ODA Spring Meeting 2017 #ASM150 Highlights

It was great being able to see so many of our clients and practice staff, as well as connecting with all the attendees who dropped by our booth at the ODA Spring meeting in Toronto last week.

Since everyone really enjoyed getting their caricatures done last year at the ODA ASM16 and the AACD in Toronto, we really wanted to bring back the fun again this year!

Thank you to all the good sports who came by and generated fun new personal content for your online marketing! #uponlinesmiles

 

Those who dropped in their contact information with us are automatically eligible for a 4 month FREE trial of patient newsletters or social media posts. Please contact us if you spoke to us but were not able to leave a card or fill out a ballot!

5 Examples of Great Dental Newsletter Practices

By: Will Koziey-Kronas
A great newsletter checks a lot of important boxes – on a regular basis, it ensures your patients keep your practice top-of-mind, are aware and engaged with any interesting content, and have opportunities for outreach.

To check those boxes, however, you need to be aware of what constitutes great dental newsletter content– so here are five excellent practices (with examples) to incorporate into your own newsletter.

Related Article: 5 tips on how to create a great email newsletter

Hillcrest Dental: - Do's instead of Don't's

Full example available here. Patients expect to hear "don'ts" from their clinic: lists of things to avoid eating, drinking, and doing for the benefit of their dental health. So why not shake things up – as Hillcrest Dental did – and highlight a list of "do's"? A list recommending teeth-friendly food carries a more positive vibe than a list forbidding patients from certain foods, and is more likely to grab their interest.

Related Article: 5 eNewsletter Mistakes and How to Fix Them



Port Hope Dental - Ask and Incentivize Reviews

Full example available here. Your patients aren't likely to leave feedback if you don't prompt them, but your newsletter should do more than asking them to fill out a survey. Do as Port Hope Dental did: provide incentives (a gift card in their case), express your gratitude, and let them know how long the process will take and whether the survey is confidential.

Related Article: 5 Ways to Ask For Referrals and Reviews



Upper Avenue Dentistry – Take Advantage of the Season and Holidays

Full example available here. Your newsletter should take into account the season and holidays of the month it mails. Follow the example of Upper Avenue Dentistry and tie any service promotions you are offering to specific holidays or seasonal themes, helping the service appear more relevant.



Kingsbury Dental - Discuss Big Health Concerns, And How to Address Them

Full example available here. Discussing cavity prevention is one thing, but it's the larger health concerns (such as Kingsbury Dental's oral cancer discussion) that are more prone to generating interest. Of course, make sure to address techniques, remedies, and fixes as well. No one wants to read about infant tooth decay, for example, without knowing how they can also avoid it.



Danforth Neighbourhood Dental Centre – Promote Your Staff

Full example available here. Your newsletter is a great place to show off some of the hard-working talent behind your practice. Giving patients faces to and names to associate with your clinic helps establish connection, but if you want to go further, like the Danforth Neighbourhood Dental Centre, promote your staff's achievements as well.

Hopefully these examples have been both educational and inspiring. We can at least guarantee that they'll be effective - elevating your newsletter into a compelling content experience that promotes your practice in all the right ways. Contact us to learn more about the importance of newsletters and how we may be of any help to you!

Online Reputation Management for Practices

By: Mahnoor Awan

 

Reputation management helps shape the perception of your practice online, by helping curate the information you put out about the practice and the industry. Managing online reviews and how you respond to them is core to reputation management, but everything from social media management to SEO links back to the process of managing your reputation online.

It's often said that the best form of advertising is word of mouth. Because of the Internet, 'word of mouth' has another platform - review modules on social media and other platforms. As people have both the opportunity and often incentive to relate their personal experiences, whether negative or positive, businesses need to take some time to curate or help respond to some of the information posted on the Internet.

When it comes to dental and health care practices, patients may have specific expectations, anxieties, and conceptions about staff, procedures, and other services. Many potential patients read reviews before selecting the practice to use for themselves and their families. They see reviews as a potential source of information in making that determination. If patients are fair and comprehensive while leaving reviews, that should come across. Unfortunately that may usually not be the case, and as a result, many practitioners are compelled to monitor their reputations.

Quite often, practices choose not to build an online presence because of the hassle of not only managing it inconsistently, but also the fear of getting a bad review or interaction that may be difficult to tackle. Keep in mind though, whether your practice chooses to build an online presence or not, customers have access to third party platforms like Yelp and Google reviews to leave reviews however they like it. Wouldn't it be better to build and manage an online presence to help tackle all reviews and not let them negatively impact your practice? Additionally, not having online reviews mean you could be missing out on potential new patients, or losing potentials to another practice with well curated reviews.

