The power of online marketing is nowhere more evident than in reviews left on the Internet. With a couple easy clicks, potential patients can learn all about your style of care through firsthand review anecdotes.
There are positives and negatives to this open venue of information. It can be a great way to attract new patients, but it could also paint your practice in an unfair or inaccurate light.
Handling the Online Patient Review
It’s not possible to completely control what does or doesn’t get said online, but you can be active in asking for feedback from happy patients. Word of mouth and reviews online are incredibly compelling for the modern dental patient.
A good strategy for procuring patient reviews depends on your personality and how you like to interact with patients. If you’re generally very open, a brief in-office request to review online in an avenue such as Facebook can work wonders.
There are more subtle or less immediate options, such as sending a follow-up email from the appointment that also includes a casual request to review.
If you’re worried that this may make your practice seem cheap, or make you seem desperate, don’t. So long as you aren’t pushy, sometimes your method will work and sometimes it won’t. The reality is that whether we like it or not, it’s highly likely that potential patients are vetting us beforehand through the Internet. The smallest thing could turn them off of visiting the office.
Anyone interested in your practice will likely want to know more about you before taking the plunge. The modern patient is educated and invested in their dental care to a higher degree than ever before. Don’t ignore that involvement when instead you can capitalize on it.
How do you incorporate patient reviews into your online marketing strategy? We’d love to hear from you!