{"id":17760,"date":"2023-10-11T08:57:03","date_gmt":"2023-10-11T13:57:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.zocdoc.com\/resources\/?p=17760"},"modified":"2023-11-10T10:47:11","modified_gmt":"2023-11-10T15:47:11","slug":"6-sem-tips-for-dental-groups","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zocdoc.com\/resources\/blog\/article\/6-sem-tips-for-dental-groups\/","title":{"rendered":"6 SEM Tips for Dental Groups"},"content":{"rendered":"

Whether it\u2019s thanks to clinical interest, business savvy or both, dentists are well positioned for industry growth. By 2040, analysts expect a <\/span>surplus of dentists<\/span><\/a> \u2014 and when supply increases in a market, competition can too.<\/span><\/p>\n

Search engine marketing (SEM) campaigns are key to helping dental groups acquire patients.<\/span> Nationally, dental care is one of users\u2019 most-searched specialities, with upward of 15 million impressions per year. For context, primary care providers attract 11 million annual impressions among that same pool.<\/span><\/p>\n

That kind of scale has all kinds of implications for patient acquisition. SEM could prove central to how well a practice grows going forward. At the heart of this strategy is efficiency, which informs tracking, which informs how to spend a marketing budget. The scale and competition of search engine marketing for dentists renders it a complex task. Those who understand it stand to benefit tremendously.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here are some quick tips that can help dentists succeed at SEM.<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Inspect<\/span><\/h2>\n

Get a handle on your cost per acquisition.<\/i><\/p>\n

Because dentistry is a competitive field both in practice and in marketing, bidding on related keywords within online ad marketplaces can come at a high cost per click (CPC). To get the most out of your advertising dollars, your practice must understand each patients\u2019 value to the practice in order to set an appropriate cost per acquisition (CPA) rate.<\/span><\/p>\n

Once you\u2019ve settled on the right CPA for your practice, Google\u2019s <\/span>Smart Bidding<\/span><\/a> will take care of the technical minutiae to meet your targets. This software ensures that your ads are shown to an optimal spread of audiences \u2014 and that your reach isn\u2019t too conservative.<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Rinse<\/span><\/h2>\n

Remove funky queries.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Google\u2019s <\/span>broad match<\/span><\/a> can bring in some odd keyword queries, some of which are pleasant surprises, while others are just strange. Dentistry especially may be competing with a multitude of products, at-home information and even career listings related to oral health.<\/span><\/p>\n

Check your search query report regularly and remove any queries that don\u2019t pertain to your practice. For example, queries like \u201cwhat is a root canal\u201d or \u201cteeth whitening strips\u201d are likely too high-funnel or irrelevant. Even questions like \u201cwhy do I have bad breath\u201d could be a patient trying to self-diagnose, with no intention of actually going to the dentist.<\/span><\/p>\n

One easy solution is to negate \u201cwhat is\u201d and \u201chow do you\u201d or \u201cwhy do\u201d on the <\/span>phrase match function<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

3. Floss<\/span><\/h2>\n

Play with different targeting levels.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Potential patients may not live in straightforward ad markets. That\u2019s why testing user targeting at different demographic levels can pay off. Consider targeting by zip code, city and even designated market area (DMA). While the most granular targeting doesn\u2019t always mean the most efficient, you might be surprised which level of targeting is best suited to your base.<\/span><\/p>\n

(Bonus tip: If you have a <\/span>Google Business Profile<\/span><\/a>, look into <\/span>location extensions<\/span><\/a> that are affiliated with your practice locations. This enables your ad to show up in situ on Google Maps, which unlocks another spot directed at local users.)<\/span><\/p>\n

4. Polish<\/span><\/h2>\n

Bid on terms that prequalify a user.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Cut out unwanted traffic by incorporating prequalifiers in your keywords. This means bidding on terms that prequalify a user (e.g., \u201cdentist new york city,\u201d \u201cdentist that takes aetna,\u201d \u201cdentist near me\u201d). For example, a dental practice in New York City that takes Delta Dental, Guardian and Cigna can bid on keywords like \u201cdentist new york city,\u201d \u201cdelta dental dentists,\u201d \u201cdentists that take guardian\u201d and \u201ccigna dentist near me.\u201d This ensures that you\u2019re showing your ad to users who can actually convert.<\/span><\/p>\n

5. Gritty clean<\/span><\/h2>\n

Make your ad copy as relevant as possible.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

If your keywords are \u201cdentists in new york city,\u201d make sure your ad copy mirrors that content. Relevant copy not only improves your ad strength, it also leads to a higher clickthrough rate (CTR): Users will naturally click on ads they find hyper-relevant, something they\u2019re already signaling through their queries in the search bar.<\/span><\/p>\n

6. Rinse (again)<\/span><\/h2>\n

Use your visit reasons as sitelinks.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Sitelinks<\/span><\/a> and other extensions improve your ad rank. If your ad is in position 1, a sitelink will also take up more space on the search engine results page (SERP). This gives your ad more visibility and pushes your competitors down the page. Given a good match with the end user, it could also improve your CTR. Take a look at your current sitelinks and make sure they reflect the reasons patients visit your practice (e.g., emergency dental, dental cleaning).<\/span><\/p>\n

In competitive spaces like dentistry, every optimization is a potential new patient or new point of market share. SEM is a key lever; optimize it for your practice or risk inefficient ad spend.<\/span><\/p>\n

Preventive Care<\/span><\/h2>\n

Don\u2019t overestimate how many patients can be captured through SEM. There is a finite number of reachable patients on Google, and many companies are competing for the same pool of searches.<\/span><\/p>\n

At some point, the only way to get more impressions is to bid more. However, keep in mind that conversion rates typically remain the same or decrease as the cost per click increases. This drives up your CPA. Google also aims to serve ads to as many searchers as possible. As it runs out of available matches, it populates ads under increasingly irrelevant searches. These don\u2019t typically translate into patient bookings, further driving up the cost of acquiring a new patient.<\/span><\/p>\n

(<\/span>Learn how<\/span><\/a> a large provider group uses Zocdoc, in addition to search engine marketing, to keep up with its rapid growth.)<\/span><\/p>\n

At a certain point, spending more comes with higher marginal costs and decaying efficiency. To achieve significant growth after that, you need to explore additional sources of patients. At Zocdoc, this is where we usually meet our clients: as a complement to existing marketing efforts.<\/span><\/p>\n

Reach out to our enterprise sales representatives to learn more about <\/span>how Zocdoc can grow your business<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Whether it\u2019s thanks to clinical interest, business savvy or both, dentists are well positioned for industry growth. By 2040, analysts expect a surplus of dentists \u2014 and when supply increases in a market, competition can too. Search engine marketing (SEM) campaigns are key to helping dental groups acquire patients. Nationally, dental care is one of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":17761,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[112],"tags":[18,122],"class_list":["post-17760","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-marketing-guides","tag-dentist","tag-specialist"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n6 SEM Tips for Dental Groups - Practice Resources<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Here are some quick tips that can help dentists succeed at search engine marketing.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.zocdoc.com\/resources\/blog\/article\/6-sem-tips-for-dental-groups\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"6 SEM Tips for Dental Groups - 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