and join in the fun - there are hundreds of dentists on there supporting each other in their daily life, plus millions of potential patients ready to be chatted up! (oops sorry, I mean they're ready to be engaged with!)

If you are on Twitter how many followers do you have? And does it matter?

My answer to that is NO it doesn't matter a jot.

I've been looking at some other social media management companies today and their clients have thousands of followers from all over the world, this looks impressive, but who gives a fig if a dental practice has followers from Russia or the USA?

What matters is relevancy, so a dental practice needs to have followers that fulfil 2 criteria:

1. They are local to the practice, ideally within 5 miles
2. They are actively engaging on Twitter, not just with an account, but actively talking to others

Finding any old people to attract as followers is easy, finding targeted followers is harder and takes time and patience - what's more valuable to you - 50 local followers who are engaged on Twitter and live within 5 miles of the practice, or 1500 followers who live 500 miles from the practice? I know which I'd prefer.

So my advice today is to go for those high quality followers, talk to them, engage with them, share their content, hand out useful dental advice to help them keep their teeth for life - and when they need a dentist they'll remember the nice person on Twitter that shared their content and helped them.

Twitter for dentists is taking off... What's your experience on Twitter?

How much more performance does your business need?

Many businesses/dental practices are looking for a huge increase in performance in order to be the best. Many want to increase turnover by 00s% in order to 'beat' the competition. Businesses often think that this is required... but my question to you now is.... is it really required?

Here's an example of what I mean.

Sunday was the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, and I missed it! GGRRR

However the wonderfully talented Lewis Hamilton won in 1 hour, 37 minutes and 11.886 seconds. Following 8.4 seconds behind (an age in F1 terms) was Fernando Alonso in his Ferrari. A totally conclusive win by Lewis with the second place driver a good distance behind... well done Lewis.

But let's look at those figures, Lewis Hamilton took 5831.886 seconds to complete the race, and Fernando Alonso took 8.4 seconds more... that's a difference of 0.14% WOW. Such a seemingly outright win was with a margin of 0.14%.

If Alonso's engineers could have got 0.2% more performance from the car he would have won.

If Alonso could have increased his performance by 0.2% he would have won.

It doesn't take massive increases to beat the competition, all it needs is consistently great results and constant improvement.

So what's the lesson for your business?

1. Start those improvements now
2. Start with any improvement, it's a start!
3. Accept that your competition are not actually that bad, and that a small % increase in every area of your business will have dramatic results
4. Start your next marketing activity now, stop procrastinating
5. Get on with Social Media - that small % increase is often enough to tip the balance
6. Start marketing with email and look for the tiniest area for improvement
7. Split test your website pages and go with the ones that perform better
8. Split test words and forms on your website and go with the ones that have the best % conversion rates
9. Look at your website analytics, which referral source gives the best % conversion? Spend time on that referral source
10. Look at your website analytics, which key word gives the best % conversion? Spend time with SEO to ensure  you are high on Google for that word/phrase
11. Break your marketing down in to a marketing system and look for every way to improve it.

If Ferrari could have got 0.5% increase at the weekend they would have won... what can you do TODAY to get that increase?

A Review of Aweber Email Marketing for your Dental Practice

A question I'm often asked is 'Will you do our Facebook page for us Mark?" My reply is NO!

My approach to Facebook is that it's part of an arsenal of tools that need to be employed together in one cohesive system to achieve an end result - more patients.

Facebook is great at building a community and generating a buzz about your practice - all good things, however if you are using a Facebook business page (which you should be!) any conversation that is started is in the public domain. So my intention is to use Facebook as level 1 of your sales funnel with the goal of always driving people to level 2 where conversations are more private and personal - and that is email marketing.

Email is a very powerful tool when done properly and a great way I find to use this tool is via a blog.

Your blog should be handing out relevant, free and useful information to your target market - this can then be sent directly to Facebook and Twitter AND to your email list - so how do I do that? Aweber.

Here's a video that explains how Aweber converts your blog post in to an email...



