Phil Cole 0:05
Hello, and welcome to the Dental Education Podcast, the podcast series where we share knowledge and experience to provide you value to you and your dental practice. I'm your host, Phil Cole. And in today's episode, we're going to briefly talk about marketing statistics. I just want to share these statistics with you so that you can see the importance of what marketing can do and how it will help build your practice. So I think that there's some enlightening. There's just the stats are pretty enlightening. And I think that it's very important that back in the day, when I first got into dental, you know, now going on 25 years ago, you've heard me say this many times on the podcast, there was always this kind of, with that generation, the baby boomer generation, that they just felt as though all you got to do is hang a shingle, and they'll come right. And as things have progressed, technology has progressed, social media has progressed and stuff, I think that it's become even more apparent that marketing is vital. And so when we used to look at practice, p&l, and stuff, it would not be just even 1012 years ago, it was not uncommon to see less than a half a percent spent on advertising marketing, you of course, had your your doctors that were, you know, just gung ho, and they wanted to just take their practice to the next level. So for that purpose, you saw them spend money on marketing. But when you take the general doctor to the general dentist practitioner, you would always see that that marketing was one of those things that was just not utilized. And if they felt that they were getting enough patients in the door, and they were happy with that, and dollars were fine, then they didn't need to do that. Now today, because of the insurances. And the the lower fees, and PPO versus Dental, Delta Premier, doctors and so forth like that, it's become a different, there's a different span on this. And things have increased, or should I say, have showed a higher different levels on which you can get dollars in the door, and so forth. And so I just thought it was important. I just have 13 statistics here, they come from different areas, from different marketing companies from the ADEA, and so forth. And I just thought we'd run through them real quick, nothing too, nothing too in depth, but just thought it would be a good thing for you to see. And then what we'll do is we'll post these statistics, and where they came from and stuff on the information in the description of the podcast as well. So number one, that out of the 13 here that I want to go over with you. And this is done by the American Dental Association, 75% of adults in the United States have visited a dentist within the past year. So that is telling to know that out of the total population, the United States, 75% of them have visited a dentist in the past year 97% of consumers search for local businesses online. And that is including dental practices in that. So this is what big one for me. Because I think that it's it's really, really important. And when I'm talking with dentists, especially the older dentists, when they're looking at retiring in the next 10 years, I always tell them, like listen, don't fall into the trap where most dentists do and that's that last 10 years, you plateau. And if anything, you start to change, to go in decreasing. Or you you get tired and so you stop paying attention to your numbers as much. And so your overhead starts to build, right. And so when I talk to them about make sure you're getting new patients in that would be the first thing that I would look at if you if you went to and I see this all the time when we look at doing our KPI management, and we look at p&l is and doing breakeven points for our clients and stuff. You'll see where they're they were at one time bringing in 25-30 new patients a month and now they're bringing in 17or 12. And when I asked, so how do you feel you're doing with new patients, we're getting plenty new patients we don't need anymore. Okay, you're, you're fine with that new patient count because you're slowing down, and your money is there and your practice is profitable, and so forth. But that doesn't mean that you're making that practice be as effective and as sellable as what it could be. If you're looking at different marketing. I also fall I also go back into where I feel like there's when COVID happened, a lot of print marketing came back. And I think that's kind of dropped off again. And this statistic, I think, kind of proves that when you say that 97% of consumers are searching for their local business online. Just Just think about that. And I will tell you, I have doctors all the time that we run across that have stagnant websites. And when I say stagnant websites, I mean websites that have not been changed or improved, or nothing's been done with them. There is no SEO attached to it or anything. It's just a stagnant website. I would say that's probably 40% of the doctors that we run across have that type of situation. Now just think about that if you have 97% of people. So if you're in an area, for example, like South Carolina is a prime example, North Carolina, where they're having just you know, South Carolina, top five states of stop top five states growing right now, okay, so they have the most they're I think the fifth actually, is the last statistic they saw. And you have that many new people coming in. Just think about that, then if you were to bring in 100,000 new people into your state in 2024 97% of those then are going to be searching for one of your for a dental practice online. What does your online presence mean? That's I mean, it's that simple. And we're dealing with a doctor right now in South Carolina, no website. And it's exactly what I just kind of spent the last three minutes going over, he's happy, he's, you know, 72 years old, I'm fine. I don't need I've got plenty of patience. I don't need any more patience. And so website's not a big deal to him. So that's just think that's a huge one. So number 340 8% of people cited a website design as their number one factor in design in deciding the credit credibility of a business. This was done by blue Corona. So just once again, there's another thing I get doctors all the time is...just give me a website, right? I don't really care. Just put up a website. What it's it 48%, those people are looking at that website to see if it looks, it's easy to navigate if it looks good, because they're making their decision on that first impression. How many times do we do we sit there and go through other things where when a new patient comes in, what do we always say? First impressions, right? I remember reading when in a sales book at one time. And they said that the first 10 seconds, decides on whether a person will do business with you. And out of the first 10 seconds. What did they say? 1) It was your looks...In other words, do you smile? Do you look grumpy? Do you look angry? Can they tell on your face that you're not having a good day 2) was how you dress and 3) was shoes. I remember the shoes and the first in the first 10 seconds. If someone walks up to you, they look down and they look at your shoes to see to judge that to see if they're nice shoes, or do you have shoes that have you know, mud on them and so forth. So same concept. It's just gone digital now.
