For dental implant practices, full arch cases are one of the highest value procedures you can perform. When a practice wants to break into the market to get more full arch cases, it requires intentional research on the front end. Developing a marketing strategy for full arch implant cases doesn’t just happen.
Many markets are saturated with competitors that are already investing in a full arch marketing strategy. Practices just starting out need to take the time to analyze their competition and develop an offer that appeals to their target patient, answering the question, “Why should I choose your practice instead of the others?”
You don’t want to do the work of offering full arch cases without understanding your market, competition, and how your practice fits in… because you’ll get beat. The practices that take the time at the beginning of their full arch offering to perform the proper research will have the most success in the least amount of time.
Here are three crucial steps you need to begin closing more full arch cases:
1. Determine your target market area.
How well do you know the potential patients in your area? Do you know them as well as your main competitors do?
Take your location and draw a radius around it, including everyone who could conceivably drive to your practice for their full arch procedure. This is your market. Now, take the time to understand the demographics of the area. Learn about the levels of education, the kinds of jobs people have, and most importantly, the median household income.
A full arch dental implant procedure is expensive for most patients. Depending on the area you’re in, it could represent someone’s entire annual income. This research will help you understand how much opportunity you have in your location, and develop the methods to reach your target.
2. Analyze your competitors who offer full arch implants.
Next, you have to know what you’re up against. How well do you understand the competition in your area?
Perform a competitive analysis. This requires listing your main competitors and determining their main strengths and weaknesses. Distill their primary full arch marketing message. Learn their price points.
Your prospective patients don’t just see your full arch offer; they see everyone else’s too. And they compare everything. Learning your competitor’s price points will give you the range you need to set your own. If you price too high, you effectively price yourself out of competition. But some practices price too low without realizing it.
A unique sales proposition (USP) is your business’s main promise of value to the potential customer.
If your competitors understand marketing, they’ll have a unique sales proposition (USP) for full arch patients. This is their answer to “Why should I choose your practice instead of the others?” Learning their USPs will help you craft your own.
3. Develop a unique full arch sales proposition.
When you understand the needs of your market and the way your competition attempts to meet those needs, you have the information you need to develop your own USP. How will you stand out in what is likely a saturated and competitive marketplace? You must offer something that the others don’t and successfully articulate that to your target.
The best way to determine your USP is through a venn diagram exercise.
One side of the diagram is the needs of your target audience. For this, you have to think deeper than “they need a full arch.” For example, in a low-income area, your target patient likely needs a cost-effective solution, financing offered, and convenient procedure times that helps them miss as little work as possible. In other areas, the biggest needs might be top materials, high-quality customer support, or even a VIP experience.
The other side of the diagram involves determining the areas your competition is not serving. Of course, to find this, you should list the needs they do meet. A little bit of lateral thinking will help you realize the gaps in their offers. For example, you might find that many of your competitors have a cost-effective solution, but fail to provide flexible financing options. Or you may realize they lack convenient and fast scheduling options for their patients. These gaps become an opportunity for you.
Your USP goes in the middle. It’s the overlap of customer needs and gaps in the service of your competition.
Let’s put it together: A dental implant practice in a low-income area may find that their patients need flexible financing and scheduling, and their competition doesn’t offer it. So, they could develop this USP:
“We perform emergency full arches with flexible financing options, and make sure you miss as little work as possible.”
Additionally, include a relevant price point in this offer. In this case, the practice will want to price low enough for their market to afford treatment, but could price a little bit higher due to the convenience factor they offer.
What will your USP be?
As you can see, performing market research and competitor analysis on the front end helps you develop a competitive proposition for your target patient. If you do the work on the front end, you’ll have something unique to offer potential full arch patients, and you’ll be able to close more cases.
If you want help developing or implementing a marketing strategy for full arch implant cases, consider booking a free strategy call with us. We’re experienced with helping implant practices close more of the cases they want, regardless of their starting point – and we’d love to help you too.