LinkedIn Question: Feel that businesses should care more of the person, less of their wallet?

LinkedIn Group Question:

Do you feel that businesses should care more about the person, and less about their wallet? http://t.co/6yt0p12d5n
— That Guy You Know (@TGYKCCR) September 5, 2013

Do you feel that businesses should care more about the person, and less about their wallet?
-- Same question tweeted by @TGYKCCR

My Answer, Comment...

Depending on who this question is addressed to: the consumer or the employee, there are various ways to come at this, which include...

As to the consumer, a long term focus is often the best way to approach a business endeavor. Obviously, some concepts like gold mining may have a short life expectancy. Otherwise, if the focus is weighted toward the wallet, the future opportunities can be, and I think often are, missed. In that case the business is pushed toward even more "immediate gains" that will engender abuses on a greater scale. This "wallet weighting" has a tendency to work against the community as a whole, generating more gouge and flight to other areas endeavors, to find more suckers.

Of course, not all businesses that focus too much on the wallet go as far as to do "bad" things, but broad ethics relativity comes into play where will be promulgated a justification of a mushy business model, eyes-averting entrepreneurialism, and "quasi-capitalism".

As to the employee, once the owner/corporation believes it should/must hold all the cards, the likelihood of deriving new life from the company over time is very often eliminated, even if the "main profit ideas" come from the owner/corp. The owner/corp only has a certain amount of life without making the "person" a vital element of the everyday thought process, which creates a true well run company, and then sustains it.

A give, and less take, strategy will outperform the opposite. This does not suggest any "giving away" of "excess funds" but of consistent and persistence of educating for success/believing in the success of the employee within the company. While this is difficult in practice, and the "perks" are constantly undulating in the marketplace, the rewards for developing a good planning structure (no one plan may work forever) is significant, and generates wider and more stable success. If the owner is out for him/herself, it is very likely the employee will be as well. A gambler can lose all, then win big, and pull all the chips their way, but a business owner does not put employees on his/her personal roller coaster of "me first, 2nd and 3rd" and find continued success.

My shorter tweeted Answer, from a Twitter account, TownAndChamber

@TGYKCCR trope "I'm used to seeing/hearing"=an owner should/must/does hold all cards. However, when actually the case= a biz destined 2fail.
— Towns And Chambers (@TownAndChamber) September 5, 2013

Sincerely, Richard The Chwalek

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• Dental Communications and Marketing Consultant
• Northern Dental Alliance Member/Co-Founder

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MN Angie's List Rep Meeting Turns Toward VALUE Dentistry Marketing Discussion

EMAIL Online@NicheDental.com for Unique Social Media Option!

Last Friday (10/19/12) I had a good meeting with Spencer H. a representative of Angie's List in Twin Cities, MN. We discussed dentistry, advertising for dentists, and the group I co-founded with Rick Epple, Northern Dental Alliance, and many other topics. The most vital issue that came up was my concept of the high value dental consumer.

The 'high value' dentistry consumer approach focuses on the value someone puts on dental care versus marketing strategies that are more concentrated on demographic like the consumer's income or other financial demos and in the dental industry more specifically, how marketers tend to focus on perception and use of dental insurance. These elements are not dismissed in 'value dentistry' but are secondary, in a lower parallel placement as to the higher objective of building value.

Some consumers may spend 'a lot of money' on other items, such as a car, lake home and significant jewelry purchases. Many consumers' smaller value choices can also add up to what it would cost to 'access' the level of dental care they may need, beyond the basics, like a cleaning, solving a pain issue or once in a year or three for emergency dentistry treatment.

Instead the consumer forgoes any dentistry (or for long periods of time), which causes future deterioration to be more extensive. Having 1% of the population change their habits, move ahead decisions weeks, months or years, can be beneficial to the patient, dentist and even public health.

Value actually excludes very few people. (SEE NicheDental.com home page for pertinent stats.) While those not able to pay for any dentistry because they are barely getting by overall, do need a destination for their care, too many people, who do not have good dental health, could do more, if not much more.

By transferring their value perspective (then funds) to a better oral health place, dental consumers would save money in the long run, and/or avoid other health problems, embarrassment and all the issues from tooth loss. In addition, the statistics show an increased mortality risk for those with dental disease.

Therefore I see the data adding up to the availability of a pool of dental consumers who are on a fence (from fear, bad experience), or slightly below a sight line to understand the advances (and/or value of them). These advances include such treatments as dental implants, smile makeover veneers, removable clear braces, sedation dentistry and more effective ways to control periodontal disease, and eliminate its most harmful elements.

Giving these wary, and out-of-sight-line, consumers a comforting word or a step up to understanding value with Connective Communication© - a platform of marketing entities, vehicles, destinations is paramount. Each strategy has its specific effect on the movement towards advanced dentistry value appreciation.

• Direct mail postcards are tactilely effective promotion, getting in front of heads of households, like no other marketing. 

• External obvious elements like billboards or OOH media of some kind stay in front of the consumer more continually. 

• Then online advertising like Angie's List, Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and the other hot Internet properties, are able to provide a health boost for patients and revenue enhancer for dentists.

EMAIL Online@NicheDental.com for a Unique Social Media Option!

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT SOCIAL MEDIA FOR DENTISTS $50/Month!

Sincerely, Dick Chwalek

• NicheDental.com

Also on NicheDentalCollaborate.com

PHONE 1-866-453-1026

Dental Logos or Dentists Brands: What Concept Should Be Focused On?

Practice owner dentists have two goals: serving their patients and making money. Dentists not making money will not be able to serve patients. Everything stops without proper cash flow.

