Audit Your Dental Web Developer w/ this 3-Piece Checklist.
They Don’t Know What’s Best (Most of the Time)
Dentistry is an insanely attractive industry. Any given dental practice has massive earning potential, even in rural areas.
This creates a huge market for external digital marketing services at a premium price to dentists.
Websites are no different.
However, it doesn’t take much for a generic web developer to pivot and claim that they’re Dental Website Experts (our past web developer was clearly one of those types).
Weirdly enough, despite the huge leaps in UX/UI, many dental websites have a very archaic, pop-up centered look to them.
Quite simply, it’s horrifying. Not only that, it’s making it harder for potential New Patients to say “yes” to making you their new dentist.
Remember, their profession is building the website.
Yours is attracting the New Patients**
Here are 3.5 ways to audit your current web-developer + website:
I. Is your website full of stock imagery?
Stock imagery of families sitting in a field modeling their smile is of. The. Past. It’s painful how cliche stock imagery of the same 3-women modeling their crystal white smile is.
If your web developer has filled your website with stock imagery, remove it immediately! There is nothing about stock families that communicates that your practice is modern and different than the one down the street.
So what should replace the stock imagery?
Today, your physical building, your office space is a huge differentiator in terms of new patients. Sure, some dentists are more gentle and you have your favorite hygienist.
But if you’re looking for a new dentist, the office itself is a huge unique selling point.
For those that are fans of Donald Miller’s Building a Storybrand, YES having aspirational photos of your target audience is helpful but NOT for your dental website in 2020.
II. Is your home page filled with multiple pop-ups, banners, and huge menu of additional pages?
I’ll quote Donald Miller here:
If you confuse, you lose!! Noise is the enemy.
Now take a look at your website. There should be no more than two, very clear routes for your potential New Patient to take.
If upon arriving at your website there are 5+ clickable offers, videos, banners, and pop-up messages, you’re most likely scaring away a lot of business.
The business that can create the clearest, easiest path for the customer to spend their money and get the solution to their problem wins every single time.
III. Is there text anywhere on your website that is longer than a paragraph (with or without breaks)?
Let me ask you, when was the last time that you went to a website (that wasn’t a blog or recipe-site) to read an essay?
Most likely, your future New Patients are not looking for a book in order to find a new dentist. Again, the smoothest path wins.
5-paragraphs of text on the homepage is not smooth, or easy on the eyes. Instead, try listing the least amount of information possible in info-points that tells your future New Patient why you can help them and how fast.
I guarantee it will work.
III.5 Are there photos of your office (inside and out) easily discoverable from the home page?
Like I said before, the big differentiator in the 2020 Dental/Orthodontic website world is the physical environment in which the patient will be spending their time.
Does your office look like your grandparent’s dentist? You’re probably not going to win much consistent new business.
Additionally, make it as easy as possible for New Patients to find these photos on your website on their own accord (read: not a pop up).
Stock imagery and no photos of your office gives very little for the potential patient to visualize as their future dental experience.
Some Examples:
Here are a few dental (and orthodontic) websites that have done a great job at ditching stock imagery, removing banners/pop-ups, limiting text, and using plenty images of the physical office:
- Real Life Dental reallifedental.com
- The Dentistry Collective thedentistrycollective.com
- Orchard Meadows Family Dental & Denture Clinic orchardmeadowsdental.com
- Real Life Smiles reallifesmiles.com
- Gladwell Orthodontics gladwellorthodontics.com
The first 3 are dental offices and the last two are orthodontic offices.
Now, go make some website changes!
Keep Going.
**Some web developers are also dental marketing geniuses, such as Jimmy Marketing. However, they are a rare exception from my experience.
