Ep. 9: Dental Marketing Trends for 2022
Marketing trends are always changing, so we’re going to help you stay up-to-date. Hear from special guest and dental marketing expert, Dan Brown, on the latest trends and what you should be focusing on in the new year to bring practice growth.
Topics:
2:37 – Focusing on what works
3:45 – Prices are going WAY up for Google and Facebook ads
6:43 – Ways to get the most out of your online ads
13:23 – Internal marketing
16:50 – Improving your online presence and using video marketing
25:52 – Where to start
Links:
The MGE New Patient Workshop – www.newpatients.net
Listen to full episode :
Questions From This Episode
How much has the cost of digital advertising actually risen, and what should a practice do about it?
Cost per click for a general search like dentist near me went from around 9 dollars pre-pandemic, down to as low as 3 dollars during the shutdown when advertisers pulled back, to routinely over 30 dollars a click since. The answer isn't to stop digital marketing, it's to get genuinely better at it, or work with a provider who already knows what they're doing, since simple setup mistakes, like ads running for cosmetic dentistry at three in the morning, waste real money at these prices.
Why do reviews matter so much for the return on a practice's digital marketing spend?
Because a consumer today checks social proof before deciding to call, and if a practice's review count is thin next to competitors nearby, even a strong star rating can lose out, the same pattern seen comparing similar products on Amazon. Every dollar spent driving someone to a Google Business profile or website with too few reviews is largely wasted, since that person will likely keep looking once they see how few reviews there are.
Is it worth a dental practice trying out newer platforms like TikTok?
Genuinely worth exploring, mainly because very few competing dentists have committed to it yet, so there's real visibility available without much competition. It won't single-handedly fill a schedule, but the dentists actually getting traction there are the ones who enjoy it and post consistently. If a platform doesn't genuinely fit a practice's time or interest, it's fine to skip it entirely rather than do it poorly.
Does a video testimonial need to be professionally produced to actually work?
No, and overproduction can work against it. One of the most effective testimonials referenced was filmed by a receptionist holding a phone sideways through a small reception window, background noise and all, and it consistently outperformed more polished content because it read as genuine. Simply asking a patient to share their experience and letting them talk, without prompting or scripting, produces far more compelling results than chasing perfect lighting or audio.
How should a practice actually decide where to focus its marketing budget going into a new year?
Get specific about what you actually want more of, implants, Invisalign, full arch cases, general restorative work, rather than running one broad campaign trying to be everything to everyone. A dedicated landing page built around that one specific goal, paired with real before-and-after photos and testimonials from patients who've had that exact treatment, converts far better than a generic I'm a good dentist message competing with everyone else's version of the same thing.
Episode Transcript
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Jeff: We're almost two years into the pandemic. How is dentistry actually doing? I gave you some of these statistics a couple episodes back, but according to the ADA Economic Impact Survey, 34.1 percent of dentists in the US right now are seeing lower patient volume than they saw pre-pandemic, and 54 percent, more than half, are collecting less than they were collecting prior to February of 2020, in some cases much less.
Jeff: Add inflation to that mix, currently at the highest level in 30 years, add the staffing issues I've talked about in another episode, staff being genuinely harder to find, and what we've been hearing from some newer clients is that certain insurance companies are actually trying to lower reimbursement right now too. All in all, not a great looking picture.
Jeff: So what do you actually do? In my opinion, the best way to survive all of this is to keep expanding, keep growing, and one of the key things you need for that growth is new patients. We've talked about new patients in a few episodes already, but for this one, I wanted to do something a little different, a bit of a freestyle episode. My name is Jeff Blumberg, and I'm your host, and joining me is Dan Brown, one of our senior seminar speakers. Dan lectures at the New Patient Workshop, really runs most of it, speaks at our Communication and Sales Seminars, and our executive seminars. He's also a partner at Blumberg Digital, a digital marketing agency, so Dan is a genuine marketing expert, and the title of this week's episode is Marketing Trends for 2022 and Beyond.
Jeff: Dan, welcome.
Dan: Thank you.
Jeff: I don't really know where to start since I've already called this a freestyle episode, but we've been talking about quite a few things lately, what are you telling clients the next year or two looks like from a marketing perspective? What's the first big thing people should be focusing on?
Dan: Right now, in the face of everything happening, the best thing you can do is keep doing what's already worked for you in the past. Whatever conventional or unconventional marketing has actually driven growth for your practice, double down on it. I think we're heading into some potentially interesting months ahead, I don't have a crystal ball, but it's a good idea to be genuinely well prepared for whatever comes.
Dan: So, focus on what's already worked, print, digital, whatever it's been for you, and then layer in some of the trends we're seeing right now.
Jeff: Let's get into those trends. Right now, paid digital marketing, Google ads, Facebook ads, is more expensive than I've ever seen it.
