Pinterest for the Modern Dentist
October 14, 2016 - David Hall
Category: Social Media Marketing
Pinterest is a wiley temptress. Part social media and part search engine, this platform has taken the world by storm with its image-heavy interface. Many different businesses use Pinterest as a way to show their product as well as their personality. Many people find the dental industry to be cold and clinical, but here at Infinity Dental Web, we know that’s anything but the case. Dentists should be creating, and using a Pinterest page! Here a few reasons why:
Demographics
Pinterest is infamously a female based platform, which lends itself to dental work quite well. Many high-end cosmetic dentists cater to women ages 25-50. The bonus to this is that many of these women are mothers, and use Pinterest! So not only are the looking for services for themselves, but for their families as well. This platform also boasts that it’s demographic has the highest annual income of all social media platforms. Partner this with the fact that 93% of active pinners use Pinterest when deciding on what product or service to buy, and you have a recipe for success. Which leads me to my next point…
Visuals
Pinterest is first and foremost a visual platform. We live in a world that loves before and afters, no matter the subject matter. This makes Pinterest a great platform to showcase drastic procedure effects. With the right image format (that we will touch on in a later blog) your talent is sure to WOW. Pins with clear images and 150-200 characters of text are repinned drastically more than their competitors. Get those photography skills ready!
Networking
Social media sites are just that- social. They allow for people to network across the world and with all demographics. Pinterest has taken this to a whole new level with ‘group boards’. As a user, you will create an account, and then create ‘boards’ with certain themes or subject matter. You can also create group boards where people can add their own pins, or join someone else’s group board. The great thing about this is you can piggy-back off of someone else’s following. You pin to a group board, and then someone else repins your content and so on. You can reach a much larger range of people for little to no cost. Pinterest has taken the idea of Facebook Ads, and made them a much more efficient, and organic thing. People only repin what they truly believe in and would recommend. You’re getting virtual endorsement with minimal effort.
Ads and Social Media Shelf life
Now each social media platform has a certain ‘shelf life’, or amount of time it can be viewed. Snapchat ranks the lowest, and Pinterest the highest. Think of it this way- A friend on Facebook could post a status and it will only show up on your feed 1-3 days depending on the number of people commenting on it. It will eventually fade out and die in the stream of their Facebook wall. Pinterest, on the other hand, is constantly circulating. As each new person repins your content, it gets an entirely new life. The best part? If you need to liven up the stream of repins, you can simply repin your own content and start the cycle over again. This is a great way to meet and collaborate with other dentists in your area!
Why is this doubly awesome? Because Pinterest Ads follow this exact same format. If you have the budget, they can live forever. Plus, with Pinterest’s algorithm, your ads will be pushed to people who are outside of your extensive list of followers. So you get double the payoff. Pinterest users are also highly critical of ads, which is why Pinterest has strict guidelines. Ads look almost identical to regular pins, meaning people repin and recirculate them more. Stealth advertising at its finest.
Showcase Personality
Lastly, because of themed boards and the ability to repin others, Pinterest allows people to show off their personality. This is especially important to industries that people sometimes have a phobia about. You can show off what your employees like to do outside of work, as well as just cool things you find. This builds a new persona for you in a patient’s mind, and creates more trust. This means that dental work seems less scary! Yay!
Pinterest is truly an overlooked social media platform. It allows people to search for exactly what they need- like a dentist. Formatting and creating a winning Pinterest profile can be a lot of work however. You need a decent amount of boards, and pinning at least once an hour is considered optimal. If you don’t have time to squeeze in a pin between appointments, consider letting Infinity Dental Web give you a hand!