Take Your Social Media Marketing Strategy to The Next Level

In the past, dental practices relied on word-of-mouth referrals and traditional marketing strategies to reach new patients.  

But with the shift in people’s reliance on technology to communicate, socialize, and discover new products - to do everything, pretty much - it’s time to implement a new strategy into your marketing plan.  

By promoting your practice on social media and showcasing your expertise in the dental field, you can target new patients and keep your existing ones engaged.  

Social media for dentists is a surefire way to build trust with your target patients, establish a credible reputation online, and increase awareness about your practice.

In this article, we will share six dental marketing ideas to boost your presence online and attract the right patients to your practice.  

How to Market Your Dental Practice on Social Media

To effectively market your practice’s products and services, you need to post engaging, relevant, and valuable content consistently.  

You want your content to be a mix of educational, promotional, and entertaining posts. Keep it simple, straightforward, and short so your audience can easily digest the information you want to share.

Social media for dentists is also highly visual so go heavy on photos, videos, and infographics to better attract the attention of your potential patients.

Here are some ideas on how to market your dental practice on social media:

• Post before and after patient results.
• Share dental hacks and tips that your patients will find valuable.  
• Feature positive patient reviews and testimonies.  
• Post infographics to educate your audience about oral health.  

• Create FAQ and Q&A posts to engage your audience and educate them.  
• Post time-sensitive promos on Stories.
• Inform your patients about closing time, office hour changes, and other time-sensitive updates.  

The best way to use social media is to treat it as an avenue to interact with existing and potential patients on a more personal level.  

By being more authentic and personable, you can build rapport, show the integrity of your team, and attract more new patients.  

Social Media for Dentists: How to Maximize Your Social Media Marketing for The Best Results

Now that you know what to post, it's time to share some tips and tricks to ensure each post generates the maximum number of engagements.  

1. Optimize for Mobile

Remember that more people access the web through mobile than they do via desktop. In fact, out of the 4.48 billion active social media users worldwide, 91% access social channels via mobile.  

This means that it’s highly likely that potential patients are viewing your content from their smartphones or tablets.

Make sure your posts are optimized for mobile to boost user experience. As much as possible, use images and videos that are in portrait mode.  

Facebook reports that 80% of its ad revenue comes from mobile campaigns. Mobile is the way to go.  

Aside from using portrait mode, here are other ways how to optimize your social media for dentist content for mobile:

• If you're putting text over an image, make sure that the font is visible to the naked eye.  
• Your visuals need to tell a story because a lot of people watch videos without an audience.  

• Add closed captions or subtitles to your videos to make them more user-friendly and accessible to everyone.  
• Keep your videos around 30 seconds long.  
• Text is 30% less visible on mobile than on desktop. So, when crafting your social media captions or copy, ensure your first sentence is striking enough to capture the attention of your intended patients.  
• Don’t be afraid to use emojis in your copy.
• Make sure the links you attach to your posts are fast-loading. No one is going to wait for your content to load.

• Shorten your form fields to increase your conversion rates.  

2. Invest in Social Media Messaging for Dentists

Aside from posting on your account and other people’s feeds, you also want to invest in social messaging.  

Social media for dentists requires you to directly interact, communicate, and share knowledge and ideas with your target audience on a virtual network.  

What’s amazing about social messaging is that it makes your interactions more personal – like talking to a friend. It allows you to develop a relationship with potential patients and keep your existing ones loyal and connected.  

You can also create a group chat and form a community around your practice. This provides an avenue for your patients where they can share their experiences and thoughts. This activity can then inspire other patients to go to your practice.

Plus, when you combine social messaging platforms like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Viber, and WeChat, they have more users than the big networks!

You can also use social messaging to present highly targeted ads that will surely win over new patients and boost your revenue.  

3. Post More Videos

In a survey, out of the 86% of marketing professionals that used video as a marketing tool, 78% said that videos directly increased sales for their business.

Video is highly in-demand because people love consuming them.  

Make sure to post videos that your target patients will find helpful. But keep in mind to strike a balance between posting educational, entertaining, and promotional video content.  

It’s important to post videos that impart knowledge to show your expertise. It's also essential that some of your videos aim to humanize your practice by joining dance challenges and sharing behind-the-scenes clips to build connections.  

You should also promote your services without being pushy about it. Here are some video ideas to help you get started:

• Tour of your office
• Day in the life of a dentist, assistant, or front desk staff
• TikTok dance challenges
• Oral health tips
• Debunk oral health myths

• Promote specific services by showing before and after results
• Feature user-generated content or pictures and videos that your patients personally posted
• Use Instagram stories to give people an update about what’s going on in your office
• Let people see how you perform certain procedures

4. Go Live

Live videos are incredibly popular right now. You can see various influencers and online sellers do live to sell or simply engage with their audience in real-time through a Q&A session.  

Join the trend and do a live video too!  Doing a live Q&A is a great way to attract the attention of new potential patients. It’s also an avenue where you can interact with your existing patients and foster their loyalty.  

You can invite influencers and relevant industry leaders to get your audience even more excited and motivate them to participate.  

Facebook isn't the only platform where you can do live. Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and other platforms also offer this feature. Choose a platform that most of your audience is using.  

Aside from Q&As, here are other live videos that will help you engage and connect with your audience in real time:

• Product demonstrations
• Live interviews
• Host quizzes
• Live stream events
• Host a webinar

5. Use Targeted Ads to Precisely Target Audiences

Social media allows you to run ads that precisely target the audience you want to interact with.  

Investing in social media ads for dentists is an effective way to reach your target patients and generate results right away.  

If you want to run paid social media for dentist campaigns, here are some best practices to follow:

• Determine the goals you want to achieve with social media ads.  
• Identify who your target audience is.  
• Audit the content you’ve already posted on social media and track which ones are resonating with your followers. Use these high-performing posts in your ads.  

• Pay for metrics that matter. Instead of investing in cost per thousand impressions (CPM) or every time someone sees your ad, go for (CPC) or cost per click. This way you know that you're only paying for people who are interested in doing business with you.  
• Optimize your ads for mobile.  
• Do an A/B test to see which version of your ad works best for your intended audience.  
• Measure results and refine your strategy as you go.  

6. Feature Reviews

Feature positive reviews on your social media for dentist pages to help your target patients gain trust and build confidence to choose your practice.  

If you're wondering how to get more reviews for your dental patients, here are some best practices to keep in mind:

• Set up a Google My Business profile.  

• Send your patients a review request via text or email following appointments.  
• Automate your review requests through communication software that syncs with your phone system. This will help maximize your ability to accumulate reviews.  
• Stay on top of what people have to say about your practice. Use social listening to keep a pulse of how people feel about you and your services. You also need to monitor your online reviews across various platforms.  
• Reply to online reviews, including the negative ones. Show that you’re responsive and act on complaints. When you make people feel that you care, they’re more likely to leave a review and even recommend you to their friends and family.  

Do You Have a Winning Social Media for Dentist Strategy?

Take your practice to the next level by optimizing your social media for dentist strategy with the tips we shared with you above!

At Digital Resource, our social media marketing experts will work with you to create a custom social content plan that will put your practice ahead of your competitors and help your business grow.  

Want a surefire way to get more patients this year and beyond? Contact us to get started!

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