There are so many great things about Facebook advertising for dentists.
In 2018, Facebook ads are one of the best ways for dentists to get new dental patients in the door.
With Facebook ads, dentists can accurately target potential patients in their local area, targeting by age, gender, annual income and other considerations so that the dentist only pays for the Facebook ad to show to a highly targeted audience.
In other words: With Facebook ads, dentists can save money and time by targeting ads to precisely the right people. So your money is spent actually bringing new dental patients in the door.
If you want to get new dental patients in the door, this is one of the the best dental marketing strategies for 2018. And not only can dentists use Facebook advertising to get new dental patients in the door, they can can also use Facebook advertising as a way to make patients get dental services done.
To succeed, though, you need to know how to write Facebook business posts.
And you will also need a strategy.
Let’s take a look.
Why Use Facebook Advertising For Dentists To Get Patients In The Door
Along with Dental SEO, and Google Adwords, Facebook ads are one of the best online marketing strategies for dentists.
The benefits of Facebook ads for dentists:
- Target local dental patients
- Show ads to existing dental patients so they schedule appointments
- Remind existing dental patients to actually use your dental serrvices
- Target dental patients by key demographics
- Save money compared to some other advertising options (such as Adwords)
- Boost your brand’s online reputation
That said, there are some difficulties in using Facebook ads for dentists too, which I’ll cover in this guide.
In this guide I will show you how to use Facebook advertising for dentists, so you can save time and money while massively increasing your lead generation. Ultimately, this will help you to get new dental patients, to get patients to schedule appointments, and to get patients to actually use your dental services.
And you will probably want to read my list of 100 ways to get likes for your Facebook page too.
The Problems with Facebook Advertising for Dentists
Measure of your engagement rate on Facebook.
You might notice it’s below average.
That’s because it’s a challenge using Facebook for dentists.
While there are many excellent things about Facebook advertising for dentists, there are challenges too.
The number one problem with Facebook advertising for dentists is this: you need to save your marketing budget while getting new patients in the door, scheduling appointments, and using your dental services.
This is at odds with the strategies used by most big marketing agencies. Those guys work on generating a ton of traffic for a dental website. But you’re not interested in getting traffic to your dental website per say. You’re interested in getting new dental patients in the door of your dental office.
Sure, you can improve FB engagement rates. But you want more than that. You want actual patients.
And that’s something big marketing agencies struggle with.
Most dental advertising agencies don’t know how to market locally in such a way that it actually brings new patients in the door of your dental office and scheduling appointments.
Dental marketing agencies do not priorities your main concern.
Your main concern is getting dental patients in the door and scheduling appointments.
How do you do that?
How To Effectively Use Local Facebook Ads For Dentists
1. To successfully use Facebook ads, dentists must take a different approach
Marketing agencies will tell you that one of the best ways to Advertise a dental practice on Facebook is with interest-based advertising. This is advertising that targets people who have expressed an interest in your topic: dentistry.
This is completely backwards.
The best target group for dental Facebook ads are people who have dental problems because they have not been to dentist lately. These are the absolute last people who would have dentistry as an interest on Facebook. So, Facebooks’ go-to advertising strategy simply does not work for dental practices.
Interest groups work differently when using Facebook advertising for dentists.
In fact, you may very well want to exclude people who are interested in dentists. These people almost certainly have a dentist already, so why bother wasting your money advertising to them?
Go ahead and exclude people who are interested in dentists. They are a bad audience for dental Facebook ads.
2. To get new patients in the door of the dental office, target people new to your area:
To get new patients for a dental practice with Facebook ads, target people new to your area: immigrants and people who recently moved. This is one of the best options in Facebook advertising for dentists.
For instance, if you’re a dental practice in Hamilton Ontario (where I am), target to new people in Hamilton. Likewise with other cities.
These are precisely the people who are in need of a new dentist. Immigrants are less likely to have a dentist that those who have always lived in your area.
You can also use this for similar groups, such as new uni students (who may be looking for a dentist near their university).
4. To get multiple new patients in the dental office, use Facebook ads to target new families
When using Facebook advertising for dentists, try targeting new families.
Most people start taking their kids to the dentist when the kid is around 3 years old.
