Why and how your dental practice should be blogging

You've probably heard that you should blog as part of your dental practice marketing strategy. But what are the benefits? While it can be difficult to find the time to come up with topics and write, blogging regularly has value for both your patients and your search engine optimization (SEO) health.

Justin Bosco.

Search engines such as Google favor websites that have new content published on a regular basis. Consistently updating your blog shows these search engines that you work actively to provide users with fresh, helpful information, which can help improve your search rankings. Blog posts can also be opportunities to gain more visibility around a specific keyword that you're trying to target. Additionally, the more blogs you publish, the more brand awareness you can generate for yourself and your practice.

From a patient perspective, blogging also offers you a unique opportunity to strengthen relationships with your existing patients and audience by having conversations with them outside of the dentist's chair. When people search for dental health questions in your area, your blogs can be the resource that has the answer. Blogs also give people the chance to share your content with others, which can improve your engagement metrics, increase your brand visibility, and act as a potential referral source.

How to brainstorm blog topics

One of the most challenging parts of blogging is figuring out what to write about; however, thinking about your blogging strategy from a marketing perspective and utilizing some free tools available online can help.

The first step to choosing a blog topic is identifying a keyword phrase that you want to target with the blog post, such as a particular service you want to promote or a common question your patients ask. Your staff can help supply you with questions that they typically receive over the phone.

It's also important to choose topics that will genuinely interest people. Having a blog called "How to Brush Your Teeth," for example, may not generate a high amount of curiosity.

If you're not sure where to start, use Google's suggestions by typing the start of a question into Google and scanning the suggestions for possible topics.

Image courtesy of Justin Bosco.

Another great tool you can utilize for free is Answer the Public. You can input a keyword, and the website then shows you questions related to that keyword that users search for in Google. Because these are questions that people are already searching for, you can have the added bonus of creating content that you know is relevant.

In addition to brainstorming your own blog ideas, it can also help to look at what blogs your competitors are doing. Can you improve upon what they're generating by including more research or expanding on the topic? These are just a few things to keep in mind as you scope out your competitors' blog strategy.

One more place you can browse for relevant blog topics are industry blogs with active comments sections. Reading through comments to see what people are asking can also be a great resource for what your audience really wants to know. Regardless of what tools or methods you choose for brainstorming your blog topics, be sure to keep a list of possible topics that you can reference in the future.

How often should you be blogging?

The life of a busy dentist or dental team member leaves little time for blogging. To remain consistent, it's important to be realistic about picking a blog schedule that you can stick to long term. Whether you have the bandwidth in your schedule for blogging twice a week or once a month, consistency is key.

Add blogging to your dental practice marketing strategy

The time and effort that blogging requires can make it one of the most challenging pieces of your dental practice marketing to maintain, but blogs can be greatly beneficial with a smart strategy behind them.

Justin Bosco is the president of Form + Function, a marketing agency that helps dentists all over the country stand out online with honest, ethical digital marketing services. Form + Function maintains a free, comprehensive dental marketing course for dentists seeking to get started with digital marketing for their practice.

The comments and observations expressed herein do not necessarily reflect the opinions of DrBicuspid.com, nor should they be construed as an endorsement or admonishment of any particular idea, vendor, or organization.