Having a dental website, blog, newsletter, Google+ page and Facebook page are all important factors in keeping your dental practice in front of your dental patients.

Some dentists are still not convinced that Facebook is an effective Internet dental marketing tool.

Last week, Facebook started the process for its highly-publicized IPO. In anticipation, the online competitive intelligence service Hitwise just released their 10 Key Statistics about Facebook, comparing the Facebook audience with that of other social networks.

Here is what Hitwise found –

1. Facebook captures 1 in every 11 Internet visits in the United States.
2. 1 in every 5 page views occurs on Facebook.
3. The average visit time on Facebook is 20 minutes.
4. Facebook’s audience skews slightly more female than the online population as a whole.(Female is 57%, male is 43%).
5. The ages of Facebook visitors are indicative of the website’s strength in the marketplace, with relative parity in distribution of its visit share by age vs. the online population (Ages 18-24 is 18%, 25-34 is 23%, 34-44 is 21%, 45-54 is 19%, and 55+ is 20%).
6. Facebook wins 499,949,430 visits from the most affluent income group versus YouTube’s 223,732,591 visits and Twitter’s 15,166,795 visits.
7. Facebook became the #1 ranked website in the US on March 9, 2010.
8. “Facebook” is the most searched term in the US and Facebook-related terms account for 14% of the top search clicks.
9. Facebook users are highly loyal to the website; 96% of visitors to Facebook were returning visitors in January 2012.
10. Internationally, Facebook ranks in the top 2 websites in every market except China, where Sina Weibo, Baidu Zhidao and Renren are the dominant social networks.

Hitwise further states that “Facebook is the largest website in the US and a top performer in numerous international markets. The fan base of the site is loyal and spends a significant portion of their time online on the social network. Facebook’s influence is seen in the presidential elections, digital shopping habits and beyond.”

Last June Hitwise concluded in their Facebook Fan Acquisition and Analysis that 1 Facebook fan is equal to 20 additional visits to a business website over the course of a year. If you have 500 Facebook fans, this means an extra 10,000 visits to your dental website a year.

Hitwise wrote, “The figure of 1 fan = 20 extra visits to a website uses a unique methodology that combines Hitwise data with data from social media experts Techlightenment. We took the top 100 retailers ranked in the Hitwise Shopping and Classifieds category and bench-marked visits to those websites against the number of fans those brands had on their Facebook page. We then also looked at the propensity for people to search for those retail brands after a visit to Facebook using our Search Sequence tool.”

Here at The Wealthy Dentist we firmly believe that your dental marketing plan should include a Facebook page. With dental patients spending more time online, dentists should increasingly be looking to use Facebook as a part of their dental marketing.

Facebook fans can play a role in dental patient retention and procurement by helping to drive dental website traffic, boosting dental practice awareness, demonstrating dental treatments or acting as a customer testimonial billboard.

On the other hand, 22% say it’s easy for new and current patients to find them online.

In addition, 48% of dentists say they’d like to improve their dental website search engine results placement.

All dentists want their dental website to show up at the top of the search list whenever someone searches for a dentist. A search-engine optimized dental website seeks to accomplish this goal. It involves a well-researched, geo-targeted keyword strategy for use in your dental website’s content.

The result is a more visible ranking for your dental website in the organic search results on search engines like Google, which brings more visitors to your dental website.

Here are some additional comments from dentists on their dental practice visibility online –

“It’s good, I get a lot of patients through the Internet. You can’t get complacent and must be on top of things, it’s ever-changing.” (California oral surgeon)

“I am never satisfied. It takes constant work. I am hopeful that I will get so busy so I can afford to delegate it. I do enjoy the game and play fairly well. If I was in a large market there is no way I could handle it.” (Missouri dentist)

“I’m looking at providers now because it seems more people are using the web as a means to get the things they want and need, including dentistry. Feel I need to give it a try.” (California dentist)

“We must update and change it to keep it current so we will be found.” (General dentist)

“There are only two of us in town so easy to find me!” (Texas dentist)

When local prospective dental patients search for dentists, you want them to find your dental website quickly and to understand what kind of dental treatments you offer. You want to stand out from your competition with a dental website listing that appears at the top of search engines.

Check out IDA’s New Patient Marketing Machine™ that targets the specific categories of high-value new patients you want to attract to your dental website. Each IDA website is targeted at one Primary Dental Market, and optionally for up to 3 Secondary Dental Markets to help your dental practice become easily found on the Internet.

This means that a lot of the times dentists end up on the losing side of the peer review equation.

Said one dentist, “Review boards are not impartial and fair, just interested in giving money back to patients.”

One endodontist professed, “It’s far better that getting involved in the judicial system!”

