Keeping the faith

Adrian Duffy offers hope to those who have lost faith in online marketing and IT

When my team and I attended the Dublin Dentistry Show, we were astounded by the sheer amount of people coming to us with horror stories and needing urgent help.

I alone must have had around 12 dental practice owners come to me throughout the day seeking advice on their predicament. What’s more, everyone seemed to have the same issues, including:

• ‘I think I have been taken advantage of!’
• ‘I have paid X for this, what do you think’
• ‘We are trying X for marketing, but have not seen any improvement in months.’

Sure enough, they have been over-charged and given a solution that will do nothing to help their scenario, and could, in fact, make matters worse.

They all have been taken advantage of by web designers, web developers, graphic designers or marketing professionals alike. Whether it is paying over the odds for a poorly designed, incomplete website, or a marketing plan that is not producing results, it seems to be happening more and more.

Here, I want to explore a couple of the possibilities why this might happen.

Reasons why

Fatal attraction

In general, the health industry is a lucrative one, so the difference of having a steady stream of new patients coming in and a line of empty seats is quite a large one in financial terms.

As a financially lucrative industry, it will attract all types of IT professionals who will try to sell their services. However, just because you run a dental practice does not mean you have to pay four times the going rate. If you do pay a large amount, make sure it is with a reputable company who can get you results.

Trust and ethics

As dental practice owners are so busy, they often put a lot of faith in the hands of the IT professional. In an ideal world, you hire an IT professional and take it for granted that they will do their job. Unfortunately, there are a lot of unethical suppliers out there who will gladly take your money, but they will do little for you if left unchecked. Often, you will get a line of excuses and no visible results.

Globalisation

In a perfect world, you will choose a local IT professional who you know, or have a direct reference for from someone you trust. However, the reality is that you will get proposals from every corner of the world, with ranging cultural work ethics and capabilities, so you need to be careful who you hire. Remember, don’t expect great results if you pay little!

Proven credentials

Before choosing any supplier, it is vital to see some track record of their work in the dental industry in Ireland. Speak to some of their current clients and see if they do indeed have better results after the completed work. If this is unavailable, you may have a supplier who is lacking experience or knowledge to be able to help you.

Every new dental patient is worth €1-2k in their lifetime. Every month you are not attracting new patients, you are losing out on this income; it’s important you invest in order to grow. If a service is too cheap, there is a good chance you will get little in return and actually end up losing potential revenue or do long-term damage to your online presence.

That website you bought for €600 may well end up costing you thousands in the long run!

I have also seen a lot of practices focus on social media marketing simply because ‘everyone else is doing it’. Some are spending valuable resources sharing promotions and content to the same group/page followers every month yet have no idea if it is generating any new patients. This is the same as firing an arrow in the sky and hoping for the best; without measuring the performance of marketing campaigns, you have no idea if they are working for you or not.

Please help!

Luckily enough, if you feel you have paid over the odds for a poor website or marketing service, the Dental Booster team is here to help. Tell us your story, and if we feel that you have been taken advantage of, we will help you get things back on track with a large discount off our fees, and a payment plan to help spread the payments out.

Adrian is the founder of Dental Booster, a specialised dental marketing and research firm and licensed Google Partner. For more information, call +353 19038188 or visit dentalbooster.com.