Dental logos, no matter how artistically pleasing,are not cash machines. Dental branding on the other hand can be your PIN password to success.

Dentists, have you asked yourself this question: Are logos really needed for my practice? Actually, no dental office needs a logo.

However,  every business needs a brand.
Strategic dental branding helps the consumer make faster, more accurate decisions:

• Is this the dental office that I should consider?
• How should I think about the dentist's expertise and services?
• Are the dental office's fees commensurate with the service, and treatment value provided?

Yes, some dental practices can build brands with heavy lifting, sweat equity, and elbow grease. Others locate in an area with economy on cruise control (growing, upscale, many families). Then, you also have the dentist as selling machine.

What about the dentist that lacks oodles of time, long community standing, and/or sales prowess?

• The Economy has hit the dentist hard, compared to other dentists
• Dentists who have built their practice with referrals, but referrals are dwindling.
• They change their dental treatment approach, and patients are not accepting this strategy.
• Revenues have slowed and the practice realizes this is real, not a fluke.
• The area has changed, and patients have different expectations, and other options (new dentist competitors).
• It is a startup dental practice, and many things have to go right to be successful.
• Finally, the area has some cruise control elements, but dental consumers are unaware of YOU!

How Can You Get Things To Move In Your Direction?

• Do some advertising in the local newspaper?
• Send direct mail dental postcards?
• Improve your dental team?
• Relocate or remodel your dental practice?
• Lower your fees? Offer half off smile whitening?
• Run PPC Online Advertising or SEO to your dental website?
• Add new advanced technology, cosmetic (botox) services and promote them?
• Develop a new dental logo?

The answer to these dental marketing questions are yes and maybe no. Here are some ideas to give you a way forward.

FIRST, Do Something Consistent And Unique

Doing something consistent is vital, but which ones and why do them? You figure this out by determining what your dental brand is. To many people and dentists, branding sounds like pure marketing consultant hokum.

Sadly, it often is. Not because there is no value in dental branding, but because few dentists develop their brand adequately, using rationale data and appropriate examination of their dental practice development goals.

Many companies disappear before most of us know who they are because of a weak idea. Other “great” marketing ideas have a short lifespan: the pet rock or petfood Dot Come, my pet examples. Then there are companies like Wells Fargo and Microsoft with brands that were built over time rather than through a "branding process".

Dental practices usually fall somewhere in the middle of the previous brand building examples. Waiting 5 years to build their dental brand is an eternity for some dentists. Most dentist brands also  don’t outlive the first dentist who develops it.

Many dental practices start up much like a new family owned restaurant. They have good food (clinical skills), a nice interior presentation, and excited people ready to serve. They can thrive for a while on this energy and with a healthy referral base. "Come to my dentist - she just opened a practice and is looking for new patients. She is very friendly and gentle." 

A few years later the schedule is full and “accepting” new patients are less of an issue. Maybe the dental practice is on cruise control on the wrong road and does not know it. Besides the economy hitting a wall, there also things like the community changing – younger competitors shake things up and newer suburbs pull people away.

Dental treatments, techniques, and strategies evolve. These complex concepts become a harder sell or just bewildering to present in a cohesive way. Financing and dental insurance add more issues and complexity to the relationship.

New dental patient referrals start diminishing. And face-to-face referrals often cannot provide the right mix of “education” to move consumers up the ladder to higher-level dentistry.

Patients still thinks the dentist is very nice, but $12,000 for a restorative or cosmetic case requires more than nice. Patients and other local consumers start seeing other dentists marketing and begin thinking the competitor has something their dentist does not have.

As dentists figure out how they will garner your portion of these dental patients, others are stumbling onto to these consumers by just doing something. These dentists slap together dental logos, ads, PPC advertising, SEO keyword content, DVDs, mailers and dental websites, Facebook, Twitter...

With shear force of doing something (and often being the first to do it), these doing something dentists find some success.

While dentists like you could jump into this fray with your own something here, something there dental marketing campaign (or possibly you already have) you stop short and say to yourself: "This is not for me. There should be a way I can have success, but still present the image I want." This is where dental branding is required!

Rather than "advertising" and hawking your dental wares, you want to communicate a different level of dental value and expertise. Your dental brand could be an upscale image or just an upgrade in expectations and results. An effective brand cannot be pulled from the shelf.

Make It Happen With Dynamic Dental Branding!

• It’s an approach with more depth than artwork alone (a dental logo)
• Determines who you should be (moving beyond the generic dentist concept)
• Refines your image so you speak directly and efficiently to your target patients
• Provides an effective background story to build memorable and genuine rapport

Communicating relevant aspects of who you are (your dental brand) helps consumers make quicker decisions about "what to do" as your patient. It prompts or cues dental patients to more easily accept what you emphasize.

Example of A Common Consumer Experience 

Coffee is an intrinsic part of the consumer culture. Service stations give it away with a fill up. Some restaurants give free coffee refills. It can be sold as a loss leader to get you to buy a meal. Now with one word, I will get many of you to pay $3.99 for one cup a joe: Starbucks! What does coffee have to do with dentistry or dental marketing?

Well, too many consumers think of dentistry healthcare’s loss leader. If the patient gets it with a fill up (it's covered by their dental insurance) they will consider it. When done properly, dental branding changes this dynamic and puts dentistry higher up on the priority ladder.

Yes, not every consumer will reprioritize his/her dentistry budget because of marketing. No matter what Starbucks does to their coffee, I won’t pay $3.99--because I do not like coffee. But Starbucks is focused more on the “coffee group” than me. They have defined their audience and are mining that vein. Targeting me is a waste of their time.

