How To Get More Dental Reviews

Google and Facebook reviews are only getting more prominent in the dental industry. Collecting reviews is a crucial part of an effective dental marketing strategy. Now more than ever, your dental practice needs consistent, 5-star reviews. And lots of them.

How to get more dental reviews is a question we hear a lot. The good news is, it is not as difficult to obtain them as many people think.

For almost 90 percent of customers, review sites are the first place they look when deciding which business or service to try. For decades, dentists and orthodontists have relied on word-of-mouth marketing to grow their practices. Positive online reviews is the new word-of-mouth marketing. Reviews create powerful testimonials, boost patients retention, and provide your practice with valuable feedback you can use to improve your patient experience.

As obvious as the importance of Google dental reviews, and Facebook dental reviews are, it’s surprising how few dental practices put any effort into collecting them at all. In some communities we have seen, local dentist reviews are almost non-existent.

Maybe it’s just not something they’re thinking about, or it seems too difficult. For the dental teams that do make an organized effort to get patient reviews, it’s a probability they will build a reputation as their city’s premier dental care provider.

The truth is, most dental teams are asking for reviews the wrong way. Once a patient walks out the door, you’ve missed your opportunity to get a review from them. Your practice needs a plan to get patients to write a review from their phone while still in your practice.

After working to help dentists build strong online reputations, we have discovered that the problem of collecting patient reviews boils down to a couple of typical obstacles.

Maybe your team doesn’t want to take any more of a patient’s time after an appointment. Your team could be afraid of seeming pushy or hurting the relationship, or perhaps they simply don’t know how to bring it up. Time constraints, worry over being annoying, and nervousness are all reasons your dental team might not be asking your dental patients for reviews. Achieve reviews success and build relationships by using the smart and easy way to bring up reviews with patients.

If asked the right way, we guarantee a majority of your patients will be happy to write you a review before they even leave their appointment.

We know that asking patients for reviews can be hard, so we have laid out four ways you can obtain more positive reviews. Turn your Google and Facebook reviews sites into one of your practice’s most powerful marketing tools!

1. Ask Specific Patients for a Review

One of the biggest mistakes dental practices make (and the quickest way to burn out in your reviews-collecting effort), is to tell your team in the morning huddle “Alright, everyone, we need to ask for lots of reviews today!” It never works. And we mean, never.

Instead of a general statement at the morning huddle, set your team up for success by pulling up the patient schedule and evaluating who is coming in. Choose one or two patients who are typically happy to be in the office.

If a patient happens to have a good relationship with a specific team member, have that team member ask them to write a quick review while they are still sitting in the chair. Plan for and select dental patients you suspect would be happy to leave you a review. Make specific assignments for your team members to ask for a review and have them report back on how it went.

2. Make it Easy to Find Your Reviews Page

A survey found that 86% of people researching local businesses read their reviews. And, 68% of people form an opinion after reading between one and six reviews online.

That means that your practice can potentially get new patients to trust you before they meet you. Begin by creating profiles on the three most prominent online reviews services. These are Google My Business, Yelp, and Facebook.

Add a profile picture to your review pages, we recommend your practice logo for easy recognition. Add your practice address, hours of operation, and other information that will make it clear where a potential patient can learn more, and contact you. In addition to cultivating relationships with patients, providing detailed information on your page also assures your current patients that they are writing a review on the correct reviews page.

3. Be Transparent

It is a well-known fact that honest feedback and reviews are essential for building a successful dental practice. When asking patients for reviews, communicate to them how much you and the team rely on reviews to find more great patients like them, and improve the experience in your practice.

Tell your patients about the reviews goal you have set for your practice and ask them to help you reach that goal. Most patients are more likely to leave a review when they are asked personally. Remember, dental practices who don’t ask for reviews are likely to only get one when a patient is unhappy. If that happens, here is how to handle a negative dental review.

4. Use a Dental Reviews Software

 

You are more likely to get great reviews if you have an online reviews software for your practice. Reviews software simplifies asking for reviews by allowing you to send automatic texts, and emails with links that go directly to your Google, Facebook, and HealthGrades sites. My Social Practice’s reviews product is designed to make it effortless for your patients to leave you a great review on their mobile device, with just a few taps. Streamline your review process, building your reputation while saving you tons of time.

Set your practice up for success by making assignments for team members to ask specific patients to write a review, making sure your review sites are up-to-date and easy to find and being transparent about where and how you’d like patients to review your practice.

These guidelines are only the tip of the dental reviews iceberg. My Social Practice has your back, download this free guide with additional information on how to collect more dental reviews!

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