Social Media in Lockdown: Part 1 of 2

I recently attended an exciting webinar by my good friend Shaz Memon, titled “Building Influence with Instagram”. Much of what Shaz mentioned resonated with me, and I thought that it might be helpful to many of you, so I have extracted some of the key points from his presentation. I believe that much of this form of communication can be applied to most social media platforms, not just Instagram. I have also combined many of these ideas with my own personal philosophy on the subject.

Shaz Memon is the founder of Digimax Dental, a dental marketing agency based in London. He has recently published a book called Instagram for Dentists, which has received excellent reviews. If you get a chance, do look into it.

Patients do not fully understand what is happening in our industry at the moment. They are unaware of what we are doing on a scientific and clinical level to overcome the challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic. All they know is that before COVID, dental treatment was readily available to them, and now it is not. Many are being triaged to urgent dental care centres, which in some cases are quite far away. As a result, they have lost their connection with their dentist.

This is a perfect time to communicate effectively with your patients, especially when they are spending more time on social media as a way to connect with family, friends and colleagues. Social media offers an excellent platform to communicate in an easy, quick and affordable way.

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You have spent time over the past years building relationships with your patients in the form of the goodwill of your practice. Now is the time to ensure that you retain and support your patients.

You need to remember that people will still have dental needs and will still require dentists. The only difference now is that their choices may be affected in different ways, depending on their experience during this lockdown phase.

Incorrect and insensitive messages will simply disengage patients who are not in the right frame of mind to absorb these. Also, marketing messages attempting to “sell” in the same way as before Covid may even damage the brand in the long term. Hence, we must carefully construct our communication in a thoughtful and caring manner. Social media communication should be sympathetic to the current times.

Here are some useful tips that Shaz shared:

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• Communicate how you are managing emergency patients by explaining what the procedure is now and what they should do in a clear way.
• Explain the reason why you have closed, as some patients may not understand that we are governed and must follow regulations.
• Reassure patients regularly.
• If you offer e-consultations, tell people about this. Actively promote it by saying that you are here to help them in any way you can, and make access to you easy.
• Providing oral health tips will be suitable for your patients, for example explaining how sugar is bad for teeth. Use hashtags such as #SugarAwareness and #StayingAtHome.
• Dental hygiene guidance will prove to be very useful.
• Avoid posting special offers at this time. Most people are anxious about redundancies and the future, so asking for a financial commitment is probably not a good idea. It may create a negative impression of your business.
• Relax how you post “before and after” pictures, as these may send confusing messages when you are not currently able to carry out that type of dentistry. Instead, it may be better to post pictures explaining how you miss doing dentistry or how much you love your work. Use it to reminisce and be positive about the future.

Social media posts can be on any of the following topics: books to read, films to watch, how to keep the kids entertained, home-schooling ideas, positive self-development posts like learning a new language, inspiring videos or podcasts, mental health and meditation, recipes for lockdown, neutral humour, goal setting and planning for the future, motivation for staying well mentally, physically and psychologically, polls to get people’s opinions, showing care and solidarity, and how you are there to help.

Go live, host a watch party, or run oral health webinars for your patients. Going forward, this type of sympathetic marketing should be continued, and I believe it will prove to be a very successful approach for the growth of any business.

Relationships are at the heart of every business. People buy from those they know and like. Sympathetic marketing through social media is the way forward.

I would like to thank Shaz for the great content shared in the webinar, which I know will be very useful to many dentists in such challenging times. I highly recommend getting his book to better understand how to make the most of Instagram.

Meanwhile, stay safe, Bhavna.