Dan: It's funny you say that, I'd shown you a Forbes article on exactly this. I've got it pulled up here, this is from the August issue, quoting Polly Wong of Belardi Wong, a direct marketing agency out of the San Francisco Bay Area. The article's called The Rising Cost of Digital Advertising Will Force Spending Shifts. Based on her agency's data, cost per thousand viewers didn't increase in January 2021, crept up 6 percent in February, then jumped 68 percent in March, topped out at 89 percent above baseline in April, increased 69 percent in May, and 42 percent in June, July figures weren't available yet in that August issue.
Jeff: So this isn't just an idea from an article, you'd already been seeing this yourself directly.
Dan: Completely. Prior to the shutdown, a general dentistry search term like dentist near me ran about 9 dollars a click. During the shutdown, everyone pulled back on advertising, so it got genuinely cheap, down to 3 dollars a click. Now it's not uncommon to see over 30 dollars a click.
Jeff: Thirty dollars for a click, and that's not even a patient, that's just someone clicking through to wherever the ad points them.
Dan: Right, hopefully a landing page, not just your general website. It's startling.
Jeff: Do you stop digital marketing at that point?
Dan: No, you don't stop, you just get better at it, make sure you've got the right provider running it. It's genuinely more expensive now, but that doesn't mean walk away from it.
Jeff: That's something I've seen too, it's gotten to the point where you really need to know what you're doing. I've seen practices running Google pay-per-click ads for cosmetic dentistry at three in the morning, which simple adjustments could have fixed entirely.
Dan: Exactly, and that's why paying someone who genuinely knows what they're doing makes a real difference at these prices.
Jeff: So that's digital cost. What else should practices be doing to make sure that spend is actually working?
Dan: From a trends standpoint, where we're seeing strong results versus weak ones really comes down to what happens once someone actually lands on your profile or landing page. Think about a dentist near me search, you've got paid ads at the top, then the map, then generally three organic listings beneath the map, that's your local search results, genuinely important real estate, that's your SEO. We could do a whole separate episode just on that.
Jeff: We touched on it briefly in an earlier episode.
Dan: Right, we don't want to go too deep here or we'll lose people. But beneath that map is another spot you can advertise too. Here's the thing though, if your reviews are poor, or too few, everything you're spending on digital marketing gets undermined, because today's consumer is looking at social proof, what other people say about you, not what you say about yourself.
Jeff: And if you've only got 40 reviews while nearby practices have 150 or 700.
Dan: That's a real problem, the same pattern you see comparing similar products on Amazon. Even if your star rating is technically higher, a much larger review count on a competing practice will win out. So that matters. Do you have before-and-after photos of your actual work? Do you have video testimonials, patients saying this was the most painless dentistry I've ever experienced, I felt like family here. That's genuinely what consumers expect to see today.
Jeff: How do you see that evolving over the next year specifically?
Dan: I think people's finances are going to get tighter, so you have to make that consumer decision process cleaner and quicker. The more genuine content you put out there, the better. That includes a real social media presence, exploring platforms you maybe haven't yet. People ask me should I be on TikTok, and honestly, as a 52 year old myself, I had a hard time with that question at first. Today, I'd say resoundingly yes.
Jeff: I laugh because I'm not getting my own TikTok page, as another 52 year old, that's just not happening for me.
Dan: I'm not saying everyone needs to be doing dance videos, we've seen some doctors pick it up and genuinely make it work, and I run our own MGE TikTok, get real engagement there too. Marketing is always evolving, and if you evolve with it, you'll find opportunities that are cheaper and more effective than practices that refuse to adapt. Will TikTok single-handedly fill your schedule? Not necessarily, but the dentists getting real traction on it are the ones who genuinely enjoy doing it and post consistently. If you don't have the time or energy for it, don't force it, skip it entirely.
Jeff: That's something I've seen play out before too, years ago there was a local business social media platform we almost got involved with, it's long gone now, I can't even remember the name, that's how little it mattered in the end. My philosophy has always been, if I can't do something well, I'd rather not do it at all. I'd rather do three things really well than ten things poorly.
Dan: Same principle exactly. That's why I always tell dentists to stay off Twitter unless you have a genuine personal passion for it, if you're not posting routinely, you're essentially invisible there anyway. Stick with what you know, and outsource what you don't. If you want a presence on Google Ads but don't have time to actually learn it, and it's genuinely more complex now than it was five years ago, find a strong provider and let them handle it.
Dan: But here's what a doctor can absolutely do right now, without outsourcing anything: get reviews, and a lot of them. Get before-and-after photos. Get video testimonials, specifically for whatever services you want more of, more Invisalign, more implants, more whitening cases, which often turn into other cosmetic work anyway. Even for general restorative work, show how you've helped someone with a chipped tooth, a cracked tooth, missing teeth. Don't just say it, let your actual patients tell that story.
