Why 'Word of Mouth' Means So Much More Today

For decades in this country, some of the most powerful people in any given city were those who owned the newspapers, because they controlled a good deal of the flow of information in town. For decades, millions watched on television what the executives of three networks decided they would watch.

Compare that with what’s happening today. Newspapers everywhere are either dying off or struggling for relevance and survival. The average TV viewer has dozens of specialty channels to choose from. And, perhaps most notably, “citizen bloggers” and the friends we follow through social media are having a tremendous influence on the decisions we make in all areas of our lives. We’re getting more information from more sources than ever, including from among ourselves.

That is an exciting development for dentists.

Dental practices have always been about person-to-person interaction; that’s the nature of the profession. And they have always grown and thrived on word-of-mouth endorsements: the relative with the story of her incredible dentist; the co-worker with the transformed smile and the heartfelt recommendation. That’s what success has always been built on. But now, they’re not just telling the person in the next cubicle. They’re writing on their blogs, they’re tweeting pictures of their new smiles, they’re posting Facebook updates before they’re even out of your office. This is word of mouth multiplied and accelerated – and it’s what’s making this era of dentistry so exciting.

(Click the link to read "How to Connect to Patients in a Hyper-Connected World.")

When opportunities for exposure multiply, it creates new levels of awareness, and that means new levels of expectations. As I have been saying, patients are also consumers, and today’s plugged-in consumers are well-informed and demanding. They’re starting to realize that a skilled dentist today can not only restore their smile, but can make it better than what nature originally bestowed on them.

Whatever the economy, there are people willing to pay for high-quality, lifestyle-enhancing services and products. Just ask Apple. Just ask Starbucks. Dentistry has already made significant inroads in this way in recent years, but we’ve really only seen the beginning. We are in a new era – an era of the consumer-driven practice, where it’s about always being ready to fulfill patients’ needs in a way that compares with what they’ve come to expect in the greater marketplace. The dentists who rise to the top in this new era are the ones who welcome and embrace this new reality as an opportunity to spread the word about great dentistry.

(Click the link to read more practice management articles by Imtiaz Manji.)