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Hey guys, welcome to this week's Monday Morning Marketing episode! In this episode, I'm joined by website expert, Josh Hampson, to dive deep into the world of dental websites and how they can effectively build a strong brand for your practice. Discover key strategies to set yourself apart from the competition and answer the pressing questions potential patients may have. Learn why your website is your most valuable sales tool and why Josh says YES to listing price ranges on your site. Uncover the secrets to creating a low-friction experience for potential patients and how to address their pain points through your brand. We also cover when to, and when not to, invest in Search Engine Optimization(SEO) when starting up your practice.
Punch that play button and get ready to transform your dental website into a powerful brand-building asset!
You can reach out to Josh Hampson here:
Website: https://www.hmpsn.studio/
Blog Post: 4 Ways to Increase Appointment Bookings on Your Dental Practice Website
Other Mentions and Links:
If you want your questions answered on Monday Morning Marketing, ask me on these platforms:
My Newsletter: https://thedentalmarketer.lpages.co/newsletter/
The Dental Marketer Society Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2031814726927041
Michael: Hey Josh. So talk to us about websites. How can we utilize this, or what advice, suggestions, or methods can you give us that will help actually attract new patients through our website?
Josh: Yeah, definitely. So for any dental practice, where I recommend getting started is really at the foundation.
Make sure that you're building a brand. So before you really think about building a website, it's important to, figure out what's gonna set you apart from your competition. Why should a potential patient. Choose to book with you over, any other dental practice in your area. So really I have a few questions that I like to answer before diving into that.
I've already said, what sets you apart from your competition? What makes you a better choice than other dental practices in your area? And then this is core, but what are your ideal customers, your ideal patient's pain points? what dental services are they typically looking for? So, are they looking for general family dentistry?
Are they maybe looking for pediatric dentistry for the little ones? or are they looking for more cosmetic dental services? You know, implants, veneers, those sorts of things. The other question that I like to ask is, what questions do they have about the services that they're looking for and how can you easily answer them on your website?
and then, you know, this is not at all website focused, but making sure that you're creating an exceptional experience for your patients is paramount. this starts, in your marketing and bleeds all the way through into that in-office experience. So as we really think about diving into the website, once you've answered these core questions about your business, about your offerings, about how you can tailor, you know, your messaging to those ideal patients, I like to dive into the basics.
So, The biggest tip that I can give anybody that's thinking about either, you know, relaunching a dental practice website or uh, if you're a brand new, practice starting from scratch don't fall into the trap of thinking that your website is just a website. I really like to think about our website as your most valuable sales tool, and it's typically, one of the first or the first touch points that you'll have with a new patient before they ever come into your studio.
So with that being said, it's important to stand out. You know, I think we've all seen a lot of dental practice websites and it actually isn't that difficult to stand out in the dental space. When we look at a lot of dental websites, they feel. Somewhat sterile. And so really offering different design aspects that make you feel more personable, that feel authentic to you, authentic to your practice experience.
And once again, going back to speaking to your ideal customer. So not just unloading about the services that you do, but really speaking to. How that is going to impact your customer, your patient's lives. Right. So, we all know that health starts with oral health. A lot of. Problems that we can experience really begin with, you know, what's happening in our mouths.
So, speaking to that unique value proposition and positioning yourself, your practice as the uh, the guide that will help your patients solve that. Mm-hmm. And then once again, going back, what sets you apart? It's all about being authentic. It's all about You know, really setting yourself apart from other practices in your area, cuz there are tons of options.
And then on top of that, your website is an integrated piece of your marketing plan, like I said earlier you know, answering questions that patients might have about any of your services. Paramount little hack there. Is, you can put these in an FAQ section. A lot of these questions are actually SEO keywords and search terms in and of themselves.
So, you know, thinking about, I'm based in Austin, Texas thinking about Invisalign, how much does Invisalign cost in Austin, Texas, huge search term here. So answering that question on your website, having that keyword on your website is automatically gonna bump you up and search rankings just by simply answering a question that your patient already has and that you know that they're going to have.