Furthermore, brands cue consumers on what to do, believe in, and ask for. Rather than a restaurant that sells generic coffee you become a coffee spa. Dentists like you need to refine who you are.
Otherwise it will be difficult to make "your latte´" seem more valuable than people currently perceive it (and possibly have a higher price) if you are promoting a large menu of other choices.

This is more than becoming a cosmetic dentist, which is still a generic concept and misunderstood at the same time. Good dental branding is about the dentist, their passion and how the dentist wants to serve patients.

When targeted dental consumers (desired patients) are presented the dentist's brand, they will relate to it. If a dentist's audience sees another dentist doing the same thing, they will be grounded to the branded dentist because they will have self-selected the brand, not just stumbled into any dental office.

How does brand loyalty play out in the real world? Example: Few Starbucks' clientele are ever seen at McDonalds (or any other less refined competitor) getting their coffee.

While no dentist has the funds of a marketing behemoth like Starbucks, there are many strategies to develop and build your dental brand to make it standout. Most established practices only need 5 to 10 new "targeted" patients each month to be successful and new dental practices can develop a stronger following by going this route. A correctly positioned brand is able to "find" those new dental patients and draw them in.

So, do dentists like you NEED a dental logo or a dentistry brand? Not every dental practice does. Some dentists just plow ahead and get it done on their own terms.

However if I ask, "What is Nike's logo and what do you think when you see it?" Then you understand how a logo can change the dynamic of your dental marketing.

Dental logos makes communication visual, adding another dimension. Humans experience many things visually. It makes learning simpler. It gives us quick cues about our world. Colors, shapes, and the like speak to us emotionally, which is very powerful.

CONCLUSION: Still Don't Want A Dental Logo?

Still thinking dentists don’t need logos? First, it is your prerogative. Of course, many dentists tell me a person's smile can say a lot about them. My response, "And no one NEEDS a 'beautiful' smile! Do they?" So is visual experience important or not?

The logo is the "beautiful" on a dentist's marketing. Like bright, confident smiles, dental logos might not be "needed" but can be very persuasive at speaking in a way nothing else can. The dental logo also helps to integrate a dentist's marketing materials and message.

If the dentist's logo is designed to fit their dental brand, then it will be distinct enough to separate the dentist from the smiling teeth logos, generic toothbrush dentistry brands and other wannabes.

A dentistry brand is many things: the dentist, their dental team, and the practice environment. It is the patients wanted by the dentist. It is the community. It is people centered, not dental focused. And, it should have a complementary dental logo.

Don't get a wannabee dental logo, get a dental brand.

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For the depth and experience in dental branding, 

Contact Niche Dental - Email or

CALL Oli 1-888.380.0020 
Have him set up a consultation with me 
 
Dental Marketing Commentary by Dick Chwalek 
Dental Communication Integration Consultant

• Developer of Connective Communication©
• Twitter.com/NicheDental
• Facebook.com/NicheDental

And Member, co-founder Northern Dental Alliance

• Review Niche Dental Client Testimonials
Also Posted on Niche Dental Logos Branding Blogspot.

 Original Dental Logos or Branding Article
Another Dental Branding Logos for Dentists Article

Still Finding A Way Into Homes, Hands, Minds: Dental Postcards

ExpressDM.com, NDC and NicheDental.com

The strategic value of online advertising platforms, social websites, Facebook, Google, SEO, PPC, Twitter, blogging, and the newest concept I probably have forgotten, cannot be denied.

Yet a tangible level of denial is in the ether in significant ways. It's the denial of what is still working.

As a promoter of dental postcards (NicheDental.com and NicheDentalCollaborate.com) for a seller of postcards for dentists' offices (ExpressDentalMarketing.com) dentists can assume as much conflict of interest as they want about my position. But if dentists can deal with that weight of potential perspective diminution, I will proceed with my goal of completely ending direct mail value denial!

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(ASIDE:) Since I am very cynical of over-hyped promotional techniques, dentists reading my work may notice statements such as the last sentence, which denotes elements of the ilk. I do this to display how unlikely over-hyped messages can quickly die on the vine or backfire, either in the near or long term.

If that line of hype I used doesn't work on most dentists reading this blog, and actually turns those dentists off, then you/dentists may get my drift. If you don't like it, then consumers don't like it.

Even though over-hyping 'might work' for various other selling ventures, in dentistry it too often builds on the old, negative stereotypes. Worse yet, it can put the dental profession at risk of media over simplification of the complexities of various treatments (causing problematic patient expectations) or conflating every dentist with what a small percentage may do or have done incorrectly.

Dentists, and dental office owners, should avoid going in this direction, and commit to finding real solutions. Be wary of dental marketing simplification of how results are achieved or over-hyped dentistry promotional gimmicks. 

As to this dental marketing consulting blog post, dentists need to fend off the tendency everyone has to deny the realities of how communication actually works, especially when new technology seems to supersede them merely as a new trend - supposedly everyone is now wedded to - and have shed all other marketing vehicles.
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VIRTUAL TECHNOLOGY REALITY BLOW BACK

www.ExpressDentalMarketing.com

So dentists and the rest of us are excited about the new online marketing technology. Of course, this would only be dentists doing, or wanting to do, public communication of their dental services. Yet, for all the excitement, these ideas unfortunately have their blow back.

The blow back is the relinquishing of reality. Or at least the virtual reality of relinquishing reality. Besides those semantics, my word antics and less than academic pun-dantics, the Internet is still about humans beings and less about Neo and the Matrix.

And yes, there is also the likelihood that any new technology is fraught with the value of getting in too soon with those so-called early adopters. This means dentists, and dental office personnel must take into account how many actual potential patients will be available on any one, new online marketing platform.

