If your dental practice exists on social media, there’s a big chance you’re constantly receiving questions, complaints, inquiries, and suggestions. Your customers are more than likely engaging with you through your social media profiles or your websites. That’s a huge advantage for your dental marketing. However, it also means that you’re being swamped with messages left and right, possibly every minute of every day.
Here’s when it becomes problematic. As much as we want as much engagement as we can get from potential customers or patients, this does not mean we’re ready to answer all questions that come our way. As a result, we might be making our patients more unhappy compared to if they don’t have direct access to us. But does that mean dentists should not invest in websites and social media?
Definitely, not. It means that if your website and social media profiles are getting questions and comments every hour, you should delegate the task of answering them to someone else. Surely, you won’t be able to answer any potential patients while you are operating on someone’s gums. Another option is for you to install a bot on your website. The bot will be pre-programmed to answer any questions and comments that your patients may post on your site or social media pages.
Faster Response Leads to More Sales
But here’s another thing you need to be aware of: patients don’t want you to simply answer their questions and respond to their comments. They want you to do it fast. Patients agree that, at the most, they expect dentists or their receptionists at least to respond within hours. Anything more than that—a day or two—can be catastrophic to your reputation.
Do you know how fast you need to respond for a patient to be impressed with you? You need to be online in under one hour. Otherwise, your patients will more than likely reach out to other dentists who they think can respond to their queries faster.
The statistics differ depending on where the engagement is happening. For example, Facebook users expect companies to respond to them within 24 hours. Twitter users wait longer. They can wait for two hours for a response. And when the tweet is based on a complaint? Facebook and Twitter users have shorter patience. They often want to receive a response as soon as they send out the tweet. Otherwise, there will be a barrage of complaints on social media about your company.
So, are you responding to your customers on social media every day? Do you make it a point to never let your customers wait? If so, you’re doing a good job with your dental marketing.