Phil Cole 9:22
So just think about that 48% So 97% of people are going to your website, or going to websites to find their doctor. And out of those 97% 48% are wanting to know if you have a website that looks good. Like what's the first impression what is the image look like? And I'll tell you I can go on to some of some of these websites and you can tell that they were done in 1980. They have not been updated at all and they look so old. It's no different to me than the first impressions when you walk in the door. If you're a dentist that still has, you know, the brown paneling from the 70s. And I've gone into offices where the where the waiting room still has shag carpet, I tell you, I'd love to buy, love to go find out who the manufacturer of that carpet is and tell them kudos for how you built that carpet to last that long. But it's true. It's It's so true that I have had a dentist that I've just recently talked to, to show that you don't get you know that you some of these guys aren't getting out of the out of the old times, or they just don't feel as though that's important, where a doctor that says that he needs some help. And I asked him what computer system he has. And he said, we're still paper. And I said, Well, your paper charts. I mean, there's still a few doctors around there that do that. But you're not. I mean, you have a computer system, right? No, we still have the old fashioned books. And there's scheduling with with a book and a pencil. So to think that you don't there's not doctors out there that aren't having websites. In fact, like I said, the one in South Carolina doesn't have websites, I would say probably in the last six doctors this month that I've talked to for transitions. Two of them do not have websites. So that's not a good percentage. All right, so number four, this is once again from the ADA... 86% of patients who seek cosmetic dentistry or women, and the majority are between ages 31 and 50. Okay, so you might say, well, what's the big deal with that? Once again, it's the marketing stuff, it's the marketing strategies that we want you to concentrate on. So when we have when we set you up for it with a website, and use get set up with, you know, social SEO, and you're going to in whatever market, you're at doing the demographics to find out what procedures are really, really being used in that area. That means your click ads or Google ads or Facebook ads and stuff. If this is what you want to go after you Here you go 86% of patients who seek cosmetic dentistry are women. So the next stat, and a survey of and this was done by software advice, and a survey of 1000 dental patients 72% said they used online reviews to evaluate a dental practice. Listen, I'll be the first one to admit getting getting testimonials and getting reviews. I mean, it's one of those things where once you have a client sit there and say, You know what, thank you so much, you did such a great job and everything, you feel good. And you're like thank you very much, I appreciate it. And you just forget to ask for that testimony that you asked him to go online and give you a review. So I'm not going to say that I'm great at it either. It's something that but it is something that you constantly have to think about. It's something that you constantly have to ask somebody for at all times. I mean, think of that. 72% said they look at online reviews. Okay, so what I what I want you to see here isn't these first five that we've given you? We're not asking you, you know, you get these marketing companies that, you know, they want to do postcards they want to do, you know, with click ads, and Google ads and Facebook ads, and they want to do you know, all these different things. Right now these first five, this is just basically understanding your target market, and just kind of having the essentials to be able to do that reviews cost you nothing. Okay? It is not hard for you to ask a patient for a review before they leave the chair. It's not hard for someone to ask for a review. When you send them statements, whatever the case may be, make it easy for them, but get those reviews because once again, they're simple. They're free. On my email signature, it says right on there. Please click here. And it's a link to a Google review. And they just click on it and automatically opens up to Google review so that they can leave it there. So 72% once again by Software Advice, #6, 92% of consumers read online reviews and 68% say positive reviews make that make them trust. Business. So this was by bright local. So once again 92% of consumers read online reviews, folks, this isn't, this isn't like 50-60%. And so, so anybody that's listening to this podcast can sit there and say, Well, I don't know or, you know, I question that or anything like that we're talking 92% of consumers, right? Ask yourself, when you go on Amazon, when you go to Best Buy, you know, bestbuy.com, you go on to anything. Tell me that you that you don't look at the reviews. Now, I'm not the guy that looks at every stinking review, and analyzes every little thing. I look at a few of them, I look at the fives, and then look at the couple, a couple of the number ones and twos. And when I see a number one sit there and say that they gave the product a one, and it was all about shipping, or it was all about the packaging or something like that. That's not the products fault. That's a lot of times I should say, That's Amazon's fault. That's that's UPS fault sometimes and different things like that. But so you throw those away, and then that makes those fives even more