Twitter.com for example is less about numbers than it is about advocating for specific causes, news and product promotion, and a fun, unique way to communicate. While there is still value in the Twitter platform for dentists, it just does not have the volume of participation and awareness (by the 'general' public) that some more traditional marketing media still has.

That gets this dentistry marketing consultant to the concept of dental postcards, and how they are perceived by dentists, and dental office staff (sometimes the marketing decision makers) as well as the general public. Denial of the value direct mail has in the public mind, is quite a bit of urban mystical history, and most of it anecdotal, which ironically is very powerful, and extremely hard to overcome in general.

Maybe dentists or other readers noticed how I just gave away the colonel, or actually the kernel idea of what is missed by most consumers, and dentists, as to how direct mailers work their magical reality. It is the major point I want to get across. Again, what I should say, it is the general point. Basically, general is the point persona in this war on reality denial. General is not the individual consumer.

Communication is never a general force, it has a mind numbing singularity of purpose. Just as most people have an anecdotal generalized understanding of marketing, marketing has an equal but opposite individualized effect. Marketing is only effectual when it works, it only works when there is someone ready to accept the effect.

This concept of individualized effect is so real and significant when personalized, but counter-intuitive and not relevant in the aggregate public mind. As a public and as dentists, we make say things like: "I hate getting postcards. It just piles of paper. Why do them dastardly mailing people send me all this stuff?" And then the categorical killer, "It's all just junk mail!"

While this relieves some tension in our lives, like a Zen moment tinged with some corporal punishment of marketers, the tension is a symptom of our need to get/see something we want.

What if it was a postcard was sent to us with Ed McMahon saying he would be visiting soon to hand us a $10 million check from Publisher's Clearinghouse of Lots of Paper Filled Envelopes? Besides being creeped out, and wondering if seances were surreal, that notification of winner-hood postcard would be like the 2nd humming of Dean Martin. You would sing out, That's Amore´ at the first sight of that postcard in your mailbox! Right?

PROOF of Real LIFE Story To Make Postcard Point

TRUE tale, virtually written: As I am writing this marketing mumble and mutter of all blogs, the phone rings. To be clear it was my land-line. Yes, I still have one, which proves my point above about how holding onto technology varies.

Anyway, the call was from a marketer! Damn them @#4#@432! Don't they know I am trying to work. Oops... I should be on their side.

No, actually I don't need to be on their side right now. Being a father of two teenagers, I am used to being hypocritical when I need to take a parental stand. For those dentists or others now leaving this blog after putting up with my conflict interest, thinking being hypocritical is the last straw...

Please hold on till you find out how many free gifts you will get with each Ginsu Knife Set purchased. Actually, everyone, whether they buy something or not, will get a chance to chat live with Ed McMahon after the blog sign off.

Of course, only you will be live, unless I've lost you with my hummer back there. (Remember Dean?) Again, that should have been humor not hummer. But obviously, it was not. :-)

So I take the marketer's call. What is she selling? Broken windows fixing.

Thinking it was an important call for my teenager, from a number I did not recognize, I was perturbed about wasting my time answering this call. However, the marketer said something that kept me from lambasting, chiding and assailing her for bothering me.

I am kidding, of course. No, for real. Remember, I have two teenagers so I have learned to control my anger. Okay, that's is a lie. But I wanted to present an air of perfection, stability and rigidness of virtue.

Now that I also lie, as well as not perfect, many readers may have lost faith in me. But again, as a father of two teenagers, I am hoping at least the pitiful sympathy you have toward me will staunch your dismay for a short while longer. 

What did the marketer say that stopped me from being so angry about the Junk Calls I am always getting? She said, "Have you had any trouble with windows since the last time we serviced your vehicle?" Darn! I used their service. How can I react negatively at them/her, now?

Yes, I have had a tough day is a good reason, but I kick my wet frog to deal with those issues. (Again that should have been pet dog, but my dog bites so I am afraid of her. And it is embarrassing to explain publicly, so I lying once more was the only option.)

Having used their fixing chipped or cracked windows service, I am trapped in a world of my personalized, individualized, singularity sized making, forsaking, confidence in my ability to lash out shaking. Therefore, I actually truly fully needed of their service the last time I got one of their dam... friendly question calls. Irony or ironies, their bothering of me was beneficial for both sides of the equation. Almighty Bruce Dern! My ability to foil them, spoiled again!

Yet, they need to call me regularly to 'catch me' at the right time. This despicable plan is paradoxically aggravating with disturbingly helpful results. Chipped and cracked windshields be Hoover Dammed! Vacuumed up like dust in the bin!

Okay, I need marketers (cursed as they are calling all the time). Similar to being a parent of teenagers. I love them more than life itself, but why do they need to be texting friends all the time... and how many years before they leave for college?

This paradox lives on in dental postcards and other direct mail marketing (unlike Ed). Anecdotal 'data' developed by dentists, dental team members and the public centers on direct mail being a nuisance. It sometimes even seems like some in the dental field have a visceral hatred for postal worker unions, or maybe it is philatelist collectivist community. The conflict of interest stamp lick curs conspiracy of it all!

First of all, calm down. Lick a toad if you get frustrated, and need to tongue lash out. Again, I meant to write, kick a wet frog (hint: frogs have no teeth, won't bite back).

All this rambling has a point to it. The point is that dentists can't virtually deny the reality of dental postcard mailings by merely pointing toward online advertising as having superseded the value and communication punch this 'traditional technology' still provides.

As I stomp around, demanding dentists avoid this, "because I said so!" there are other reasons as well... I am now stalling until those reasons come to me. But dentists can be assured I will take delivery of those answers soon.

