May 18, 2026 • 50 mins
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If your practice is “booked up for eight weeks”, you might feel successful, but you could also be bleeding high-intent patients who simply will not wait. We sit down with Rahil Kumar from MySmile Media to unpack what organic marketing really means for UK dentists in 2026, and why the basics now decide whether patients choose you or move on within minutes.
We talk funnels in plain English: every view, click, and doorstep glance sits at the top, then the journey narrows through enquiry, consultation, and attendance. From there we get specific about the points most practices miss, like lead response time, how to remove friction from booking, and why your website is not a brochure but a growth engine. Rahil shares the practical checklist he uses when auditing dental websites, including mobile-first design, loading speed, clearer calls to action, and writing that patients actually understand.
The conversation also turns to the AI shift: people are using ChatGPT for everyday searches, and Google’s AI Overviews are changing how patients consume information. The takeaway is not to abandon SEO, but to treat it as a long-term practice builder that earns trust and visibility over time. We finish with an organic social media plan you can stick to, why three consistent posts a week beats sporadic bursts, how to balance before-and-after content with human stories, and when TikTok is worth your energy compared with mastering Meta first.
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Dr James (01:36):
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Alright, welcome back, anotherepisode of Dentists Who Invest
(02:21):
Podcast here.
Here to talk about something wehaven't talked about in a long
time and actually is really,really, really important.
So it's about time that we did,and that is organic marketing
with the expert on this matter,Mr.
Rahil Kumar from MiSmile Media.
Rahil, how are you today?
Very good, mate.
Thank you very much to both ofyou for having me on.
Hey, listen, good to have youback.
And yeah, you're quite right,because this podcast is a little
(02:42):
bit of a departure from thenorm on the DWI podcast, in that
it's co-hosted by myself andalso Dr.
Dan Shaffer.
Thank you very much.
Hey, no problem, mate.
Good to have you here.
And you know what?
Uh yeah, worth mentioning thatwe know each other through
Business of Dentistry, uh, whichis the events uh side of things
uh over here in Dentist whoinvests.
(03:02):
And like I say, uh we'rerecording this podcast again,
fresh off the back of havingdone an event yesterday.
So we're riding high, we'refeeling good.
We're still in the venue, henceour plush surroundings.
Uh a little bit of an upgradeuh from what we do normally,
which is basically just awebcam.
Uh so yeah, no, it's uh itfeels good.
It feels good to have anotherbig event in the bag, looking
(03:24):
forward to the next one already,come October time.
But that's not the purpose ofpointing this podcast.
The purpose of pointing thispodcast is to talk about organic
marketing and what's changed in2026.
So I guess the first thing todo would be to start out by
defining organic marketingbecause I know people use that
term, they throw it around alot, but how do you define it?
Because definitions differslightly on this one sometimes.
Rahil (03:46):
I think it's I think it's a trend of marketing.
It's like you know, everything,everyone's got a different
definition for everything.
Uh I think go back to the ourpodcast that we did on branding,
like everyone finds it so hardto define it.
Um we look at all organicmarketing as uh kind of a series
of channels as opposed to likeyou know a cluster, shall we
(04:10):
say?
Um so we look at it as let'ssay posting on posting on social
media, be it Facebook, be itMeta.
Uh we class SEO as more organicmarketing, even though you're
you know, even though you'rehaving to potentially pay an
agency.
What do we class it as organicmarketing?
We actually group your websiteinto organic marketing as well.
Um so we kind of group those,I'd say, three main channels as
(04:34):
your you know, as your organicmarketing kind of piece.
Dr James (04:38):
Yeah, I guess another way of defining it is the more
passive stuff, right?
A little bit, kind of.
As in to me, it's there's moreof a with ads, it's like when
you see the word ad, you'realready primed, there's a CTA
here, right?
And to be fair, organic stuffcan have CTAs in it as well, but
it's a lot more about brandingand positioning and everything
(05:00):
along those lines.
Or at least, at least usuallyit is, anyway.
Again, as you're saying, it's alittle bit more hard.
It's harder to define, buthaving an extra perspective on
it or an extra way of describingit will help make it hopefully
a little bit more clear inpeople's heads.
Rahil (05:15):
Yeah, I think that you know the way that we the way we
look at paid compared to toorganic is like you know, paid
is paid's a tap.
You know, you turn that tap on,leads come out of the bottom.
Like you know, you spend money,you get leads.
Either that's through Google,through that's Facebook, but you
turn that tap off, it stops.
Whereas the way we look atorganic is that everything that
(05:36):
you you know you do, be it postcontent on social media, be it
putting blogs on your website torank higher in SEO, be it you
know building a website and andhaving that live, like you you
know, you do it once, but it itremains there.
Um so that's kind of how wedifferentiate it as well.
Dr Dan (05:54):
Sure.
And that SEO, I mean, uh forthe benefit of the listeners,
SEO is search engineoptimization, and uh the other
term I think we use was CTA,which is a call to action, which
would be a button for people topress or or click through to.
And these form all parts of afunnel.
(06:14):
And you know, we use that termjust to symbolize the widened
top going down to a narrowbottom.
So you get a large number ofpeople you feed into the top of
the funnel, and they dwindleaway to those uh leads.
You might get them through acall to action, whatever it is,
and you qualify those leads, andthe quality ones fall out the
(06:37):
bottom, and those are the leadsthat you then want to work with.
Dr James (06:41):
You know, I really like the funnel analogy, is a is
a common one used in marketing,and you can even use you can
even describe each one of yourchannels as a funnel in and of
itself, right?
Uh so the the top, but it's itgets wider at the top and
narrower at the bottom.
I think that's a RussellBrunson uh uh uh piece of
terminology right there, uh thethe marketing funnel, or perhaps
(07:04):
maybe it wasn't his originally,perhaps he popularized it.
I don't I don't know.
But Rahel, tell us what afunnel is in your words, because
I'm I'm curious to know,curious to know your thoughts on
this.
Because every I heard him sayonce, this guy Russell Brunson,
I remember reading one of hisbooks back in the day, and um he
was he said something stuckwith me and he said, All
businesses are a funnel inessence, right?
(07:25):
Whether you have digitalmarketing or you don't, your
business is still a funnel,right?
Because at the top of thefunnel, you've got your sign
outside your door, right?
And then of the amount ofpeople you see that, some people
will make through the nextalbum whether walk through the
front door, right?
And then some people can makeit through the next level where
they book an exam or whatever.
Rahil (07:42):
I like that one.
I like that.
That's cool, right?
I like all businesses are afunnel.
I like that.
Every stage of the every stageof the customer journey is
actually a fun- I like that.
Um honestly there's I think thethe way that you both kind of
explain the funnel is is prettymuch spot on.
Um obviously starts wider atthe top, and you've got like you
(08:02):
know, if you just look at it asa whole, let's say as you know,
your marketing activity as awhole, you'll have all sorts of
things that will feed into youknow people going in at the top
of this funnel.
So they might see you on yourorganic social media, they might
find you on Google, they mightclick on an ad, they might, they
might even just walk past yourbrand.
Like, you know, whatever it is,like you know, they see you in
(08:22):
some way, but like you know, atthis point we don't know what
what you know what they're doingwhen they see you, whether
they're interested in anythingthat you do, or they're just
browsing.
But every eyeball on you, inessence, feeds into the top of
the funnel.
And then each stage that you godown the funnel, this funnel
gets tighter, is morequalification, as you said, Dan.
Um, so they move from aneyeball into a lead, from a lead
(08:46):
into a consultation, from aconsultation into actually going
into the practice.
And each one of those, yes, youare gonna have a drop-off, it's
only natural, but from amarketing point of view, and
then from a you know, from a youknow, from a team point of
view, it's about making surethat we try and minimize that
drop-off and make it asefficient as we can.
(09:07):
So ultimately you end up withmore patients in the chat.
Dr James (09:10):
Sure.
So, yeah, there's only two waysthat you can uh the other the
way to expand on it as well isanother thing that I liked is
and there's only two ways youcan actually make your phone
more profitable.
Okay, you can improve thethroughput, okay?
You can, as in, you cangenerate more customers.
You can either generate morecustomers or make the customers
worth more.
And I love this.
This was some really coolbusiness wisdom, right?
(09:31):
Uh you can either generate morecustomers or make them worth
more, right?
So, how do you do that?
How do you generate morecustomers?
You either widen the funnel,okay, you widen it, or you
increase the throughput.
How do you make them worthmore?
You increase the LTV of thepatient, however that's done.
Or you the the custom, or youknow, it you know, obviously we
want to do things ethically anddo the right thing for the
patient.
That comes first and foremost.
(09:52):
Uh, and then we enable them tomake choices that are good for
their health.
And if those happens of agreater monetary value, then
what that means is obviously thebusiness's revenue is boosted
too.
But like I said, it you have tobe now, but it has to be that
way around, not the other wayaround, of course, just to say
that out loud.
But yes, anyway, um, so like Iwas saying, and that I think
that's a no-extra musi quote,and we mentioned him before.
(10:13):
He was like, you either makemore customers or you make them
worth more, right?
And I was just I I love littlethings that just make these
seemingly abstract and break.
It makes them more simple,right?
And I'm like, right, I'm eithertrying to do this or this.
But here's the thing I seeDennis do wrong with marketing a
lot of the time, and it'll beinteresting to get your take on
this.
Uh, because I think sometimesthey use it incorrectly, and
they're like, oh, I want mybusiness to be more profitable.
(10:35):
My diaries are booked up by sixto eight weeks.
I think I'm gonna try to getmore patients, right?
And it's like, no, thatliterally makes no sense.
You have to actually make themworth more because it's not a
fully leveraged business, right?
Like if you if you had a pure,if you had a website like
Amazon, you know, if 10 peoplelook at the website or a million
people look at the website,it's literally the same, okay,
in terms of effort for them.
(10:55):
It's fully leveraged, right?
Okay, maybe server costs go up.
I don't know.
I don't know enough about thatstuff, right?
But a dental practice can onlyhave so many patients.
There's only so many seats,there's only so many hours in
the day, there's only so manyinstances that the dentist is
going to be in a chair with apatient, right?
So in that instance, you haveto make them worth more.
Thoughts on that?
Rahil (11:13):
I think it's an interesting concept, this booked
up for weeks that you that yousaid earlier.
Um a lot of dentists, I think,in the past used to, it almost
used to be a sign of, oh, lookat me.
A badge of honor.
Yeah, a badge of honor,exactly.
I'm booked up for I'm booked upfor six weeks, I'm booked up
for eight weeks, I'm booked upfor like, you know, some months
(11:33):
in advance and needs to, youknow, say it very proudly.
Um what that actually means nowis that if a customer or a
potential patient inquires inand they want to see you, and
they're at the hottest momentthat they are, like, you know,
they have inquired, they arelike, yes, I want this.
You are the practice I want togo to.
Oh, I you can't see me for 10weeks.
(11:54):
You think that customer'sgonna, you know, they think that
patient's gonna stick around.
No, they're gonna shop forthey're gonna they're gonna go
shop around because they'restill they still want it.
