Speed to lead wins more patients

Announcer: Welcome to the Ignite Podcast, the only healthcare marketing podcast that digs into the digital strategies and tactics that help you accelerate growth. Each week, Cardinal’s experts explore innovative ways to build your digital presence and attract more patients. Buckle up for another episode of Ignite.

Ashley Petrochenko: Hey everybody, welcome back for another episode of the Ignite Healthcare Marketing Podcast. I’m your host today, Ashley Petrochenko, and I’m also back in the host seat. I’ve been out of the office for a few weeks, but I’m really excited to get back into the podcast and to be having these conversations with healthcare marketing leaders across the industry.

Today, we have a guest joining us from the dental industry. I want to speak about all things dental trends, predictions, what’s working in dental right now, what’s not. Without further ado, let me welcome our guest today, Ana Doran. Welcome to Ignite.

Ana Doran: Thank you. Very excited to be here.

Ashley: Thanks. I’m so glad to have you here. Before we dig into the topic at hand, maybe share a little bit about who you are and your work in the dental industry.

Ana: Yes. Originally from Minnesota, moved to Colorado about close to 10 years ago or so. I have been in marketing for a little over nine years, worked in mortgage for a while, mortgage marketing, and then transitioned into dental. Doing graphic design, video creation and editing, same thing with photo, email templates, scheduling all the things, you name it. You really dove deep this year.

Ashley: Something that across marketing, they often have to be jacks of all trades, building a startup organization that you have to have to wear a lot of hats. I actually got into marketing also through a photography design background. I’m excited to talk about branding and creative today. We’re talking about what works with consumers and what people respond to. I think that’s a really great intro.

Then you’re in Colorado. I know that a lot of people—we’re going to date this podcast; it’s July 15th. A lot of people are heading to Dykema DSO right now. I have a little bit of FOMO myself. It’s one of my favorite conferences. I know at the event, we’re going to be talking about trends, predictions of what’s happening in the dental world. Let’s kick off with that topic today, too, for our podcast. When you look at the dental industry, what trends have you observed in the most this year? What’s changing? What are you paying attention to?

Ana: One of the biggest ones that I’m seeing and that we’ve even tested out, too, is the move away from the initial passive lead generation to instant AI automated engagement practices that are using systems to respond to inquiries within 30 seconds are very much seeing a massive spike with appointment bookings compared to those who are waiting to the front desk to follow up or along those lines.

Same thing, too, with online scheduling. Huge thing. Especially recently where it’s not new by all means, but it’s something I think where the dental industry hasn’t caught up with it yet. People don’t want to sit and wait for someone to call them back, let alone call them on the phone and speak to somebody. Being able to book those appointments right away and be said and done with it, we’re seeing, too, a huge spike within new patient appointments.

Ashley: Speed to lead is so important. I think in every industry, as an agency, speed to lead is important. You probably can’t see, but I have a hole in my ceiling right here where I had a pipe break and the plumber that answered and got here in 40 minutes, I was like, yes, I love you. Speed to lead is so important. AI is really helping take a lot of that burden and that administrative lift off of the front desk team. Not having to be their hand on the phone, they try to do 10 things at once, that’s a really astute observation. Then it’s also from the marketing side, what are you observing in patient acquisition? Any other trends or things that you’re watching this year?

Ana: Big thing is many marketers are underestimating the impact of word of mouth, especially to private spaces like text threads, community forums, Facebook groups, next door. It’s a little harder to track. You’ve got to factor that in in order to help boost your brand health. There’s also an underestimation of the fact that marketing funnel is only as strong as the person answering the phone. That was a huge thing that we had seen and fixed with some of the dental companies that I’ve worked at.

If your acquisition strategy is top tier, but your front desk, let’s say, is inefficient, your marketing’s going to fail. It won’t really matter so much anymore. That’s a big thing to make sure that you’re auditing that, you’re training the people at the front desk or whoever’s answering the phone, and also making sure that the phone is being answered is another huge problem as well too.

Ashley: AI, the speed to lead, there’s more sophisticated tools on websites, the pop-ups, there’s things that people can engage with. Online scheduling has become a lot more robust. Really, marketing can only do so much. We can drive the lead, we can get people to pick up the phone, to go to the website to call, but you really have to have the right tech on the operational side too.