Nice. I do have a question
Michael: about the, the website. When you, I guess, put yourself in it, your brand, you know, like the loudest page and things like that. Or about the practice, do you prefer or do you think it's better to speak from like a third party or like, it looks like the doctor's actually saying like, I love this community and I love, or the doctor loves this community, and what's better?
Josh: I think it really depends on the size of your practice. So if you're solo, you're the only doctor in your practice, I think that having that type of you know, one-on-one conversation with a patient is um, the way to go. If you've got many, many, many doctors in your practice, maybe multiple locations I would recommend kind of saying, this is what we are about.
And then you can always do like a letter from the founder or blog post from the founder. Mm-hmm. Um, I think is a really great option there. Gotcha. Okay, cool. And then going back to really making it easy to find answer or for your patients to find answers to their questions. One of my favorite dental hacks is an insurance verification form.
We typically use type form, which allows you to set up. Essentially this is gonna get a little developer, but uh, bit of conditional logic where you can upload all of the different insurances that your practice accepts. And then anything that you don't accept, and then set that form up so that you're grabbing patient's name, their email address what insurance they will be potentially using with your practice.
And from there you can conditionally then display. We take your insurance, let's go ahead and book your appointment. We don't take your insurance, but you can then direct them to maybe you have like an in studio membership option. But what you're doing there is making it one easy to answer whether or not you accept their insurance.
Two, you're also capturing that lead and able to follow up with them. In the instance that you do accept their insurance and they didn't quite make the jump to uh, schedule that appointment. You can always follow up and convert that lead, that's kind of one of the most valuable tools that we've employed lately.
Michael: Gotcha. When it comes to that, like, okay, how much is in, how much does Invisalign cost? Or how much are implants? Or, you know what I mean? Would you prefer to have the price on the website? Like, just, just put it out there or, cuz you know how some people are like, well, don't put the price out there. You know what I mean?
You're gonna deter people and have them call for, you know what I mean? And then that kind of doesn't answer the question that Google wants. Right. Yeah,
Josh: so I'm a big, big proponent of including pricing on your website, whether it's, you know, a dental website or you know, a SaaS website. Think about how many times you have been looking for the price of really any product or service and can't figure that out.
You're more likely to just put it off and not, Book your appointment not reach out, anything like that. What you're really doing and including pricing is once again, like validating that you are the right choice for your patients. So if they come in and they see that, your Invisalign price is out of their price range It's gonna save you a little bit of time as well to not have to answer those questions, those sorts of things.
So it's gonna limit some lift on your front office staff but it's also going to help you attract your ideal customer, which is what it's all about. We want to make sure that we're getting the right people in the doors at the right time and helping 'em with the products and services that they need.
Okay.
Michael: Okay man. So have the price on website.
Josh: Definitely. And big thing with that, I know these are all variable prices, so you can always include a range. So if we're looking at an implant, we know that that can vary dramatically depending on patient's, individual you know, their individual case that sort of thing.
So you can always put a range. It doesn't have to be. An implant is $3,500. Implants typically start at X and they could go up to Y depending on what your individual case looks like. Mm-hmm. Okay. Awesome. Another often overlooked Option for helping convert potential patients, to actual patients is utilizing an online booking widget or platform.
So we know that. It can be kind of a hassle to schedule a dental appointment, especially if maybe you haven't been to the dentist in a while. So making it as easy as booking an Airbnb or ordering DoorDash that's really going to dramatically like boost the number of patients that are in your practice.
So if they can easily figure out if you do take their insurance and then easily book online, you're just taking away. Those blockers that could keep them from booking with you. So they don't have to call. Of course they can call if they want, but we all know if things are put right in front of us, the likelihood that we'll actually move forward with doing that thing.
it'll actually happen. So just streamlining that, making it as easy as possible for patients to figure out once again, if you take their insurance. And then ultimately book, paramount and getting more folks through the door. And typically most dental practice software are going to have an embedable widget.
You can usually find it directly in your platform. It's just an embed code copy pasted into your website builder and seamless. So mm-hmm. Super, super easy to implement, onto your website, provided that your, uh, dental practice software has that option. Mm-hmm. And then, maybe a lot of SEO guys or SEO gals are gonna ding you for this, but I'm always hesitant to tell, especially a practice that's just starting to go full send on seo, search engine optimization.