But we're in a generation andand we're in a we're in a you
know um a society now, shall wesay, where we want things now.
And not just in the dentistry,but outside the dentistry.
(12:17):
I want food, Uber Eats, herewithin half an hour, done.
I want you know, something, Iwant something delivered to my
daughter, Amazon Prime next day,or even the same day now.
It just comes to me.
We get everything now, now, nowwhen we want it.
Same with information.
I want to know something, I canfind it on Google, I can find
it on YouTube, I can geteverything the way I want it,
the way I want it now.
(12:37):
But if someone wants to go seea dentist and they're like, oh,
I've booked up for eight weeks,you know, I still want this
thing now, I am gonna go shoparound.
So that it's kind of been a bigshift where it's getting
patients in when they're thehottest is is you know one of
(12:58):
those ways where we're talkingabout, oh, how can we get more
patients at the bottom of thefunnel?
You know, see them as quicklyas you can, get in contact with
them as quickly as you can, andsee them as quickly as you can.
I think there was research donethat shows if you, you know,
when a league comes through oneof your channels, be that social
media, be that through thewebsite, if you contact we if
(13:20):
you contact them within fiveminutes, you're 80% more likely
to get in contact with them.
And every minute that you waitis a minute that goes colder and
colder and colder.
So, you know, I submit aninquiry to a practice, and then
16 hours later someone gets backto me, it's like that moment
(13:40):
for me is is gone.
Like I was at I was at myhottest when I submitted that
inquiry.
And I'm not saying, oh, ifsomeone needs to man this phone
24-7, like, you know, obviouslyevade practice working hours,
but there's a there's a wholething in terms of everyone looks
at marketing as all the youknow the fancy stuff at the at
the top of the funnel, and we'reobviously going to talk about
that, but it's also improvingeach step in that funnel, the
(14:04):
contacting them, getting thembooked in, all of these things
actually mean you don't have tokeep, you know, spending as much
money on the top of the funnel,and you can still generate more
patients at the bottom of it.
Dr Dan (14:15):
Sure.
I I I like that idea, and itmade me vaguely uncomfortable if
I'm honest about the lifetimevalue of a patient.
So but but I like that ideabecause we used to call it kind
of, you know, if you get apatient and you treat them well,
you'll keep them for life,they'll send you their children,
their grandparents, theirfriends, you'll turn them into a
walking advert, and you know,they'll then showcase what
(14:38):
you've done and how you do it.
And if you ask your patientswhat they tell their friends,
they'll tell you, you know,hopefully they'll tell you
something like, Yeah, you canreally trust this dentist,
they'll sit down and have timeto talk to you, and that's what
people are after.
And and so that's howword-of-mouth referral works,
which is the most effective,organic way to uh you know grow
your practice.
(14:59):
And the more effort you can putinto that, the better, as long
as you consciously do it withyour team.
But this lifetime value of apatient, so you quantify it into
pounds, shillings, and pence,and you say, right, okay, well,
this patient will be with me 20years, they'll need you know,
five shillings, they'll need youknow, 10 crown, however you
(15:21):
want to in an implant.
So that's the value that thepatient's gonna bring.
They're gonna bring inreferrals, X, Y, and Z, and we
can assign a number.
Now, to me as a clinician, andI know I'm the only one clinical
out of the three of us, yeah.
Rahil (15:34):
It makes a change from the Usual Podcast, yes, I'm
sure, having just marketingcoming on.
Dr Dan (15:39):
Yeah, well, absolutely, but uh it makes me vaguely
uncomfortable as a clinician,and I'm sure some of your
listeners might beuncomfortable, having to use
those business insights andthink about the lifetime value
of a patient when all you'redoing is ethical treatment, you
know, you're curing disease withpractitioners, we're healthcare
practitioners.
(15:59):
And for me, it just sits alittle bit, I don't know.
I mean, do you do you find thatresistance in dentists and
healthcare practitioners to theidea of quantifying these
patients into pounds?
Rahil (16:15):
Yes, because it's not like you know, every dentist,
like you know, your first, youknow, your priority first and
foremost is to want to help thatpatient.
Obviously, like you know, withevery service as an associated
cost, but a lot that you knowthe ethical responsibility is to
is to help that patient.
And the other part of it isthat for dentists by and large,
(16:37):
like across the board, no onehas really taught them these
things as well.
Be it like, you know, we'regonna come on to, I'm sure,
like, you know, more fancyterminology, but like you know,
lifetime value and cost perlead, and you know, when how
quickly you need to contact likeyou know, leads that kind of
like no one's really, you know,you don't discuss this in dental
(16:58):
school.
Like, you know, it's neverreally been it's never really
been a topic for a lot ofdentists, and then they come
into this world of practiceownership, and suddenly they're
thrown into thrown into the deepend having to, in essence, kind
of believe what a multi-agencywill tell them because they
don't know what good looks liketo know, okay, this is what I
(17:21):
should be expecting on my end,or this is like you know, what
figures I have in for mypractice and terms of that
lifetime value.
Dr Dan (17:28):
Um so yeah, I think it's it's kind of two things in in
that sense.
And and it goes a bit further.
I mean, a lot of dentalpractices in the UK don't even
have websites.
Which is really weird when youthink crazy to think about.
Dr James (17:41):
Any stats on that?
Or if you have to lick yourfinger put in the air, I hill.
Rahil (17:45):
Ooh.
Uh I don't have a stat on itoff the top of my head.
Dr James (17:50):
Maybe an ex in ex maybe even if it was a lick your
finger put in the air, just inyour experience, sort of thing.
Rahil (17:57):
I think many don't have websites.
I'd like to change it slightly.
I think there's I think that'sa I'd like to think a lot of the
practices would have a website,but whether they would actually
whether they've actually lookedat that website in the last and
it might be 20 years old.
Exactly.
I think that's the that's thekind of reframe I'd like to
apply to because I think a lotof practices, like let's say
(18:19):
finger in the L I said that 80%of practices will have a
website, but that website, youknow, let's say if they bought
that practice 15 years ago, thatwas the last time that anybody
had a look at probably thatwebsite.
Um and that figure, thatpercentage is a lot, is the one
that probably means a lot more,is they don't actually like you
(18:41):
know, revisit that website, itis and it still has the same
look, feel as it did 15 yearsago, and we know that the way
that things have moved along.
And the the way that anaudience and our consumers look
at a website and how they buy isvery different to what it was.
Like you know, even five yearsago, how different it is.
So I think that's the moreimportant kind of stuff.
Dr Dan (19:03):
And I see I've seen some websites for dentists that look
like they're stuck in the 80sfrom the beginning of the
origins of the internet, and youthink, well, you know, what's
what's going on here?
I mean, as a user, I'm gonna goonto that set and I'm gonna
think, whack, this is justincredibly weird.
Rahil (19:19):
It's it's just the twilight time machine.
Yeah, and and you could andthat dentist could be actually
the best dentist for thatpatient.
Absolutely.
But they will that patient willnever know it.
Don't even walk into thesurgery.
Exactly, because it it it feelsyou know, if you'll that
website will feel alien, almostalien to them to visit, uh,
(19:39):
because it just hasn't kept upwith the times.
Dr Dan (19:41):
But it's almost like dentists feel like they're
outside of that consumer world.
I know we've been discussingthis, and and and they don't
have to do this stuff, they'llhave their practice, and people
will just walk in through thedoor.
But that is really changing.
Dr James (19:56):
Yeah, that's the top of the funnel, right?
Yeah, that's literally the topof the funnel.
And people who walk through thedoor, uh, yeah, well, the
website can be obviously thedigitally can be part of that
decision.
And yeah, just to look back toI know your area of expertise is
of course the marketing side ofthings.
Uh Rahil, if we and you know, Iget what you're saying.
(20:17):
It's like as we progress downthe funnel, it's like, okay,
response times, and then how dothose conversations go?
Who books in, what do they bookin for?
And that's as it progressivelygets narrower.
Mark the main marketing mainlyto me is like the very, very,
very top bit, right?
Or at least that's the firstthing, anyway, right?
Because you're you'reincreasing the throughput,
aren't you?
So if we were to focus on thatarea, let's talk.
(20:40):
I'd love to talk about uhsocials.
Yep.
I'd love to cover that.
And I'd also love to cover, butbefore we jump onto that, we
were talking about websites justa second ago.
Yeah, you must be able to lookat a website and be like, right,
change this, this, this, this,and this.
And all of a sudden the websitegoes bang, pop.
What are those things?
And I know obviously it's like,okay, cool.
(21:01):
You know, there's a differencebetween knowing what they are
and how do you apply them.
I get this.
I get there's the devils in thedetail, but even if you could
just round some off, some easyones, that'd be really valuable
for the audience.
Rahil (21:11):
We have we have uh we have a little like you know
website checklist that we thatwe go through when we audit our
websites, like you know, it it'squite long, so I can pick out
like the best ones that we lookat.
And the one that sticks out alot for for dentists now is it
does it actually is it actuallyoptimized for mobile?
What a lot of agencies in thepast will have done is they
(21:33):
would have shown you thisincredibly nice built-out
website on the laptop with thevideo here and the button looks
beautiful and it all flowsreally nicely.
But what we found, and we didsome tests on sites that we
built and managed, is thataround 60 to 75 percent of the
visitors on that website are nowcoming from mobile, which makes
sense because that's where wespend all of our time.
(21:54):
So you know we all carry ourphones in our pockets, it's you
know what we scroll on all thetime, it's where like you know,
it's where our attention is, andobviously, the because of that,
like you know, people in thevisit your website from it.
So we've seen that about 70% ofthe traffic for a website will
come from the mobile, but whenyou visit that website on the
mobile, suddenly that video thatlooked incredible on the web on
(22:14):
the desktop version is nowshrunk down.
Yeah, then you only see likethe bush when you enter the
practice instead of someonewalking through the front door.
Dr Dan (22:23):
And the sides cut off.
Rahil (22:24):
Exactly, the sides cut off, the image is stretched out
or really thinned in.
The you know, the button thatyou know you click when you
let's say wanted to book anappointment is half off the
screen.
Yeah, and it's a kind ofreframe that we're trying to do
is we build mobile first nowbecause that's where the
majority of the traffic comesfrom.
The other one is actually theother one's a very simple one,
(22:48):
is uh how quickly does yourwebsite actually load.
Um it goes back to the youknow, we're in that generation
where we want everything now,now, now.
Um, and there were some statspublished recently by um by a
agency that looks not only atthe at healthcare but also like
you know um a lot of industriesas a whole.
(23:08):
And they said that if yourwebsite doesn't load within
three seconds, yeah, that 53% ofpeople.
Will click off and go and findsomething else.
Dr Dan (23:17):
And scroll attention on socials is even smaller.
I mean that's about one and ahalf seconds.
If you don't see content comeup, then you'll just scroll on.
Rahil (23:26):
You're gone because we're in that we're in that thing
where we want it now, now, now.
Um, and then there's so many,there's you know, there's
there's so many other ones interms of websites, like having a
clear like journey that youwant this, you know, this custom
this patient or this potentialpatient, should I say, to follow
when they get on the website?
