Published: 01/06/2022

Read time: 6 Minutes

If you’ve opted to keep leads and patients updated by encouraging them to follow you on social media, then your next step is looking at how to ramp up your social media plan and create content that’s both engaging and informative.

Spontaneously creating content and posting on social media can be great – but it’s also a lot of work, requires constant attention, and can result in either poor quality posts or a drop-off in enthusiasm and presence.

In order to create engaging content, you need to create a plan of action first so you know what you’re aiming to achieve, and what content will match that goal best.

 

Social media audit

Firstly, do a check of your social media activity so far:

  • What have you been posting and where?
  • Which posts got the most attention or the most likes?
  • How frequently have you been posting – daily, weekly, monthly?
  • Do you have a style/theme/brand?

From there, the next step is to check what your competitors are up to. Find out who the top 3 or 4 competing practices in your area are, and check out their social media. Work through the same audit of their profiles as you did for your own.

 

Themes

Now it’s time to collate your research, working through your findings to determine what your themes should be – in other words what topics should you be posting about.

The key is to find a balance between educational, promotional and fun, so make sure you include posts that match each – perhaps one team post per week that shows off the fun side of the practice, with a dental hygiene top tip thrown in, followed by promoting an offer on a high value treatment.

When planning your themes, don’t forget that you need to prove your worth to users in order to get them to engage, and to make yourself stand out from the crowd.

 

Brand

Standing out from the crowd is where branding and tone take the limelight next.

In the sea of posts that your patients and leads will be scrolling through, they need to be able to identify a post as belonging to you in the blink of an eye. So make sure you brand the posts to your practice, with colour, font, a logo (where relevant), and even by using the same filter on each post.

 

Content creation

When creating content for social media, you need to consider your audience and put yourself in their shoes – if they’re following their dental practice, what kind of posts do they want to see, and how can you make your topics interesting.

Make sure to do a mixture of static image posts and videos – or use gifs/moving images to help catch the eye of a bored scroller. Also, keep in mind that you’re building your brand and creating a more personable side of the business, so try and get the team involved in creating content as well.

If you’re not a dab hand at photoshop or image creation, then check out Canva and their social media templates – there are free and paid plans which allow you use their existing templates to create and download professional-looking posts.

 

Content ideas

Social media platforms – in particular Instagram – allow you to release your inner creativity. The more creative you are, the more of a following you’re likely to build and the more engaged that following is likely to be.

Think about starting with some of the following suggestions, putting your own twist and practice personality on them – from there, the world is your oyster:

  1. ‘Did you know’ treatment videos presented by the dentist/nurse/TCO talking through the pros, cons, and processes for individual treatments the practice offers.
  2. Live Facebook/Instagram sessions answering patient FAQs on dental treatment, hygiene etc.
  3. Quizzes or raffles for leads/patients to receive a prize or coupon for discounted treatment in the future.
  4. Recommend or promote local businesses that are offering helpful or additional services during this time.
  5. Surveys on experiences, opinions, and requests for future content.
Examples of Engaging Social Media Content