Most digital marketing data reflects the same reality: content is king. This year, experts projected that the content marketing industry would reach a value of $412 billion.1 Eighty-four percent of companies have a content marketing strategy—including dentists.
Practices and businesses using blogs to market their products and services see 13 times more ROI than those not blogging.1 Videos, an essential component of content marketing, can increase new patient leads by as much as 80% when added to your landing page.2
It’s clear that creating quality content for your dental practice yields results. So how do you do it? Quality is, of course, subjective. But there is a common approach to creating content that results in the valuable information your patients are looking for.
1. Make a Plan
Seventy-seven percent of companies claim to have a content marketing strategy.3 And they should. Every successful project, marketing or not, has to follow a plan. To design your plan, you need to answer two questions.
Who Needs What You Know?
Don’t just think about the demographics of your audience. You also need to know their concerns. As a dental practice, you may focus on a certain field of dentistry. You may cater to a specific type of patient. Or your audience may be anyone needing oral care. Whatever your focus, think about your patient’s common concerns and questions. That is the content you want to create.
What kind of information will this reader find helpful? What tone will they respond to? On what platform (Facebook, Instagram, YouTube) are they most apt to consume this content? When you know the “who,” you can move on to “how.”
How Will They Find This Information?
One of the most common complaints we hear is that a client tried to publish their own content but had no success. They worked for weeks on an article—putting time into the process that they didn’t really have—and no one read what they wrote.
Avoid this heartbreak by identifying how customers will find your content. About three-quarters of the population look for healthcare providers, including dentists, with search engines.4 Search engine optimization (SEO) and search intent are two more essential considerations in your planning efforts.
SEO is a simple concept with a complicated execution. Your objective is to predict what someone searching for your content will type into Google. Will they pose their search in the form of a question? Or will they conduct a local search since they’re looking for services in their immediate area? Searches for dentists are usually local and could very well be searched in the form of a question. Either way, optimize your content so patients who need your information can find it.
2. Be Creative
When most people think of content marketing, they usually conjure up thoughts of blogs and articles. Content marketing is much more than that! Blogging is one of the most popular forms of content, but it’s not the only kind.
Make a plan that includes content across a broad spectrum of mediums, including videos (the most popular), podcasts, webinars, blogs, interviews, white papers, guides and even eBooks. The possibilities with content marketing are practically endless!
Your content should include engaging, attractive images and graphics to draw readers in. About 34% of bloggers say they get more substantial results when they have videos in their posts.3 Also, bear in mind that articles in list-form (listicles) are shared two times more than typical blog posts (e.g. 10 ways you can improve your dental health).
3. Do Your Own Research
When you create new content, don’t just regurgitate topics you’ve read in other articles and videos. Content like that seldom comes off as authentic. Patients (and Google) can sniff out your desperation to create something (anything) without really saying anything new. In fact, 86% of people claim authenticity is a key factor when deciding which businesses they’ll support.5
Instead, take the time to do your research on a topic you brainstorm from step one. You should spend about as much time researching the article as you take to write it. Thirty-two percent of top-performing bloggers say original research and robust results are directly correlated.1
4. Be Honest
One of the most important functions of content marketing is to build trust. And this is probably more true in dentistry than almost any other business. By engaging with your patients this way, they see a new side of your practice and are more inclined to believe what you claim. Four out of five consumers say they need to trust a brand before they’ll become a customer.5
Doing your research should naturally lend itself to honesty because you’re forced to back up what you share. But as you build out your content marketing strategy, you may be tempted to oversell your practice. Don’t.
About one in three people say accuracy is one of the most crucial factors of quality content.1 Another 66% of people say transparency is one of the most attractive brand qualities.6
5. Revisit Old Content
Think of your content’s life cycle as a circle. Just as you’re finishing up and reaching the top, you have to keep going by rewriting and editing what you’ve already created. Although tedious, updating old blog posts can increase your page traffic by 106%.1 And many businesses agree. Fifty-one percent of companies say updating old content is a proven, efficient means to increase web traffic.3
Need help with your practice’s content marketing strategy? Contact Dreamscape Marketing today at 888.307.7304 to get started.
For a list of references, please contact us.