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These days, you can hardly turn on the news without hearing about Twitter… Hear what protesters in Tehran are saying! Read what such-and-such a senator just tweeted! Follow the news program on Twitter!
We'll tell you a few basic things about Twitter: what it is, what it's good for, and why it's NOT the next big thing in dental marketing.
1. What is Twitter?
Twitter is a social networking website where you can post short messages. The beauty and simplicity of Twitter is that it doesn't try to do much more than that.
First, you create a profile with some basic information about yourself. (See The Wealthy Dentist's profile) Then you start following other people's feeds, and they start following yours. Updates are limited to 140 characters, and you can even use your mobile phone to "tweet," as they call it.
2. What is it good for?
If you're into that sort of thing, Twitter can be a fun way to interact with friends and family. But if you hate Facebook and MySpace, then you probably won't care for Twitter either.
Twitter also lets fans follow celebrities; Ashton Kutcher is famously Twitter's most-followed member. As more and more politicians sign up, politicos are tuning into Twitter too. Newt Gingrich's tweet about Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor was much-repeated on cable news channels.
But the protests surrounding the controversial Iranian election really brought Twitter into the news spotlight. As the hard-line government tried to shut off phone and Internet access, Twitter (and to a lesser extent Facebook) became one of the only lines of communication, proving invaluable to both protesters and journalists. The US government even asked Twitter to postpone planned maintenance in order to keep the site online during this struggle in Iran.
3. So what about dental marketing?
There's a school of thought that says you should market yourself to patients through every available line of communication. And there are tech-minded "marketing gurus" who push the latest, most cutting edge technologies.
But I've always been an ROI-minded kind of guy. The return on your investment is the most important thing to consider. How much time and money will you spend, and what can you reasonably expect to get in return?
Twitter can give you access to potential new patients, but they're not there to find a dentist. Most people would do that on Google, not Twitter. Any hard-sell message on Twitter makes you look like a spammer, not a real person. Attracting followers requires quality content, which takes time, and converting followers to patients takes both time and finesse.
If you or someone in your office is enthusiastic about Twitter and wants to post daily tweets, then it might prove an effective marketing avenue. But unless you're on Twitter anyway, there are better places to spend your marketing energy.
Post a comment
June 24th, 2009 at 6:54 am
Have you ever considered that our patients may actually rather not think of us on a daily basis? They have other concerns in their lives, and let’s not kid ourselves. We’re only their dentists.
I agree with Jim. I don’t think Twitter has a future in promoting one’s practice in the traditional blast-marketing sense. However, I expect someone somewhere to develop an application similar to Web 2.0 Internet sites where patients can rate their dentists. “Describe your last dental visit in 140 characters or less.”
Until that happens, I think Twitter definitely has appeal that goes beyond simple entertainment.
I’ve been horsing around on Twitter as “Proots,” and I’ve served misery to Delta Dental, ADA/IDM, Humana Dental, BCBSTX and many others. Twitter is an easy and entertaining way to reach up and grab command and control bureaucrats and pull their shy butts out into the wide open spaces. Anyone can do it. You can do it. You should do it.
For example, some anonymous dental consultant at Humana Dental in Lexington, Kentucky declined to pay for a four surface filling without proof of necessity with an x-ray. Right or wrong, I took that as a personal, in-your-face insult from Humana Dental, and I’m not going to let it fade from Twitter until I get a public explanation why Humana’s dental consultants are holding up dentists’ payments for FILLINGS! I’ve mentioned this to Humana CEO Mike McCallister through Humana’s Twitter site. If I mention his name a few more times, my complaints with Humana’s anonymous dental consultant will appear on his first page when one searches his name.
Here’s what’s neat. My patients have no idea about my nasty alter ego. And should they find out, who cares? They’d probably join others in cheering me on as I do my part to clean up the community by sending PR types and dental consultants on down the road.
Since yesterday morning, I have been hammering Janis Oshensky, Vice President of Dental Relations and Public Policy for Delta Dental. Oshensky has a terrible habit of preferring to direct her PR efforts towards Congress rather than marketing to dentists and our patients. I think this is a transparently stupid thing for Delta to attempt. I caught them going around the new chain of command. It’s a new business environment in the dental benefits world Direct Reimbursement will rule.