Like, you know, if they get onthe website and they can't
actually see where that buttonis to book an appointment, or
(23:49):
the first thing that they see isto do with like your
cancellation policy or somethinglike that.
How many a clear journey forthem to follow when they get on
the site presenting theinformation in a way that's
actually easy for them tounderstand and avoiding too much
dental jargon?
Dr Dan (24:03):
Yeah.
Rahil (24:04):
I think you know, you you both probably testify to it
that when a dentist getstalking, especially if that's
something technical, it can goover a lot of people's heads,
especially if they're notfamiliar, familiar with it, and
that can scare a lot of peopleoff.
So actually, just you know,simplifying it down into
language that a patient willwill understand.
(24:25):
Um, and I think you know, thelast last couple are coming back
to what we discussed earlier,with almost that look and feel
of the website.
Like, you know, if it doesn'tlook and feel like a modern day
website, like you know, if yourmeet the team is just it's not
even pictures of the team, ifit's just like you know, blank
faces, yeah.
And all I see is Dr.
(24:46):
So and so, and then the 20letters after his name that to a
dentist are you know anotherbadge of honour.
But for a you know, for apainting, like you know, for a
consumer, what does that meanfor me?
Why does you know the fact thathe's got this many letters
after his name, what does, youknow, what does that mean for
me?
What is this person actuallylike?
Um the two questions, the twoimportant questions we ask
(25:07):
someone with their website arekind of looking at when they
last looked at it are you know,firstly, like, are you proud of
your website?
We we like to do a little testwhen we when we run our events,
is we pick someone and we'relike if we were to put your
website on the screen in frontof everyone else, like then
would you be happy for us to doit now?
(25:28):
What do people say?
No, really not.
Genuinely not.
Genuinely not, but then they'rehappy for tens, if not
hundreds, of patients, ofpotential patients to be seeing
it every single day.
Yet they won't show it on aroom full of full of 10, 20
people.
Um, and then fundamentally,like, you know, what is your
website there for?
(25:49):
It's there to generateinquiries, so is it doing its
job as a website?
Dr Dan (25:54):
And then people have got to find the website as well.
Yeah, and the website is onegateway and hundred percent.
Search engine optimization isnot just about that.
I mean, you can write blogs andyou can optimize the blogs so
that they come up on a Googlesearch.
You can uh you know, registeryour business on Google Business
listings, and that'll get youup on the maps, and and that's
called the the is it thethree-pack in the top three uh
(26:17):
businesses, so you can you canoptimize your organic listings
uh to get found a lot easier.
But the game is changing, isn'tit?
And and I I'll tell you what,this chat GPT using it to
glorify Google, this is now thething that people are really
interested in, and they'refinding it difficult to optimize
(26:37):
listings for chat GPT, althoughthere are some tips and tricks
apparently.
Dr James (26:43):
Yes.
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Rahil (28:35):
I can tell you a funny, funny little story.
So I was in London not too longago, and usually when I get to
London, if I need to figure outwhen I get into Houston where I
need to go, I'll put it on theUnderground app or go on Google
Maps.
So I was going down theescalator into Houston, I have
my journey map tower, I wasgonna go on the Northern Line
and then I was gonna go um, Ithink I was on the Victoria.
The woman in front of me,instead of going on to Google or
(28:58):
on the under on the like youknow, TFL app, she went on to
Chatley GPT and she said, How doI get from Houston to here?
And I love it.
I am a big advocate for it, buteven I'm like, wow.
That's how much people arelike, you know, that's how much
this you know people are usingthese things day to day now.
Dr Dan (29:21):
Uh but it probably worked better and gave uh
there's a delay on the northernline, so you need to avoid this
route, whereas the app might nothave said it quite like that.
Rahil (29:29):
Every everyone's got their own preferences, isn't it?
And then like, you know, withGoogle now, for example, they
have an AI overview.
Like, you know, you don't evenfor a lot of the time you answer
you ask a query on Google andit'll come up with this AI
overview, which is Google's, inessence, AI summary of what
you're looking for.
But what's really interesting,and it comes back to the SEO
(29:50):
point, is if you look at thesources of where Google's
actually picking up thatinformation from, most likely
you will find those websitesthat it uses on page one of
Google.
So Google will use sites in itsAI overview that it actually
trusts.
It's not just gonna obviously,you know, it's not just gonna
pull information fromeverywhere.
(30:12):
It's gonna look at you know thesites that it trusts and the
sites that rank highly.
So it's not only a case of yes,you can be found high, like you
know, more organically and youknow, get higher on Google, not
only on the Google Maps listing,but also on Google searches,
but you will now also feature inthese AI overviews that
everyone's now getting when theysearch on Google as well.
So it's it's something that issuch a good like long-term
(30:36):
practice builder is the way thatwe look at SEO.
You're not gonna see a returnon investment with this as you
would pay down.
It's not gonna be like youknow, you turn the SEO tap on
and you're now gonna startgetting patients.
It's a long-term practicebuilder, but it's value when
done right.
Like being on page one ofGoogle, if you can get to number
(30:59):
one, yeah, wow.
Because people are becomingmore like distrusting of ads if
they see the word ad, and sochanging.
Sponsored listing.
Exactly.
I'm sure you can both testifyto it.
Like people are becoming moredistrustful of that.
So some people like you scrollpast it straight to that number
one organic listing.
Dr Dan (31:18):
I know I do when I use Google.
And and coming to things likebudgeting, I mean, should you be
setting aside uh a marketingbudget?
How do you how do you do that?
Because you know, you need tospend money on these things, and
and you know, however you do,whatever you do.
We've talked about improvingwebsites, we've talked about
feeding people into funnels,everything costs.
Um the thing that really usedto annoy me when I used to have
(31:41):
a marketing budget was themarketeer would come and we'd
sit down and they'd show me alovely graph with great colours
on it.
And it would say, Right, you'vegot this number of impressions,
and that means the number oftimes people have seen the
thing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And that's converted into thisnumber that's also very
impressive.
And and the marketer would say,Isn't that great?
And and I'd be sitting therethinking, Well, I haven't seen
(32:04):
many more patients in the book.
Bums on seats is what it iscalled.
Now, you know, how do youassess, especially with things
like organic SEO improvements,uh, which we've talked about,
that you're not going to see areturn straight away.
How can you then budget andconvert to bums on seats?
Rahil (32:25):
It is probably one of the probably one of the hardest
questions to to answer becausedentists, like as we all do,
they know we want things to showa return that you know as soon
as possible.
Um when it comes to we don'tlike to kind of group
everything, like you know, wedon't have to look at things
(32:45):
individually, as you said.
Like we try and set up anoverall marketing budget, and
that will include obviously somepaid activity in there, and
then there'll be a section setaside for obviously the practice
building organically, be likeI'd be the website, SEO, social
media.
Um, there's I think in theagency world now, there's you
know, as with there is withdental practices, so much
(33:07):
competition.
Like, you know, you can get SEOdone for a couple hundred
pounds a month, or you can getSEO done for around a thousand
pounds a month.
But it kind of depends on, youknow, the quality, the quality
of what you get is gonna bedifferent, and also like you
know, how much they're gonna doon your site is gonna be
different.
Um for me, it's more aboutprioritize like you know, what's
(33:31):
you know, the channels that areactually gonna that are right
for you in the moment.
Um for a lot of practices yesSEO is important, but I would
look at let's say your socialmedia and your website as bigger
priorities than investing moneyin SEO straight away.
Yes, the benefits are morelong-term with SEO, but if you
(33:55):
look at you know just pureeyeballs on where you know your
customers are, social media iskind of one that you have to be
on.
And I know we're we're probablygonna discuss that a lot more
like as we as we talk.
And just as you said, yourwebsite, like it's in essence
that is your that's your growthengine.
Um, and even if like you knowyou're not being found as as
(34:16):
high as you want organically,there are still other ways to
drive traffic to get to thatwebsite.
Um setting that budget is hard,but we kind of we work
backwards in a sense.
We kind of look at how many,right, this is you know, this is
how many cases we want to bedoing.
To get this many cases, we needthis many consultations.
(34:40):
To get this many consultations,we need this many leads.
To generate this many leads,this is gonna be our overall
budget.
Um so we kind of work with thepractice to set these goals and
where they want to be.
So we kind of work backwardsfrom bums on seats and said,
okay, this is in essence howmany eyeballs we're gonna need
(35:02):
to get these bums on seats.
And in terms we were talkingabout, there's two ways to
increase that.
You either increase the numberof eyeballs or you increase the
conversion piece between everysingle one.
So you go from the eyeball, thenumber of eyeballs could stay
the same, but you can get moreleads from it because you became
more efficient in capturingthat.
You convert more leads into aconsultation because you became
(35:24):
more efficient in actually likeyou know that can that first
step conversion piece.
So we work backwards and wekind of you know see where the
drop-offs are before weinstantly start looking at okay,
this channel and this channel,because there's so much that can
be done without even like thedrastic measures on top of the
funnel.
Dr James (35:42):
I think it's just doing the basics and doing them
really well.
I mean you're like most thingsin life, if you literally just
do the basics really well,you're like in the top 10%
somehow.
Do you know what I mean?
Rahil (35:52):
Um my dad has a quote and he says world class basics will
will be like 90% of people.
There we go.
World class, but and it'smajority of what we try to do
isn't overly like out there, itis just these are your you know,
these are your basics.
Get them to a point where it'sabsolutely like you know, world
(36:15):
class.
And then when you do go toscale your marketing with things
like paid or like you knowputting some more money into
content or more into SEO,because your basics and because
your systems, your processes areso good, you can scale.
Whereas if what people do isthey'll put so much in at the
top too early, and everythingcrumbles because they don't have
(36:37):
the right systems and stuffbelow it.
Dr James (36:39):
You know, I heard uh your website and your organic
socials described as yourdigital CV, okay?
And I really I I like that,right?
Because basically, someone willfind out about you, they'll do
a little bit of research on youand what's out there already,
and then they'll make a decisionto get in touch with you,
whatever that is regarding inthis instance conventional in
(37:00):
the dental practice, it's goingto be the patient deciding that
they want to speak to you.
And I think that people need tounderstand that actually that
works in tandem with your paidmarketing rather than being a
separate thing, an individualthing.
They actually enhance eachother.
You get more out of your paidmarketing when you have organic
socials as well.
And you know what another thingI think people don't understand
is I think people think thatyou have to have a huge amount
(37:23):
of followers, or it has to takea long time necessarily to see
some benefit.
You actually start to see somebenefits pretty fast.
Like you might even get someDMs pretty quick.
You know, obviously with timeit can get really crazy and it
can go really exponential.
And I think that people thinkthat it does take quite a while
always to build up.
It does get better with time,but you can see some effects
(37:46):
pretty much straight away.
Website, I have a quickquestion about a website.
I'm interested to know, do youthink that it's smart?
I you know, I don't want todwell on this one too long.
I just I'm just curious to knowyour stance on this because we
do need to talk about organicsocials as well before this
podcast concludes.