Thinking about what you mentioned about word of mouth, I go to my local community’s Facebook group. To see who was recommending that said plumber, who’s recommending someone to fix my drywall. People are distrustful, I think, of ads. People are distrustful sometimes of different sources. They’re looking for their community, they’re looking for their peers, their family for recommendations. How do you shape that preference too? I think part of it’s the actual delivery of the product or the service.

Let’s talk about building creative and building brand that stands out and earns that trust. Dental industry is so competitive and so many of the brands look the same. They all have teeth, they all have teal or blue branding, and they really aren’t differentiated. When you think about branding and how do you actually stand out in the dental industry, what comes to mind what’s working right now?

Ana: I’d say getting away from your stock photography and then actually doing organic stuff. The professional shots are great, but people love authenticity. That’s taking your phone, recording behind-the-scenes type glimpses and stuff that really shows the patient, hey, we are here to do and work on your teeth, but we’re also human beings too. I think that right there starts building trust. That can also help your cost per lead and your PPC stuff.

Again, more people want to see authentic, real content and video, not so much stock or anything along those lines, as well as what are you creating specifically? Honing in on specific patient insecurities. Are you defining and answering that need to a problem and giving that solution? We definitely saw that in the All-on-4 space, where here are the things that this person’s struggling with, now we have a solution to your problem.

Ashley: Back to what you’re saying about word of mouth, people are looking for referrals or recommendations from their network. They’re doing more research more than ever now independently. It’s really hard to trust something that looks artificial and fake and that looks like every other one. Really leaning into the real people at the actual practice and also the patients. We can get patient testimonials and get them to be part of the conversation. I think helps build that trust, like you said. You are building that brand preference over time, and you’re trying to balance that top of funnel with higher intent, Google Ads, PPC at the bottom. How do you think about that balance and where do you invest, and how do you approach that conversation with leadership?

Ana: I can see it as a 60-40 split. 60% on acquisition, so you’ve got your PPC, your pay-per-click, or your LSAs for immediate patient flow. Then I would say 40% on branding and reputation management. The way that I’ve seen it framed and what’s always been taught to me is frame it to leadership as the difference between harvesting and planting. Acquisition is more or less at the harvest, and it brings immediate revenue. The branding is going to be the planting. It builds that trust and it makes every future lead cheaper and easier, again, “to acquire”. If you only harvest, you’re eventually going to have just a very desolate field.

Ashley: I love that analogy so much. I’m actually like a gardener. I have a little mini farm. I really love that kind of analogy like that, but it makes so much sense. You will harvest everything that there is to harvest unless you start with those seeds. I think that’s great. How do you tell when a campaign that’s working in one market is performing well, you’re seeing success then? How do you tell when it’s ready to scale it to a new market or across the organization?

Ana: I would say, first, just make sure that your branding and your foundation to that is all synced up and consistent across the page, your logo, core values, the tone. In my opinion, I do not think you should scale the campaign until it is run for 90 days in a test market. Proving that it actually produces an ROI, a return on investment, it maintains consistent as well as the big thing.

When you are ready to scale and when you verify, too, that the front desk team, they’ve got the capacity, they’re answering the phone, they’re feeling that increase, and it feels like you’re scaling, and that the campaign is successful, then I think that’s when you should go. Also, to get the rest of the team ready as well because from an office that, let’s say, is not used to phone calls that are increasing, form fills that are now shooting through the roof, they got to also be prepared for that as well too. It’s a balance, I think, between both marketing and operations.

Ashley: You test to make sure that you actually have enough data to understand the confidence level of this is actually, we’re seeing improvements, but then you have to do a slope roll. You can’t necessarily say, let’s go across it. You have to, as in readiness, assess if the whole team is ready. We definitely hear when the front, they don’t even know that there is a new campaign being launched. They don’t even know maybe some of the offering, some of the messaging that’s being out there, and it’s blindsides to that, and it creates a poor patient experience. Let’s think about maybe like a lessons learned. I think everyone in marketing has the war stories. We talked about putting war paint on. I got my makeup on today. How do you think about any lessons learned that you would want to share with our listeners, things to think about when you’re looking at scaling marketing across a brand?