I’m also trying to persuade Ms. Kim E. Volk to discuss Delta Dental’s policy openly with dentists on the Medical Executive-Post. I think eventually, she will give in to my demands and at least send a Delta representative in her place. I hope it is Delta Dental VP Janis Oshensky. As you can imagine, I have a long list of questions for her. Wish us luck!
D. Kellus Pruitt DDS
June 24th, 2009 at 8:30 am
Jim,
I am a pretty big follower of yours, I follow you on Twitter, and I agree with most of what you say above.
You can’t get away with selling much on Twitter and not be considered a spammer.
The BIG AHA with Twitter is two fold:
1. As @Proots said above, he can deal out some targeted hell to companies very quickly. His message spreads very quickly, and he can quickly build a community of follwers to help his cause. If he can do it, what’s to keep a patient from trashing a dentist who gave bad service. Information spreads quick, and not just on “review sites.”
2. The power of Twitter is not in the communities, it is in the search. Use the search function on Twitter to find information right now. Keep tabs on your practice name, or even see what people are saying about Sleep Apnea, Invisalign, or Dental Implants.
Half (or more) of the battle in marketing is some research on the emotional needs of people. Twitter is a great source for that information as it happens.
June 24th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
How in the heck does anyone have the time in their lives to devote to such things as Twitter? I am not a fan of getting into other peoples lives, blogging, Facebook, etc. I love my privacy and would never even want to let other people know about my and my live nonetheless get involved in theirs! I can hardly keep up with the weekly blog of The Wealthly Dentist and I have no desire whatsoever to “follow you on Twitter” like James Erickson. Twitter seems like something that a hormone driven teenager might be able to fit into their daily lives, but it is definitely not for me. I do not know anyone at all who is into this kind of stuff. And I am happy for that.
June 24th, 2009 at 11:20 pm
I think all of you are missing the point regarding
social networking and dentistry. It is not about
getting new patients per se; it about keeping a
presence on the web without paying an arm and a leg
for ad words and pay per clicks to keep your site
on the first page. The more your name is on the
web, and you can post links to your site, you will
have more referral sources and organic search will
be effective rather than search engines. Website
cost big bucks to start up and then to maintain if
you are looking for direct response and then the
ad words etc. Why not use the web and all of the
ways you can do this for free. Example Madow Bros.
havea public profile on Facebook…it is a great way
to advertise Align Tech(invisalign) has a pubic
profile on Facebook….these companies and dentists
would not be doing this if it did not work. I have
registered Dr. Fields on Facebook, My Space, Linkin.
Yahoo groups, google maps, google public profile and
and google local businesses. Please post any comments
you might have regarding my opinion which is just
worth 2 cents. I am not a dentist, i help in marketing
a practice and this is the most cost effective way
to direct patients to your website. The best dentist
is maybe not the greatest but is the most well known,
and the internet is the New Yellow Pages Karen
June 26th, 2009 at 6:33 am
[...] View original post here: Twitter Is Fun – But Is It Good for Dental Marketing? | Dental … [...]
June 26th, 2009 at 7:16 am
what about the potential negative post from people who don’t want to pay, break appts., who are dismissed because of financial issues or BA’s? The post stays and you can’t delete or due to HIPPA respond.
June 28th, 2009 at 11:15 pm
Arnie, one cannot afford to play to not lose. One must play to win.
The only way that dentists can guard against hot-heads is to piss off as few customers as possible. I call that unprecedented, efficient quality control.
Embrace consumerism and everything will work out fine. Count on it.
D. Kellus Pruitt DDS
June 29th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
From my own experience, after nearly a thousand posts (updates) and 1600+ followers, Twitter has resulted in only one client.
The total time invested to achieve the above was several hundred hours, which means it was an absolute failure, a ROI disaster and a BIG waste of my time.
Compared to search engine traffic, visitors referred by Twitter are not pre-qualified, highly targeted prospects interested in my offer, but only mindless curiosity seekers. At least 50% of the clicks originate from other countries too.
After all is said and done, the single biggest benefit for my website and SEO service has been to acquire another position in Google’s SERPS for The Visible Dentist.
Unknown to the mass millions who join, Twitter has quite a different agenda from what most users believe; and it sure is heck isn’t about helping you, Mr. Dentist, attract more new patients to your practice.
John Barremore
Houston, TX
July 1st, 2009 at 3:12 pm
I would like to address comments regarding made
regarding the use of twitter for dental marketing.