Please click the image below to find our more about Aweber.
Simple RSS to Email by AWeber Communications

Email marketing can be annoying, however when done right it is very effective and I see a good  £ conversion of enquiries in to patients for my clients. My most recent stats show a client spent £3k with me and saw £37k of business through an email marketing campaign.

So if you aren't using email yet, I suggest you give Aweber a go as it makes patient communication simple, measurable and effective.

What email system do you use, and why do you like that one?

Facebook Lists and Privacy Settings

Facebook's new privacy settings have been all over the news recently, and I have to say I quite like the new way of posting status updates.

Historically if one had a load of 'friends' on Facebook, but only 100 were 'actual' friends (in the old style meaning of the word) and the rest were just aquaintances or business contacts it was difficult to really separate the streams of content that each group saw.

Facebook's privacy has allowed you to block lists and individuals from seeing photos and updates for a while, but it was always generic - in other words if you block a list from your status updates then ALL your updates are blocked - not great really.

The new privacy settings now allow you to chose who sees what on an update by update basis - and this is direct response to Google +1 Circles I would imagine.

In this video I show you how you can manage this privacy setting, plus give a top tip for managing your list for business... enjoy...

And if you want more about Facebook for Dentists, do check out my website

If the video above doesn't display, click here to watch on YouTube

How to be creative - the story of naming a puppy

I've just bought a puppy. Yes he's very cute and, as ever, there's a story in it for a blog post!

So, new puppy arrives home and what are we going to call him? All the usual dog names get bandied about by the kids - you know things like Spot and Patch - but nothing seems to fit.

So as a family we start chatting about things we like, looking for inspiration, then my eldest daughter says "Mum loves Cornwall, it would be great to find a name that relates to there, wouldn't it?" - and it's true Mrs O has a deep love for Cornwall and we both intend moving there in the future...

So while the kids go through lots of Cornish place names I get out a Cornish dictionary (thank goodness for Google) and see that the Cornish for happy is 'Lowen' - that's it - sorted that's his new name.

So how does this relate to creativity?

When I did my MBA I spent 6 months doing a creativity and innovation module and I wish to share a few concepts with you - during that time of my degree we were told to keep these presuppositions in mind... all the time.

Cycle often and close late. This means during any creative process don;t come to conclusions too quickly, allow the creative juices to flow for a long time. The biggest killer for this is to tell someone their idea is no good - so if you want  a creative team allow them to cycle around the problem often and bring the creative session to a close as late as possible.

Build up don’t knock down: This is to build on people's ideas. A suggestion is to stop using the word 'but' and replace it with 'and'. When someone puts an idea forwards, add the word 'and' then add your input - by doing this you build upon the work of others.

Value Play: Children learn through play, and as adults we have this knocked out of us at an early age - one of the most amazing and valuable exercises I did on my MBA was finger painting! Value play and you get the participants to discover again like a child.

Explore the givens: Challenge what you believe to be true - companies will often say "we can't do that" or "That won't work" but why? Also, look at what you already do and ask why... nothing should be out of bounds to discuss when looking for creative solutions to problems.

Connect and be receptive: Connect to the people involved in the process and be receptive to their thoughts and opinions, remember build them up don't knock them down!

There were loads more, but I found these were the most useful in any creative problem solving issue I was tackling - and keeping these in mind while trying to chose the dog named helped to come up with a creative solution that truly meant something to our family.

And now comes a big one! Some people might say "But I'm not the creative type!" OH YES YOU ARE, all you need is the right environment and the right support - most people, even the most 'creative' can't just go off and sit in a  corner and 'be creative' - they need to get their mind in to the right state and use a system to help the process - if you think you are not creative it's not true,  all it is is the wrong state of mind and a lack of process!

Using Twitter For Marketing in Dentistry

Last week Twitter experienced the biggest spike in UK use ever, why? The riots!

Many tweets were people trying to find out where the riots where going on, some were co-ordinating a clean up and many were co-ordinating the riots themselves - now I'm not going to comment on the riots in this blog post (not because I don't have an opinion, but because this is not the place to air it!) but I do want to talk about why they chose to use Twitter.

