Growing your dental practice with Google advertising

As the owner of a dental practice, you want your practice to continue to grow. And we all know why…more patients = more money.

It also means more warm fuzzy feelings from helping more people who need your expertise, but the more money thing is pretty awesome.

So how do you get those new patients in the door? The world is changing with new technology every day, so there are new online marketing tools to help you do it easily and effectively.

Along with setting up your website for great organic SEO, (which is a huge topic for another day), you need to look into two fantastic marketing tools that Google offers to small business owner-- Follow-up ads and Pay Per Click ads.

1) Follow-up ads
These are fantastic and so easy! You basically just have to incorporate a little bit of web code into your website. Then, Google will track every single one of your site's visitors. If one of these anonymous web surfers doesn’t connect with your company while on your site (fill out a contact form, schedule an appointment, etc.), Google shows them follow up ads designed specifically to draw them back to your site to schedule an appointment. These ads can appear on any of the millions of websites in Google’s display network, even heavy hitters like CNN.com and Dictionary.com.

Without this marketing tool in place, you have dozens, maybe even hundreds, of prospects coming to your website and leaving with no way to reconnect with them. You don’t lose those online leads anymore if you use follow-up ads!

Research shows that 80% of sales are made between the fifth and twelfth contact.

Basically, that means if you’re not following up, you’re leaving a large majority of your revenue potential on the table. One of my clients used Google's follow-up ads with great results. After using direct mail postcards to drive prospects to their website, there were over 600 new visitors flooding their site. Now, not all of those people made appointments, but that’s when Google's follow-up ads kicked in. The ads brought over 55 prospects back to the website to make appointments and their practice started growing like crazy! So basically the follow-up ads work…really well.

2) Pay Per Click ads
The other marketing tool brought into this world by Google is Pay Per Click marketing — and yes, it’s as cost effective as it sounds. You only pay when a prospect clicks on your ad. These ads aren’t designed as follow-up ads, but as interest generating ads. They are introducing quality online prospects already searching for dental servicesto YOUR practice.

Now you may be thinking, “There are, like, a billion people on the internet. How am I supposed to find 'quality' prospects?” Well, Google kind of knows everything about everyone on the Internet, and they let you choose which demographics you want to target to narrow down who will see your ads.

Especially for dentists, it’s crucial to target the right prospects with online ads. You don’t want someone in Seattle seeing your ads if your practice is in North Carolina. What if they click on it? You just paid for a click from someone who’s never in a million years going to come to your practice. I don’t care how good you are, that commute isn’t worth it. So, it’s crucial to target local Internet surfers who have the right income level and fit the demographics of your ideal prospect. Google Pay Per Click ads let you do all of this.

The ads will draw your online prospects to your site, at which point…wait for it…your follow up ads take over to bring them into the fold. It’s a beautiful marketing cycle that gives your practice continual promotion and brand exposure with quality prospects.

If you want to learn more about using Google’s marketing tools to boldly bring your practice’s marketing into the Internet age, you can download our free report, 5 Steps to More Effective Pay Per Click Ads, and don't forget to sign up Google Analytics right now if you haven't already!

Happy marketing, my friends!