Creating Your Dental Practice Web
Site
adapted
from material by
Laurence I. Barsh, DMD
Imagine that you had a dental assistant who
worked 24 hours a day, 365 days a year ... and never asked for a raise!
Imagine that the assistant marketed your practice to a local and worldwide
market and could answer all of your patients` questions. Imagine that this
assistant could distribute information on new, state-of-the-art services
as soon as they became available, could gather data that would help market
your practice in the future, and had personal contact with over 50 million
potential patients. Welcome to the World Wide Web!
Any 12-year-old with a computer can put a
page on the Web and that's the problem! Surf the Net and look at some of
the dental-practice sites. They usually include the dentist's name, office
address and phone number, hours of operation, insurance plans accepted,
maybe a picture of the dentist and staff, perhaps a map, and a list of all
the great things the dentist can accomplish, complete with illustrations;
in other words, a practice brochure on-line! (That 12-year-old sure has
been busy!) All of these things are necessary in a dental Web site, but
experience has proven that Web sites limited to simply providing practice
information accomplish nothing more than satisfying the ego of the
practitioner.
Futurists predict that
the Internet will alter even more profoundly the way both society and
business function in the coming century. The Web is well on its way to
becoming the dominant medium in our society. One reason for this is its
unprecedented rate of adoption by an estimated 50 million users merely
three years after its commercialization.
Recent surveys from the Institute for the Future, Princeton Research
Associates, and Louis Harris & Associates were reported in the New York
Times on July 9. The survey showed that two-thirds of the people who go
on-line have sought health information on the Web, and that 67 percent of
doctors interviewed said they had patients who came in with information
they found on the Internet.
One significant factor separating successful from unsuccessful practices
in the next century will be how proactive a practice is in capitalizing on
the strengths of the Net to increase patient value. For a dental Web site
to be truly successful, the site developer must understand how this new
paradigm of practice operates.
So it's no surprise that the rules of the
game are changing and, with it, the way we communicate with patients.
Successful Web sites should be built on six driving principles of this new
paradigm: 1) A
properly constructed Web site will provide the patient with the ability to
tailor information to his/her specific needs.
2) Electronic renderings of print media generally fail. On-line marketing
creates a wealth of new ways to exploit patient attention that are not
available offline. With the availability of color, interactivity,
animation and sound, on-line versions of printed materials will not hold
the interest of most Internet-savvy consumers. With space on the Internet
virtually limitless and with all the technological advances that currently
are available to Web-site designers, there are no excuses for setting up a
boring Web site.
3) Instant interactivity is critical. For example, if a patient needs
specific information about home care of dental implants, rather than care
of natural dentition, a Web site can be constructed to provide this
specific information rather than generic information about home care in
general. Being the source of customized dental information can be a
powerful marketing tool, as well as serving the needs of the Internet
community.
4) People are interested in what affects them. Technologically-aware
patients do not merely want customized information access. They want some
indication that a practice acknowledges their individuality in all its
dealings with them. These preferences can range from whether a patient
prefers morning or afternoon appointments to whether a patient prefers to
be addressed by their first name or their last name. Data-driven Web sites
provide an excellent opportunity for patients to obtain this information
and more at their convenience on-line. This creates a community base
solidly in your practice's foundation.
5) People have power. It no longer is necessary for your patients to walk
down the street to consult another dentist about a suggested service or
fees. On the Web, your competitor is just a mouse click away. The
Internet's future is about empowering the consumer. In the future, there
will be no reason why someone will not be able to smile into the camera on
top of the TV-computer, capture the image, and design his/her own smile.
With this image in hand, this potential patient can then visit various Web
sites and get an idea of whether that smile is achievable - and even get a
cost and time estimate - all on-line without leaving the comfort of
his/her living room.
6) Competition always will exist. Your competition will exploit the
advantages of the Web whether you do or do not. Having a presence on the
Web is essential for the dental practice of the future.
This article was adapted from material by
Laurence I. Barsh, DMD, from his Dental Economics article of December,
1998
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