How to Differentiate Your Dental Practice from the Competition
The most important marketing move you can make for your practice is to find a way to be unique.
When it comes to your dental marketing strategies, being the same as everyone else is just about as good as being invisible. You need to determine what will make you stand out, and creating a dental brand that new patients will choose above all others.
To set yourself apart from the crowd, you need to follow five important steps.
Target a Unique Audience
First, understand who your ideal patients are. This will come partly from compiling demographic data and also from defining your ideal patient personas. Taking a shotgun approach and trying to be everything to everyone isn’t really the way to go, even if you are a general dental practice. Remember, if you’re targeting everybody, you’re really not targeting anybody. Sure, you’ll still end up attracting patients who don’t exactly match your ideal patient persona, but make sure your core audience matches up with the patients who will bring the most value to your business.
Have a Unique Value Proposition
If you’ve completed a SWOT analysis and a competition analysis, you should have a pretty good idea of what your strengths are, as well as your competitors’ weaknesses. Exposing these gaps can be your biggest opportunity to separate yourself from the pack. Your value proposition doesn’t have to be limited to one strength. In fact, it should really be a combination of your greatest strengths, and a combination that no other dental office in your area can offer.
Provide a Unique Dental Patient Experience
Every patient who steps foot in your office, speaks with you on the phone, or visits your website should have a positive dental experience worth telling others about. After all, dental referrals are an important part of bringing new patients into your office, and if you don’t give your patients something to talk about, then they won’t be referring anyone new to your business. Make sure every interaction with your patients is designed to impress them.
Show Your Unique Personality
One thing you and each member of your dental team have that is truly unique is your personality. Whether you consider yourself “knowledgeable,” “reliable,” or just plain “likeable,” always make sure your personality shows through in person as well as in your marketing messaging. Social media, video, and even your website provide great opportunities to let people see who you really are.
Develop Your Own Unique Brand
Once you have a clear picture of what makes you different, you need to develop a distinctive dental logo and practice brand that communicates your uniqueness to patients, both current and new. To pull this off, you really need an experienced dental marketing agency to develop the visual and messaging components that make up a strong brand identity.
