How to Use Testimonials as Part of your Dental Marketing Strategy
Patient testimonials are a powerful marketing tool, particularly in the dental world, to show potential new patients how much your current patients love your services and dental practice. Even though Valentine's Day has been and gone, doesn't mean love can't still be in the air!
What is a testimonial?
According to the official definition by Merriam-Webster, a testimonial is a statement testifying to benefits received, a character reference, or a letter of recommendation.
In the dental world, this would be a quote from a patient, recommending you, your services, and your practice to others on your website.
Why are testimonials important for your marketing strategy?
Testimonials are a form of free advertising by using social proof (when positive evidence from other people cause people to follow in the same action). Social proof is a powerful tool in marketing as it doesn’t always matter how amazing you say your own service is, people tend to find what a third party says about you more trustworthy.
Northwestern University found that having a testimonial alongside service offerings increase conversion by up to 380%.
What’s the difference between a testimonial and a review?
A testimonial is a customer review that you gather yourself and put on your website, while a customer review is usually on a third-party website. You can learn more about reputation management here.
How to get testimonials for your website?
Ask for them! When patients gush about the service and results of their treatment at your dental practice, take that moment to ask them if they’d provide a testimonial. Many happy patients will be honored and delighted to be asked.
Search for them! Some patients may have written something positive about their experience on your social media, via email, or a past review — ask them if you can use that on your website!
Provide them! Patients are as busy as you are, so to gather testimonials, you can make it easy for them by making some suggestions that they can approve.
No matter how you get the testimonial, make sure you have your patient agree to it and for privacy, check with them that you can use their full name, otherwise you can use their first name and the first letter of their last name.
What makes a good testimonial?
It’s a good idea to look at your overall marketing objectives and identify the unique selling propositions (USPs) of your practice that set you apart from the competition. This way you can ask your patients to focus on one of the objectives so the testimonials don’t overlap and each highlight a key feature of your business.
People’s time is limited, so as with all your marketing messages, it’s important to keep the testimonials short and to the point.
If you post your website testimonials in a carousel format, it’s important to make sure the timing is sufficient for people to read it before it moves to the next one.
Are there other types of testimonials?
Absolutely! Video testimonials can be extremely effective and very easy to develop these days on your smartphone. Make sure you have good lighting and there’s limited background noise. Have your patient stand facing a window (the person recording should have their back to the window).
This can then be uploaded to your site. If you have a stand-out testimonial it may be worth investing in a more slick video, say for a full mouth reconstruction or makeover.
How many testimonials should I have on my website?
It’s most effective to have the most impactful 1-2 testimonials showcased on your home page and link to a testimonial landing page to host additional testimonials.
Where Can I use Patient Testimonials?
Patient testimonials usually live on your website, however, you could also ask your patient if they would add the testimonial to your third-party pages like Google and ZocDoc.
Denteo Marketing Group specializes in reputation management and creating impactful market strategies and websites, including managing the testimonial process, for dental professionals in the Northern Virginia and DC Metro area. Please get in touch if you’d like to learn more about our services and how we can help show your business some love — all year round.
Commentaires