Twitter is one of the best ways to get up to date, current and live information. It's rapidly becoming the number one place people go to search for information, and here's why:

1. Twitter has a very short 'half life' so anything you find is normally only a few hours old maximum. This means Twitter is VERY current and up to date
2. Content is linked to individuals, so if you find a piece of information you are looking for then you can communicate directly with the author.
3. There is a huge amount of 'non-twitter' content being shared, this means blogs, websites and articles - so it's a great place to find useful information on your chosen topic

Statistics also show that more people update their profile every day then Facebook, with 52% of users updating their status everyday, compared to Facebook's 12% - this means Twitter is a much more active and engaging environment to work in.

So how can we use this for dentistry?
A recent poll by Pew Internet showed that the most searched for subject on the internet is 'Health' - if this is coupled with the fact that the bulk of 'shares' on Twitter are for 'content' then it makes sense to write a blog about 'dental health' and post this to Twitter.

Writing a blog with a dental health focus is a great way to set yourself up as THE expert in your local area, plus it provides content for people to share and read - and one of the ways to share your blog is to post it to Twitter.

There are a few tools that can be used to post your blog to Twitter, many are free although my preferred option is Social Media Borg, as this gives many other useful features too.

As well as writing a blog I suggest you search for local Twitterers, try Twellow or Twitter Grader - simply enter your local town and follow the local people and engage with them - ReTweet their posts, comment on their blogs and become part of the local Twitter community... then, as they begin to trust you they will look at your blogs and start to share your content.

My golden rule with Twitter is Don't Expect Something For Nothing, if YOU join in, take part and promote other people, THEY will do the same for you.

So, get yourself over to Twitter, sign up , follow me and let's talk dental marketing....

Top Tips for Writing a Dental Blog

I'm often asked to take a peek at dental practices' blogs to review them, here's a summary of the most common suggestions I make to enhance your blog.

1. Add links back to your main website where the visitor can find out more, link to specific treatment pages
2. Include links in the body text of each blog post to specific pages of your website
3. Give people a free giveaway (help guide, 'how to' sheet, info pack) in return for their email address - they can then automatically be sent your blog and you add them to an email marketing campaign. I use Aweber for this.
4. Use plenty of 'key words' in the blog title - such as 'teeth whitening' etc - this will get your blog found on Google. Use your geographical location as well if at all possible
5. Add Twitter and Facebook to your blog (insert them in widgets in the side bar). Widgets are freely available from Twitter and Facebook
6. Use the categories feature in blogger to allow people to find blog posts via category
7. Ensure your blog is sent directly to Facebook and Twitter. I use Social Media Borg to ensure this happens automatically.

A blog is the MOST important part of your online marketing as it's your opportunity to PROVE that you are the most helpful and knowledgeable dentist in the local area - plus it's a great way to populate Twitter and Facebook with great content.

What other suggestions would you make to enhance a blog?

A Dental Practice's Basic Story, What's Yours?

Last Friday I went to see the excellent 'We Will Rock You' at the Dominion theatre in London's West End, if you get the chance to go I can thoroughly recommend it, it really was a great night out.

One thing struck me as I watched in awe of the performance... they were talking about Lady Gaga, Facebook, Twitter and X Factor - none of which existed nearly 10 years ago in 2002 when the show was first put in to production.

This means the show has evolved to be more current, to be more relevant to today and to keep fresh. But I bet the basic elements of the show have stayed the same - the big hits, the moving stage, the jokes about Queen - 'the basic story' stays the same.

So there is a 'core' of the show that is timeless and people love, yet they have a flexible element that stays up to date, current and fresh - so my question is now this... what is the 'core' of your business and which parts do you need to change regularly to be current and fresh?

Is the 'core' of your business the modern colours, the Molton Brown soap, the expensive glass partitioning and the espresso coffee which is always on tap? Or is the 'core' of your business great dentistry that helps people with their dental health issues?

