Even dentists who have been in practice for years can be assailed by self-doubt. All it takes is a series of bad months to have them doubting their marketing practices and even their competence as business owners.
When that happens, there’s an all-too natural tendency to run for cover. Unfortunately, that’s the last thing dentists should do.
“Cover,” for dentists, is to begin cutting their prices in hopes of getting more patients through the door.
What happens when you cut prices? Your competitors take notice, and they begin cut prices to match you. Then you have to cut yours further, leading to them reducing prices even more, and so on.
Marketing on price is a race to the bottom, and even the dentist who “wins” often loses.
Cheaper is the last refuge for dentists who can’t show they are better.
If that stung, it’s time to take a look at yourself. You’re an accomplished, licensed health professional who changes people’s lives through your knowledge and skills. That’s incredibly valuable… so why aren’t you valuing it?
And if you don’t value what you do, how do you expect your potential patients to value you?
Rather than racing to the dubious cover of lower prices, consider upping your marketing game. To do that, you need to stop chasing patients and start attracting them.
Today, dentists are assumed to be competent. In any given market, the vast majority of dentists are advertising the same services in the same media channels and newspapers. Dental patients don’t have any clear reason to prefer one dentist over another.
To be attractive to your dental prospects, you have to influence them to view you as the trusted dental expert who is the only logical choice to solve their dental problems.
You’re probably thinking that this approach won’t work, because all patients think about is price, right? That’s true for a lot of patients, but those aren’t the patients you want.
There are significant numbers of patients who want, and are willing to pay for, a dentist who they can relate to and who they trust. Those patients are motivated strongly by the sum total of the experience they anticipate with you and your practice. They’re not price- or insurance-driven, so they can afford to be selective.
Those people are the ones who will help you grow your practice, and you won’t get them by becoming the lowest-price dentist in town. You will attract them by positioning yourself as the preferred choice in their eyes.
Attracting patients rather than chasing them through advertising is long-term proposition. You can find all the information you need to create your own patient attraction system at smartboxwebmarketing.com.
However, if you’d prefer to focus on doing what you trained to do and love to do – changing people’s lives for the better – go to
www.smartboxwebmarketing.com/blueprint and schedule a Patient Attraction System Blueprint™ Session. They are free to serious dentists who want to see a patient attraction system that can double their practice. You can get more patients, more profits, and more freedom.