Dan: Pair that with a real internal marketing strategy too. People always say internal marketing is the cheapest marketing that brings the best patients, I'd agree with the second half of that, but not the cheapest part, you've spent years and real money becoming the clinician you are and building the team and culture behind your practice. When a patient mentions that warmth in a review, that's the payoff of everything you've already invested. So how do you actually capitalize on that? We go deep on this at the New Patient Workshop, but as one example, clients sometimes ask if they should incentivize referrals.
Jeff: You mean incentivizing the patient directly for referring someone.
Dan: Right, and in certain jurisdictions you legally can't structure it that way, but you can always acknowledge them. If I sent you a thank you card for referring a client to MGE, you'd probably think, you're welcome, I didn't do it for you, I did it for my friend. But if I sent you a ten dollar gourmet brownie with a card that said, thank you for caring enough about another person to bring them into our practice, one in three Americans don't go to the dentist, and people with healthy teeth and gums live longer, you've helped us help someone live a longer, healthier life, that lands completely differently. Compare that to a five dollar Starbucks card, which is better than nothing, but it just sits in a wallet with a few others, it doesn't even fully cover a coffee. It's simply not personal.
Jeff: So how do you build that relationship with someone searching for a dentist at nine thirty at night, exhausted, just moved to the area, still unpacking boxes?
Dan: They land on your Google Business profile and see either an empty operatory and an empty reception desk, or they see your team looking genuinely warm, maybe goofy in Halloween costumes, kids smiling, that communicates a real family practice, not a corporate chain. I'd encourage every doctor to stop thinking like a dentist or a business owner for a moment and think like a consumer. How do you shop on Amazon? How do you shop in general? Are you actually showing up that way online? Because whatever your Google ads, internal referrals, or postcards do, they're all ultimately driving someone toward your online presence, and a great internal culture can be completely undermined if it's poorly represented externally.
Jeff: As we look further ahead, more and more people have jumped onto that online bandwagon already, so what actually shifts from here?
Dan: More people are genuinely fleshing out their social media now, especially in dentistry specifically, and I don't think that changes much over the next year or two, Facebook, Instagram, these platforms aren't going anywhere. But walking into 2022, you're going to need to be a cut above where you used to be. Where 75 reviews might have made you the top practice in your area before, now you're looking at 300, 350. Posting fresh photos to your Google Business page every couple of days. Whatever's already working, you're going to need to push it harder than ever, because the beach is simply more crowded now.
Jeff: And this connects to how we help clients eventually delegate this, to an office manager, and eventually a dedicated new patient coordinator, running around collecting before-and-afters, getting HIPAA releases signed, handling the social posts.
Dan: Right, and it becomes genuinely fun once it's properly delegated, that's how good organization actually works, so it doesn't consume the doctor-owner's entire time.
Jeff: Let me actually stop on that, since this is still new territory for a lot of people. Most dental websites aren't even designed to attract new patients in the first place, that's honestly its own separate conversation.
Dan: We should do a whole episode on that, there are four key elements to a genuinely effective dental website.
Jeff: We'll save that one for later. But you don't see many practices using real patient video testimonials specifically, before-and-afters, sure, sometimes even purchased ones, but genuine testimonials are rare, and they're honestly quick and easy to get.
Dan: People get this idea it needs to be a three-camera professional setup. If you've got that, great, one of our clients actually has a dedicated shoot room, full lighting, sound insulation, genuinely impressive, but out of thousands of clients, he's the only one I know of with that kind of setup. The best camera is the one already in your pocket.
Jeff: What if the person on camera stumbles over their words or seems imperfect?
Dan: That's what video editing is for, you can clean some of that up. But think about it this way, have you ever gotten a newsletter from a small local business that was obviously homemade, versus a glossy magazine from your vet's office clearly bought from some template company, generic recipe, generic filler, straight into the trash? That overproduced version doesn't land. A genuine cell phone video of a patient saying, this is the most painless dentistry I've ever experienced, I used to avoid the dentist entirely because I hated needles and drills, and you all treated me like family, I'll never go anywhere else, a thirty second testimonial like that drives in more new patients than any postcard campaign ever could.
Dan: One of the best testimonials we've ever tracked was filmed by a receptionist holding her phone sideways through the little reception window, patient standing on the other side, camera moving slightly, drill faintly audible in the background, genuinely unpolished. It's still one of the highest performing pieces of content we track, based on how many patients specifically mention having seen it.
Jeff: I think that's really it, even though we're doing all of this online and electronically right now ourselves, people are still fundamentally looking for something real and personal. I remember during the pandemic, a lot of our clients recorded simple messages of hope for their patients, nothing highly produced, and we told them not to worry about production quality at all. I saw my own dentist do one, and it genuinely meant something, just seeing him.