If we are going to have a business that has longevity we need to identify what is our core business and which part of our business needs to be 'flexible' and change, then ensure the flexible part stays current and relevant to the people of today.

So what are the implications of this?

Well, in my opinion I see too many practice focus on the 'flexible' extra parts, they spend a fortune on the glass partitioning and fancy sofas - yet at the end of the day I didn't go to see We Will Rock You for the 'extra' jokes about Lady Gaga - I went to see the show for the 'basic story' which was made more enjoyable by the up to date and relevancy of it.

So, what's your basic story?

Which parts of your business do you need to keep relevant and flexible?

What are the implications of spending money on the 'flexible' elements?

Should you spend more time and money on the 'basic story'?

Think or Act, which do you do?

If we are to move our businesses forwards we need to learn from our experiences...we get taught a lot of things at school, but one thing we don't get taught is how to learn!

Kolb and Schon did a lot of work on learning, and between them came up with a great model to explain the process.

It starts with a concrete experience this could be a dental case going wrong, an appointment missed, or any other event. Kolb then said that we should take time to think about that experience in detail and to ask ourselves 'what would have happenend if...' or 'if I had done that differently what would have been the result?'. He calls this abstract conceptualisation.

Thinking about our experience in this abstract way, and asking ourselves these questions helps us to detach from the experience and look deeper in to the experience itself. This deep reflection then needs to be put back in to action which is the final stage in the process. This action, which is often a reaction to the original experience then needs to affect all future concrete experiences and so the cycle starts again!

This cyclical process ensures we genuinely learn from our experiences.

Society in general doesn't like this 'detachment' and thinking sections, society likes people that 'do' and 'act now'..often the people that do this miss out on the reflective side and don't learn quite so well. Certainly as dental professionals it is my experience that this happens often. In fact Kolb classifies the people that er towards the action end of the scale as:

"those that act before they think, if they ever think at all"

Whilst the people that er towards the thinking end of the scale only as:

"those that think before they act, if they ever act at all"

Which are you?

I guess the best thing is to have the balance, we will always have a prefered style...acting or thinking... but we need to be aware of this and move ourselves (sometimes forcibly, and yes you know who you are!) through the other stages.

I'm of to thinks some more, then take some action!

Facebook Pages for Dentists - Friends or Fans

Many dentists are setting their Facebook accounts up wrong! I added 15 new friends on Facebook the other day and all were set up as personal profiles.

When you set up a Facebook account you simply create one for YOU as an individual person, then create a PAGE for the practice with YOU as an administrator, you can then add admin rights to other people. The PAGE is your practice and the profile is YOU.

Here's a video which explains why this is important.



If you can't see the video please click here to watch on YouTube

Is Dentistry retail and should you treat your practice as a retail business?

Lots of debate around this subject, so here's my opinion.

No... dentistry is not retail and I justify this comment as follows.

The Definition of Retail is generally considered to be 'The sale of goods to end users for use and consumption by the purchaser. Manufacturers sell large quantities of products to retailers, and retailers sell small quantities of those products to consumers."

So, retailers sell products.

Now, in business there are generally considered 2 types of 'market':

1. Products
2. Services

Products

Products have a few distinguishing features about them:

1. They are tangible and can be handled
2. Because they are tangible they can be evaluated or 'tried' before purchase
3. They can be made to stock and left on a shelf
4. They can be returned after purchase if they are unsatisfactory

Services

Services on the other hand exhibit these features (1):

1. They are intangible and so can not be handled
2. Inseparability - this means there is simultaneous production and consumption. Like a teacher, as the words are spoken the service is 'consumed'
3. Variability - a service will vary according to who delivers it
4. Perishability - a service has no 'shelf life' and can not be stored or returned

Products and Services are not dichotomies but are on a sliding scale (2) and purchases can have elements of both a service and a product - Apple are the masters at combining both these elements. (boy if only you knew how hard it was for me to say that!)

Because products and services are so different, purchasers will use a different set of 'indicators' to evaluate them. For a pure product they will simply 'ask for a test drive' and handle the product to see if it is fit to solve the their problem.