important, right? They make it they just make it go, Okay, this product is really good. But everybody does it. It's it's just kind of become like second nature to us nowadays. I think. In fact, I have lots of friends that sit there and say that, you know, will ask me for my opinion, and then they sit there and go, Well, what kind of reviews have you saw? And to me, it's like, okay, you're asking me for opinion on a car, which I'm very big into cars. You know, you asked me for an opinion on a car, I didn't look at the reviews, I'm basing it off of my own experience maybe. And or I'm basing it off of other experiences of people I know that own that brand a lot or something like that. But ultimately said and done when you think about it, that really is kind of the the beginning stages of a review. So 92% of consumers once again, read online reviews, 68% of them say that the positive reviews make their mind up. Okay, number seven here. 70% of dental practices. This is done by pro sites. 70% of dental practices report that they have a website, and 75% of those websites are mobile friendly. Okay. So 70% of dental practices report that they have a website, folks, that is astounding today, to me that only only 70% say they have a website. That means out of 200. And there's there's over 200 and some 1000 dental practices, I apologize, you probably should have had the stat for that. But there's over 200,000 dental practices, that means 30% I mean, 60,000 of them out there do not? Is that correct? 2000 Yes. 60 around 60. If they didn't just say 30,000 dental practices don't have websites. It's just astounding to me. Those are the guys that I'm telling you that when we are dealing with transitions right now, that are the ones that sit there and say they don't have websites. We're dealing with another one in Florida gentleman, we're doing a buyer advocate for him. He's buying a small practice, we're doing a jumpstart with them, asked, Hey, what what's the practice? No website, we have another one that we're dealing with right now that they have a website, they have a domain. And they have a website and their website is basically coming soon. So they've got it, they bought the domain, but they never finished it. So they don't have a website. So once again, astounding percentages to me. But not only that,
Phil Cole 19:09
well I think what is even more is where I go back to that stagnant website, right? Where I would say that doctors have websites, and here we see 75% of those websites are mobile friendly. So that means 25% are not. Now if you talk to one of the stats that I received from a marketing company, Dr. Logic, it was a it was amazing. I think it was like only 40% of websites out there are are voice capable. And I didn't know this but it was an astounding amount of search going on right now. I think it was over 60% I'll double check and find out but over 60% of As of Google searches are done by voice. And so, you know, once again, it kind of goes back parlays back into those are you? Are you mobile friendly? If you have a web website that's not mobile friendly, I guarantee it's not doing voice search then. And so then what are you falling into is your fall into a situation where, you know, you got 75% of those people searching on a phone or an iPad, and you're not going to show up, because you don't have a mobile friendly site. Next one, number eight, this is done by Campaign Monitor, email marketing, has an average return on investment of $38 for every dollar spent, okay? So email marketing for dentists, maybe it maybe not as much. But yet on the other hand, if you want to do specials, if you want to try to reach out to the community and stuff like that, an email marketing campaign, those are those are huge. It's, it's something that the the email funnels, the marketing and so forth, are gigantic. If you're say, let's say you're taking on a new product, you just, you just are going to do all on fours, or you're going to do implants now and you got your new CBCT, or you're going to start doing ortho, and Invisalign, or whatever the case may be, to get that out to your patients. In an email marketing campaign, there's, there's your average right there, there's your return on investment on average, $38 For every dollar spent. And I will tell you, depending on how you've set up your email campaigns, and who you're using a lot of these Dental, you know, we've typed things and in mango and other ones, a lot of these are built in and a lot of your, your website designers, our hosts that are hosting, you have those capabilities already built in, you're paying for it, you're just not using it. So I would say that it's something that you definitely should consider. Number nine, social media platforms are the most popular channels for promoting dental practices, with Facebook being the most commonly used platform. Okay, that's also done by pro sites. So when I get doctors all the time, as soon as I say, Yeah, I have a website, it usually fits into one of these categories that I that I have on top of my screen in front of me, where it's, you know, stagnant. But then they say, Yeah, I don't have time for social media. We don't have this, well listen to our social media, we can, we can help we can do the posting for you and stuff like that. And it's huge. It's huge to have that presence and stuff. Because once again, that people are on their social media at all times. The other thing is too is when you're putting those things out social media is keeping track of that. And when they find that you're talking about a dental practice, and next