Whew. Hi, Mr. McFeeley. Thanks for getting here just in time-delivery, as they say.  Say hello to Mr. Roy  for me. Oh, I didn't know he hangs out with Ed now. Learn something new everyday. Happy trails to you to.

Speaking of learning something. Knew I would use that phrase here, didn't you? Well, how about this:

When someone needs dentistry, let's say they have a chipped or crack tooth, don't you think getting a postcard might stand out for them, have a lot of value to them in that one individual instance, and not be a nuisance? Even though every other day your prospective dental patient might bemoan it, each want what they want when they want it.

Until you have a web cam on every consumer* sending out postcards consistently to promote your dental care services is the best way to tactically engage consumers who are geographically and demographically most likely to choose your dentistry office.

(*The technology is available now - just prohibitively expensive. As soon as DARPA and Homeland Security sells every-home-reverse-webcam technology to Google for mass exploitation and intrusion, I will send out a postcard to verify it for you. As Bill Maher would, say "I just kid you Google".)

CONCLUSIVE SOLUTION

Dental Postcards Marketing

There all you dentists go. Problem solved!

Some lies, truths, conflicts, sour pun mints, kicks and tales may have gotten in our way, but as everyone can now see, each and every living dentist, consumer and Star Search MC have all come to see my way about the value of direct mail, postcards marketing. Denial has been abolished and life can now go on in a more favorable way.

Yes, Ed will not join us in this, but I still have my $10 million envelope, and feel lucky today, punk'd.  Have I been? :-)

PS: Truth is stranger than my fictional elements. Postcards work! I do not kid you about that.

FOR the Real Truth to Success:

Contact Oli,

Niche Dental Co-Consultant, Strategic Partner from Fallbrook, CA.

1+888.380.0020 • EMAIL Oliver (Oli) Gonsalves

Also posted on Dental Postcards Marketing blogspot.

Written, Edited, Posted by,

Dick Chwalek
www.NicheDental.com

• Co-Creator of ExpressDentalMarketing.com with Oli Gonsalves
• Developer of Connective Communication©

 

Dick Chwalek is a member, co-founder of NorthernDentalAlliance.com

• Twitter.com/NicheDental
• Facebook.com/NicheDental
• NicheDentalCollaborate.com

Dental Consultant's Blogging Using Wink-Nudge Effect from NDC: Do Direct-Mail Postcards Work Today?

For Consistent Success: Call 1+888.380.0020

NDC, virtually but not literally based at NicheDentalCollaborate.com, provides a platform for various 'strategic partners' of mine at Niche Dental (NicheDental.com) in developing and providing comprehensive solution oriented value to dentists, dental offices and other dentistry professionals.

At the virtual-reality site hosted by NDC, I, Dick Chwalek, will provide at various times, blogs that are somewhat more impulsive, ironic and idiosyncratic.

WARNING:  Below you will find one of those blog entries, the type noted above (i, i and i). Please get parental approvable before excusing yourself from reading this blog in its entirety. The BRB (BLOG RATINGS BUREAU) demands your attention to this item. As a pre-cautionary tale, precognitive suggestion and incoherent reminder: Looking away, avoiding this responsibility or using your freewill has many figurative, unintelligible and illusory consequences.

Dentists: Do Direct-Mail Postcards Work Today?

With online advertising, such as Facebook, Twitter, dental blogs, Google Plus and many others, many, even most dentists might think direct mail, or specifically dental postcards have lost their value. Maybe those dentists figure mailings will drop lower each day as more and more types of Internet-based marketing are added to the communication quiver.

Yes, this assumption by online marketers of print marketing supplantation and gone bye-bye postal annihilation is correct. You got me. I give up. What was I thinking, merely promoting a product I make a profit from?

What I actually mean, is NOT!

Well, first: Accusing me, the gentle soul of marketing, of a conflict of interest is very interesting at least, and usually something I take personally, and as a threat to my ethics. But today I will let it slide. Just stand aside, and no one will be alarmed by my not so thick skin.

Moving beyond my damaged image and hurt feelings, I object to your/online marketer incorrect assertions that suggest some kind of mailer/printer marketing apocalypse has occurred. Online marketers, while not totally swallowed up by their own swirling swimming pool of conflicting interests, do have some mottled enamel in the game.

Pi = 3.14+ =  Three Main Elements of Connective Communication©

These online marketer philatelist hating fanatics push what might be called (and actually called by me) a self fulfilling prophecy of off-line, printed postage paid dental postcards gone poof positive, which is patently puffed up and pitifully proposed, yet potently promulgated!

Yet, as a dentistry communication specialist, I harrumph at the insolence of these dental marketers! (I am also a dental marketing consultant for online and off, but only when it suits my needs. Or in this case, when it separates me from the chaff, I want to be separated from to look better than others but not make me look purposely pompous.)

So what's this online versus off line (mailing/print type) marketing harrumph all about? Do I have a case against its accusation that postcards are not working for dentist offices impudence? I do! I do have a case!

In short, here is my recalcitrant rebuttal:

Dental postcards work! Just because! That's that!

~~ Sadly that doesn't even work with my two teenagers, but if you're a parent, it's worth a try after a long day at work.

Therefore, I will run through my list of why dental postcards work, which is the more professional way to run a marketing firm. As every other marketing firm will explain it online, here are the TOP FIVE REASONS yada. yada... Isn't that the way we do it?

Well, sorry to disappoint you. I only have time for the TOP THREE REASONS:



Why Dental Postcards will help dentists attract more patients, and 'reactivate' the current patients.

• #1 Postcards work!
• #2 Because they do!
• #3 Because I said so!

