Without further ado, the Versa Creative team has put together this list of the top 17 tips for social media marketing for dentists.
Post Before-and-Afters
Show off your results! Sharing the before-and-after transformations of some common procedures in your office allows prospective patients to envision their own possible results. This also reinforces trust between your practice and the customer, demonstrating your skills and competence. This has the additional effect of letting customers know about some of your practice’s services.
Educate Your Followers
By posting educational content, you can establish yourself, your practice, and your colleagues and employees as credible experts in the field of dentistry and teach your followers something new. Posting dental health tips or fun facts will encourage follower engagement, as they may find themselves coming back to your account to see what new information you’ve posted.
Emphasize Follower Interaction
As with any brand, it’s critical to ensure your content isn’t being idly scrolled past. Consider creating stories with polls, posts that ask questions, or an FAQ series to encourage followers to interact with your account. Think of your social media content as a means of communication rather than just a way to broadcast information.
Share Reviews
One of the most effective ways to drum up business for dental practices is to demonstrate your services’ impact on existing patients. Resharing positive reviews on multiple social media platforms will ensure that potential customers from all over the internet can see them, rather than only those who check Google reviews. This strategy increases brand trustworthiness, as customers tend to trust word-of-mouth recommendations from their peers.
Communicate Crucial Info
As much as your social media channels should be sources of communication and engagement, it’s also important to make them consistent sources of information. Post information like store hours, closures due to holidays, and contact information on your social media profiles so that followers know how, when, and where to reach you when they’re ready to make the step from follower to patient.
Establish a Brand
One of the most important aspects of a marketing strategy is establishing a cohesive brand. This means using the same colors, fonts, and messaging across platforms so that prospective patients can recognize your practice on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and more. Your brand will also be reflected in your actions when you respond to comments and messages. Establishing a brand tone and values will ensure your branding is consistent across the board.
Optimize Posting
Certain times of day will lead to more traffic on your social media posts, as more users will be online. There are also optimal times to post on social media for dentists in particular, as their best posting times are not always the same as posting times for retail. A study by Sprout Social concluded that the best time for a dental practice’s social media to post on Instagram is Tuesdays at 8 AM, while the most consistent times for engagement are on weekdays from 9 AM to 3 PM. That being said, optimal times are different for every practice, so it can be helpful to research what times lead to the most engagement for your specific pages.
Invest in a Scheduling Platform
It can be difficult to consistently post on social media while managing your practice or operating on patients. This is especially true when considering optimal posting times, as they tend to be during business hours. Scheduling platforms such as HeyOrca! and Sprout Social allow you to upload all your content at once and have it automatically released, rather than making you post it in real time.
ABC (Always Be Closing)
Dental social media marketing isn’t just meant to make your practice look good—it’s meant to get patients in your operating chairs. Utilize calls-to-action in your profile bio and captions, and consistently link to your website and contact forms to increase the likelihood of a user booking an appointment.
Consistent Management
Simply posting on your pages doesn’t get you all of the available benefits of social media. One of the best uses of social media is reputation management. By checking your messages and comments on a regular basis and responding to them with your brand tone and messaging, you’ll craft a narrative for your dental practice that will make users feel good about going to you for their dental needs.
Analyze Your Data
As we mentioned for optimal posting, nothing is more relevant to your dental practice than your own data. Utilize the resources that platforms like Instagram and Facebook provide for business accounts to analyze which of your posts get the most engagement, which calls-to-action or messages generate the most leads, and more. This will help you restructure your content to continue the upward motion of engagement.
Create Dynamic Content
If there’s anything that recent years have made clear, the average social media user is less interested in static posts and more in videos. While infographics can be useful ways to convey information, consider using reels and motion graphics on your pages to catch your users’ attention.
Use Branded Hashtags
Branded hashtags can do a lot for your business. Not only does it make your content easier for users to find, but you can also use them to track engagement and organize posts from different social media strategies. Furthermore, this can be a fun way to increase brand engagement, as users can use branded hashtags to share their experiences at your practice.
Use Backlinks
Your social media pages are a great place to link to other aspects of your practice. Similarly to including a call-to-action in your posts and bio, you can back up any fun facts about dentistry or information about your practice with links to your site. Consider linking to your blog posts (and getting a blog, if you don’t already have one) to increase your visibility on search engines and your ranking on search results pages.
Share Limited-Time Content
Ever heard of FOMO (fear of missing out)? It’s exactly what it sounds like, and social media users often get FOMO from missing out on sales or promotions. Even if your dental practice doesn’t offer promotions, you can make your practice feel exclusive by posting limited-time content, such as live videos and stories. This will encourage your followers to be more engaged with your content and seek it out.
Utilize Sponsored Content
All of the above tips can be applied to your organic social media, but organic content is only one step in a well-rounded social media marketing strategy. Consider using sponsored content to boost your posts or working with influencers so that your content can reach more people.
Hire a Social Media Marketing Team
If it seems like too many things go into effective social media marketing for dentists, that’s because it’s true. It can be a separate full-time job, which is why marketing agencies offer social media marketing services for businesses, including dental practices. Moreover, a social media marketing team can provide unique marketing ideas and strategies to increase your online presence and generate more leads.
Marketing agencies like Versa Creative offer social media marketing in addition to traditional media and many more services. Another benefit of using a marketing agency is that they can take care of every element of your marketing—from writing the captions with a copy team to creating the designs and even developing the best strategy to increase your patient population. Take the pressure off of your shoulders, focus on your dentistry, and contact Versa Creative today so they can build a powerful brand out of your practice.