Do you think it's a good ideato have some sort of lead jam
form right at the top of thewebsite?
(38:08):
Like right in the You mean likean inquiry form?
An inquiry form or justsomewhere people can fill in
their contact details orsomething like that.
What basically what I'm askingyou is what's the best way to
generate leads from your websitein your having it synced
directly with your online book.
Rahil (38:25):
Having it synced directly with your like um your like
practice management software andthey can book them directly.
Interesting.
That is like how like whentypically we'll like you know,
we like to direct people, forexample, our call to action when
we get people on um is to booka free consultation.
Okay so they will click on thatlink and that link will bring
(38:48):
up a diary in the availabilitythat will sync with our practice
diary so they can instantlyjust book it.
So direct into the diary.
Dr Dan (38:57):
Okay.
So I I'm quite resistant tothat.
Dr James (38:59):
I know a lot of dentists are.
Yeah, a lot of dentists are.
Dr Dan (39:02):
I prefer it that it sends the receptionist an email
with the appointment request,and then the receptionist then
confirms it in the software.
I always feel losing control ofthe diary is a fear I've got.
Dr James (39:14):
But you know what?
This is why I love to askquestions like this, because
obviously Rahil is someone whodoes marketing all day long for
down practice, right?
And sometimes when you askquestions like that, you get
responses that you maybenecessarily didn't respect uh
didn't expect.
Uh, but where those answerscome from is a place of greater
knowledge than yourself.
So I'm curious, why does thatwork?
Rahil (39:36):
So we look at it, so we look at it from a customer's
point of view.
If they are visiting thewebsite and they're clicking on
that call to action, they and intheir head have made their mind
up that I want this, I'vechosen you for it, and they just
want to have it.
And I want to say Tuesday 1.30.
Exactly.
For them, and that's you know,in essence, I think that's what
(39:56):
dentists by and large don't likeis like you know, we have to we
have to optimize this for thatcustomer and for the potential
patient here.
That is what that's what thejourney is optimized for.
As much as it's you know, forexample, you know, you do lose a
bit of control, granted, butfor a patient, it's so low
friction.
(40:16):
Um, it's like another one islike when on your website, like
your phone number on the on themobile, make sure someone can
just tap it.
Click.
Yeah.
Tap that tap the phone numberand it phones.
Dr Dan (40:28):
Yeah.
But you know, thinking aboutthat, that really annoys me on
uh not dental websites, otherwebsites when you can't click
the phone number.
And then you have to remove it.
Rahil (40:36):
You have to copy and paste it, and it's you're just
giving the you're giving thatyou're giving that potential
patient the opportunity to justyou're removing a barrier.
Exactly.
Make it as easy as you can.
So that's why we try and say,okay, you know, integrate it
with your with your onlinebooking system if you can.
Um but a lot of websites willalways have a form.
(40:59):
We usually put it near thebottom, um, because it's still
like if they're not sure, thenobviously, you know, they leave
their, you know, they leavetheir details because patients
now, well customers now, theydon't they don't just inquire
one practice.
They will they will shoparound.
Um and it's well what aboutchat box?
Dr Dan (41:17):
I mean that's uh another thing that's very popular.
Rahil (41:21):
I have a con I have a kind of contrarian take with
chat box that's like you know,it doesn't align with what a lot
of people say is I I don'tthey're good for a customer who
doesn't know what they want.
If I'm sure if I visit thewebsite and I'm not sure, a
chatbot coming in and beinglike, yeah, like you know, this
(41:42):
is all about us, what do youwant to know?
Then I really see the value init.
But if I know what I if Iclicked on a website like, yeah,
I want this, and then thischatbot takes up half of my
screen, it actually annoys likeme personally.
Dr Dan (41:56):
Minimize it.
Rahil (41:58):
It's it's I you know I see the value in them, and we
have sites that we do havewebsites that we manage that run
them, we have websites that wemanage that don't.
It is more on a kind ofcase-by-case basis because there
are a you know a wide varietyof people that like to look at
things their own way.
Like when you land on somethinglike I want to explore this in
(42:20):
my way, rather than havesomething tell me, oh yeah, this
is this is what you need now,this is what you need to click
on.
Like I personally don't likeit, but I know a lot of people,
and there are chatbots out therethat get a lot of like
inquiries through them becauseit makes it it makes it easy for
someone to just be like, yep,oh, I land here, okay, it's
done.
So personally, I'm not a fan,but I know they I know they do
(42:44):
work.
Interesting.
Dr James (42:46):
And you know, I bet there's a load more where all of
that stuff came from withregards to your knowledge on
websites and the MZ dentists cando it.
I bet there's way more to it.
We're probably just scratchingthe surface of these things
right here, some of thestraightforward things people
can implement, but I bet whenyou fully overhaul a website for
a dentist, there's there'sabout 50 million things in
there.
I was just curious just beforewe round off, uh, organic
(43:09):
socials.
Let's talk about organicsocials as well, because
obviously that is superimportant to you.
And they can complement yourwebsite, they can complement
your ads, they can do a lot ofgood stuff for your practices uh
out there.
And not even if you are just adental practice, even if you're
just an associate as well,because obviously that enhanced
your personal brand.
Uh, that can help you if youwish to start a practice one
(43:32):
day, or even build a list ofhighly qualified patients for
whatever treatment that you do.
So on that front, Rahil, Iguess what a lot of people, I
feel what a lot of people wouldbenefit from is just some sort
of structure to doing it.
And what would you suggest onthat front?
How many can people get reallythey get analysis process with
it, I think, right?
And they're you know, there'sthe Gary V logic.
(43:54):
What's the Gary V Interruplogic, which is like post as
many times as you humanly can,and it's like, okay, I get that,
right?
But if you're just putting outnonsense all day long, that's
not gonna work either.
Uh then again, if you neverpost, well you're not gonna
benefit from it.
So where's the sweet spot?
Rahil (44:09):
So the platforms, the platforms reward consistency,
first of all.
So like there is there is alike there's actually nothing
good if you are active for oneweek and then you take a break.
Like, you know, we see that theviews on your post will
consistently suffer if you'renot consistent on the platforms.
(44:29):
Actually, having a consistentpresence on these platforms is
massive.
I love Gary V, and um there isa lot of logic as to what he
says, but for a lot of practicesit that is either just
unrealistic, like you know,posting multiple times a day on
every single platform, and ifthey do do it, it won't be
(44:53):
valuable content, it'll just bea flood of just like you know,
AI written content that just youknow doesn't help or serve
anyone.
So, what we like to say is a slike a sweet spot is three times
a week, and we usually are likeyou know what, for a lot of
practices Monday, Wednesday,Friday, in terms of posts on the
grid, it's a nice sweet spot.
(45:13):
It's not too over.
Overwhelming, but it's enoughgoing out there that you know
you're still consistent on theplatform.
Obviously, that's posts on thegrid.
You're you know, there's somany different, so many
different things you can do onsocial media.
Your stories, like you know,you should be using them
whenever you can, but you know,they're only there for 24 hours.
If something's happening, youknow, in the practice, if you
(45:35):
had like you know, a patientsend you a nice thank you card,
even like you know, that you caneasily make a story if you're
going with uh, you know, ifyou're doing anything fun with
the team, or like you know, ifyou've just started uh, you
know, if you just startedsomeone's smile jet, you can
instantly put these things onstories, they're there for 24
hours and they disappear.
But what it does is it kind ofkeeps you in the feed, in the
(45:57):
mind, and then you know, thatthree-day a week is what we
usually aim for as a minimum.
There's you know, obviously, asyou go through and you get
comfortable with that, peoplemove up to five, some people
even post seven times a week,and some are posting multiple
times on every platform, but wetry and find that minimum is
three times a week.
And the way we view yourcontent is we say it's it's the
(46:21):
consultation before theconsultation is the way that I
like to look up your organicsocial presence.
So if we look at that, if allthat that person who visites
your socials can see is beforeand after, before and after,
before and after, great, theyknow you're clinically
competent, but they don't knowanything else about you.
And a lot of patients, a lot ofyou know, people scrolling on
(46:43):
social media, they'll think thatyou know what, all dentists
from their point of view, theycan they do the same thing.
There's not as much educationon what actually separates a
dentist from a good dentist froma clinical point of view.
But what you can do to separateyourself from people is and it
comes back to the branding thatwe were talking about earlier.
You talk about yourself, youtalk about your team, you talk
(47:06):
about you know the practicejourney.
Like, you know, some of thesepractices have been around for
you know 15, 20 years.
Like, you know, there's got tohave been a lot of development
in that time that a new patientvisiting your profile wouldn't
know or appreciate.
Talk about your staff, like youknow, if you do stuff outside
of dentistry, talk about that.
We have a dentist in our in ourBirmingham practice, and we
(47:27):
proudly say on on our socialmedia that he's an Aston Villa
fan.
Guess who engages with him?
Aston Villa fans.
Guess who's really happy whenthey find out that Dr.
Oliver is their dentist?
The Aston Villa fans.
But if we didn't show thisother side to you know him, the
team, you wouldn't give themthat opportunity.
If you think about what youwould rather see when you go
(47:49):
onto social media, would yourather see a faceless practice
with just endless before andafters?
Would you rather see a practicethat shows their team, shows
the human side of it, isrelatable, feel like and it
feels authentic.
There's there's an obvious oneon which you'd rather engage
with.
So it's a mix of obviouslyshowing that clinical competence
(48:10):
and making sure that shinesthrough because it needs to.
There's no substitute for gooddentistry at the end of the day.
So making sure that shinesthrough in a different in
different ways, like you know,not just the selling before and
after every time.
Can you do video testimonials?
Can you post a Google review?
Can you do a smile reveal?
Can you do it in a in adifferent format of video
(48:30):
instead of a static?
There's all these differentways that you can do it to make
it more engaging.
But then the other side is likethe human feel to everything,
which is you know what peoplewant to see, because we do, you
know, people do business withpeople they like.
And if you're not showing themthe people behind the practice,
then you're not giving them achance to engage with you.
Dr Dan (48:49):
I guess one platform uh we we've really haven't
mentioned at all, which is worthit mentioning, is TikTok.
I mean, had we done thispodcast a little while ago,
TikTok would have been front andcentre of the conversation.
Whereas now it's kind of gotlost.
Is it is TikTok going down inpopularity?
I know it's gone up and down alittle bit, but still people uh
(49:11):
were using TikTok as TikTokUniversity and you know, asking
all kinds of questions, youknow.
Uh let's have a look at um, youknow, uh in this county
Hartford, let's have a look atsmart makeovers, and you'd come
up with a couple of dentiststhat would do it.
And you know, dentists wereposting quite a lot.
Um, but I do feel that with theAI revolution, has that touched
(49:32):
the edges of TikTok?
Rahil (49:34):
TikTok is each platform is as you know is better for
different demographics ofpeople, is the best way to kind
of you know to kind of addressthat question.
Like, you know, you'll you'lltypically find a uh a more
mature audience on Facebook, forexample.
