Where a practice loses its week
Ask the owner of a dental practice what they did on Tuesday and the answer is patients, from the first appointment to the last. Ask when they looked at the website, replied to the reviews or thought about why the new-patient calls slowed down in the spring, and the answer is usually a pause.
Nobody is being careless. A full schedule leaves no room. The office manager is in the same position, holding the front desk, insurance questions, the schedule and the staff rota together. The work that would grow the practice is the work with no deadline, so it waits.
Meanwhile a family moves into the neighborhood and searches for a dentist. They see three practices. One has recent photographs, a clear page on what a first visit involves and reviews answered by name. The other two have a stock photo and a list of procedures. The family never tells the other two why they did not call.
The work that would grow the practice is the work with no deadline, so it waits.
What we take off the owner’s desk
We work as an outsourced business manager. In a dental practice that means we pick up the recurring work around the clinical day and keep it moving. The exact list is agreed in writing before we start. It can include:
- A weekly rhythm with the owner and the office manager, so decisions are made once and then carried out.
- The follow-up lists that slip when the front desk is busy, organized so somebody owns each one.
- Vendor and supplier coordination for the website, the phones, the signage and the printed material.
- A monthly report in plain words: what went out, what came in and what we suggest next.
- The marketing, PR and social media work described below, done to a calendar and not when someone has a free hour.
We are not a dental consultant and we do not touch clinical decisions, fees or patient records. We work alongside your accountant, your attorney and your practice software, and we stay out of their lanes.
Marketing a practice honestly
Dental marketing is mostly about removing doubt. A new patient is choosing someone to trust with their mouth, often while slightly nervous. They want to know who the dentist is, what the practice is like and what happens at the first visit.
So we start with three questions about the practice itself. Who are you? What are you about? Why should a family choose you over the practice two streets away? The answers go on one page, and everything else is built from it.
Then we look at what a patient finds:
- The website. Can someone on a phone find the address, the hours, the insurance you accept and a way to book within a few seconds? Does each service have its own plain page?
- Your local listings. Name, address, phone number, hours and photographs should match everywhere they appear. Small mismatches cost calls.
- Reviews. We set up a polite routine for asking, and we draft replies for your approval, including the difficult ones.
- The first-visit page. It is the page nervous patients read most, and most practices do not have one.
If your practice already uses our OPTIMIZE service for search, this work sits on top of it. You can read about that on the dental optimization page.
PR for a local practice
A dental practice rarely needs a press campaign. It does have news that deserves to be told properly: a new associate, a second location, new equipment that changes what you can offer, a school visit, a free screening day, an anniversary.
We write the short announcement, find the handful of local outlets and community groups that would care, and follow up. We also prepare the dentist for the occasional interview, so the answer to a reporter’s question is clear and does not drift into a claim the practice cannot support.
Press coverage is never ours to promise. Editors decide. What we can promise is that the story is ready, accurate and in front of the right person on time.
Social media patients will see
Most practice accounts follow the same pattern. A burst of posts, then a holiday graphic, then silence for four months. The silence does more harm than having no account, because a patient who checks sees a practice that looks closed.
We keep it simple and steady:
- A monthly calendar you approve in one sitting.
- Posts that answer what patients ask at the front desk. What does a first visit cost? How often should a child come in? What should I do about a chipped tooth on a Saturday?
- Faces. The team, the rooms and the neighborhood, photographed with permission.
- A short monthly note on what people responded to, so the next calendar is better than the last.
Two or three good posts a week, every week, do more for a practice than a flood followed by quiet.
Privacy, consent and the rules on dental advertising
Dental marketing has limits that general marketing firms sometimes miss.
Patient privacy comes first. A before-and-after photograph, a testimonial or even a reply to a review can reveal that someone is a patient. We do not publish anything that identifies a patient without their written permission on file, and we draft review replies so they never confirm treatment.
Advertising claims come second. The rules on what a dentist may say about specialties, results and comparisons with other practices vary by state. We write to the cautious side, we do not use words like best or painless, and the dentist approves every piece before it goes out. Where a claim is in doubt, we ask you to check it with your own counsel or your state board’s guidance. We are not lawyers and this page is not legal advice.
How we work inside your team
One person in the practice approves what goes out. It is usually the owner or the office manager. That one rule prevents most of the delay and confusion we see elsewhere.
We ask for about an hour a week. Part of it is a standing conversation and the rest is approvals. Your website, your listings, your social accounts and your patient list stay yours. We work in your accounts with access you can remove at any time.
Where to start
Most practices begin with the 90-Day Plan. It is a fixed fee for a written list: a review of the website and the social accounts, your three answers, five rewritten pages, twelve pieces of content and a monthly discussion with your team. At day 90 you have a plan for the next quarter that you can run yourself or leave with us.
If you are not sure what the practice needs, start with a conversation. Tell us about the practice, the area and what is getting stuck.