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JUL
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GDPUK remains free to join and to post on the forum. We have close to 9000 members and they love using the resource to keep upto date with all things dental and keep engaged with the dental community. Revenue for the site is generated from banner advertising. Our clients who advertise are predominantly from the dental trade.
Clients of GDPUK often ask us about designing banner ads for the site, so we thought we would put together this simple guide and let you know our thoughts on what makes up an effective banner ad. Obviously when creating a web banner ad, it is important to always look at it from the perspective of the viewers (or your potential customers).
Make sure it is correct size. If you are given details of a certain specification or size needed, you should follow the requirements, otherwise the banner ad won’t work.
Keep the file sizes to a minimum. Smaller files load faster and it increases the chance of being seen by visitors.
Good copy (like all advertising) is very important. Use of graphical elements is good, however, it's the copy that triggers people to find out more about your product. Banners that are effective are kept short and simple. Further info below
You want your potential customers to look at your ad, get interested, and click on it, then find out more info about your product on your website (preferably on a relevant landing page on your site). Don’t try to fit all the benefits of your product into that small space, it never looks rights and is ineffective. Simple and clear is the best method.
Over the years, the banners that have been the most effective, use an eye-catching hook. Headlines are what trigger people to read the story. Emphasising the benefits of your products more than the features of your products is the way to go.
By using a call to action graphic or text you make it very clear to the visitor what you want them to do. For example: For More Information; Download Info Now; Click Here to Purchase. This works with the earlier advice of being simple, clear and direct.
Animated GIFs work brilliantly on GDPUK but graphic designers always tell us that you need to avoid using photos and photo-like images on animated GIFs. Because of how GIFs work, the photos won’t look as nice and it will just make the file size huge. It is most likely you will be limited to having just one or two frames for the banner given the file size limits, plus as mentioned before, banners are more effective as a smaller file.
If you want to use photos in your ad (for websites only; not on our daily digest emails), consider creating it in Flash or HTML5. It will give you better return in terms of quality and file size.
Effective landing pages. We have mentioned this a number of times over the years! When people click on the banner, they should be presented with the relevant campaign or information immediately. They do not want to go to your homepage and be forced to hunt for the information that may exist on another page of your site. An effective landing page produces a great experience for your customer but also better results from your advertising campaigns.
Thanks for reading this guide to creating effective banner ads. We hope you find it useful and a simple blueprint to follow when looking to advertise online.
If you need further information or want to ask a question about this blog. Please get in touch.
Thanks
Jonny
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6577 Hits
On Wednesday 27th May the dental industry came together to launch The Implant Hub, a unique and exciting new online resource for dentists looking to grow their dental implant business.
This brand new digital hub, at www.theimplanthub.com, provides information on topics that will directly impact profitability for both GDPs and specialists, supporting the business of implant dentistry.
A venue where you can gain valuable insight into growing your dental business, The Implant Hub delivers exclusive support and advice in implant dentistry through articles and blogs to Google Hangouts, as well as LIVE Q&As from our three top coaches: Chris Barrow (Business Coach), Mark Oborn (Marketing Coach) and Dr Nav Ropra (Inspirational Coach).
Speaking about The Implant Hub, Ken O’Brien, General Manager of BioHorizons UK, the team behind this new offering, said:
‘Always mindful that we provide unparalleled support for our clients in the business of implant dentistry – and beyond the sale of implants – The Implant Hub was the natural development in our offering to this industry. We are delighted to launch The Implant Hub and, together with our three coaches, our aim is to provide a resource that helps our clients develop their practices from a business perspective.’
Recently added content includes:
- White Paper Marketing in Implant Dentistry
- How to differentiate yourself from the practice down the road
- Why online marketing is more powerful than conventional marketing techniques.
To see for yourself what The Implant Hub has to offer your implant dentistry business, please visit www.theimplanthub.com.
The Implant Hub is currently available free of charge to all BioHorizons customers. For those who are not BioHorizons customers, please register your details on the website to find out how you can gain full access.
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5639 Hits
Your Landing Page
Neil Sanderson
Most people think of a website as an entity in its self, this is not the case. A website is a series of pages of which you need to think about landing pages.
What is a landing page? Well the description is in the name really, it’s where people land when they first come to your website.
Most people think that the place people should first see when they arrive at your site is the home page, this again is not the case, ideally you need people to land on the correct landing page, let me explain.
I’m sure that all of you have at one time or another gone to Amazon. Can you ever think of a time when you arrived on a home page which had menu options across the top for you to find what you are looking for?
No of course you haven’t. You always land on the page that you wanted. For instance if you are looking for a camera. I typed in the search “Canon EOS 70D” and below is the search I got.
Camer search screen
All the search items are about the EOS 70D which is what you would expect, some are reviews and technical pages others are sales pages, but effectively all of them are about this particular camera.
So whenI click on the search item which takes me to the “landing page”. It comes as no surprise that the page I land on is about the Canon EOS 70D.
Because Amazon is so good at this you are presented with everything you need to purchase this camera, there are reviews, things that people also bought when they buy this camera etc. In fact just about everything you need to make a purchase, this is a typical Amazon landing page and they are very good at it.
Amazon Canon landing page
So what has this got to do with your website and the landing page that your prospective patients land on?
Well it’s about this, we have all been tought by the likes of Amazon that we want to land on exactly the page we are interested in. We don’t want to land on the “home” landing page, we know what we want and we want it right now.