Those little kids are some of the best potential new patients for a dental practice. Target the parents.
While it is true that the parents will probably have a dentist already, many may not be satisfied, and the new addition to their family can often be the motivation parents need to find a new dentist.
And remember: you might get three or more new patients in the door of the dental office from this—each member of the family.
5. Target people whose interests suggest they might need a dentist:
Above we discussed how you can save money by excluding people who are interested in dentists from your Facebook ads. Those dentist aficionados are not likely to become new patients at your dental office.
The people who will become new patients at your dental office are the ones who have bad teeth. The ones who have cavities.
You need to target your dental Facebook ads to people who are statistically more likely to need dental work.
For instance, people who have cavities
What causes cavities? Sugar. Where do people get the sugar that causes cavities? Candy and pop, right? People who are interested in sugary treats are statistically more likely to need your dental services. Advertise to them.
To use interest groups in Facebook advertisements, dentists must target people who are statistically more like to actually spend money on dental work, which is people who have unhealthy diets who happened to LIKE numerous unhealthy foods on Facebook.
Coke, McDonalds, every candy company in the world, they all have Facebook pages and you can target their audiences.
Of course, I don’t mean to focus solely on sugar here.There are other interests that people who dental work have.
The point is: think about what interests people who need a dentist might have.
6. Target your dental Facebook ads to people interested in cheap alternatives:
One smart way to target people for your Facebook dental ads is to target people interested in cheap alternatives.
For instance, people who are interested in whitening gum obviously want whiter teeth, but they may be on the fence about paying for an actual dental whitening. These are good people to target to, as are people interested in cheap dental tools (many of whom try to take care of their own teeth because they’re afraid of the dentist)
Target people who are interested in the alternatives to dentists. These are people ready to convert. They are people who are near to becoming new patients at a dental office, people who are close to scheduling dental appointments and paying for dental services.
7. How to use demographics in Facebook advertising for dentists
To get new dental patients in the door via Facebook advertisements, dentists should make use of their current data—the information you’ve collected over the years.
Your dental marketing data will tell you specific and accurate information on the type of people who use your dental services. Look at age, income and so on.
To truly maximise your ROI, match specific services to their specific demographic.
If, for instance, you’ve been seeing new dental patients in the door from the 50 + age group target to them generally. And if, at the same time, you’ve been seeing new dental patients in the door aged 40-50 who specifically want teeth whitening, target the with a Facebook ad about dental whitening.
If you have a Facebook page for the dental website, Facebook Analytics is a great way to get insights into your key demographics. Then you can target those demographics with your dental Facebook advertisements.
8. Use Facebook Pixel To Create Retargeting Facebook Ads For The Dental Website
One of the best advertising strategies for dentists on Facebook is to target people who have visited your dental website.
To do this you will want to setup Facebook pixel for the dental website so you can start getting data on the traffic to your dental website.
Once you’ve setup Facebook pixel on the dental website you can then show ads to people who visited your site.
Traffic to your dental website is, by definition, from people interested in dental services, and often people in your region. These are the best people to target in the Facebook ads for a dental practice.
You can also use this strategy as a way to make dental patients schedule appointments (because many of your patients will have visited your dental website).
To do this, create a Facebook custom audience for people who have visited specific pages on your dental website, and serve ads specific to each group.
For instance, create a custom audience called “Orthodontist” for people who viewed your website page about orthodontists, and serve them an ad about orthodontics.
You can also use this as a way to make dental patients schedule treatment.
Use Facebook remarketing to show ads to people who have viewed that specific service on your website.
And that is how to use Facebook ads for dentists to get new dental patients in the door and scheduling appointments
In this guide we’ve looked at the best ways to use Facebook advertisements for dentists. Of course, to succeed you will also need excellent dental copywriting [read that link for some great tips on how to get copywriting that converts].
With these dental advertising strategies, Facebook will become one of the best ways to get new patients at the dental office.
Remember, you will also need a fantastic overall online marketing plan to succeed as a dentist online.
Have you found this guide helpful?
Have I answered some of your questions?
Would you like more advice from me?
Contact me today and let’s work together on the Facebook advertisements for your dental practice.
