Did you know that 72% of your potential patients would perform an online search before choosing you as their dentist? This is not some new, shocking revelation; dental practice owners are expected to know the magnitude of influence their digital presence has on their business (and take appropriate steps to steer the influence in the right direction)! Fortunately, most practice owners do realize it and also heavily invest in their digital marketing efforts (in response). But simply investing in your digital footprint isn't enough. You should know whether your current digital marketing efforts are working - or not working? How would you do that?
That's where a digital marketing audit comes in! Performing an audit means comprehensively evaluating all of your online strategies to see if they're meeting your dental marketing goals! It's like having a routine checkup for your marketing (instead of your molars) if that makes sense! That's just a surface level explanation; there's so much more to it and there's a whole list of reasons why every single dental marketeer (or practice owner for that matter) should perform it. Yet, many practices fail to do it. The consequence? Wasted marketing budget. No new leads. No growth. If this feels relatable, this blog is for you!
In this blog, we'll talk about digital marketing audits in detail (discussing what it is, what it entails and why it is crucial for your dental practice). We'll also talk about the actionable steps you can take post-audit to remedy the shortcomings revealed in the audit.
Digital Marketing Audit: What It's And What It Entails
So, first things first: what's a digital marketing audit? Pretty fancy term, but it has a very simple meaning. It means running a test on all your online marketing efforts to see how effective they've been in yielding results. This is no superficial test, however; it's a thorough, in-depth scrutiny of all of your active digital marketing channels:including those focused on dental implant marketing. The goal is not just to gauge efficiency but to uncover the discrepancies and gaps in your current strategies, giving you a clear picture of where you stand in the overcrowded (and highly competitive) digital space.
If you're leading the crowd, the audit will help you retain your position as the leader. And if you're struggling to make your way out of the crowd, gasping for visibility, the audit would light the path up for you! In simple words, the analysis lets you improve your strategy in so many ways (which we'll discuss in detail later in the blog). For now, let's have an overview of what a digital marketing audit includes.
Here are its key components:
Website Analysis
Your website audit would you get answers to the following questions:
- Is your website mobile friendly, fast loading and easy to navigate?
- Does it include clear CTAs (calls to action)?
- Is the website content appropriate and updated?
- Does it have 'working' appointment scheduling options?
SEO Analysis
Here, the efficiency of your recent SEO efforts is determined by analyzing:
- Whether your website is ranking for relevant keywords (like "family dentist in XYZ city").
- Whether your meta titles, descriptions and on page content is optimized for local and general searches.
GBP (Google Business Profile) Analysis
GBP optimization goes hand in hand with local SEO, so it's also analyzed. It includes:
- Checking if your business hours, location, contact details and reviews are up to date.
Content Audit
The evaluation entails:
- Analyzing if your content (which includes blogs, landing page offers and service descriptions) is driving traffic.
- If the content is actually helping the audience.
Social Media Evaluation
This means reflecting on your entire social media presence and looking at it from a critical perspective. It yields important insights regarding:
- The time you actively spend on social media (including Facebook and Instagram)
- The value your social media posts provide (or don't provide)
- The relevance of your social media posts with your brand image
Paid Ads Review
It helps you analyze the effectiveness of your paid strategy from both a qualitative and quantitative perspective. It gauges:
- Whether your ads are bringing high quality leads
- Whether your CPC (cost per click) is within industry standards
Email Marketing Performance
Critical insights regarding your email marketing are obtained, including:
- The results of each of your email campaigns (like open rates, click through rates, etc.)
- Whether your campaigns are actually driving useful action (i.e. booking appointments and helping with patient retention).
Reasons Why A Digital Marketing Audit Is Crucial For Your Practice
By looking at the above pointers, a digital marketing audit seems like a whole lot of work. But it's not necessarily the case.
Yes, it's time taking and requires good analytical skills on the part of the auditor, but it's doable. And when you understand the very reasons why such audits are important, you'd not only be willing to spend your time (and resources) in conducting the audit but you'll be convinced to make it a part of your routine.
Let's talk about these reasons! Digital marketing audits are crucial for dental practices because they help you:
Get The Most Out Of Your Marketing Budget
Here's a disappointing statistic: small business owners (including dental practices) waste upto 25% of their total ad spend! The underlying reason? Underperforming keywords and poorly targeted ads (which are never identified as underperforming and poorly targeted to begin with).
This wouldn't be the case if these businesses integrated a simple thing into their operations: performing marketing audits! An audit would help you pinpoint exactly what's working and exactly what's draining your budget, so you can then identify and eliminate the waste and reinvest that money in high performing strategies.
Identify Gaps In SEO
If your practice doesn't show up on Google's first page when a nearby patient searches for "dentists near me", it means you're invisible to your entire target audience. You're nonexistent for them. Why is this so? Well, 68% of all online experiences begin with a search engine (and Google's local pack alone gets over 44% of all clicks for local searches).
The only way to determine whether or not you're visible to your audience is by performing an SEO audit (which sees whether your profile is optimized for local keywords and whether your GMB profile is up to date, as we mentioned earlier). Even the best dental websites may go unnoticed if these elements aren't in place (and aren't fixed on time)!
Improve Your Online Reputation
Patients choose their dentists with the same scrutiny as choosing a significant other – no exaggerations! Trust is literally everything in dentistry! And how is this trust built? Via online reviews (84% of patients trust online reviews as much as they trust direct recommendations from family and friends).
So, a patient is very unlikely to choose your practice if it has negative/outdated reviews.
A digital marketing audit will help prevent this. While auditing, you'll check how your reviews are managed and displayed across major platforms (like Google, Facebook and Yelp), so you'll have a chance to improve them if needed. This will help build a bond built on trust with your potential patients, which will significantly improve conversion.