 ~ Remember I'm a dental marketing consultant. Oops. I meant to say, I'm a communication... special person. Specialty case. Special, because my mom said so. So there!

While this type of blogging is mostly a frustrating experience for the reader (even for me most days), it shows the persistence I have for demonstrating to dentists that just because someone said so, does not mean it's so. So when you dentists hear some online marketer –– yada, yada, yada –– don't open wide and swallow.

NOTE: Effective communication is not about cornering the market in one type of 'technology' or keeping up with the latest cool thing, it's about what actually works.

Connective Communication© - something I developed* - there was no such thing as Communication before I came along, I threw in Connective 'just because' it creates an alliteration. Yet, this original Communication idea I think I developed first, provides all the elements of what works.

• Improving: making everything better (as dentists are able, which includes case acceptance, dental websites, branding/logos)
• Gathering: new patients (includes online) these are the consumers already looking
• Creating: Making Value Important, Activating consumers, reactivating current patients

I guess, the ones above are my THREE, which actually form my Connective Communication© Approach. But don't think of it from a marketing stuff perspective, think instead of building a systematic matrix of what works.

For example in the world of dentistry, fluoride is an amazing 'technology' that is available in two basic forms. Fluoride is found naturally in wells and underground aquifers or through public water systems, drinking fountains and such.

However, as much great work as it does, too much of it will cause teeth to turn brown or what those experts call fluorosis**. So don't let online cool-ade-high-tech drunkenness turn your marketing all yucky.

Feed the need of all 'elements' of communication to get what fills your coffers but is also quite shy of greed.

For More Information, here is my Connective Communication© Case Study, it has videos, client examples, testimonials, and more.

Call Oli Gonsalves of The Other Office/Express Dental Marketing

• 1+888.380.0020 

To develop your postcard campaign or to set up 15 to 30 minute complimentary consult with me (Dick Chwalek).

Blog Written, Posted by

Dick Chwalek
NicheDental.com
~ Dentistry Communication Specialist
~ Dental Marketing Consultant

Dick is also a co-founder and
member of the Northern Dental Alliance.

Where first was published:
Direct Mail Postcards Dental Marketing blog.

*Truth be told, I was not the person who came up with the concept/word Communication. It was my great great great...

**(Please, no fluoridation-is-dangerous comments. I work with big pharma, and am guided by blue helmeted govt types, so I am not interested in and weary of fluoride conspiracy leeries or queries.)

Deteriorated Dental Office Brands

> Invigorating Referrals & Refreshing New Patient Numbers

Dental brands can become stagnant and then deteriorate very quickly, depending on the conditional of the local and national economic environment and strength of the practice structure and management. Generally, within five to seven years many elements can begin to go spread apart and lose their strength without a focused reenergizing effort.

A dental brand includes the office location, facility décor and layout, dentist expertise, team presentation, practice mission, advertising statements and of course, logo design and the look of other marketing materials. Some dental brand elements will have a much longer life and other brands become outdated even before Google can rank it.

Does your dental practice brand have the strength to thrive?

Weak & Confusing Dental Brands

• Employing generic marketing when dentists want to emphasize high value dental services
• Advertising convenience and speed while expecting consumers to pay a high quality treatment fee
• Promoting cosmetic dentistry without the look and feel of artistry within practice brand elements and office design
• Building awareness of implant dentistry expertise while simultaneously focusing a lot on free and discounted dental services

Dental office brand inconsistencies mean your patients and consumers come in with hard to manage expectations.

Deteriorating & Stagnant Dental Brands

• Dentists with significant expertise who have little high value public exposure
• Referrals built solely on simplistic brand knowledge and expressions such as “friendly and nice”
• Dental offices where comfort is not an obvious focus in the treatment, setting and team demeanor
• Marketing focused on services, NOT on people and the overall value of advanced, lifelike dentistry

When a dental brand becomes stagnant and too internally focused (about what the dentist is comfortable with), patients start to look elsewhere. Simply being nice and friendly just won’t cut it anymore.

Dental Office Brand Identity

Brand is closely tied with image. A stronger dental brand can take the office image to a higher level. Dentists with exceptional credentials and a well-honed brand are an infinitely more cohesive entity. An expert can't stop adding new techniques and knowledge and a brand can't rely on one element to survive long term. Many dental office brands rely on one or two things: location/expertise, facility/high-tech or great team/superb service. These branding attempts can only cover so much ground on their own.

New dental patients are attracted because of many branding efforts. Relying on one or two elements like location and referrals means gaps in new patient development will appear. Branding is communication; communication is everything for a dental practice. Oral health, dentistry expertise, and preventive dental care compliance all need communication to make them viable within a consumer society, and ultimately, perceived as vital to each individual.

Marketing dental expertise is complicated. To be successful advocating your high value dentistry services, the complexity needs to be skillfully explained and succinctly understood. This is difficult to do when current and prospective patients are being influenced and distracted by other branding efforts that appeal to them at more basic and emotional levels from ‘free whitening’ and ‘covered by my dental insurance’ to ‘mercury fillings’ and ‘dentist visit fear.’

Marketing a full line of dental care services that are always changing and often misunderstood is problematic. This garble of clinical terms intermixed with always evolving marketing techniques adds to the confusion, which disconnects the consumer from understanding the value your dentistry expertise makes possible. A relevant and concise brand sets your dental office apart from dentist competitors selling those same services as well as other consumer services, which will end up taking precedence when dentistry is missing from public discourse.

