Patients don’t want brand junkie dentists

By DR SIMON HOCKEN

I sometimes think that hairdressing salon bosses have a lot to teach dental practice principals. Like many practices, hairdressers offer retail-style services on busy high streets with plenty of competition and, just like dentists, they and their competitors offer similar menus of services.

When we choose a hairdresser, we judge their skill and our confidence that we will get the quality of result we want. We also choose accessibility and a nice experience once we are there. Like dentists, hairdressers choose supplier-brands which their clients may know, such as: Redken, Schwarzkopf, KMS etc. However, if you look at a selection of the more progressive hairdresser salon websites in your area, you will see that they make their proposition all about the hair cut and not the brands that they use to achieve this.

Meanwhile back in the world of dental practice, just like hairdressers, brands are emerging that have some traction with the public and so dentists are displaying them on their websites and in their shop windows. Brands such as:

  • Invisalign
  • Six Month Smiles
  • Lumineers
  • Zoom Whitening
  • Juvederm

And, a little like hairdressing, these brands facilitate or support a treatment, but they are not the core of the dental practice’s proposition. I understand that writing about them might help your website’s SEO performance, but the patients want straight teeth, not necessarily Invisalign, a gorgeous smile, not necessarily Lumineers, and to look younger, not necessarily using Juvederm. These are tools in the dental toolbox and good dentists have a large selection, giving them many choices of treatment to solve their patient’s problems.

You wouldn’t expect your trusted garage to advertise the make of the spanners their technicians use would you? And one last analogy: if you wear glasses and visit an optician regularly, you will know that whether you can see well is down to the skill of your optician, and his/her prescription, not the make of the frame supplier…

These dental brands aren’t going away any time soon because there are fortunes to be made whenever they get sold. What I’m suggesting is that if you rely on attracting patients by marketing brands rather than marketing your skill, experience and reputation, then it somehow diminishes you as a professional and your practice as a place that delivers a professional service.

The public assume (rightly or wrongly, in the same way they assume a pilot on an easyJet plane is qualified to fly), that a dentist can examine, diagnose, treatment plan, repair gums and teeth and create perfect smiles. And they assume all dentists do cosmetic dentistry and put in implants, or know someone who can. So, don’t disappoint them, tell your prospective patients and your existing patients about your fantastic reputation, your experience, your gentle painless treatment and your long lasting solutions that make for perfect smiles.

If you would like some help articulating just what you and your practice really offers, phone or email me for a chat.

  1. 07770 430576
  2. simon.hocken@breathebusiness.co.uk
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