Services are a little more difficult to evaluate, so we tend to use the following to evaluate a service (3):

• Reliability Ability to perform ‘the promise’ dependently and effectively
• Responsiveness and Willingness to help customers 
• Assurance - Knowledge of employees and ability to inspire trust
• The physical evidence - staff, website, phone
• Empathy - Caring and individualised attention to the customer

The above is often known by the mnemonic RRATE.

So, lets bring this back to dentistry.

1. Can your patient physically hold, touch and evaluate their new smile, or healthier smile BEFORE they commit to buy?
2. Can you make their new smile or healthier smile in advance - or will the patient evaluate your dentistry as they experience it in the chair?
3. Would the dentistry that patient receives remain totally constant no matter who treated them?
4. Can you 'stock' new and healthy smiles on the shelf?

If you answered NO to those questions, then we are in agreement... dentistry is a service!

So now we agree that dentistry is a service, we need to look at how it will be evaluated - the physical evidence or your practice, website and phone skills. Your reliability, do you do and say the same thing all the time? Are your staff responsive to new patient requests? Can you inspire trust - after all you are going to ask that new patient to lie on their back while you cover your face and prod them! And are you empathetic to their unique needs?

If dentistry is a service, and retail is about selling products then we have a mismatch if we consider dentistry a retail business.

Marketing

If a practice believes they are in retail they may be led to use marketing techniques suitable for retail, rather than marketing techniques that are suitable for a service which enable  a patient to evaluate that service prior to purchasing.

Marketing for products will generally be around convincing customers to buy that product, where as marketing for services is normally focused around allowing a customer to fully evaluate that service by providing evidence for  RRATE as described above. (Assuming we are marketing a specific service and not a brand)

What if things go wrong?

If a product goes wrong the tendency is to look for manufacturing defects, hence if a dental practice views itself as providing 'products' the tendency could be to do the same... and look for defects within the 'manufacture' 

However, a service that goes wrong will be viewed in a VERY different way with 'gaps'  in the service delivery being highlighted - things such as a mismatch between the 'promise' and the 'experience' of the patient. Gaps between the marketing used and the actual service delivered. In fact there are 5 specific and clear 'gaps' (4) that a business should use to 'fix' a broken service.... very different to a business that makes a product and looks at the production line!

In my opinion the concept of viewing dentistry as a retailer is littered with problems, although if it gives a practice a kick up the proverbial to get going and be competitive then it may have its place!

So, where do you stand? Do you market your practice around the idea of products, or do you market your practice around the idea of a service?

Of course these are my opinions, and I am happy to debate this in an open forum to discuss the concepts further.

Thanks for reading... I'm off to run for cover!

Stay sharp,

Mark

References:

(1) Gummesson E (1999) 'Total relationship marketing' Oxford, Butterworth, Heinemann

(2) Shostack, G.L (1977) 'Breaking free from products marketing' Journal of Marketing, Vol 412, April pp73-80

(3) Zeithaml V A, Bitner M J (1996) "Services Marketing" McGraw Hill

(4) Parasuram A, Zeithaml V A, Berry L (1985) "A conceptual model of service quality and its implications for further research" Journal of Marketing Vol 49, Fall, pp41-50

A review of North Social's Facebook Apps

Facebook is a great place to build engagement on the internet, and work to set yourself up as THE expert in the local area by handing out useful, free and relevant advice - watch all the top experts in their field... they all do it!

One thing many people aren't aware of are Facebooks guidelines on running promotions, now I'm not saying there are Facebook police out there, but if the guidelines are broken and your account is deleted then you may only have yourself to blame for not following them.

A simple way to overcome this is to use a third party application that is Facebook compliant to run competitions, sweepstakes and draws - I recommend you check out North Social, and here is a brief summary of what they can do for a dental practice.