Standing out from the generic dentist crowd has a lasting impact. Providing brand name dental services like Lumineers, Invisalign, CEREC One-visit Crowns can be helpful initially. But when every other dentist is advertising the same way, you begin to blend in again. Rather than being the “brand named” cosmetic dentistry veneers artist, invisible braces/orthodontic expert, or high-tech crown restorative dentist, develop an image that is bigger and more exclusive than a service you provide that every other dentist does. A unified and distinctive practice-branding strategy can tie together these other elements and create a focal point for your dental advertising and value educative messages.

Visual Brand Icon: Dental Logos Design

Combining a unique dental logo, cohesively designed package of materials, a congruent image with a consistent salvo of ongoing refreshed re-branding strategies can prevent your dentistry brand from going on life support.

Dental brands such as ‘drill, fill and bill’, ‘dentistry has little value’ and ‘only if insurance covers it’ survive in the minds of patients because most dental offices have similar images or generic marketing strategies. Therefore, dentistry mostly attracts one segment of the larger consumer audience - those who have tooth loss, those in pain, the insurance patient and the (non-fearful) health conscious.

Some of these consumers are desirable, but won't change their current perspective without a different message; many others are not likely to ever connect without an enhanced brand identity being presented. A unique brand that incorporates pleasant images (no dental chair mouth mining), relaxing actual patient renewed smiles (not fear producing metal probes) comfort creating service strategies like sedation dentistry (avoiding the perception that tooth pulling is the goal) as well as advanced technology for a more rewarding experience and smile makeover result has substantial potential to change perspectives and lives.

Comprehensive dental branding will bring more people from the yesteryear of bad dental visit memories to the present day ‘brand’ of total oral health with the dental ‘logo’ of exceptional value and oft spoken ‘tagline’ of painless treatment and pain free living. Effective dental branding is about high value not high cost, great service not great expense, and lifelike results not lifeless quality.

Brands focused on rejuvenated oral health and stunning smile makeovers present the public with a reason to rethink their current value system and move beyond the generic concepts of fix and maintain into the realm optimal and exceptional. Whether dental branding makes sense to you or not, many of your patients and much of the general public need an assertive and refreshing message to move in the right direction quickly enough to preserve their oral health and in many too many cases save their smiles.

Conclusion: Refreshing Dental Practice Brands

Sitting on the sidelines means more people missing out on your dental expertise and smile makeover artistry, which is a losing position for everyone. Patients lose teeth. Dentists like you miss out on revenues. Public dental health continues its supreme reign as the ultimate king of loss leaders.

Take your dental practice to a higher plane of dentistry communication. Get properly branded.

Dental Marketing Commentary by Dick Chwalek

Niche Dental President

Dental Marketing Coaching & Dentistry Communication Consulting

For Dental Brands, Logos, Websites, and Online Services contact The Peripheral Vision

Dentists Sap Their Value When Following The Sameness Stampede

There are TWO ways to approach dental marketing...

1) Compete 2) Turn around. 

Dentists Competing for Patients

Competing dental marketing is very challenging and costly in many ways because there are numerous players. Turn Around marketing is like judo: using the "generic heft and creative complacency" of this large group to take advantage of what they cannot see or target.

Competing marketing players are looking for everyone to be their dental patients. They see this huge mass of dental consumers and wonder why they can't get a large chunk of them. They want to fill the dental chairs and maybe at some point move them to higher-level procedures like cosmetic dentistry.

There is nothing wrong with dental practices that go this route. It is just that to compete in the general arena means you communicate in simple and similar terms like your competition. You say "FREE", half-off, toothache, and dental emergencies. Possibly you now say Invisalign, CEREC, Lumineers veneers, and ZOOM! But pretty soon every dentist is saying those things as well.

Dentists that follow and compete like this often get worn out. In addition, as they pursue this sameness strategy, dental consumers get trained to expect sameness. For example, most consumers want things at the lowest cost possible, you and me included. But there some things we also will pay a lot for. "I would like a new smile but it’s a lot of money. Plus I just bought a big screen TV and we are going to Mazatlan again this year."

What is wrong then; why is your dental expertise not a higher priority? Consumers do not see YOU! They see a dentist. They see dentistry. And they already "understand" dentistry. "It should be covered by dental insurance. It should be low cost. Of course, something should be free. And finally, when the dentist tries to explain why I need a lot of dentistry and it does not fit this sameness pattern, he/she is trying to 'sell me' something. 

But what if you have tons of dental CE? Can create lasting, healthy, beautiful smiles? Have many years of experience? Treat people not teeth? If you are doing one or all these things, YOUR consumers should see something else besides the "same idea of dentistry" people saw 30 years ago when things were more similar.

Yes, dental technology and all the cool cosmetic and restorative techniques can get you noticed. But the "new service/technology theme" is short-lived and often shallow in value because it is not focused on people. People make decisions and that means the "justification process" is complicated. Some of it is logical but it also has to do with fear, ignorance, complacency, and emotion. And a beautiful smile might only be a small influence on taking that final step.

People only connect to things that have deep meaning; otherwise "simple" rules the day. Free Whitening focuses on simple. Exciting, yes. But still simple, especially when Wal-mart also sells it. They only remember FREE -- whitening is forgotten quickly and then they think - free dentistry from the local dentist who must not have much expertise if he/she is promoting free services. Low cost marketing "works" - but where does it take you?

When dental consumers are not connected - you can lose them very easily. When you do general (competing) dental marketing you invite them to not expect value because you are competing with the same message everyone is offering. You are making the blur of sameness blurrier. Sameness is valueless when it comes to dental treatment beyond cleanings and "fillings". 

More on Sameness Stampede Marketing In my next Dental Coaching Blog entry. NOW POSTED.

Contact Niche Dental - Email or Call 866-453-1026

Dental Marketing Commentary by

Dick Chwalek

Dental Communication Integration Consultant

What is the best marketing for my dental practice?