Instagram kind of encapsulateseverybody, and TikTok is
primarily for that youngergeneration.
They like to be engaged in adifferent way compared to like
(49:56):
you know, an old, like you know,older generation, so they are
more video first.
The platform still definitelyhas a place, and like you know,
you should be using it.
But what we like to say formajority of practices is master
meta first.
So master Instagram andFacebook first, because that's
where your audience primarilylives in terms of like you know,
(50:18):
potential patients, more ofthem live on meta than they do
on TikTok.
And once you're comfortable onthat, then you move into other
platforms like TikTok, YouTube,it's endless.
So we always try and mastermeta first.
So I
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Alright, welcome back, anotherepisode of Dentists Who Invest
(02:21):
Podcast here.
Here to talk about something wehaven't talked about in a long
time and actually is really,really, really important.
So it's about time that we did,and that is organic marketing
with the expert on this matter,Mr.
Rahil Kumar from MiSmile Media.
Rahil, how are you today?
Very good, mate.
Thank you very much to both ofyou for having me on.
Hey, listen, good to have youback.
And yeah, you're quite right,because this podcast is a little
(02:42):
bit of a departure from thenorm on the DWI podcast, in that
it's co-hosted by myself andalso Dr.
Dan Shaffer.
Thank you very much.
Hey, no problem, mate.
Good to have you here.
And you know what?
Uh yeah, worth mentioning thatwe know each other through
Business of Dentistry, uh, whichis the events uh side of things
uh over here in Dentist whoinvests.
(03:02):
And like I say, uh we'rerecording this podcast again,
fresh off the back of havingdone an event yesterday.
So we're riding high, we'refeeling good.
We're still in the venue, henceour plush surroundings.
Uh a little bit of an upgradeuh from what we do normally,
which is basically just awebcam.
Uh so yeah, no, it's uh itfeels good.
It feels good to have anotherbig event in the bag, looking
(03:24):
forward to the next one already,come October time.
But that's not the purpose ofpointing this podcast.
The purpose of pointing thispodcast is to talk about organic
marketing and what's changed in2026.
So I guess the first thing todo would be to start out by
defining organic marketingbecause I know people use that
term, they throw it around alot, but how do you define it?
Because definitions differslightly on this one sometimes.
Rahil (03:46):
I think it's I think it's a trend of marketing.
It's like you know, everything,everyone's got a different
definition for everything.
Uh I think go back to the ourpodcast that we did on branding,
like everyone finds it so hardto define it.
Um we look at all organicmarketing as uh kind of a series
of channels as opposed to likeyou know a cluster, shall we
(04:10):
say?
Um so we look at it as let'ssay posting on posting on social
media, be it Facebook, be itMeta.
Uh we class SEO as more organicmarketing, even though you're
you know, even though you'rehaving to potentially pay an
agency.
What do we class it as organicmarketing?
We actually group your websiteinto organic marketing as well.
Um so we kind of group those,I'd say, three main channels as
(04:34):
your you know, as your organicmarketing kind of piece.
Dr James (04:38):
Yeah, I guess another way of defining it is the more
passive stuff, right?
A little bit, kind of.
As in to me, it's there's moreof a with ads, it's like when
you see the word ad, you'realready primed, there's a CTA
here, right?
And to be fair, organic stuffcan have CTAs in it as well, but
it's a lot more about brandingand positioning and everything
(05:00):
along those lines.
Or at least, at least usuallyit is, anyway.
Again, as you're saying, it's alittle bit more hard.
It's harder to define, buthaving an extra perspective on
it or an extra way of describingit will help make it hopefully
a little bit more clear inpeople's heads.
Rahil (05:15):
Yeah, I think that you know the way that we the way we
look at paid compared to toorganic is like you know, paid
is paid's a tap.
You know, you turn that tap on,leads come out of the bottom.
Like you know, you spend money,you get leads.
Either that's through Google,through that's Facebook, but you
turn that tap off, it stops.
Whereas the way we look atorganic is that everything that
(05:36):
you you know you do, be it postcontent on social media, be it
putting blogs on your website torank higher in SEO, be it you
know building a website and andhaving that live, like you you
know, you do it once, but it itremains there.
Um so that's kind of how wedifferentiate it as well.
Dr Dan (05:54):
Sure.
And that SEO, I mean, uh forthe benefit of the listeners,
SEO is search engineoptimization, and uh the other
term I think we use was CTA,which is a call to action, which
would be a button for people topress or or click through to.
And these form all parts of afunnel.
(06:14):
And you know, we use that termjust to symbolize the widened
top going down to a narrowbottom.
So you get a large number ofpeople you feed into the top of
the funnel, and they dwindleaway to those uh leads.
You might get them through acall to action, whatever it is,
and you qualify those leads, andthe quality ones fall out the
(06:37):
bottom, and those are the leadsthat you then want to work with.
Dr James (06:41):
You know, I really like the funnel analogy, is a is
a common one used in marketing,and you can even use you can
even describe each one of yourchannels as a funnel in and of
itself, right?
Uh so the the top, but it's itgets wider at the top and
narrower at the bottom.
I think that's a RussellBrunson uh uh uh piece of
terminology right there, uh thethe marketing funnel, or perhaps
(07:04):
maybe it wasn't his originally,perhaps he popularized it.
I don't I don't know.
But Rahel, tell us what afunnel is in your words, because
I'm I'm curious to know,curious to know your thoughts on
this.
Because every I heard him sayonce, this guy Russell Brunson,
I remember reading one of hisbooks back in the day, and um he
was he said something stuckwith me and he said, All
businesses are a funnel inessence, right?
(07:25):
Whether you have digitalmarketing or you don't, your
business is still a funnel,right?
Because at the top of thefunnel, you've got your sign
outside your door, right?
And then of the amount ofpeople you see that, some people
will make through the nextalbum whether walk through the
front door, right?
And then some people can makeit through the next level where
they book an exam or whatever.
Rahil (07:42):
I like that one.
I like that.
That's cool, right?
I like all businesses are afunnel.
I like that.
Every stage of the every stageof the customer journey is
actually a fun- I like that.
Um honestly there's I think thethe way that you both kind of
explain the funnel is is prettymuch spot on.
Um obviously starts wider atthe top, and you've got like you
(08:02):
know, if you just look at it asa whole, let's say as you know,
your marketing activity as awhole, you'll have all sorts of
things that will feed into youknow people going in at the top
of this funnel.
So they might see you on yourorganic social media, they might
find you on Google, they mightclick on an ad, they might, they
might even just walk past yourbrand.
Like, you know, whatever it is,like you know, they see you in
(08:22):
some way, but like you know, atthis point we don't know what
what you know what they're doingwhen they see you, whether
they're interested in anythingthat you do, or they're just
browsing.
But every eyeball on you, inessence, feeds into the top of
the funnel.
And then each stage that you godown the funnel, this funnel
gets tighter, is morequalification, as you said, Dan.
Um, so they move from aneyeball into a lead, from a lead
(08:46):
into a consultation, from aconsultation into actually going
into the practice.
And each one of those, yes, youare gonna have a drop-off, it's
only natural, but from amarketing point of view, and
then from a you know, from a youknow, from a team point of
view, it's about making surethat we try and minimize that
drop-off and make it asefficient as we can.
(09:07):
So ultimately you end up withmore patients in the chat.
Dr James (09:10):
Sure.
So, yeah, there's only two waysthat you can uh the other the
way to expand on it as well isanother thing that I liked is
and there's only two ways youcan actually make your phone
more profitable.
Okay, you can improve thethroughput, okay?
You can, as in, you cangenerate more customers.
You can either generate morecustomers or make the customers
worth more.
And I love this.
This was some really coolbusiness wisdom, right?
(09:31):
Uh you can either generate morecustomers or make them worth
more, right?
So, how do you do that?
How do you generate morecustomers?
You either widen the funnel,okay, you widen it, or you
increase the throughput.
How do you make them worthmore?
You increase the LTV of thepatient, however that's done.
Or you the the custom, or youknow, it you know, obviously we
want to do things ethically anddo the right thing for the
patient.
That comes first and foremost.
(09:52):
Uh, and then we enable them tomake choices that are good for
their health.
And if those happens of agreater monetary value, then
what that means is obviously thebusiness's revenue is boosted
too.
But like I said, it you have tobe now, but it has to be that
way around, not the other wayaround, of course, just to say
that out loud.
But yes, anyway, um, so like Iwas saying, and that I think
that's a no-extra musi quote,and we mentioned him before.
(10:13):
He was like, you either makemore customers or you make them
worth more, right?
And I was just I I love littlethings that just make these
seemingly abstract and break.
It makes them more simple,right?
And I'm like, right, I'm eithertrying to do this or this.
But here's the thing I seeDennis do wrong with marketing a
lot of the time, and it'll beinteresting to get your take on
this.
Uh, because I think sometimesthey use it incorrectly, and
they're like, oh, I want mybusiness to be more profitable.
(10:35):
My diaries are booked up by sixto eight weeks.
I think I'm gonna try to getmore patients, right?
And it's like, no, thatliterally makes no sense.
You have to actually make themworth more because it's not a
fully leveraged business, right?
Like if you if you had a pure,if you had a website like
Amazon, you know, if 10 peoplelook at the website or a million
people look at the website,it's literally the same, okay,
in terms of effort for them.
(10:55):
It's fully leveraged, right?
Okay, maybe server costs go up.
I don't know.
I don't know enough about thatstuff, right?
But a dental practice can onlyhave so many patients.
There's only so many seats,there's only so many hours in
the day, there's only so manyinstances that the dentist is
going to be in a chair with apatient, right?
So in that instance, you haveto make them worth more.
Thoughts on that?
Rahil (11:13):
I think it's an interesting concept, this booked
up for weeks that you that yousaid earlier.
Um a lot of dentists, I think,in the past used to, it almost
used to be a sign of, oh, lookat me.
A badge of honor.
Yeah, a badge of honor,exactly.
I'm booked up for I'm booked upfor six weeks, I'm booked up
for eight weeks, I'm booked upfor like, you know, some months
(11:33):
in advance and needs to, youknow, say it very proudly.
Um what that actually means nowis that if a customer or a
potential patient inquires inand they want to see you, and
they're at the hottest momentthat they are, like, you know,
they have inquired, they arelike, yes, I want this.
You are the practice I want togo to.
Oh, I you can't see me for 10weeks.
(11:54):
You think that customer'sgonna, you know, they think that
patient's gonna stick around.
No, they're gonna shop forthey're gonna they're gonna go
shop around because they'restill they still want it.
But we're in a generation andand we're in a we're in a you
know um a society now, shall wesay, where we want things now.
And not just in the dentistry,but outside the dentistry.
(12:17):
I want food, Uber Eats, herewithin half an hour, done.
I want you know, something, Iwant something delivered to my
daughter, Amazon Prime next day,or even the same day now.
It just comes to me.
We get everything now, now, nowwhen we want it.
Same with information.
I want to know something, I canfind it on Google, I can find
it on YouTube, I can geteverything the way I want it,
the way I want it now.