Ana: I remember we ran, I’m not going to say a national campaign, but I guess sort of or company-wide. It was a singular ad, so a certain amount of money off on, I think it was a new patient special. It ended up working in some locations, but not all of them. When we really honed in as to the why, it was because we didn’t structure it to think about the local cost of living. The patient demographic taught me that while the process is scalable, the offer in and of itself must be tailored to the local culture.

Ashley: Yes, marketing at its core is local. Healthcare marketing is local, and you have to understand the nuances between a rural market versus urban versus different cost of living. That could be a humbling reminder sometimes. You’re like, why isn’t this working?

Ana: Oh, yes, absolutely.

Ashley: The data is not always perfect in healthcare, and the patient journey is often complex, and it’s not always this like, hi, I clicked here, and I’m a patient. How do you communicate marketing performance to leadership when you’re in that reality?

Ana: The biggest thing that I’ve learned over the years is not everyone knows what a CTR or CPM or CTA, those shortened terms mean, especially if you’re not in marketing. What I would suggest and what I’ve seen is leading with, for example, let’s say with dental, lead with total new patients and total production revenue using real, clean dashboards, like real-time dashboards.

What I’ve found is when leadership can create a clear correlation between the investment line and then revenue line, they’re less concerned then about, I would say, the super messy data that we had to all try to put together in order for it to look nice. Just speaking that and showing them, these are the things that we’re doing. Here’s a light scope of the data, but here’s the nitty-gritty that you actually very much care about.

Ashley: Yes, it’s like you have to speak the language of your audience. Same thing for patients, same thing internally to your executive team. The language is more patience and understanding and being able to, what’s the goal? We’re trying to drive new patients. Communication is such a bigger part of our internal roles as well. One insight or metric that you are watching, and this relates back to our question about trends before. What do you think people should be paying attention to more right now in marketing?

Ana: I would say, again, touching on the speed to lead, the timeframe between a form fill or a phone call, and the first time a human actually contacts them, I do think is massive and it’s important. Rather than only solely focusing on the lead, in my opinion, the true health of marketing is determined by how many of those leads actually show up for the appointment.

You can get the leads in all day, all night, but if you don’t have any showings, your marketing either is targeting to the wrong type of people or there’s something on the operational side that’s not talking correctly. I think that’s where being in a couple different DSOs, watermarks are so incredibly important. Harmonized scheduling, implementing those because a lot of these AI systems, they are talking to the watermarks, and making it easier for patients to book to a less likely reason to cancel an appointment or reschedule. Again, I think there’s a huge correlation between marketing and operations, and it’s slowly going that way.

Ashley: If you’re looking on the health of your program, if you’re reaching the right people or other, look at your no-show rates, look at who’s actually showing up or who’s not showing up and that can really reveal a lot of issues. Marketing operations, MOPs, as we say here at Cardinal, is vital to everything marketing does, and we’re always looking for ways to get closer with operations. I think it’s really important. Let’s close it out. Let’s think about closing advice. If you had to leave our listeners with one thought when they’re building their marketing strategy today, what would you tell them to focus on first?

Ana: Yes, I’d say three things that all go hand in hand. Focus on data hygiene, reputation management, and automation. Those three things all at once, just focus on those. Before you crank up the ads and crank up the spend, ensure your CRM, your reporting dashboard, your patient communication workflows, they’re airtight. There’s no mishaps, there’s no missteps because then you got to go back and clean it up.

That’s the same thing, too, with reputation management. If somebody is looking on Google, and they see you have 43.5 stars, and it’s not great, more than likely they’re not going to go to you. Just making sure that you build that up prior to and that everything on your Google My Business is airtight. It’s SEO, AEO, and GEO-friendly, and then really ramp up your marketing spend and your stuff.

Ashley: Get your foundations in order, listeners. Make sure your reputation is solid and your data foundations are clean, and you’re really building that measurement foundation. Thank you, Ana, so much. That’s great closing advice. Thank you for joining Ignite. If the listeners want to connect with you, where can they find you?

Ana: LinkedIn is a good one. Just type my name, Ana Doran. Otherwise, Facebook or email. It’s [email protected].

Ashley: Thank you for joining us again. Listeners, we’ll be back next week with another episode of the Ignite Healthcare Marketing Podcast. Thanks again.

Ana: Thank you.

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