13 DENTIST hits the airwaves

13 DENTIST is the most ambitious marketing programme for dentists ever to be undertaken in Australia and it started with a bang, with adverts hitting both Radio and TV in its launch month of June.
The programme has been born out of the belief by Carl Burroughs, Managing Director of Australia’s only dedicated dental marketing group, that many practices are spending far too much money with publications such as Yellow Pages and that there is far more effective strategies that can be provided through collective advertising.

“The dental profession spends millions of dollars with Yellow Pages each year and in my experience receives a very average return on this investment,” says Mr Burroughs.

“Yellow Pages has its place in society and it is our intention to use it to promote 13 DENTIST in the future, however it’s a very singular marketing activity and there is plenty of other mediums to use that achieve better results”.

“TV, radio and glossy magazines are not in the budget for many dental practices, however by dividing the country into regions and sharing the costs, these highly powerful marketing mediums become attainable and deliver intelligent and compelling dental messages to the public”.

The technology behind the 13 DENTIST telephone system splits the country into 225 regions. Any call made from within a region goes straight through to the member dentist in that region. This way the caller is getting straight through to a practice who can answer their questions and book them in for an appointment. Carl and his team wanted to avoid using call centres as the public are sick and tired of not getting through to a person who can actually help them at the time they want helping. However, dental practices are not open 24 hours per day so after 6pm at night until 9am in the morning and for the whole weekend, the 13 DENTIST number goes to a professional call centre in Sydney (not overseas) who handle the call, takes the callers details and forwards these on to the dentist to be handled when they re-open.

The initial TV campaign has engaged the services of Dr Penny Adams, a celebrity TV medical GP. The TV commercial was made in a practice in Sydney and depicts an enjoyable dental experience for the whole family and gives compelling reasons why the public should visit a 13 DENTIST. “The 13 DENTIST campaign is designed to reach a broad audience, not just the niche market of cosmetic or implant dentistry. However, we have efficiently incorporated the cosmetic, implant and whitening aspects of dentistry together with the main message of general dentistry and the benefits of regular visits,” says Carl. “This can only be done effectively through the sophisticated media we have chosen”.

“13 DENTIST is a long-term campaign and we have only just started the advertising push in the last few weeks, but we are already seeing a pleasing result from the public”. “It is our intention that 13 DENTIST will become the default place to find a great dentist over the coming months and years. I want to thank the members who have had the faith to support the campaign in the early days and I look forward to welcoming new members”.