These are just two of the comments dentists offered The Wealthy Dentist when surveyed about the dental peer-review process.

Click on Play to hear more from dentists on how they answered the survey question: Have you been disappointed by dental peer-review?

Uninsured Americans are turning to emergency rooms nationwide to manage the pain from dental problems, according to a 2010 Health Resources and Services Administration report.

The same report reveals that dental emergencies make up between 1.3 percent and 2.7 percent of all ER visits.

USAToday reports the reason is a lack of dental coverage for under-insured and uninsured patients as emergency rooms are treating toothaches, tooth abscesses and other dental care emergencies.

Although that number might seem like only a small percentage, Alan Sorkey, a Louisiana emergency physician, pointed out to USAToday that he treated 226 of the 6,336 patients for toothaches last year.

These dental care-related ER visits create higher costs for taxpayers because many of these dental patients return to the ER two or more times per dental problem to manage their symptoms, according to the ADA. And, while the Affordable Care Act addresses dental care for children on Medicaid, the requirement doesn’t exist for adults, ADA spokesman Robert Raible told USAToday.

The ADA is currently working with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to devise an approach to get “broader and deeper numbers and look at key indicators for solutions,” ADA President William Calnon said.

What are your thoughts on this growing dental insurance issue?

For more: Lack of dental coverage sends patients to ER for pain

9 out of 10 dentists use Facebook as their preferred place to network online.

While Facebook is facing criticism over their often-disputed privacy policies, most of the dentists using Facebook use it for both professional  and personal networking.

“We are at the beginning stages of our Facebook dental marketing. We are using it as an informational, personable and promotional platform. We are giving our patients useful information, keeping them updated on what is new in our office, and giving away prizes for liking our page. We also give patients $5 off their services when they check in!“ responded one dentist.

The Wealthy Dentist decided to survey dentists to ask what sort of social networking they do online, and whether it was for personal or business purposes.

Dentists use the following social networking sites professionally -

• Facebook
• LinkedIn
• Twitter
• YouTube
• Blog
• Google Plus

And for personal use?

• Facebook
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• Google Plus
• LinkedIn and blogging were used the least

Here are some dentist comments:

“We have a business Facebook page which does well for us. I update it regularly and have a couple staff that like to write updates on the wall, too.” (Ohio prosthodontist)

“I haven’t yet figured out what to make of Twitter.” (General dentist)

“I still prefer word-of-mouth recommendations most of all.” (Arizona dentist)

“I really do not have the time or inclination to follow through with these media platforms.” (Massachusetts dentist)

With Facebook about to make a public of offering, which is estimated to bring in about 10 billion dollars, it is time for just about every dental practice that is serious about dental marketing to get on the Facebook bus!

People quickly assumed the problem was with foreign dental labs, particularly those in China.

The Wealthy Dentist conducted a survey asking dentists a number of questions about foreign dental labs.

One dentist said,  “Patients have been systematically kept in the dark when it comes to dental procedures.  Patients should be given informed consent when choosing materials.”

Another dentist complained, “Too many dentists are accommodating low insurance payment schedules by buying materials and fabrications that are too cheap.  It doesn’t seem to matter that it compromises the health of the patient.”

Click on Play to hear more of what dentists have to say about foreign dental labs –

What has been your experience with dental labs?

Florida dentist Bill Strupp experienced a dentist’s worst nightmare: having thieves break into his dental practice to steal computers and dental equipment.

They also made off with Dr. Strupp’s sports memorabilia collection which included an official Heisman football, dozens of signed Yankee baseballs and three signed Yankee bats given to him by his friend and dental patient, George Steinbrenner.

He desperately wanted the stolen items returned.

So he decided to use some Internet dental marketing by placing an ad on Craigslist offering a reward for the return of the stolen property. Dr. Strupp must have written a great ad, because someone called offering to sell the sports memorabilia back to him.

That someone seemed like the thief.

The Tampa Bay Times reports that Strupp played along with the caller and promised not to call the police.

“Immediately, as soon as I hung up with him, I picked up the phone and called (Clearwater police) Detective Jonathan Walser,” Strupp told the Times.

In working with the police Dr. Stupp agreed to meet the caller in a local shopping mall to obtain the sports collection and his computers in exchange for $10,000. When the thieves approached Strupp to handover the stolen property, Clearwater police moved in and arrested the suspects.

A search warrant helped find more of Strupp’s missing dental practice items, but not all.

Strupp told the Times, “I’m just flabbergasted that anybody would be that stupid to try to sell something back to somebody after you stole it from them!”

Maybe it was the great Internet dental marketing he used to write that Craiglist ad.

For more on this story see: Dentist bites back: Craigslist ad leads to arrest of two in stolen property case

6 out of 10 dentists also include Internet dental marketing in their annual budget, while 5 out of 10 allot a portion of the budget to internal referral programs.