Deal Share


This is their equivalent of Groupon and means you can run legitimate group deals, with countdowns to the number of offers left, how many people have subscribed and closing date/time. The app will collect subscribers details for you but most importantly North Social have built in a clever 'viral' component. Whilst Facebook users can bypass this viral component (those pesky Facebook Guidelines again) this feature makes this a very powerful way to virally enrol people on to a group deal.

Mark's suggestion: A group deal for 50% off Teeth Whitening by a certain date for the first 30 subscribers. Ideally tie this to a date in the calendar to give a reason (weddings, holidays, celebrations). The focus is to get people in to the practice, then concerntrate on gently encouraging them to become practice members.

Here's a video demonstration

Document Display


This is a great way to gain fans and let them promote your page for you. It allows you to share information via a document, then encourage fans to 'like' the page and 'share' the link.

Mark's suggestion: Simply write a white paper, free guide or useful information guide and upload it. The only way for Facebook users to see this document is to become a fan of your page, they are then encouraged to share this document with other, who then need to become fans in order to see the page. And so the virality goes on.

For a live example of this app in action, please visit my own Facebook page and take a look now.

Here's a video demonstration:

Fan Offer

This app allows you to provide fans with a special offer or deal - perhaps a coupon or discount voucher, or entry ticket to an event. As with all North Social Apps it has a high viral component which again encourages your fans to do your marketing for you... a great idea!

Mark's suggestion: Run a Fan Offer for them to get a refund of your initial consultation fee against any further treatment. So the patient pays your new patient assessment fee, then with the voucher can get this money off of any further treatment. I've run this offer (not with North Social) on many client website and it's been a great way to gain more quality patients.

Here's a video demonstration:

For a live example of North Social in action, please visit my own Facebook page and take a look now.

How much does it cost?

For a regular dental practice it will cost $19.99 per month which is about £12! A no brainer really!

I recommend you take a good look at the other North Social Apps, the above is just 3 out of a total of 19 different ways to promote your practice on Facebook.

If you want further help in setting up North Social or any other form of online marketing, please just shoot me a quick email to info@markoborn.com (I am running a spam filter so please expect an auto response from me - just follow the simple instructions when you get them) or visit my dental marketing website for more info.

Speak soon, and stay sharp.... and social!

Mark

Facebook Pages? Nah, this is where the REAL power is...

Facebook is a hugely powerful medium for marketing, and in this post I want to show you why.

We are all connected to one another - 6 degrees of separation they say - and Facebook is starting to map those connections. As a marketer we can also tap in to this resource and utilise those connections.

So here are the results of less than 12 hours integration of a client website in to Facebook using their Social Plug-ins. These social plug ins allow a website visitor to interact with your website:

• they can 'comment' on a blog post or photo
• They can 'like' an article or patient case you have posted and
• they can 'recommend' you - all by clicking a simple button.

So for example when a website visitor, that has 500 Facebook friends, uses a social plug-in on your website it automatically syncs to their Facebook stream and will be shown 500 times to all their friends.... ooh now that sounds interesting!

Here's what it looks like:

I simply clicked the 'recommend' button on this website, and this was automatically posted to my friend stream for friends to 'view'.

Now here's the clever bit - we can track those 'views' (Facebook calls them 'impressions') and see how many times it was viewed and how many people clicked on the link back to the original website.

Here are the stats for a client site for 12 hours:

The site had 4 people click the 'recommend' button, it was then shown 1,222 times (MASSIVE brand awareness) which then resulted in 44 hits back to the website - amazing stats for a small dental practice in a few hours.

As Facebook knows how people are connected, it's then possible to create a 'personal recommendations' box showing your site visitors what their friends have shared, liked etc on your site - the future of this, as I see it, is a totally dynamic website that customises itself based on the user experience of your friends... scary (but exciting) stuff huh? Too see this 'personal recommendation' box in action please visit my main blog and scroll down on the right.

To get the Social Plug in, you will need to visit the Facebook Plug-in directory and to gain access to the stats these generate you will need to instal some code on your website from the Facebook Insights page. A small amount of tech knowledge is required to instal.

Have you used social plug ins and to what success?