Dan: Exactly, that's the whole point. Now, with Facebook, Google pay-per-click, and SEO specifically, you do need real professional help there, someone who genuinely knows what they're doing, outsource that piece to a proven provider. But if you're wondering where to explore next, TikTok is new in the same way Facebook advertising itself was once new. I ran my very first Facebook ad back in 2013, if I tried building a campaign in that portal today with what I knew then, it'd be genuinely bad, thankfully our own marketing team has kept up with how much more complex it's become.
Jeff: So TikTok specifically is still at that simpler, earlier stage.
Dan: Right, video generally, on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, isn't new as a concept, but it's a space most competing dentists haven't fully committed to yet, so you're not facing much real competition there. And video, even a mediocre one, is a bit like pizza, even when it's not great, it's still pretty good. Just get past the hesitation, pick up the phone, ask a patient if they'd mind sharing how their treatment went, then stay quiet and let them talk. Don't prompt them, don't script it. They might talk for three and a half minutes when you expected twenty seconds, send that to an editor, trim it to about forty seconds, add a little music and a simple intro, done.
Jeff: And walking further into the future, we're also in a genuinely inflationary environment, most practices are going to need to raise fees at some point, which probably deserves its own episode entirely. But that's exactly why standing out through video and some of these less crowded channels matters, you're not fighting the whole crowded beach, just a couple other people out there right now.
Dan: Exactly, the further ahead you get on this, the more established you become.
Jeff: We're recording this in mid-October of 2021, looking ahead to 2022. Beyond stronger reviews, more video, exploring platforms like TikTok, and rising pay-per-click costs, do you see anything else shifting, assuming someone's already working with a provider who genuinely knows what they're doing with paid ads?
Dan: I do think we're already seeing a real swing back toward more conventional outreach, direct mail specifically. There are real, updated guidelines for doing it well now, it's not simply dust off your old postcard and run it again, if you don't modernize the actual content and offer to match what people expect to see today, it won't perform, and we cover all of that at the workshop, which is exactly why it runs two full days, there's a lot to walk through.
Jeff: We probably shouldn't keep plugging the workshop on here.
Dan: Definitely don't buy it, kidding, of course. But I'll say this, one of our clients recently sent me a postcard with genuinely remarkable results, and it looked like something put together in a basic word processor, herself, nothing fancy, but it had all the right elements. So yes, conventional marketing is swinging back, the personal touch is swinging back. If you're not using two-way text messaging with your existing patient base for reminders and outreach, that's genuinely one of the best ways to reach someone today. Anything that feels like it's reaching the individual specifically matters enormously, since we're all so overcommercialized now, it's a constant fire hose of information.
Jeff: So say I'm planning out 2022 right now, I'm not going to stop Google pay-per-click, just tighten it up, but I want to try something new. Video's essentially free, TikTok's essentially free, where would you actually have me start, text, print, both?
Dan: It genuinely varies by what each specific dentist actually wants more of. Say you tell me you want more implant cases, or more Invisalign, or more full arch cases. I'd tell you, go get me six before-and-after cases and three testimonials specifically for that. We'd build a dedicated landing page around that exact campaign, a one page site built specifically to convert on that one thing. If someone clicks an ad or scans a QR code from print media, that landing page only talks about implants, it doesn't mention sleep apnea, it doesn't mention hygiene, it shows exactly what you can achieve with that one specific treatment.
Jeff: Rather than a broad, I'm a dentist, I'm a good dentist message.
Dan: Right, that's fine to have too, generally, but think specifically about what you actually want more of. Want to fill up hygiene? Run a texting reactivation campaign. Want more cosmetic cases? Build a dedicated cosmetic campaign. It's time to get more targeted rather than running one broad campaign, since so many more people are competing for the same marketing dollar now, and it's genuinely more expensive across the board. I always start by asking a doctor where they are now, what they're currently doing, what they're not doing that they want to be doing, and what they specifically want more of, then build from there. What's right also depends heavily on where you're located, a relatively underserved area with little competition calls for a different strategy than somewhere like Miami or New York.
Jeff: I think that covers it well.
Dan: Agreed.
Jeff: Dan, thank you so much for joining me today. Folks, if you want to actually see Dan live, or at least on Zoom, you can catch him at the MGE New Patient Workshop, a two day workshop, and the average client attending it sees a 42 percent increase in new patients. Find out more at newpatients.net, also linked on the episode webpage. You can also see Dan in person at the MGE Communication and Sales Seminars, where I'm there too, link also on the webpage.
Dan: I think that covers the overview well, we'll get into some of these specific topics in their own episodes down the line.
Jeff: Agreed, but for a general look at where marketing's heading next year, I think this was a good one.
Jeff: Alright folks, have a great week, and we'll see you at the next episode.