By Luc Wade, Management Consultant at Hive Business
What could online videos be doing for your business? One dental practice owner we know tripled turnover to £1.4m in four years, and video marketing played a key role.
Mark Durnall’s marketing strategy at Pure Dental Health hasn’t just been about raising brand awareness and building trust with his audience, it’s also been about helping his team connect with and convert prospects too. Online video has been used across many marketing channels and platforms to this end. If you’re not using video then you’re still using amalgam fillings, says Mark. Here’s why.
Video is instant and visual
Your prospects, old and young, are living in a world in which everything is instant and visual. Older patients tend to comment when they’ve seen a patient video testimonial because it establishes a sense of trust and familiarity.
Video builds trust
We have filmed many of Mark’s testimonial videos in the patients’ own homes, so that prospective patients can see his team has really been let in, and the patients are real people and not actors.
People relate to people, not things
Nervous patients who can afford treatment may get stuck because they don’t know where to go or can’t bear to look at informative content about dental care such as before and after images or written articles. But they will always be able to relate to another human being who was also anxious at the beginning of their treatment.
Make it the rule not the exception to ask
When you start making videos you might feel unsure if your patients are going to say yes or no, and therefore you may feel scared about asking them. Mark’s team asks every single patient as a standard part of the patient journey. If the patient ticks the box, the team follows it up with a phone call.
Get positive consent
The conversation goes something like: “We’d like to pay you a visit at home, would you be comfortable with that? Here’s an example of what we want to make.” Now they know what to expect and the ones who agree will be feeling excited about their five minutes of fame.
Videos build team morale
The team members at Pure Dental Health value the videos and share them with friends and peers. As a result other nurses and dentists want to come and work with them because they can easily perceive the quality in the patient journey. They can see the care that is taken with patients, which is articulated in the patients’ own words.
So what kind of video should you make? Here are three types that can create a better patient journey:
- knowledge-based videos
- meet the team videos
- patient stories
If you’re going to choose just one, I’d go for patient stories. They are just so powerful. Not sure it’s worth the bother? Here’s how important video content now is for retail businesses like dentistry — it’s quite breathtaking:
- In 2019 80% of internet traffic will come from video
- Video on a landing page is capable of increasing conversion rates by 80%
- Mentioning “video” in your email subject can increase open rates by 19%
- 90% of customers say videos help them make buying decisions
Videos appeared in 74% of Google search results in 2018, and websites with a heavy focus on video content were some of the biggest winners in organic search performance. Meanwhile the Google update last June saw video carousels being displayed in desktop search results for the first time. But if online video was already exploding, it’s gone nuclear in 2019.
As Facebook has grown older so too has its user base, along with its popularity among older people. The largest growth will be among older users, with 500,000 new over-55s expected to join Facebook this year. There will be 6.4m regular Facebook users over the age of 55 this year, the biggest demographic save for 16 to 34-year-olds.
Let us know if you’d like to commission video content that can transform your digital marketing and your business.