Email newsletter marketing and Yellow Pages advertising remain in the dental marketing budget for 53% of the survey respondents, while 30% still include radio advertising and direct marketing.

Less than 10% factor TV advertising into their yearly dental marketing budget, reflecting a national trend towards developing a a media plan that does not include TV advertising.

“We hired a dental marketing firm and are getting better results.  We think that marketing is the key to getting the number and type of patients you want. Return on investment is good,” said a Virginia dentist.

“We are very happy. Our marketing has shown consistent growth of over 100 new patients a month for the last 4 years. The newest being the low cost, proprietary CRM that we have implemented that is above and beyond anything I have been shown before,” said a general dentist.

Some dentists feel dental marketing costs are too expensive, with one pediatric dentist saying, “It’s too expensive. Everybody raises prices for dentists because they feel we have more $.”

On average, dentists employ eight different dental marketing tactics to achieve their marketing goals.

What dental marketing vectors are the most effective use of your yearly dental marketing budget? Let us know in the comments!

If you want more how-to advice to address the dental marketing challenges facing dentists today, sign up for our weekly newsletter.

Survey was conducted by The Wealthy Dentist.

Google has just announced that it is introducing three new features to connect Google+ search users to their social networking profiles when they search the web.

According to Google when a user is signed in with Google+, they will receive personal results and profiles of people they know or follow. They will also be able to expand expand their results by discovering people related to their search.

Included in search results will be Google+ profiles and pages, personal photos and posts, and items that have been shared with the search user on Google+. This will mean that whatever Google+ circles a user belongs to and interacts with will have an influence on the Google search results returned.

This marks the beginning of more personalized Google search results.

Also added is a People and Pages feature where Google matches search queries to posts on Google+ that are linked to compatible content. This means when someone writes about a subject on Google+, and people in their circles Google search that subject, the comments and links are displayed automatically on Google’s page one for the Google+ users.

Google has also added the ability to see shared topics by Google+ power users on the right sidebar of the search results page, offering search users the option to connect with them on Google+. All of these are reasons why you want to add Google+ to your dental marketing plan.

Google+ just hit sixty million users and is still in its infancy.

It is important for you to create a dental practice brand page on Google+, and become an active user. Begin asking your dental patients if they are on Google+ and consider offering some incentives for patients who add your practice to their circles.

Internet experts feel more businesses will now be forced get more involved in Internet marketing and hire established internet marketing companies to ensure that their business will be found on the Internet.

Internet dental practice website design has become a major dental marketing strategy for many of The Wealthy Dentist subscribers. How many new patients you obtain from your dental website is determined almost entirely by one factor: your website’s position on the major Internet search engines including Yahoo, MSN and Google.

The Wealthy Dentist is here to help you with the ever-increasing changes in dental marketing.

The fact that one person believes something tends to convince another person that it must be true, else why would he/she have said it?

Strangely, word-of-mouth is the most neglected of all the forces at work in a dental marketing.

Word-of-mouth has probably destroyed more dental practices and, conversely, made more practices successful than all the other forces in the marketplace put together. Why isn’t it more researched/systematized/budgeted/planned for?

The principles of word-of-mouth advertising are particularly relevant to dentistry because patient referrals generate an estimated 68% of all new patients. Sound like something you’d like to try?

Here are the steps:

1. Ask! Patients are honored when you ask them to refer more people “just like them.” Use a Smile Card (referral card) to punctuate the request.

2. Track! Know who referred your new patient so you can thank them. A personal thank you card can get patients motivated to refer again.

3. Reward! The reward? A small amount gift card from a local merchant with a hand-written thank you note stimulates the recommender to do more of the same.

4. Winner! Have a contest to promote referral. When a new patient is referred by your patient with a Smile Card put that card with the name of the referrer in a “fishbowl” for a drawing. Once a quarter draw a winner who receives a gift card for say, $250 to a local mall. Make a big deal about the Smile Card drawing with a sign sporting the photo of the latest winner up in the office, on your website and in your newsletter. This is a win for the new patient, a win for the referrer and a win for you!

Dental marketing can be as simple as asking for a referral with a Smile Card when a procedure has pleased one of your patients—or sending out helpful reminders like a personal letter or a quarterly newsletter promoting your Smile Card drawing.

A little dental marketing can go a long way. Doing nothing—especially in times like these, can really deteriorate your practice.

Melinda Spitek is CEO of Hycomb Marketing Inc. Hycomb is an authority in marketing for dentists. Melinda has had plenty of hands-on experience as well, having worked 23 years in dental offices. For help with marketing, just call Hycomb at (800) 523-6961 or visit www.hycomb.com.