HENRY SCHEIN || THE 2025 INTERACTIVE PLAYBOOK TO BUILDING YOUR DENTAL PRACTICE
3. CREATE YOUR BRAND IDENTITY
Once you’ve identified your ideal target market, you can then build your practice infrastructure and your brand around their specific needs. Branding is a way to create a distinct feeling associated with your practice that attracts and retains the type of patients you’re seeking. Your brand encompasses the entire experience that patients have with your practice. It’s not just your marketing materials but every touchpoint. You can demonstrate your brand identity with the nature of the person who answers the phone, the quality of services offered, the atmosphere throughout the practice, the convenience of scheduling appointments, the dental technology used, the demeanor of your hygienist and more.
Once you’ve defined your vision and values, you can translate them into a tangible brand identity and a marketing strategy to attract and retain patients. Start by understanding the marketplace data and the competitive landscape. Working with a marketing firm to conduct a competitive analysis can help ensure that your practice’s services and unique qualities align with the demographics in your area.
From there, focus on what makes yours stand out. For example, you may offer restorative services such as crowns that can be completed in the same appointment, as well as implants or orthodontic aligners — but if it’s not articulated in your brand (through your website, social handles, Google listings, etc.), patients may not necessarily know how this differs from what the dentist down the street offers. Think through how your brand identity can reflect that unique patient experience. “Include key team members in helping to define your brand so they get excited about being part of something bigger that has purpose,” says Moffat.
GETTING STARTED:
Create a persona for your ideal patient. For example, your target audience might be young adults who desire esthetic services such as teeth whitening and aligners. Other examples might be patients requiring restorative and prosthetic work and/or the busy working professional who requires same-day dentistry.
Developing this persona will help guide you in creating a brand identity and overall marketing strategy that aligns with your target audience.
PATIENT PERSONA
Cosmetic Carly
Demographics 26 years old, female, single, urban
Pain points Needs a payment plan
Trust factors Checks ratings, referred by a co-worker
Dental needs
Bi-annual check-ups, cosmetic dentistry, teeth whitening, tooth alignment
Influenced by Beauty and music celebrity influencers
Media habits Instagram, TikTok, streaming content
Preferred contact
Text messaging