Don’t get caught blind-sighted by a digital marketing trend in 2019. Here is compilation of the dental digital marketing trends you need to know to increase your online presence in 2019.
1. Confidence with Micro Moments
The second top digital marketing trend was coined by Google called, Micro Moments. Today, patients research every detail of their dental experience before their appointment. For example, they may research the procedures, office wait times, results, and office hours. This digital marketing trend and style of quick research for small details of each experience can determine your practice’s success. If a patient cannot find what they are looking for, they will move on to the next office that has more information available. To take advantage of this digital marketing trend, fill-out your entire Google MyBusiness page.
Google breaks down Micro Moments into three main categories: I-want-to-know-moments, I-want-to-go-moments, I-want-to-do-moments, and I-want-to-buy-moments. For a dental practice, the most common micro moment will probably be I-want-to-go moment. All in all, bridging the gap between a patient’s confidence and understanding of your office can win you more new patients in 2019.
2. Chatbot Integration
Utilizing a chatbot can make your practice more accessible to patients 24/7. This digital marketing trend is about increased convince to capture patients. Whether it is in the middle of the night or on a holiday, patients can reschedule or book an appointment via an AI system. Chatbots can be integrated onto your Facebook page, your website, or other platforms your patients use to communicate. Not only is a chatbot always available, it is more convenient for patients who do not want to talk on the phone. This digital marketing trend can capture more patients and schedule more appointments than a traditional scheduling system.
3. Facebook Live For Business
Over the past few years, the importance of video has been thrown into almost every trend blog at nausea. But, here it is again. Although, in 2019, pressing the Facebook live button and asking patients to visit your practice will not suffice. In this digital marketing trend, audiences are interested in engaging content. Examples of this include: answering frequently asked questions or uncommon dental facts that can impact your patients’ lives.
If you have not jumped on the Facebook Live bandwagon because you are afraid of making a mistake, you are in luck! Patients and audiences are more likely to build trust with a brand that is transparent. So, don’t be afraid of technology malfunctions or saying everything perfectly. Be yourself! That is what your patients want. And, it is an easy digital marketing trend you can implement today.
4. SEO Clusters, Not Just Keywords
Yes, keywords are still important, but clusters will take the SEO spotlight in 2019. Valuable website content is key for a successful page, as you may remember from our previous article explaining the importance of blog posts. However, once your practice has a large query of information in the blog section, it can become overwhelming for the viewer to search through that information. Not to mention, an unorganized page makes it more difficult for search engines to interpret your content. A cluster approach centers around one keyword on a pillar page, such as Dental Crowns. Then, within that pillar page, an internal links connect subtopics on the page.
To explain this digital marketing trend better, take this example. Instead of having three blog posts under the category Dental Crowns, you can condense these posts into one pillar page. In the image below is an overview of how topic clusters work from HubSpot. Additionally, there is a simplistic example of a pillar page. Notice that it contains a table of contents, which has hyperlinks that point to each section of the article. Now, Google can find multiple keywords and long-tail keywords (ex. What are Dental Crowns? or When to get a Dental Crown.) on one page. This will increase your Google ranking, website traffic, and new patients!
5. Optimize for Visual and Voice Search
Finding the best dental office in town expands beyond simply typing into Google search. Today, patients use AI systems such as Alexa, Siri, Google, and more to find dental practices. Additionally, patients may even use visual search my taking a photo in Google and searching for a similar item. If you do not optimize your website for these search changes you will lose traffic and new patients every month. The best way to optimize for voice search is to focus on snippets. For example, if you ask your Google home, “What is the best dentist in Dallas?” Google will read a snippet from a website on rank #0. Below is an example of rank #0 versus rank #1.
-
Optimizing for Voice Search
Voice search optimization is conversational and therefore has longer and more specific keywords. The first step to optimize your website for voice search is to lengthen your keywords. Take the keyword dental crown, for example. Using tools like Answer the Public and UberSuggest, you can lengthen the keyword to what is a dental crown procedure. See? This is a more natural and specific question someone may ask via voice search. The most important tip to creating a good voice search keyword is localization. Add keywords like dentist near me or dental crowns in Dallas to increase your Google ranking. Remember to use a handful of keywords per page and sprinkle them generously throughout the page.
-
Formatting for Voice Search
Next, format your blog or webpage using keyword heavy questions, just like the ones that patients may search. Make one headline Should I get a dental crown? and the next What are the advantages of dental crowns? Feel free to add questions and answers in the body of your content as well. Additionally, use formatting tools such as bulleted lists and H2/H3 headings. Organizing your page not only makes it easier for the reader to understand, it also improves Google’s ability to crawl the page. Ultimately, this increases your chances of becoming a Google snippet (rank #0) and answering a voice search.
Lastly, the best way to increase your chance of being chosen for a voice search result is to increase your domain authority. Simply, be a credible source. You can prove to Google that you are a credible source by increasing the links pointing to your website, encouraging sharing on social networks, and producing frequent and quality content.
Digital Marketing Trend Implementation
Now that you know the upcoming digital marketing trends for 2019, you can start implementing them. As with any big change, remember to start small. Take manageable steps toward your goals instead of a few, large, impossible strides. A manageable step is answering one frequently asked question via Facebook live each month. Then, talk with your website designer to optimize your site for 2019 digital marketing trends. The new year is just around the corner and it is never too early to get a head start on your 2019 marketing plan. For more tips or information about digital marketing, feel free to contact Lucent Spot Marketing. One of our dental digital marketing experts will be happy to work with you.