If you do have an online presence, or plan to build one, here are a few tips to manage your reputation online.

Monitor the Review Sites

Sometimes, when a patient has an amazing or a dreadful experience, they are inclined to leave an online review. Today, there are multiple online review sites like Yelp, Google Reviews, RateMDs, Vitals, and HealthGrades. Make sure you monitor these sites to ensure that customers are not falsely accusing your practice or leaving ingenuine reviews. It also allows you to see what your customers are appreciating about your practice and what is lacking, so you can improve upon it. UpOnline offers reputation management tools that help you track reviews from multiple review sites. Contact us for more details on how we can help you monitor these sites.

How To Build A Brand Narrative For Your Practice

By: Ayesha Tak

The most powerful way to gain interest and attention is through storytelling. A brand narrative is a story about your business and what you do. People can't identify with a logo, but they can identify with the story behind your business name, or the meaning behind your logo. A brand by itself is a symbol, but a brand narrative creates a community.

Here are 5 steps you can take to build your brand narrative:

Consider the Bigger Picture

A brand narrative paints the bigger picture. Instead of outlining your purpose, goals, and other biographical details outright, a brand narrative presents these details in a story worth remembering. To begin your story, consider talking about where your passion for dentistry begun and what you did to materialize that passion. When you have a story with a beginning, middle, and end, weave your purpose and goals into the story.



Connect With Your Patients

Write a story with an emotional cause or message at its core. It is important to empathize with your patient, and using emotional storytelling in your brand can help you achieve that. In addition, when patients identify with your brand and its message, they are more likely to share it with their peers.

Good brand narratives not only raise awareness of the brand, but also create human connection. Make sure to bring out the human element in your story and make it about the people involved. This could be the dentist, the dental team, and even other organizations.Your patients want to matter - they want to see themselves in the story. Ask yourself: What story would my patients like to hear? What details would be relevant to engage their emotions?

What Makes a Good Dental Website?

By: Mahnoor Awan

Today, a dental practice needs more than just a basic website. At a bare minimum, you need to make sure that the website is user friendly, mobile compatible, SEO optimized, and has a has basic functionality to help interact with potential and existing clients. Here at UpOnline, we make it a priority to keep our clients' websites fresh, modern, and up to date with current website best practices.

Related: Click here to read the case study about one of our favorite website revamps. 
 
Based on our experience, we have rounded up a few things your dental practice's website should have, which would make it a good experience for users.

Relatable Homepage Content

To start with, the most important piece of information - which, for a dental practice is the location address and contact information, should be in the top fold of the homepage (taken from newspaper parlance, Top-of-the-fold, means the top portion of the website first shown to most users when they visit). It is recommended for this information to be at the top right corner because visitors usually view the website in a reversed F shape, so contact information will be one of the first things their eyes will look at.
Contact and location information are considered some of the most important pieces of information for a practice website because patients often check the website solely to make an appointment or find the address for a visit.

Your most important piece of information - which, for a dental practice is their location address and contact information, should be in the top fold of your website.
The content on your homepage should be a good balance of information for your visitors to read and also be good for SEO. You should have a strong introductory paragraph that is easy to read but also has relevant keywords like location served and key services.
It's also a good idea to have a strong "hero image" (taken from marketing jargon, meaning large banner image, prominently placed on a web page) at the top. This is often a visual representation of the office and conveys the key messaging about your brand and offerings.
(Pro tip: Make sure the pictures don't have pointy dentistry tools because that could lead to an increase in a patient's dental anxiety and send those potential patients away).
Images you could use:
• Smiling group of people
• Kids - if your practice is focused on children's dentistry
• A group picture of the team
• Location photography
Here's an example of an UpOnline client, Hillcrest Dental Centre. Their homepage has the location and contact information at the top right corner, a 'hero' image that conveys the message of a family practice, and a strong introductory paragraph that is equally inviting and SEO optimized.





Hillcrest Dental Centre - Index page




Strong CTA's

Having a strong Call to Action (CTA) is an important aspect of a good dental website. What is it that you want your web visitors to do once they are on your website? CTA's help with converting your web views into potential business - in the case of your practice, like getting new patients or requests for appointments. Strong Call To Actions could include:
• Contact Us
• Request an Appointment
• Connect with us online (link either leading to your social media pages or to subscribe to your newsletter)