(12:37):
But if someone wants to go seea dentist and they're like, oh,
I've booked up for eight weeks,you know, I still want this
thing now, I am gonna go shoparound.
So that it's kind of been a bigshift where it's getting
patients in when they're thehottest is is you know one of
(12:58):
those ways where we're talkingabout, oh, how can we get more
patients at the bottom of thefunnel?
You know, see them as quicklyas you can, get in contact with
them as quickly as you can, andsee them as quickly as you can.
I think there was research donethat shows if you, you know,
when a league comes through oneof your channels, be that social
media, be that through thewebsite, if you contact we if
(13:20):
you contact them within fiveminutes, you're 80% more likely
to get in contact with them.
And every minute that you waitis a minute that goes colder and
colder and colder.
So, you know, I submit aninquiry to a practice, and then
16 hours later someone gets backto me, it's like that moment
(13:40):
for me is is gone.
Like I was at I was at myhottest when I submitted that
inquiry.
And I'm not saying, oh, ifsomeone needs to man this phone
24-7, like, you know, obviouslyevade practice working hours,
but there's a there's a wholething in terms of everyone looks
at marketing as all the youknow the fancy stuff at the at
the top of the funnel, and we'reobviously going to talk about
that, but it's also improvingeach step in that funnel, the
(14:04):
contacting them, getting thembooked in, all of these things
actually mean you don't have tokeep, you know, spending as much
money on the top of the funnel,and you can still generate more
patients at the bottom of it.
Dr Dan (14:15):
Sure.
I I I like that idea, and itmade me vaguely uncomfortable if
I'm honest about the lifetimevalue of a patient.
So but but I like that ideabecause we used to call it kind
of, you know, if you get apatient and you treat them well,
you'll keep them for life,they'll send you their children,
their grandparents, theirfriends, you'll turn them into a
walking advert, and you know,they'll then showcase what
(14:38):
you've done and how you do it.
And if you ask your patientswhat they tell their friends,
they'll tell you, you know,hopefully they'll tell you
something like, Yeah, you canreally trust this dentist,
they'll sit down and have timeto talk to you, and that's what
people are after.
And and so that's howword-of-mouth referral works,
which is the most effective,organic way to uh you know grow
your practice.
(14:59):
And the more effort you can putinto that, the better, as long
as you consciously do it withyour team.
But this lifetime value of apatient, so you quantify it into
pounds, shillings, and pence,and you say, right, okay, well,
this patient will be with me 20years, they'll need you know,
five shillings, they'll need youknow, 10 crown, however you
(15:21):
want to in an implant.
So that's the value that thepatient's gonna bring.
They're gonna bring inreferrals, X, Y, and Z, and we
can assign a number.
Now, to me as a clinician, andI know I'm the only one clinical
out of the three of us, yeah.
Rahil (15:34):
It makes a change from the Usual Podcast, yes, I'm
sure, having just marketingcoming on.
Dr Dan (15:39):
Yeah, well, absolutely, but uh it makes me vaguely
uncomfortable as a clinician,and I'm sure some of your
listeners might beuncomfortable, having to use
those business insights andthink about the lifetime value
of a patient when all you'redoing is ethical treatment, you
know, you're curing disease withpractitioners, we're healthcare
practitioners.
(15:59):
And for me, it just sits alittle bit, I don't know.
I mean, do you do you find thatresistance in dentists and
healthcare practitioners to theidea of quantifying these
patients into pounds?
Rahil (16:15):
Yes, because it's not like you know, every dentist,
like you know, your first, youknow, your priority first and
foremost is to want to help thatpatient.
Obviously, like you know, withevery service as an associated
cost, but a lot that you knowthe ethical responsibility is to
is to help that patient.
And the other part of it isthat for dentists by and large,
(16:37):
like across the board, no onehas really taught them these
things as well.
Be it like, you know, we'regonna come on to, I'm sure,
like, you know, more fancyterminology, but like you know,
lifetime value and cost perlead, and you know, when how
quickly you need to contact likeyou know, leads that kind of
like no one's really, you know,you don't discuss this in dental
(16:58):
school.
Like, you know, it's neverreally been it's never really
been a topic for a lot ofdentists, and then they come
into this world of practiceownership, and suddenly they're
thrown into thrown into the deepend having to, in essence, kind
of believe what a multi-agencywill tell them because they
don't know what good looks liketo know, okay, this is what I
(17:21):
should be expecting on my end,or this is like you know, what
figures I have in for mypractice and terms of that
lifetime value.
Dr Dan (17:28):
Um so yeah, I think it's it's kind of two things in in
that sense.
And and it goes a bit further.
I mean, a lot of dentalpractices in the UK don't even
have websites.
Which is really weird when youthink crazy to think about.
Dr James (17:41):
Any stats on that?
Or if you have to lick yourfinger put in the air, I hill.
Rahil (17:45):
Ooh.
Uh I don't have a stat on itoff the top of my head.
Dr James (17:50):
Maybe an ex in ex maybe even if it was a lick your
finger put in the air, just inyour experience, sort of thing.
Rahil (17:57):
I think many don't have websites.
I'd like to change it slightly.
I think there's I think that'sa I'd like to think a lot of the
practices would have a website,but whether they would actually
whether they've actually lookedat that website in the last and
it might be 20 years old.
Exactly.
I think that's the that's thekind of reframe I'd like to
apply to because I think a lotof practices, like let's say
(18:19):
finger in the L I said that 80%of practices will have a
website, but that website, youknow, let's say if they bought
that practice 15 years ago, thatwas the last time that anybody
had a look at probably thatwebsite.
Um and that figure, thatpercentage is a lot, is the one
that probably means a lot more,is they don't actually like you
(18:41):
know, revisit that website, itis and it still has the same
look, feel as it did 15 yearsago, and we know that the way
that things have moved along.
And the the way that anaudience and our consumers look
at a website and how they buy isvery different to what it was.
Like you know, even five yearsago, how different it is.
So I think that's the moreimportant kind of stuff.
Dr Dan (19:03):
And I see I've seen some websites for dentists that look
like they're stuck in the 80sfrom the beginning of the
origins of the internet, and youthink, well, you know, what's
what's going on here?
I mean, as a user, I'm gonna goonto that set and I'm gonna
think, whack, this is justincredibly weird.
Rahil (19:19):
It's it's just the twilight time machine.
Yeah, and and you could andthat dentist could be actually
the best dentist for thatpatient.
Absolutely.
But they will that patient willnever know it.
Don't even walk into thesurgery.
Exactly, because it it it feelsyou know, if you'll that
website will feel alien, almostalien to them to visit, uh,
(19:39):
because it just hasn't kept upwith the times.
Dr Dan (19:41):
But it's almost like dentists feel like they're
outside of that consumer world.
I know we've been discussingthis, and and and they don't
have to do this stuff, they'llhave their practice, and people
will just walk in through thedoor.
But that is really changing.
Dr James (19:56):
Yeah, that's the top of the funnel, right?
Yeah, that's literally the topof the funnel.
And people who walk through thedoor, uh, yeah, well, the
website can be obviously thedigitally can be part of that
decision.
And yeah, just to look back toI know your area of expertise is
of course the marketing side ofthings.
Uh Rahil, if we and you know, Iget what you're saying.
(20:17):
It's like as we progress downthe funnel, it's like, okay,
response times, and then how dothose conversations go?
Who books in, what do they bookin for?
And that's as it progressivelygets narrower.
Mark the main marketing mainlyto me is like the very, very,
very top bit, right?
Or at least that's the firstthing, anyway, right?
Because you're you'reincreasing the throughput,
aren't you?
So if we were to focus on thatarea, let's talk.
(20:40):
I'd love to talk about uhsocials.
Yep.
I'd love to cover that.
And I'd also love to cover, butbefore we jump onto that, we
were talking about websites justa second ago.
Yeah, you must be able to lookat a website and be like, right,
change this, this, this, this,and this.
And all of a sudden the websitegoes bang, pop.
What are those things?
And I know obviously it's like,okay, cool.
(21:01):
You know, there's a differencebetween knowing what they are
and how do you apply them.
I get this.
I get there's the devils in thedetail, but even if you could
just round some off, some easyones, that'd be really valuable
for the audience.
Rahil (21:11):
We have we have uh we have a little like you know
website checklist that we thatwe go through when we audit our
websites, like you know, it it'squite long, so I can pick out
like the best ones that we lookat.
And the one that sticks out alot for for dentists now is it
does it actually is it actuallyoptimized for mobile?
What a lot of agencies in thepast will have done is they
(21:33):
would have shown you thisincredibly nice built-out
website on the laptop with thevideo here and the button looks
beautiful and it all flowsreally nicely.
But what we found, and we didsome tests on sites that we
built and managed, is thataround 60 to 75 percent of the
visitors on that website are nowcoming from mobile, which makes
sense because that's where wespend all of our time.
(21:54):
So you know we all carry ourphones in our pockets, it's you
know what we scroll on all thetime, it's where like you know,
it's where our attention is, andobviously, the because of that,
like you know, people in thevisit your website from it.
So we've seen that about 70% ofthe traffic for a website will
come from the mobile, but whenyou visit that website on the
mobile, suddenly that video thatlooked incredible on the web on
(22:14):
the desktop version is nowshrunk down.
Yeah, then you only see likethe bush when you enter the
practice instead of someonewalking through the front door.
Dr Dan (22:23):
And the sides cut off.
Rahil (22:24):
Exactly, the sides cut off, the image is stretched out
or really thinned in.
The you know, the button thatyou know you click when you
let's say wanted to book anappointment is half off the
screen.
Yeah, and it's a kind ofreframe that we're trying to do
is we build mobile first nowbecause that's where the
majority of the traffic comesfrom.
The other one is actually theother one's a very simple one,
(22:48):
is uh how quickly does yourwebsite actually load.
Um it goes back to the youknow, we're in that generation
where we want everything now,now, now.
Um, and there were some statspublished recently by um by a
agency that looks not only atthe at healthcare but also like
you know um a lot of industriesas a whole.
(23:08):
And they said that if yourwebsite doesn't load within
three seconds, yeah, that 53% ofpeople.
Will click off and go and findsomething else.
Dr Dan (23:17):
And scroll attention on socials is even smaller.
I mean that's about one and ahalf seconds.
If you don't see content comeup, then you'll just scroll on.
Rahil (23:26):
You're gone because we're in that we're in that thing
where we want it now, now, now.
Um, and then there's so many,there's you know, there's
there's so many other ones interms of websites, like having a
clear like journey that youwant this, you know, this custom
this patient or this potentialpatient, should I say, to follow
when they get on the website?
Like, you know, if they get onthe website and they can't
actually see where that buttonis to book an appointment, or
(23:49):
the first thing that they see isto do with like your
cancellation policy or somethinglike that.
How many a clear journey forthem to follow when they get on
the site presenting theinformation in a way that's
actually easy for them tounderstand and avoiding too much
dental jargon?
Dr Dan (24:03):
Yeah.
Rahil (24:04):
I think you know, you you both probably testify to it
that when a dentist getstalking, especially if that's
something technical, it can goover a lot of people's heads,
especially if they're notfamiliar, familiar with it, and
that can scare a lot of peopleoff.