I wish I could tell you what is the best type of dental marketing. Unfortunately it is a secret. Fortunately my ability to keep secrets is feeble.

The other dental advertising firms have a FREE report of SECRET MARKETING STRATEGIES that you to sign up for and then have to wait for the email. Then it turns into some kind of bait and switch and you realize there was no secret except the fact the secret was - there was no secret.

The difference with my dentist coaching and dental consulting services is that I give you the report upfront and all I ask is that after reading it you send me $1,000 or $10,000, whichever fits your budget.

I would prefer $10,000 since I just got the FREE REPORT on the SECRETS of LIVING TO 100 and after getting them, was persuaded to purchase their products that cost $9,000, which included healing magnets, super-sized supplements, ancient Chinese herbs and feng shui (fung shway) dung infused organic soil for my garden.

Then a few days later I talked to my doctor who did not have a free report - which made me wonder if he actually knew what he was doing (or how successful marketing worked). He says to me, "You can also live well by eating in moderation, drinking in moderation, exercising at least moderately, avoid sucking down a pint of nicotine with a shot of carcinogen each day, and brushing and flossing."

I thought - you tricky one - you logically and scientifically trained health professionals. What is this? I knew that already. Yes, I want a well trained engineer building my bridge and someone that actually knows materials science to build my iPod, but for my health, I want something that sounds like it came from the UFO that lands in my yard every night.

Health can't be something I know how to do - then I might be the problem. That means I need to actually do something. It should be something totally fascinating out of my control and nearly magical to be effective.

Sadly, Niche Dental is based on something different than fantasy. My bait is mostly about throwing the switch on of reality.

As humans, we want to believe there is something easier and simpler - because we need easier and simpler so we can do more of what we would rather be doing. Like your dental patients. They want their visits and treatment to be painless, costless, done in a minute or in no time, no further obligations, and last until they want it to.

The answer to this complex dilemma is simple: just COMMUNICATE in some new way that you are not doing now.

Should you do your dental marketing in a certain quality, complete, targeted, consistent way? Yes. Of course.

But what if there were TEN people who needed dentistry of -- any kind. And you got 7 of them to brush and floss regularly and get to a dental visit once every three years instead of -- never. Rather than losing all of their teeth by the time they hit 60 years of age - they make it to 67.5721 years or almost 67 years and 6 months? Would that have been better than only 60 years with teeth? Of course.

Therefore, you simply need to COMMUNICATE MORE! This will change the dynamic in some way for a few patients...

There you go. The SECRET of Dental Marketing Revealed RIGHT HERE!!! No obligation of any kind. No need for me to get your email and send you a lot of stuff that is so super secret that only the magician behind the Web curtain can make it appear. And for that, just send me $1,000 - I mean $10,000 and we are even... No questions. No lawyers. No harassing calls. 10 Large and I am good...

Now, about communicating/marketing in a quality, complete, targeted and consistent way. Obviously that level of communication commitment is better - you are able to get beyond the basics like the other 3 of the 10 patients above that we have not dealt with yet.

One of these three remaining patients in my example gets a dental implant supported denture, which that patient uses to build an empire - "I liked the dental implant gadget so much I bought the company!" You put that in a press release about your amazing dental expertise and become the talk of the town. Use this headline - no charge (after I get my 10 large). One dentist. One implant supported denture. One Mega Success. America - ya gotta love it!

The 2nd patient of the remaining three (or now remaining two - sorry this is confusing) gets ongoing periodontal treatment and avoids a heart attack (or a stroke) which the patient in this example would have had without you MARKETING TO THEM - because they did not know about the link between gum disease and DEATH!!!!

The last patient (or the third of the three or last of the one... No we will call her Patient Ten - because of HIPAA I can't say that the patient is Sally my neighbor - so don't ask...) also gets whitening, veneers, and other amazing dental treatments for the smile makeover you now can present to all your other patients and the public to show them what is possible today with advanced restorative and cosmetic dentistry.

But Dick what exactly do I do? Dental postcards? A practice brochure with my smile makeovers in it? A dental website for my office? Yes. Yes? But Dick I need more. Then I will add some weight to my list.

So you want to know why we gain weight? No, Dick I want to know about marketing and what to do.

Calories in - calories out. It is that simple. No Secret Dental Advertising Reports. No bait and switch - just the reality that you need to say more, say it in the best way you can - right now and then keep augmenting, enhancing and moving forward.

Stop sitting around in the living room sofas of indecision and consuming all the dental marketing mumbo jumbo calories. Work with my strategic partners (see below) and sign up for my coaching. Call or email one of us.

Dentist marketing coaching provides the right information at the right time as well as ongoing encouragement to make things happen in a shorter time span. If you want more proactive integration, ask about my dental communication consulting services.

If you want other options - I have heard of this Google thing, and this Yahoo is another, and there are many more. Search for the marketing partner you want to work with. But make a decision.

As you wait, teeth fall out, bleeding gums persist and strokes and heart attacks are removing qualified candidates from your potential patient list.

No dental patient wants to be "sold" something they don't need - but if they are missing what they need to know and don't know what is possible now to make it better - the bill of goods they end up with could be much worse.

DO NO HARM - dental marketing is very healthy for your patients and the viability of your dental practice.

Dental Marketing Commentary by

Dick Chwalek - Niche Dental

Dentist Marketing Coaching and Dental Communication Consultant

Dental Websites, Logos, Brochures, SEO, PPC advertising

The Peripheral Vision

Direct Mail, Postcards for Family, Cosmetic Dentists and Orthodontists, Keep In Touch Marketing

Express Dental Marketing