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What Are Landing Pages?

 

In digital dental marketing-speak, a landing page is a single web page specifically designed for one purpose – to convert visitors.

Whether that conversion is a phone call – or online form submission – from a prospective new patient looking for a dentist, or a review on Google, or a referral from an existing patient, is dependant on how your landing page is used.

Landing pages are used for a marketing or advertising campaign.

For dentists interested in new patient acquisition, a landing page is a web page that allows you to capture an appointment request through a lead form, or to elicit a phone call – via a mobile click-to-call button – to your office.

These specially designed web pages are where a visitor “lands” when they have clicked on a Google Ad, Facebook Ad, email, social media post, or any other communication where you are looking for the visitor to that page to take the desired action.

The desired action(s) for dentists using landing pages are:

  1. to call the office
  2. to submit an appointment request form
  3. to write a review
  4. to send a referral

Why Dentists Need Landing Pages

 

Landing Pages Have A Call To Action

 

Landing pages are designed with a singular laser-focused objective – known as a Call to Action (CTA).

And every landing page should only have one call to action.

For example, a call to action on a landing page for a dentist running new patient acquisition ads on Google could be:

  • Call Now to Schedule An Appointment
  • Complete the Form to Request an Appointment

A dentist concerned with acquiring more reviews from happy patients could use the following calls to action:

  • Review Us On Google
  • Tell Us How You Really Feel

And a dentist interested in gaining more new patients via direct referral might use these calls to action on your landing page:

  • Refer Us To A Friend or Family Member
  • Send Us Your Referral

Remember, effective landing pages have one call to action, so why did I just list two calls to action for each example?

Because with landing pages you can A/B test to see which option performs best, not something you can cost-effectively with your website homepage.

More on this later, now that we’ve defined what a landing page is and what it’s used for, let’s first examine why dentists need them.

This simplicity is what makes landing pages the best option for dentists wanting to increase the conversion rates of your new patient acquisition advertising campaigns, elicit more reviews, or acquire more referrals.

To fully understand the difference between a landing page, and the other pages on your website, such as your homepage, it’s important to understand the differences between organic search traffic (SEO) and traffic received via paid search advertising (SEM, PPC, CPC…etc.).

Your website homepage is NOT a landing page!

 

Why Do Dentists Need Landing Pages?

 

Too many dentists spend their hard-earned advertising dollars sending potential new patients who showed interest in their ad to their website homepage.

This is a huge missed opportunity, one that costs you more money than sending that paid traffic to a specifically designed landing page with a clear call to action.

We see it every day – and love it – because it’s usually from a competitor of one of our member dentists who is running Google, Bing or Facebook Ads.

Landing pages are primarily used for new patient acquisition advertising campaigns – Google Ads, Bing Ads, & Facebook Ads.

For example, let’s say you’re running a Google Ad campaign with one of your primary keywords being “dentist near me.”

This means you are targeting people with your ads who use Google to search for a “dentist near me.”

Now let’s say your ad copy raves about how great of a dentist you are and how you have umpteen years of experience.

Albeit totally borning, and probably ineffective ad copy.

Stay with me, now let’s say someone actually clicks on your ad, which then directs them to your website homepage.

When that visitor, who clicked on your ad and in turn cost you anywhere from $1 to $40 to generate that click – depending on the competitive landscape of your location & actual cost per click – then lands on your homepage, what do you want them to do?

What is your desired call to action?

If you’re running new patient acquisition ads you want them to call your office or submit an online appointment request form.

Does your website homepage make it easy for them to do just that?

Despite the resounding “Yeah sure” answer you’ve already muttered, it’s really not the case.

That’s not to say your website isn’t a great-looking, well-designed, mobile-friendly informative representation of your practice.

It simply means that your website homepage:

  1. Gives visitors too many “outs”
  2. Is not set up with an effective call to action
  3. Is not closely correlated with the theme of your ad & your ad campaign keywords

Sending that traffic you paid to generate to a tightly themed landing page – as opposed to your website homepage – that prompts visitors to complete the desired action, will not only boost your new patient acquisition numbers and overall campaign goals, most importantly it will also deliver a better return on your advertising dollar and save you money.

Dentists using paid search advertising (Google Ads/Bing Ads) or paid social advertising (Facebook Ads) will generate significantly better ROI by using targeted landing pages.

Let’s examine why that is.

 

Why Do Landing Pages Deliver A Better ROI for Dentists?

 

When it comes to cost-effective & sustainable new patient acquisition for dentists using paid search or social advertising, it’s all about ROI.

Your digital dental marketing ROI will either make or break you, either you are getting enough of a return on your advertising dollar to continue, refine, test & optimize your ad campaigns, or you are losing money.

If a new patient costs you $100 to acquire, and you realize $400 in profit from that patient in the first nine months, you’ll continue that advertising campaign forever.

At that $400 value of a new patient – which is the lowest estimate from the ADA – just three new patients a week would equate to an additional $62,400 a year onto your bottom line.

So why would that number be different sending paid search or social traffic to landing pages as opposed to your website homepage?

Here are three primary reasons why landing pages will deliver better ROI from new patient acquisition ads than your website homepage.