So actually, just you know,simplifying it down into
language that a patient willwill understand.
(24:25):
Um, and I think you know, thelast last couple are coming back
to what we discussed earlier,with almost that look and feel
of the website.
Like, you know, if it doesn'tlook and feel like a modern day
website, like you know, if yourmeet the team is just it's not
even pictures of the team, ifit's just like you know, blank
faces, yeah.
And all I see is Dr.
(24:46):
So and so, and then the 20letters after his name that to a
dentist are you know anotherbadge of honour.
But for a you know, for apainting, like you know, for a
consumer, what does that meanfor me?
Why does you know the fact thathe's got this many letters
after his name, what does, youknow, what does that mean for
me?
What is this person actuallylike?
Um the two questions, the twoimportant questions we ask
(25:07):
someone with their website arekind of looking at when they
last looked at it are you know,firstly, like, are you proud of
your website?
We we like to do a little testwhen we when we run our events,
is we pick someone and we'relike if we were to put your
website on the screen in frontof everyone else, like then
would you be happy for us to doit now?
(25:28):
What do people say?
No, really not.
Genuinely not.
Genuinely not, but then they'rehappy for tens, if not
hundreds, of patients, ofpotential patients to be seeing
it every single day.
Yet they won't show it on aroom full of full of 10, 20
people.
Um, and then fundamentally,like, you know, what is your
website there for?
(25:49):
It's there to generateinquiries, so is it doing its
job as a website?
Dr Dan (25:54):
And then people have got to find the website as well.
Yeah, and the website is onegateway and hundred percent.
Search engine optimization isnot just about that.
I mean, you can write blogs andyou can optimize the blogs so
that they come up on a Googlesearch.
You can uh you know, registeryour business on Google Business
listings, and that'll get youup on the maps, and and that's
called the the is it thethree-pack in the top three uh
(26:17):
businesses, so you can you canoptimize your organic listings
uh to get found a lot easier.
But the game is changing, isn'tit?
And and I I'll tell you what,this chat GPT using it to
glorify Google, this is now thething that people are really
interested in, and they'refinding it difficult to optimize
(26:37):
listings for chat GPT, althoughthere are some tips and tricks
apparently.
Dr James (26:43):
Yes.
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Rahil (28:35):
I can tell you a funny, funny little story.
So I was in London not too longago, and usually when I get to
London, if I need to figure outwhen I get into Houston where I
need to go, I'll put it on theUnderground app or go on Google
Maps.
So I was going down theescalator into Houston, I have
my journey map tower, I wasgonna go on the Northern Line
and then I was gonna go um, Ithink I was on the Victoria.
The woman in front of me,instead of going on to Google or
(28:58):
on the under on the like youknow, TFL app, she went on to
Chatley GPT and she said, How doI get from Houston to here?
And I love it.
I am a big advocate for it, buteven I'm like, wow.
That's how much people arelike, you know, that's how much
this you know people are usingthese things day to day now.
Dr Dan (29:21):
Uh but it probably worked better and gave uh
there's a delay on the northernline, so you need to avoid this
route, whereas the app might nothave said it quite like that.
Rahil (29:29):
Every everyone's got their own preferences, isn't it?
And then like, you know, withGoogle now, for example, they
have an AI overview.
Like, you know, you don't evenfor a lot of the time you answer
you ask a query on Google andit'll come up with this AI
overview, which is Google's, inessence, AI summary of what
you're looking for.
But what's really interesting,and it comes back to the SEO
(29:50):
point, is if you look at thesources of where Google's
actually picking up thatinformation from, most likely
you will find those websitesthat it uses on page one of
Google.
So Google will use sites in itsAI overview that it actually
trusts.
It's not just gonna obviously,you know, it's not just gonna
pull information fromeverywhere.
(30:12):
It's gonna look at you know thesites that it trusts and the
sites that rank highly.
So it's not only a case of yes,you can be found high, like you
know, more organically and youknow, get higher on Google, not
only on the Google Maps listing,but also on Google searches,
but you will now also feature inthese AI overviews that
everyone's now getting when theysearch on Google as well.
So it's it's something that issuch a good like long-term
(30:36):
practice builder is the way thatwe look at SEO.
You're not gonna see a returnon investment with this as you
would pay down.
It's not gonna be like youknow, you turn the SEO tap on
and you're now gonna startgetting patients.
It's a long-term practicebuilder, but it's value when
done right.
Like being on page one ofGoogle, if you can get to number
(30:59):
one, yeah, wow.
Because people are becomingmore like distrusting of ads if
they see the word ad, and sochanging.
Sponsored listing.
Exactly.
I'm sure you can both testifyto it.
Like people are becoming moredistrustful of that.
So some people like you scrollpast it straight to that number
one organic listing.
Dr Dan (31:18):
I know I do when I use Google.
And and coming to things likebudgeting, I mean, should you be
setting aside uh a marketingbudget?
How do you how do you do that?
Because you know, you need tospend money on these things, and
and you know, however you do,whatever you do.
We've talked about improvingwebsites, we've talked about
feeding people into funnels,everything costs.
Um the thing that really usedto annoy me when I used to have
(31:41):
a marketing budget was themarketeer would come and we'd
sit down and they'd show me alovely graph with great colours
on it.
And it would say, Right, you'vegot this number of impressions,
and that means the number oftimes people have seen the
thing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And that's converted into thisnumber that's also very
impressive.
And and the marketer would say,Isn't that great?
And and I'd be sitting therethinking, Well, I haven't seen
(32:04):
many more patients in the book.
Bums on seats is what it iscalled.
Now, you know, how do youassess, especially with things
like organic SEO improvements,uh, which we've talked about,
that you're not going to see areturn straight away.
How can you then budget andconvert to bums on seats?
Rahil (32:25):
It is probably one of the probably one of the hardest
questions to to answer becausedentists, like as we all do,
they know we want things to showa return that you know as soon
as possible.
Um when it comes to we don'tlike to kind of group
everything, like you know, wedon't have to look at things
(32:45):
individually, as you said.
Like we try and set up anoverall marketing budget, and
that will include obviously somepaid activity in there, and
then there'll be a section setaside for obviously the practice
building organically, be likeI'd be the website, SEO, social
media.
Um, there's I think in theagency world now, there's you
know, as with there is withdental practices, so much
(33:07):
competition.
Like, you know, you can get SEOdone for a couple hundred
pounds a month, or you can getSEO done for around a thousand
pounds a month.
But it kind of depends on, youknow, the quality, the quality
of what you get is gonna bedifferent, and also like you
know, how much they're gonna doon your site is gonna be
different.
Um for me, it's more aboutprioritize like you know, what's
(33:31):
you know, the channels that areactually gonna that are right
for you in the moment.
Um for a lot of practices yesSEO is important, but I would
look at let's say your socialmedia and your website as bigger
priorities than investing moneyin SEO straight away.
Yes, the benefits are morelong-term with SEO, but if you
(33:55):
look at you know just pureeyeballs on where you know your
customers are, social media iskind of one that you have to be
on.
And I know we're we're probablygonna discuss that a lot more
like as we as we talk.
And just as you said, yourwebsite, like it's in essence
that is your that's your growthengine.
Um, and even if like you knowyou're not being found as as
(34:16):
high as you want organically,there are still other ways to
drive traffic to get to thatwebsite.
Um setting that budget is hard,but we kind of we work
backwards in a sense.
We kind of look at how many,right, this is you know, this is
how many cases we want to bedoing.
To get this many cases, we needthis many consultations.
(34:40):
To get this many consultations,we need this many leads.
To generate this many leads,this is gonna be our overall
budget.
Um so we kind of work with thepractice to set these goals and
where they want to be.
So we kind of work backwardsfrom bums on seats and said,
okay, this is in essence howmany eyeballs we're gonna need
(35:02):
to get these bums on seats.
And in terms we were talkingabout, there's two ways to
increase that.
You either increase the numberof eyeballs or you increase the
conversion piece between everysingle one.
So you go from the eyeball, thenumber of eyeballs could stay
the same, but you can get moreleads from it because you became
more efficient in capturingthat.
You convert more leads into aconsultation because you became
(35:24):
more efficient in actually likeyou know that can that first
step conversion piece.
So we work backwards and wekind of you know see where the
drop-offs are before weinstantly start looking at okay,
this channel and this channel,because there's so much that can
be done without even like thedrastic measures on top of the
funnel.
Dr James (35:42):
I think it's just doing the basics and doing them
really well.
I mean you're like most thingsin life, if you literally just
do the basics really well,you're like in the top 10%
somehow.
Do you know what I mean?
Rahil (35:52):
Um my dad has a quote and he says world class basics will
will be like 90% of people.
There we go.
World class, but and it'smajority of what we try to do
isn't overly like out there, itis just these are your you know,
these are your basics.
Get them to a point where it'sabsolutely like you know, world
(36:15):
class.
And then when you do go toscale your marketing with things
like paid or like you knowputting some more money into
content or more into SEO,because your basics and because
your systems, your processes areso good, you can scale.
Whereas if what people do isthey'll put so much in at the
top too early, and everythingcrumbles because they don't have
(36:37):
the right systems and stuffbelow it.
Dr James (36:39):
You know, I heard uh your website and your organic
socials described as yourdigital CV, okay?
And I really I I like that,right?
Because basically, someone willfind out about you, they'll do
a little bit of research on youand what's out there already,
and then they'll make a decisionto get in touch with you,
whatever that is regarding inthis instance conventional in
(37:00):
the dental practice, it's goingto be the patient deciding that
they want to speak to you.
And I think that people need tounderstand that actually that
works in tandem with your paidmarketing rather than being a
separate thing, an individualthing.
They actually enhance eachother.
You get more out of your paidmarketing when you have organic
socials as well.
And you know what another thingI think people don't understand
is I think people think thatyou have to have a huge amount
(37:23):
of followers, or it has to takea long time necessarily to see
some benefit.
You actually start to see somebenefits pretty fast.
Like you might even get someDMs pretty quick.
You know, obviously with timeit can get really crazy and it
can go really exponential.
And I think that people thinkthat it does take quite a while
always to build up.
It does get better with time,but you can see some effects
(37:46):
pretty much straight away.
Website, I have a quickquestion about a website.
I'm interested to know, do youthink that it's smart?
I you know, I don't want todwell on this one too long.
I just I'm just curious to knowyour stance on this because we
do need to talk about organicsocials as well before this
podcast concludes.
Do you think it's a good ideato have some sort of lead jam
form right at the top of thewebsite?
(38:08):
Like right in the You mean likean inquiry form?
An inquiry form or justsomewhere people can fill in
their contact details orsomething like that.
What basically what I'm askingyou is what's the best way to
generate leads from your websitein your having it synced
directly with your online book.
Rahil (38:25):
Having it synced directly with your like um your like
practice management software andthey can book them directly.
Interesting.
That is like how like whentypically we'll like you know,
we like to direct people, forexample, our call to action when
we get people on um is to booka free consultation.