Again this is not to communicate and try to sell
your practice or garner new patients! You are not
align tech or Bill Dorfman or the Madows! You
would use Twitter, Facebook, My Space Linkin, Super
Pages.com, and yellow pages.com etc as links to your
current website….you do not need adwords to stay
on google’s first page….you put your business on
google maps, local businesses and google profiles
all of this marketing above is FREE…again we are
spending no MONEY or no Time….you can have a
great dental website that you can change up for
FREE and Keep it on the first page by links to your
website….so want 1600 followers on facebook….you
only need the link to your website for people to
look at the website and you can look at google
analytics, which is free, by the way to track your
hits. It works Also a blog on your website or
a blog done by word press is great…ROI is good
since you are not spending thousands of dollars to
start up a dental website and then money to maintain
it …you want to see referral sites on that
google analytics graph not search engines alone!
Karen McNulty
July 20th, 2009 at 9:20 pm
I find all the comments interesting. I have been in the industry for 22+ years and have interacted with the internet since the late 80’s. I have experienced the evolution and watched the growth rate that social networking has achieved over the last 5 years – which is mind blowing numbers.
I believe you are all missing the boat. For the first time in a consumer’s history, their voice can and frankly will be heard. The purpose of these mediums is not to solely sell products or get new patients, but to find out how you and your services are performing, how your organization is performing, what new services you can potentially offer – simply, engage with your patients and vice versa. They want to and will be heard.
Have any of you taken a survey from your patients to find out who is using these mediums and the demographic breakdown? Where are they spending time?
I disagree that spending time on any of these sites is a waste of time. In all the work I have been doing with my clients, I have learned that you now have the potential to develop programs that transcend age, time, location, revenue, and address your audience in ways that are meaningful to the individuals. And, the kicker is that most of these programs are free with exponential ROI and cost containment for your operation. Once you learn how to “connect” with folks, they then want to transact with you. Until you offer them anything of value, then you might as well not bother. Also, this is not just a PR or marketing vehicle. Do you remember the days of “Dot COM” or organizations that simply focused on eBusiness (Scient, Viant, Razor Fish, IXL – those professing to be the experts. THEY DON’T EXIST TODAY!) Those organizations born out of MARCOMM, PR, and Advertising firms and focused on only one small compoent of the overall opportunity for their clients. Today, because “media” is included in the description, everyone considers the use of these tools as a marketing play. How about the cost efficencies and productivity improvements they bring to your organization? You have the ability to launch a new program, immediately gauge how it’s performing, and exit the market before too much time or effort is spent on that initiative.
The Dental Industry and providers haven’t been utilizing these mediums for very long. Other industries that have been “on-line”, understand that websites, social and professional networks, videos, blogs, podcasts must have a well thought out and executed strategy. That your websites and technology capabilities for your online presence must provide for ease of use and self-service functionality, not to mention access to content that pertains to the reader, regardless if you are a sole practioner, or a large practice. That all the individuals within your offices and practice must engage and support. You can’t just “tweet” or put a profile on Facebook without a plan – one that takes your entire organization and constituency base into consideration.
Many providers have been extremely successful using social networking tools – which they all point to the fact that they put together a strategy and executed the plan, continuing to monitor and engage. One of my clients grew his practice by 7% between 1/08 and today, and shaved 15% off his marketing budget.
Bottom line – you’re going to need to figure it out. 67% of individuals between the ages of 18 and 37 spend a minimum of 31/2 hours a day on-line, most of the time is spent on facebook and twitter sites. Whether or not your patients respond to you, be assured that they are watching you. The 65+ demographic is right behind.
I worked with one of the greatest brands ever created which happens to utilize the internet as the foundation for their business model. They launched in 1993. They went from a $2.3B organization in 2006 to $789M in 21/2 years. Why – they got greedy. They focused most of their efforts on their employer/business constiuents that spent the money for their services, and lost site of their most important asset, the consumer. If you give the patient/consumer what they want, the money always follows.
August 19th, 2010 at 6:43 am
I agree completely with @Karen and @Maria.
I think you’re describing Twitter in a way that is not the way it should be used. Yes, advertising is like spam, but Twitter is just to keep your name out there, make connections and be on the mind of someone when they need a dentist.
@Maria, will you please write your own article on this?