thing you know, you start to get those ads and so forth. #10, 75% of Internet users never scroll past the first page of search results. This is done by HubSpot. And if you don't know who HubSpot is HubSpot is probably one of the leading marketing slash CRM companies. There is right now. That 75 So just reiterate 75% of Internet users never scroll past the first page. So you'll hear marketing companies all the time with websites, numbers and stuff, say that, you know, you got to have a strong SEO, we were going to do this and this and this so that we can get you at the at the top of the page. Sometimes it's, you know, it's sales jargon. But yet on the other hand, this stat also is very important to know that 75% of the people won't go down, scroll down to the bottom and hit next page, or number two, to go to see who the next doctors are. So not necessarily mean you got to be spending all that money to be number one. But you do need to have a good enough SEO to make sure that you're on that first page. Because once again, 75% of those people are not going to go past that first page. So the scrolling doesn't happen. So when you're dealing with your marketing company, you know, if you already have one, go back and ask them Are we on the first page? And are you on the first page locally or on the first page statewide and so forth? You know, because a lot of times people are moving from other states and they're if they're moving into let's say Chicago I go from Texas into Chicago, but they don't know they're going to the Greater Chicago area. And they search, is your SEO going to pick them up from Texas? Or is it just going to be those people that are in that area that your SEO is actually grabbing for. So it's just important to have those conversations. #11, According to Google, near me, searches have increased by 500% in the past few years. So this is once again, significant for dental practices. Now going to the to the other extent, the one that I just mentioned before, but now this is for the near me. So if you if what I'm saying is, as let's say, my dentists, I'll give a prime example my dentist retired right now I'm staying with the dentists that bottom out. But let's say that for some reason, for me as a prime example, I have to drive an hour to go see my my dentist, I have him and I were such good friends, we got along so well. He was like family to me. So I had no problem paying, driving that hour to see him. Now the new dentist is here. And we picked great guy, the whole works, staying right where I'm at, because I enjoy, you know, immensely and I can see our relationship growing just as much. But let's just say that it was a person that you know, just the the personalities didn't jive or be cut, because I don't even want to try to start a new relationship. I just want to get closer to home. What am I going to do dentists near me 500% increase. So huge and significant for dental practices to be paying attention to that. #12, 84% of patients use both online and offline sources to research dental practice before making an appointment. That's a done another one done by pro site. So 84% of patients use online and offline sources to research dental practices. And then last but not least, this was done by the dental trade Alliance. And it says according to their study, for every dollar spent on preventative dental care, the return on investment is between eight and $50, depending on specific preventative measures. So I think that what they're trying to get at this one is is is basically you see the impact that that $1 spent on that dental care to get preventative in there, it's important than to make sure that we're marketing towards that preventative side. And it is important to get them to that preventative side. Because once again, once you get them in the door, the goodwill then begins. And you can see the where the dollars aren't wasted. But you can also see where you can start to build that trust, and things start to move. So once again, this is just kind of a quick synopsis of the importance of of dental marketing. I think it's gigantic for everyone to pay attention to.
Phil Cole 28:36
If you have any questions, you can talk to us reach out to me, I'm going to leave a put these 13 things in with the description for this podcast so that you can read through them again and have them as as stats. But I think it's very important for you to really start taking a look at that the younger generation, I know you guys are doing much better when we're talking to you and stuff, you're doing a lot better job of understanding the importance of it. But I would say for those of you who are nearing retirement that when I say nearing retirement, you're on your twilight years of your dental practice, and you're going to start looking so those who are 10, maybe even you could go 15 years out, take take a deep look at this. Because this can really really be a big factor when it comes time for us to help the buyers in buying a practice because a lot of numbers we look at so new patients, the new patients that are coming in the recall system and stuff from those new patients are all huge things that we look at when wanting to help a doctor buy into possibly your practice. So I want to thank you very much for just Taking the time to listen to the marketing stats that we just received. If you enjoy our show, please rate review us on Apple Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Phil Cole and I want to say thank you very much for listening to Dental Education Podcast.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