Boosts Conversions With Better CTAs/UX
Did you ever abandon a shopping card because the website was painfully slow? The same can happen to your clinic; patients can be on the verge of booking an appointment but don't because the website won't load!
Yes, website load times are that much impactful on user decisions, and consequently, on conversations (even a minuscule 1 second delay in load time can reduce conversions by 7%)! Besides load times, the overall look and feel of your website (how it works on mobile devices, where the CTAs are placed and how interactive it is) - basically the entire user experience - also plays a huge role in conversions. Luckily, a digital marketing audit will evaluate your website on these fronts as well! It'll reveal the friction points that may be deterring your patients from staying on the website so you may fix them accordingly (and convert visitors into booked appointments).
Stay Ahead Of The Competition
The digital space is overwhelmingly crowded (and competitive), which means there's a constant tug of war going on between clinics on who will get the most traffic and bookings. Suppose you and your competitor are targeting the same keywords, running the same type of ads, and have an equally compelling website (apparently). Who will get the bookings?
The answer is: the one who's in the top 3 listings on Google (as they'll get 75% of all clicks on the entire listing).
You can get in the top 3 by performing a digital marketing audit. It'll help you have a deep look at your marketing efforts and help you benchmark your performance against your competitors. This will reveal all the (otherwise overlooked) gaps in keywords and show how you can improve content and ads.
Keep Up With Changing Algorithms And Trends
Google's algorithms are updated 100s of times per year, and just when you feel like you've cracked the code for effective social media marketing, the platforms change their features and advertising tools. These changes demand frequent updating of strategies, and that's something a digital marketing audit does best!
Regular audits (at least twice a year) would help you pinpoint outdated/dead strategies and give you a chance to revive them as per the latest trends and algorithms. This helps you stay relevant, compliant and competitive!
Strengthen Patient Retention
A dental business becomes profitable with new patients, but it can only stay 'sustainable' if existing patients are retained (i.e. they stay loyal to the practice). This is why patient retention is a major marketing goal. And it's interestingly an easier goal to pursue (as retaining a patient costs 5x less than acquiring a new one).
A digital marketing audit helps here too! It checks how effectively you're engaging with existing patients (through newsletters, followup emails, appointment reminders and loyalty programs). This lets you identify any shortcomings in your communication efforts and fix them so you can reduce churn and keep patients loyal to you!
Next Steps After Your Digital Marketing Audit
Suppose you've successfully conducted your digital marketing audit, now what's next?
It's time to turn your insights (which you've obtained through the audit) into action; don't let them collect dust.
Here's what to do next:
- Create a roadmap based on priorities. See which areas are seriously impacted and need the most improvement. High impact issues generally include website errors, ad inefficiencies and missing seo elements. Address these areas first, then move on to less serious ones. Build a timeline with clear, realistic goals.
- Speaking of goals, ensure all of your goals are tied to improving your KPIs (key performance indicators). And make sure the goals are specific! This could include increasing monthly website traffic to 30%, improving your average Google ratings to 4.8+ or decreasing your CPC (cost per click) by 20%.
- Never make a single, mediocre attempt at addressing an inadequacy and leave it at that; keep striving for excellence until you achieve. Test new ad copy, try different blog topics, A/B test landing pages and monitor performance consistently. Remember that marketing isn't a destination; it's a journey. And journeys are never 'done'!
- Once you're done with the audit and have fixed everything, schedule your next audit in advance. You should make digital marketing audits a part of your routine and intend to perform them at least twice a year.
Conclusion
Your dental practice thrives on how valuable, accessible and trustworthy you showcase yourself online. Several digital marketing strategies are employed to strengthen your online presence, but not every strategy will work. A digital marketing audit is how you can evaluate your existing marketing strategy for efficiency and make it smarter and more effective!
Ready to perform a digital marketing audit for your dental practice? Start by evaluating your website, SEO, ads and social media.Or if doing all this feels overwhelming (or you lack the in-house expertise to do it for you), consider reaching out to a trusted dental marketing partner instead!
The marketing team at Teraleads would be more than glad to assist you! We're a full arch dental marketing agency specializing in all major marketing channels. We also have extensive experience in performing digital marketing audits and interpreting results. Partner with us and help us drive real growth for your clinic! Your future patients are already online. Let's make sure they find you first!
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a digital marketing audit for dental practices?
A digital marketing audit is a comprehensive review of all your online marketing efforts, including your website, SEO, ads, content, social media, and more. It shows what's working, what’s not, and where to improve.
Why is a digital marketing audit important for my dental clinic?
It helps you uncover missed opportunities, reduce wasted spend, improve visibility, and ensure your marketing is aligned with your business goals.
How often should I conduct a digital marketing audit?
We recommend doing a full audit at least twice a year to stay ahead of industry changes and ensure consistent growth.
What does the audit typically include?
The audit covers your website speed and usability, SEO performance, Google Business Profile, social media, content strategy, paid ads, and email marketing.
Will the audit help me get more patients?
Yes. By identifying and fixing weak spots in your marketing, the audit can lead to increased visibility, better conversions, and ultimately more patients.
Is my website’s performance reviewed during the audit?
Absolutely. We evaluate everything from page load times and mobile responsiveness to on-site SEO and user experience.
Can the audit help with patient retention?
Yes, it looks at communication strategies like appointment reminders, newsletters, and reputation management to help keep patients loyal.
Do I need to give you access to anything for the audit?
Yes, we may need access to your website backend, Google Analytics, Google Search Console, ad accounts, and social profiles to do a complete review.
What makes your audit different from others?
Our audits are dental-specific. We understand the unique challenges of dental marketing and offer actionable insights, not just reports.
How do I get started with a digital marketing audit?
Just contact us through our website or schedule a free consultation:we’ll guide you through the next steps.
