Your Brand Tells Your Story
All dentists graduate with a dental degree, but not all dentists offer the same dental experience. The purpose of a Brand is to tell your story. It’s how we bring your practice to life and how we show potential patients how you’re different than all those other dentists out there. It tells patients WHY they should choose YOU!
Your brand also acts as the cornerstone of all your marketing efforts. If you’re not consistent in marking, people aren’t going to understand who you are. You can’t come across as humorous on your direct mail postcards and then be dull and serious inside your practice doors. Consistency is key to telling the right story. Your brand is your foundation which is why it is so critical to make sure it’s right.
So how is your brand created? When you work with Ascent, you are assigned a team of highly trained specialists who will work with you to ensure all of your marketing is on point. One of those team members includes your content specialist (like me!). As a content specialist, it is my job to get to know you and your story. I do this by having you fill out a Brand Questionnaire. Your answers to this questionnaire will give me insight as to who you are as a dentist, what you are trying to achieve with your practice and what message you want to portray. Once I gather and analyze all this information, I write your brand.
What does my brand look like? Your brand consists of 4 main parts. Your practice vision, your core values, your differentiation statements (tagline and headline) and your practice benefits. Once approved and in line with your practice goals, we transform these words into beautiful, compelling marketing materials which will include your website, postcards, hygiene cards, business cards and so on!
But really, let’s dive deeper into what your brand actually looks like.
Internal:
Vision — Your vision statement defines what you’re working toward and what is most important to you. It is what you strive for and what needs to happen to accomplish your goal. Your vision is divided into three parts.
1. Your ultimate goal
2. How you’re going to achieve your goal
3. The end result when you achieve your goal
Values — Your core values outline how your team interacts with patients, just like how our personal values determine our behavior. When your team is on board with your core values, your culture inside your practice will begin to transform. Your patients will be able to see daily how you work and live by these values. Your values can include honesty, trustworthiness, respect, integrity, teamwork, genuine care, positivity, etc. You should live and work by these values daily.
Your Vision and Values are part of your internal brand. They are used within your practice, among your team members, to create unity and ensure that your are delivering a great experience to your patients that is in line with your brand. Now, let’s dive into your external brand. This is the message that will be read and recognized by your potential patients. It’s what we use to bring more new patients through your doors.
External:
Tagline — Your tagline is the first thing people read about you — their first impression. Smilier to Nike’s Just Do It or Olive Garden’s When you’re here, you’re family, your tagline should be a short phrase that can be read in less than 5 seconds and presents one main idea about your practice. It is meant to catch the viewer’s attention and entice readers to learn more about who you are and why they should choose you for their dental care.
Headline — Your headline builds on your tagline. It consists of one or two sentences that further describes your tagline and introduces additional ideas of what your practice is about. Your headline should be able to be read in less than 20 seconds.
Your Practice Benefits — We also like to call these your Key Benefit Bullet Points, as we like to list them out in bullet point format because they are easier to read! After all, it’s all about getting your message across quickly and effectively. Your practice benefits are just that — a list of the benefits you provide your patients at your practice. They build off of your tagline and headline to continue your story and highlight what is important to you. Their main objective is to build trust with current and potential patients. Your key benefit bullet points can include things like a comfortable environment, thorough patient education, a caring team, up-to-date technology, etc. Along with just listing these benefits, we provide a more detailed description (no longer than a short paragraph) to accompany each. This helps the reader further understand what exactly you offer in the patient experience. For example, you may offer the benefit of always keeping up with the latest advanced technology, so one of your key benefit bullet points might look like this:
Advanced Technology — We know that the beauty and functionality of your smile is serious business — it has everything to do with your health, confidence, and success. Because we know this, we use only the most advanced technology available, including digital x-rays, intraoral cameras, and 3D scanning systems. It will help us serve you more gently, quickly and with precision.
As you can see, this paragraph works to explain that keeping up with advanced technology is important and it explains how it benefits them as a patient, setting you apart from other practices in town.
To recap, your external brand consists of your tagline, headline and practice benefits. These three components work in harmony to reflect your brand to the world. Because they all share the same message, they can be used individually or jointly on various marketing materials. For example, you may want all three on your website, but just your tagline and headline on your direct mail postcards. Our specialists here at Ascent will help you determine the best strategy to market your brand to your audience.
So what’s the purpose of a brand? To tell your story. You want quality patients coming to you, not one-timers who are looking for a quick fix or a cheap cleaning. By telling the right story, you’ll attract the right patients to your door — long-term, loyal patients. And the right story begins with the right brand messaging.
Interested in working with Ascent? Click here to schedule a free consultation.
Toll Free: 1-888-401-0650 | Office: 801-285-5669 | info@ascentpgs.com