People are not prepared to come to a “home” landing page and navigate around the website until they find the item they are looking for, this is why you have to promote your landing pages all the time, so that your visitors get exactly what they are looking for immediately.
If someone is looking for teeth whitening, most dental websites are set up so they will come to the “Home” landing page, they will then click on the treatment tab, then they will find the whiting link and click on that, do you see the issue?
If you want people to visit your teeth whitening page you need to start optimising this page so that Google can pick it up and display it, this needs to become your whitening landing page.
The same goes for all your other treatment, such as facial aesthetics, implants, straightening etc. etc.
Writing a blog is a great help but having the right key words on the page is also crucial, along with the correct meta description. Get ahead of your competition and ensure that your treatment pages are optimised to be your landing pages.
However you can bypass all this an just use Google Adwords, which will always send people to exactly the page you require, this is one of the huge benefits of Adwords.
If you would like more information on your website, call me on 01767 626 398 or email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or visit our Facebook page.
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5570 Hits
This week, we are publishing a guest blog by Alex from FireCask on how you can improve your online exposure.
Alex is a Director at FireCask, an online marketing and web design company in central
Manchester. He has written over 10 WordPress plugins attracting over 750,000 downloads,
speaks at industry events and has written for publications such as The Guardian, Huffington
Post, Smashing Magazine and Econsultancy.
I have been working in online marketing for nearly 10 years now. In that time I’ve worked with
100’s of businesses in all kinds of verticals and helped them get ahead online. Dentists are
actually in a competitive vertical when it comes to ranking within search engines so it’s important
to know that your online exposure is improved as much as possible to ensure you get new
people walking through the door and into the dentist’s chair.
Tip #1: Write something relevant on your site
You may have been advised to write on your site’s blog or you may have a company writing blog
posts on your behalf. One piece of advice is to ensure that the content is of the utmost quality
rather than content being produced for the sake of publishing content x times per month. As well
as this make sure your subject matter is relevant and possibly attached to current affairs.
I’m still unsure why no dentist has taken advantage of the Suarez biting incident. It’s current,
popular and you have the opportunity to sell yourself whilst using something such as humour as
your outlet.
Tip #2: Make sure your Website is user friendly
Ranking well in Google is great, but it’s only half the battle. Once someone enters your site they
need to find what they’re looking for whilst you try and make them convert. A conversion for you
may be as simple as sending you an email, picking up the phone or finding out your location but
these things need to be easy for the user to do.
Ensure your website has this information to hand on every page. It’s also important to have your
site mobile friendly meaning that someone on a mobile (or tablet) device can read and navigate
through your site just as easily as they would a desktop computer. As someone who wrote the
chapter on Mobile SEO for Econsultancy, I understand that dentistry is a vertical where the
majority of people now will view your site on a mobile, and because 2014 is the year that mobile
use overtakes desktop use for browsing the web, it’s vital to cater for mobile users.
By the way, we make great websites at FireCask :)
Tip #3: You’re the Authority, not the building you work in
If I want to research into my next dentist or I want to know more about a certain procedure I
would have more trust in you if you were the ones who authored the information. For example, if I
need a root canal and read information about it (sources of the issue, what to expect on the day,
approximate costs) I’d be much more comfortable knowing the information was provided by the
dentist that could potentially be performing the procedure.
People love people, not brands. This means that if you want to attract a new client they have to
connect with the people, not the building the people work in. You will be in more demand if you
become the authority on dentistry (or your specific area of dentistry).
Tip#4: Get recommendations from your customers
At FireCask we don’t have a sales team so most of our work comes from the oldest method of
social networking known to man word of mouth. Online, a good recommendation written by a
satisfied customer has a wider reach and is permanent (unless of course the customer decides
to remove the recommendation at a later date which is very uncommon).
You can receive recommendations offline (via post, or filling out a form) which you can then
publish on your website. Asking for marks out of 5 can help you produce the 5 star rating system
as seen in some of Google’s results pages such as this. Online, you have various options for
recommendations:
? Facebook: your company may have a Facebook Page. If so, ensure it is set as a Local
Business where people will then be allowed to rate you out of 5.
? Linkedin: people can recommend you as a dentist within Linkedin. For me, I find this
invaluable as I now have over 35 recommendations spanning over 5 years. Business
pages used to have recommendation options but have now been replaced with
Showcase Pages which I suggest you look into.
? Google+: as with Facebook, your business’ location can receive reviews if you have a
Business Page. If you don’t have a business page I suggest you create one as soon as
possible so you can be located on a map (such as if you search for dentist in
manchester)
Tip #5: Add to a Discussion
As well as the above, social networks also let you, as a person, get involved with discussions.
Here’s a few places you can go to and become an authority on dentistry within the networks
themselves:
? Linkedin Groups you will see suggested groups to join, as well as being able to search
for groups in the search bar at the top. ? Google+ Communities similar to Linkedin. Find some relevant communities and
contribute to them.
? Facebook Groups search for groups with relevant terms.
? Niche sites as well as GDPUK, there will be other sites that cover dentistry from the
customer’s point of view. Contributing to those sites will help you also become an
authority, especially if they’re locally based. Searching for terms such as dentist forum uk
can help (and I notice GDPUK is number 1).
I hope that this post helps you be able to become more involved online not only to grow your
business but also your personal profile. Some people of course don’t have the time to do all this
which is why they hire companies such as my own in order to help them improve their online
exposure and conversions.
Get in touch via email - This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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9594 Hits