 

1. Too Many Outs

 

When someone visits your website from a Google or Facebook Ad you want to grab their attention immediately.

They felt compelled enough to click on your ad and they are looking for an answer to their question or a solution to their problem.

You may think your website homepage provides the answer or solution the visitor is looking for but does it?

Sure, your phone number and address is there, so are your hours, and maybe even some reviews, but is that information presented in such a way to immediately capture (& retain) that information, let alone elicit action?

No, here’s why.

Your website homepage is way too distracting, you may think your call to action is clear and you’re providing everything a prospective patient would want to learn about your practice.

And you are, too much in fact.

Considering your website homepage, there are most likely anywhere from 5-100+ links off of that page.

Remember, you want to make it as easy as possible for a prospective patient who clicked on your ad to contact you.

You don’t want them to have to click through your website pages to find answers & solutions, because with each click your chances of converting that prospect into a new butt in the chair patient reduce dramatically.

Your website navigation menu can quickly turn a laser-focused prospect into a confused shopper that cost you money to acquire but never converted to an actual new patient.

Your website homepage is designed to have visitors learn more about your practice by clicking through to other pages.

Landing pages are designed to evoke a response, to elicit action – call you, complete your form, or leave the site.

The lack of navigation on a landing page keeps visitors focused on the ad and accompanying offer they clicked on to evaluate whether or not they want to take action in contacting your office.

The headline on a landing page is far more benefit-oriented than the one – or lack thereof – on your website homepage.

Effective landing pages for dentists running paid search or social advertising for new patient acquisition have zero “outs.”

 

2. Your Call To Action Is Absent or Ineffective

 

Someone visits your website, what is the goal you have in mind for that interaction?

For your website homepage, that goal is impossible to predict for every visitor.

Prospective new patients clicking on your site from an ad have a totally different reason for visiting your website than returning or existing patients.

Landing pages have only one goal supported by one call to action, which is to convert a visitor on an offer you’ve advertised.

When users navigate to your landing page from an ad, it’s because they’ve felt compelled enough to click your ad in order to claim the offer you’re advertising.

That’s why, on your landing page, it’s your job to include only the information that visitor will need to determine whether your offer is worth claiming.

Where most dental websites fail in this regard is on mobile, in particular, a click-to-call button.

Your website homepage likely does not have a strong and prevalent call to action, which is fine because your website is more like an online brochure to be used as a resource to a wide array of visitors.

Landing pages, however, set themselves apart from website homepages by visually and verbally driving visitors to take action.

 

3. Your Website Homepage Is Not Optimized for Conversions

 

As we outlined before, your dental website homepage has to be designed with new & existing visitors in mind.

Your website homepage needs to provide a window into your practice and links off to more specific areas of what a new or existing visitor is looking for – an answer or solution.

In contrast, a landing page is designed with a singular goal in mind – to convert a new visitor into a new patient appointment. 

A well-designed, highly converting landing page meets the expectation and need of the visitor, which is directly related to why they clicked on your ad in the first place.

Optimizing your landing page for conversions is all about context, congruence, value, trust, and simplicity.

Your conversion rate (the rate at which you convert visitors into new patients) will depend greatly on how well you communicate those tenets of landing page success.

A successful landing page uses congruence and context to keep visitors focused on and interested in the offer that compelled them to click on your ad in the first place.

Dentists using landing pages communicate value and trust to prospective new patients by providing compelling headlines, engaging copy, captivating imagery, and a clear value proposition.

A landing page that clearly articulates the value of what is being offered to a prospective new patient establishes credibility, drives conversions and ultimately delivers better ROI than your website homepage ever could.

Here’s a quick example, let’s say someone is searching for a dentist near them who offers conscious sedation (or implants, Invisalign, veneers…etc.).

You offer all of those things, and more, and your website homepage says so.

It just doesn’t say it enough, with enough of an emphasis on what specifically compelled the visitor to click your ad in the first place, and it expects the visitor to go looking for it by clicking around your site.

That homepage approach equates to simplicity, value, context, congruence & trust lost.

To deliver the best ROI from your new patient acquisition ad campaigns your landing pages need to be tightly themed with your ads and keywords.

So, this means when that prospective new patient searches for “sedation dentist near me,” they should be directed to a landing page with a compelling headline and engaging copy centered around the specific keywords (sedation dentist), captivating imagery, and a clear value proposition of why that patient should contact your office about sedation.

Same goes for implants, Invisalign, veneers and so on and so on and so on…

To sum up a monumental conversation about Ad Rank and Quality Score into a single takeaway about new patient acquisition ROI, just remember this:

Well written ads that are tightly themed with related keywords and lead to similarly tightly themed landing page experience will ultimately cost you less than your competitors AND deliver a better ROI.

Furthermore, and back to the A/B testing I mentioned earlier, with landing pages you can test all of this to determine which combination of headlines, copy, imagery, calls to action – even button color – will deliver the best return on your new patient acquisition advertising investment.

You could A/B test all of that with your website homepage, but you’d be paying out the ass to do so. Therefore, it’s not feasible.

Instead, get your landing pages on point and watch your new patient acquisition numbers & ROI skyrocket!

 

New Patient Acquisition On Google & Facebook

 

New Patients for Dentists by Social Dental Network

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