What's more important for a brand new dental practice is making sure that you have the SEO fundamentals down. So making sure that you're hitting. Keywords, relevant keywords to your area. Super, super easy to go onto a tool like a CM rush and find what those. Keywords are for your, your individual area and make sure that you're including those into your site.
But I think when it comes to creating tons and tons of s e o content I generally kind of reserve that for practices that are at least like a year old. it takes time. It's. A costly endeavor. And I think more important for a brand new practice is making sure that you're really growing your book, providing an excellent in-office experience, those sorts of things.
But like I said, I see o fundamentals are super, super important. Make sure that you're most siteholders would do this if you're um, You know, building your side on your own, just make sure that you've got your H one s, your H two s noted so that things from a uh, technical standpoint, Google will validate your website and start to, to rank you.
All right, man. So that's nice.
Michael: That's good to know about the seo especially, I feel like a lot of the times when you're getting out in the get going, like, you know, it's like kinda like crickets or like a couple new patients. You're like, Ooh, I'm paying seo. You know what I mean? Like, come on, why aren't we first on Google?
Or something like that. I had to get impatient a little bit.
Josh: Yeah. I mean, SEO takes time. It takes time. It's a good bit of work. And most importantly, once again, answering those questions that your patients have, because at the end of the day, like good seo. Is also good user experience, right?
So answering questions um, the folks might have and directing them where they need to go is um, foundational piece of seo, last thing that I would say is, And I touched on this at the very beginning of our call, is just making sure that your website is an integrated piece of your marketing plan.
So, when you have a lead come through on your website, whether it's through a contact form, that insurance verification form make sure that you follow up with those leads, especially if they do not book with you immediately. That means. They're a warm lead. They're a hot lead, and they are looking to find a place to get a dental home, essentially.
Other piece, stay in touch with your existing patients. So, once they come in for that first appointment, if you didn't get the opportunity to schedule them for their second follow or for their follow-up visit during their appointment. Make sure that we're following up, three to four months after that first appointment so that we can get them scheduled for that follow up.
And last but not least streamline referrals. So we all know Word of mouth is our easiest advertising tool, right? So, make sure you're streamlining referrals. There are a number of different platforms that you can use to do that, that integrate directly into your website.
And once again, really, really valuable in, converting potential patients, especially after um, one of their friends, one of their colleagues has had a great experience with you. It's a shoe for them to come and get their dental services done with you as well. Mm-hmm. Nice.
Michael: Okay, man.
So fo yeah, focus on referrals, but it starts with building that brand, right? Building the brand and making sure all this is kind of in play and we can dive deeper into SEO and upcoming month. But, at the same time, making sure your website's, looking good. You mentioned referrals, widgets have the SEO optimization conversions, right?
Getting the leads in. Yeah, man, that's it. It sounds like a little bit, but then there's a lot of moving parts, you know what I mean? And so this is the, I, I feel like this is where the listener, right, is I guess, paying for that optimization, right? Like, okay, this is where we gonna have to move, moving parts, keep up to date, all these things.
Because it's a lot. It's a lot. Yeah.
Josh: Definitely. I mean, it's a lot of moving parts. our dental clients they're experts in, dentistry, right? Mm-hmm. Maybe they might not have taken a business class since, general college. And so there's a lot of moving parts and it can become very technical.
So, yeah, just make sure that you're hitting all those key points and everything will fall into place.
Michael: Awesome, Josh. I appreciate your time and if anyone has further questions, you can definitely find 'em on the Dental Marketer Society Facebook group, or where can they reach out
Josh: to you directly?
Yeah, definitely. So drop on over to our website. It's www.hmpsn.studio, so just my last name with Noval. And then we've also got a dental blog post on our Website as well. It dives into a lot more of this in detail, so check that out as well.
Michael: Awesome. So guys, that's gonna be in the show notes below, and Josh, thank you for being with me on this Monday morning marketing episode.
Josh: Thanks so much, Michael. It was a blast.