Social Media for Dental Practices

transcript

Andrea Hewlett

Internet Marketing Strategist

Site-Seeker, Inc. \\

dental@site-seeker.com

Dan Salamone

Marketing & Communication Coordinator

dansalamone@site-seeker.com

Understanding Social MediaFor Dental Practices

• Founded in 2003

• Corporate Office in Upstate NY• Offices in Bloomfield CT, Rochester, NY, New Jersey

• Employs 20 in CNY, CT, NJ, MA, VA

• Full Service Internet Marketing Agency• Search Engine Optimization Services• Pay-Per-Click Management Services• Social Media Implementation and Mgmt• Web Design, Development, Applications & Testing• Analytics

Who are we?

Fast Track 50 of CNY

2007 2008 2009

MV Chamber of Commerce

2009 Business of the Year

B2B Twitterer of the Year

@KatieHoke

We hear it everywhere…

Social Media

“Social Media is, at its most basic sense, a shift in how people discover, read, and share news

and information and content. It's a fusion of sociology and technology, transforming

monologue (one to many) into dialog (many to many.)”

-Brian Solis

Why is Social Media Important?

Socialnomics Video

1. Community Relations

2. Customer Service

3. Loyalty Building

4. Collaboration

5. Networking

6. Patient Acquisition

Social Media is:

Ultimately it is ALL about gaining . . .

AUTHORITY

LEADERSHIP

Top Insights:

1) The 35-54 year old demo is growing fastest• 276.4% growth rate

2) The 55+ demo is second • 194.3% growth rate

3) The 25-34 year old demo doubles every 6 months

4) There are more females (55.7%) than males (42.2%) on Facebook • 2.2% are of unknown gender.

5) College crowd 18-24 year olds remains largest • at 40.8% • down from 53.8% six months ago.

Creating your Facebook page:

• Identify your objectives

• Practice presence

• New patient acquisition

• Patient loyalty

• Who will view your page?

• What do you want your page to say about you?

• How will you engage your audience

• Refer a Friend, Appointment Requests, Community Service, and Education

What is a Facebook fan?

• According to Facebook:

• average fan becomes a fan of 4 pages each month.

• Free way to advertise your company or product

• A great way to engage users through promotions and contests.

Tips for a successful page:

• Make your business hours, location, and phone numbers always accessible

• Encourage your “fans” to interact by commenting on their visit and experience

• Sponsor fun events in the office that make your patient want to encourage others to attend

• Allow patients to ask questions- RESPOND to help alleviate fears and concerns

• Include pictures of the office

Engage, Engage, Engage

What Can Facebook do for your practice?

• Build a Fan base

• Promotes you as the “Expert”

• Attract New Patients

• Receive Patient Feedback

• Create Relationships with your Patients

Get Listed - Step 1

Search Engine Results Page

Local Search - Summary

• Free

• Easy

• Trackable

• Gets you there with little to no effort

Online Reputation Management

Personal Reviews

• Google Places• Yelp!• Healthgrades• Wellness

Relax! Manage them, don’t react!

Video is quickly becoming as widespread a content medium online as text!

2: The second largest Search Engine in the world (behind Google)

24 Hours: The amount of video uploaded to YouTube every minute.

1,000 Years: The amount of time it would take to watch every video on YouTube.

100 Million: The amount of YouTube videos watched everyday.

Monitor Successes

Is this your target audience?

Establishing Credibility with Social Media

Become the Expert

Create Accounts (Name Claim)

Grow Networks

Create Content

Distribute Content

Participate in Discussion

Lead Discussion

How to Distribute Your BlogEmail Campaign

Twitter

Facebook

Other Blogs

Social Bookmarking Sites

Other (links)…

Blog Posts

Wordpress.com vs. Wordpress.org

Wordpress.com

• Free and Easy to Use

• All setups and upgrades are done by the program

• Extra traffic from blogs of the day and tags

• Easy to find similar bloggers through tags

How will you measure the effectiveness of your website?

• Increased visitors to the site

• New patient appointment requests

• Patient referrals

• Phone Calls

Establish Baseline & Benchmarks

What happens when you bring it all together?

This does not happen overnight

Consistent and regular participation

brought traction and growth

over time.

Ready to get started?