Before you crank out your next dental marketing piece push pause. There’s something you’ll want to include, besides something catchy or creative.

Compelling today’s dental patient or dental industry client requires more than a burst of creativity. Their decisions about your services have less to do with an eye-candy mailer or luring them with a cute contest.

What’s the catch?

Truthfully, there is no catch. Get comfortable without one.

Today’s patient has one thing you must know and understand. And it becomes the focus of your dental marketing.

A Problem

It’s at the core of their buyer (patient) persona.

David Meerman Scott takes a bold step saying that a “buyer persona” is better than a focus on benefits. He shares a true story that reveals the power of the buyer persona.

”Nick Woodman wanted to sell cameras with a waterproof housing. A ‘benefits, not features’ approach would have used language like, “protect your camera while it is in the water.” Nick however did much more than reverse-engineer benefits from the features. He interviewed surfers to learn about their problems around shooting photos in the waves. Surfers told him they found it challenging to paddle into a wave with a camera, stand, get into balance and trim, and then only having a second to take a photo. It was too awkward to do with the cameras available on the market at the time. The key learnings from the interview is surfers don’t look for the benefit of “protecting my camera in the water”. Rather, they want to know ‘how can I take photos while surfing.’ And that’s how in 2004, the GoPro was born and have since sold millions of cameras.”

Problems lead to solutions. And solutions are what you provide as a dental professional.

But first, what’s the problem?

It’s easy to think about every dental patient as one in the same. Generally speaking that’s true.

And yet each patient has a unique “story” that highlights their specific problem-solution persona.

It’s time for you to become the “mentor-guide” that’s pointing the way. That’s the role of your dental services content.

According to Copyblogger’s Bryan Clark,

”……by accepting the role of mentor with your content, your business accomplishes its goals while helping the prospect do the same. Which is how business is supposed to work, right?”

Stop Marketing to Your Patients…

Instead get to know their problems. How?

Listen

Be attentive to every story they tell…problem they reveal…pain they mention…etc. As vital as your clinical expertise is to them so is your empathy.

If you want them to become part of your “story” you must join them in theirs with a sincere level of empathetic listening.

Use aggressive listening

Have a predetermined set of strategic questions. Make sure they’re designed to probe beneath the surface of why they (really) called and scheduled.

It’s often more than a commitment to routine dental care (though you want them to value that). It could have more to do with their calendar, relationships, or life goals.

For example, create and have on-hand questions designed to gain insight into their social calendar, trips they’re planning, relationships they value, and goals they want to achieve. This helps you apply specific services to a particular chapter in their story instead of a random attempt.

Use anticipatory listening

This is where your expertise (authority) meets their problems. You know, intuitively, what they need by looking in their mouth, at their x-rays, or their treatment history.

How you use that information can help them “write” new chapters in their story. Questions that include:

• “Have you thought about…?”
• “Why would you…?”
• “How are you dealing with…?”

Next…

Leverage

Apply what you hear to your marketing content. You’re perhaps most accustomed to following a templated, standard approach to promoting your practice and services.

Leverage your content into a-ha solutions to real patient problems. This positions you as a “mentor-guide” in their health care.

Again, Bryan Clark confirms,

”When you think in terms of empowering people to solve their problem by playing the role of mentor, you’re naturally performing better than competitors who take an egocentric approach.”

Join them in their journey. Without an empathetic appeal you could miss substantial opportunities to stay engaged via ongoing mentor-status.

Your best leverage is being intuitive about about who your patient or client is (their persona). Intuition becomes accurate by listening beneath the surface of their problem.

Then you’re prepared to share the best solution to solve it!

Solving problems is what you do. It’s better (and more patient-centric) than merely touting your benefits – those that may or may not be relevant to them. The more you know (them) the better your solution-to-problem accuracy.

There’s more to be said about buyer personas. Let this ruminate for a bit…and stay tuned for more on this topic.