Okay so they will click on thatlink and that link will bring
(38:48):
up a diary in the availabilitythat will sync with our practice
diary so they can instantlyjust book it.
So direct into the diary.
Dr Dan (38:57):
Okay.
So I I'm quite resistant tothat.
Dr James (38:59):
I know a lot of dentists are.
Yeah, a lot of dentists are.
Dr Dan (39:02):
I prefer it that it sends the receptionist an email
with the appointment request,and then the receptionist then
confirms it in the software.
I always feel losing control ofthe diary is a fear I've got.
Dr James (39:14):
But you know what?
This is why I love to askquestions like this, because
obviously Rahil is someone whodoes marketing all day long for
down practice, right?
And sometimes when you askquestions like that, you get
responses that you maybenecessarily didn't respect uh
didn't expect.
Uh, but where those answerscome from is a place of greater
knowledge than yourself.
So I'm curious, why does thatwork?
Rahil (39:36):
So we look at it, so we look at it from a customer's
point of view.
If they are visiting thewebsite and they're clicking on
that call to action, they and intheir head have made their mind
up that I want this, I'vechosen you for it, and they just
want to have it.
And I want to say Tuesday 1.30.
Exactly.
For them, and that's you know,in essence, I think that's what
(39:56):
dentists by and large don't likeis like you know, we have to we
have to optimize this for thatcustomer and for the potential
patient here.
That is what that's what thejourney is optimized for.
As much as it's you know, forexample, you know, you do lose a
bit of control, granted, butfor a patient, it's so low
friction.
(40:16):
Um, it's like another one islike when on your website, like
your phone number on the on themobile, make sure someone can
just tap it.
Click.
Yeah.
Tap that tap the phone numberand it phones.
Dr Dan (40:28):
Yeah.
But you know, thinking aboutthat, that really annoys me on
uh not dental websites, otherwebsites when you can't click
the phone number.
And then you have to remove it.
Rahil (40:36):
You have to copy and paste it, and it's you're just
giving the you're giving thatyou're giving that potential
patient the opportunity to justyou're removing a barrier.
Exactly.
Make it as easy as you can.
So that's why we try and say,okay, you know, integrate it
with your with your onlinebooking system if you can.
Um but a lot of websites willalways have a form.
(40:59):
We usually put it near thebottom, um, because it's still
like if they're not sure, thenobviously, you know, they leave
their, you know, they leavetheir details because patients
now, well customers now, theydon't they don't just inquire
one practice.
They will they will shoparound.
Um and it's well what aboutchat box?
Dr Dan (41:17):
I mean that's uh another thing that's very popular.
Rahil (41:21):
I have a con I have a kind of contrarian take with
chat box that's like you know,it doesn't align with what a lot
of people say is I I don'tthey're good for a customer who
doesn't know what they want.
If I'm sure if I visit thewebsite and I'm not sure, a
chatbot coming in and beinglike, yeah, like you know, this
(41:42):
is all about us, what do youwant to know?
Then I really see the value init.
But if I know what I if Iclicked on a website like, yeah,
I want this, and then thischatbot takes up half of my
screen, it actually annoys likeme personally.
Dr Dan (41:56):
Minimize it.
Rahil (41:58):
It's it's I you know I see the value in them, and we
have sites that we do havewebsites that we manage that run
them, we have websites that wemanage that don't.
It is more on a kind ofcase-by-case basis because there
are a you know a wide varietyof people that like to look at
things their own way.
Like when you land on somethinglike I want to explore this in
(42:20):
my way, rather than havesomething tell me, oh yeah, this
is this is what you need now,this is what you need to click
on.
Like I personally don't likeit, but I know a lot of people,
and there are chatbots out therethat get a lot of like
inquiries through them becauseit makes it it makes it easy for
someone to just be like, yep,oh, I land here, okay, it's
done.
So personally, I'm not a fan,but I know they I know they do
(42:44):
work.
Interesting.
Dr James (42:46):
And you know, I bet there's a load more where all of
that stuff came from withregards to your knowledge on
websites and the MZ dentists cando it.
I bet there's way more to it.
We're probably just scratchingthe surface of these things
right here, some of thestraightforward things people
can implement, but I bet whenyou fully overhaul a website for
a dentist, there's there'sabout 50 million things in
there.
I was just curious just beforewe round off, uh, organic
(43:09):
socials.
Let's talk about organicsocials as well, because
obviously that is superimportant to you.
And they can complement yourwebsite, they can complement
your ads, they can do a lot ofgood stuff for your practices uh
out there.
And not even if you are just adental practice, even if you're
just an associate as well,because obviously that enhanced
your personal brand.
Uh, that can help you if youwish to start a practice one
(43:32):
day, or even build a list ofhighly qualified patients for
whatever treatment that you do.
So on that front, Rahil, Iguess what a lot of people, I
feel what a lot of people wouldbenefit from is just some sort
of structure to doing it.
And what would you suggest onthat front?
How many can people get reallythey get analysis process with
it, I think, right?
And they're you know, there'sthe Gary V logic.
(43:54):
What's the Gary V Interruplogic, which is like post as
many times as you humanly can,and it's like, okay, I get that,
right?
But if you're just putting outnonsense all day long, that's
not gonna work either.
Uh then again, if you neverpost, well you're not gonna
benefit from it.
So where's the sweet spot?
Rahil (44:09):
So the platforms, the platforms reward consistency,
first of all.
So like there is there is alike there's actually nothing
good if you are active for oneweek and then you take a break.
Like, you know, we see that theviews on your post will
consistently suffer if you'renot consistent on the platforms.
(44:29):
Actually, having a consistentpresence on these platforms is
massive.
I love Gary V, and um there isa lot of logic as to what he
says, but for a lot of practicesit that is either just
unrealistic, like you know,posting multiple times a day on
every single platform, and ifthey do do it, it won't be
(44:53):
valuable content, it'll just bea flood of just like you know,
AI written content that just youknow doesn't help or serve
anyone.
So, what we like to say is a slike a sweet spot is three times
a week, and we usually are likeyou know what, for a lot of
practices Monday, Wednesday,Friday, in terms of posts on the
grid, it's a nice sweet spot.
(45:13):
It's not too over.
Overwhelming, but it's enoughgoing out there that you know
you're still consistent on theplatform.
Obviously, that's posts on thegrid.
You're you know, there's somany different, so many
different things you can do onsocial media.
Your stories, like you know,you should be using them
whenever you can, but you know,they're only there for 24 hours.
If something's happening, youknow, in the practice, if you
(45:35):
had like you know, a patientsend you a nice thank you card,
even like you know, that you caneasily make a story if you're
going with uh, you know, ifyou're doing anything fun with
the team, or like you know, ifyou've just started uh, you
know, if you just startedsomeone's smile jet, you can
instantly put these things onstories, they're there for 24
hours and they disappear.
But what it does is it kind ofkeeps you in the feed, in the
(45:57):
mind, and then you know, thatthree-day a week is what we
usually aim for as a minimum.
There's you know, obviously, asyou go through and you get
comfortable with that, peoplemove up to five, some people
even post seven times a week,and some are posting multiple
times on every platform, but wetry and find that minimum is
three times a week.
And the way we view yourcontent is we say it's it's the
(46:21):
consultation before theconsultation is the way that I
like to look up your organicsocial presence.
So if we look at that, if allthat that person who visites
your socials can see is beforeand after, before and after,
before and after, great, theyknow you're clinically
competent, but they don't knowanything else about you.
And a lot of patients, a lot ofyou know, people scrolling on
(46:43):
social media, they'll think thatyou know what, all dentists
from their point of view, theycan they do the same thing.
There's not as much educationon what actually separates a
dentist from a good dentist froma clinical point of view.
But what you can do to separateyourself from people is and it
comes back to the branding thatwe were talking about earlier.
You talk about yourself, youtalk about your team, you talk
(47:06):
about you know the practicejourney.
Like, you know, some of thesepractices have been around for
you know 15, 20 years.
Like, you know, there's got tohave been a lot of development
in that time that a new patientvisiting your profile wouldn't
know or appreciate.
Talk about your staff, like youknow, if you do stuff outside
of dentistry, talk about that.
We have a dentist in our in ourBirmingham practice, and we
(47:27):
proudly say on on our socialmedia that he's an Aston Villa
fan.
Guess who engages with him?
Aston Villa fans.
Guess who's really happy whenthey find out that Dr.
Oliver is their dentist?
The Aston Villa fans.
But if we didn't show thisother side to you know him, the
team, you wouldn't give themthat opportunity.
If you think about what youwould rather see when you go
(47:49):
onto social media, would yourather see a faceless practice
with just endless before andafters?
Would you rather see a practicethat shows their team, shows
the human side of it, isrelatable, feel like and it
feels authentic.
There's there's an obvious oneon which you'd rather engage
with.
So it's a mix of obviouslyshowing that clinical competence
(48:10):
and making sure that shinesthrough because it needs to.
There's no substitute for gooddentistry at the end of the day.
So making sure that shinesthrough in a different in
different ways, like you know,not just the selling before and
after every time.
Can you do video testimonials?
Can you post a Google review?
Can you do a smile reveal?
Can you do it in a in adifferent format of video
(48:30):
instead of a static?
There's all these differentways that you can do it to make
it more engaging.
But then the other side is likethe human feel to everything,
which is you know what peoplewant to see, because we do, you
know, people do business withpeople they like.
And if you're not showing themthe people behind the practice,
then you're not giving them achance to engage with you.
Dr Dan (48:49):
I guess one platform uh we we've really haven't
mentioned at all, which is worthit mentioning, is TikTok.
I mean, had we done thispodcast a little while ago,
TikTok would have been front andcentre of the conversation.
Whereas now it's kind of gotlost.
Is it is TikTok going down inpopularity?
I know it's gone up and down alittle bit, but still people uh
(49:11):
were using TikTok as TikTokUniversity and you know, asking
all kinds of questions, youknow.
Uh let's have a look at um, youknow, uh in this county
Hartford, let's have a look atsmart makeovers, and you'd come
up with a couple of dentiststhat would do it.
And you know, dentists wereposting quite a lot.
Um, but I do feel that with theAI revolution, has that touched
(49:32):
the edges of TikTok?
Rahil (49:34):
TikTok is each platform is as you know is better for
different demographics ofpeople, is the best way to kind
of you know to kind of addressthat question.
Like, you know, you'll you'lltypically find a uh a more
mature audience on Facebook, forexample.
Instagram kind of encapsulateseverybody, and TikTok is
primarily for that youngergeneration.
They like to be engaged in adifferent way compared to like
(49:56):
you know, an old, like you know,older generation, so they are
more video first.
The platform still definitelyhas a place, and like you know,
you should be using it.
But what we like to say formajority of practices is master
meta first.
So master Instagram andFacebook first, because that's
where your audience primarilylives in terms of like you know,
(50:18):
potential patients, more ofthem live on meta than they do
on TikTok.
And once you're comfortable onthat, then you move into other
platforms like TikTok, YouTube,it's endless.
So we always try and mastermeta first.
So I
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