Today I want to address two stories that recently made pretty big news in their local areas.
Both involve dentists and both are bad for the doctors involved.
In one story in Massachusetts, 10 dentists were accused of bilking a welfare dental program of $1.3 million in fraudulent claims. In one of the cases, a dentist billed the system for 53 fluoride treatments on one patient.
In the other story in Scotland, ONE DENTIST is accused of the same thing to the tune of $1.3 million US.
There is a way you can profit from these and other notorious actions. Of course I don’t think anyone reading this would ever do such a thing, and I am certainly not advocating doing anything like this.
But you can profit from it.
Local press love to localize stories. If you were to see a story involving dentistry, even a negative story like these, you could reach out to the local press and offer to be their expert.
A short email or phone call to your local TV station or newspaper could result in an interview and inclusion in a story. This, in turn, would get your name out to the public as an expert.
Of course, you don’t want to speak out of school or offer up inflammatory comments. Stay in your lane and speak only about issues about which you are knowledgeable. Don’t speculate or answer hypotheticals.
But you can address how similar situations are handled in your local area, checks and balances for preventing such incidents (if there are any) or talk about need for reform.
This also would boost your SEO ranking when those media outlets used your name in their stories online. We’ve discussed the benefits of that in a previous blog.
At SmartBox, we see such potential in this brand of marketing that we can provide it as a service to our clients.
Dentistry doesn’t make mainstream news every day, so when it does, be sure to be your local media’s go-to expert.
For more tips on how to attract the patients YOU want, get a copy of my new book “Attract More Patients in the Next Six Months Than in the Past Six Years” at MoreandBetterPatients.com.
Until next time, keep moving forward.