This week, the Dental Amigos welcome Jaclyn Nona, CEO, Co-Founder, and Marketing Strategist of Clever Dental Co. Jaclyn helps dental practices implement effective in-house marketing and social media strategies, empowering dental practices to build authentic brands and stronger patient connections.

In this episode, Jaclyn shares her background in communications and her journey collaborating with dentists on their dental marketing strategies and working in the dental industry which began in  2013. She focuses on how in-house marketing can transform dental practices. She explains why social media is underused in dentistry, how training existing staff to manage marketing saves time and money, and how authentic, in-house content builds patient loyalty, staff retention, and community reputation.

To learn more about Jaclyn and Clever Dental Co., visit www.cleverdentalco.com or connect with her on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaclyn-nona-7b9424314/.

Listeners who want to reach Paul can do so at Paul@DentalNachos.com and those who want to reach Rob can do so at Rob@RMontgomery-law.com.

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FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

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Bumper

Welcome to the Dental Amigos podcast with Dr Paul Goodman and attorney Rob Montgomery, taking you behind the scenes of the dental business world, all the things you didn't learn in dental school, but wish you had Rob is not a dentist, and Paul is not a lawyer, but since Rob is a lawyer, we need to tell you that this podcast is for informational purposes only and shouldn't be considered legal advice. Listening to this podcast does not and will not create an attorney client relationship, as is always the case. You should formally consult with legal counsel before proceeding with any legal matter. Learn more about the Dental Amigos at www.thedentalamigos.com. And now here are the Dental Amigos.

Rob Montgomery

Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the Dental Amigos Podcast. I'm Rob Montgomery, and I'm joined, as always, by the head Nacho himself, Dr. Paul Goodman. Great to be talking, Rob. It's good to be talking with you, Paul. And today we've got a very cool guest who's going to talk about marketing strategies in your practice and social media tips and things like that, and I think it's going to be good content for all of our listeners.

So, Jaclyn Nona is the CEO and co-founder of Clever Dental Co., an educational and creative platform designed to help dental practices implement effective internal marketing and social media strategies. She has worked in the dental industry since 2013 and collaborates with top doctors and practice managers in Indiana. She's a member of the AADOM and the American Marketing Association. Jaclyn spends her free time with her family and their wild pup, Murphy. So, coming to us from Michigan City, Indiana—welcome, Amiga, and thanks for being on the show.

Jaclyn Nona

Hello. Thank you guys so much. I'm excited to be here.

Paul Goodman

Awesome, Jaclyn. I'm excited to talk with you. Love this topic. Before we get started, we ask: what is your favorite Nacho topping? And if we were in your town, where would you take us for nachos?

Jaclyn Nona

If you were in Michigan City, I would have to take you to El Cantorito. It's my favorite Mexican joint. Nothing makes a bad day better than a margarita and chips with queso. A ton of queso is the secret, and some chorizo in there too.

Rob Montgomery

I like the margarita—that's sort of the habit that goes along with it, right?

Jaclyn Nona

Yeah, it'll make a good day great. And it'll make a bad day good.

Paul Goodman

It's a good slogan.

Rob Montgomery

Well, she is in marketing. Jaclyn, I'm sure she has lots of slogans for people.

Jaclyn Nona

That's my next venture.

Rob Montgomery

Sounds good. So I know that with Clever Dental Co. we really get into helping practices and dentists with their social media, but can you talk to our listeners about what you see as far as practice owners and how they leverage—or don't leverage—social media in their practices?

Jaclyn Nona

Sure. So I think that there's just kind of an issue with dentistry as a whole. I think the industry is kind of behind other industries like medical, travel, hospitality. I don't see a lot of doctors really promoting their practice, despite it being your life's work, which just doesn't make sense to me. Your practice is your baby. This is how you stay relevant. This is how you stay top of mind. This is how you keep your patients loyal and engaged. And it's such a low cost—I don't see why every office isn't doing this.

Paul Goodman

I'm with you, Jaclyn. Part of me thinks this as someone who's, you know, done quite a bit on social media and learned myself. And, you know, I learned from Gary V and different people. Saying "use social media" to dentists is like saying, "go to a gym." Just go to the gym, but not knowing what exercises to do in the gym.

And then, kind of keeping with this analogy, people say, "I don't want to go to the gym because I don't want to get so bulky and too strong." And I go, why would you just go one day and see what happens? So people say, "I don't want to use social media. I don't want to be taking selfie videos of myself all day long, taking selfies." I'm like, well, nobody told you to do that either. You know, dentists who are giving you objections.

So, kind of, if you were saying, let's just pull back about internal marketing in general in a dental office—tell us a little bit about that and how utilizing that's important.

Jaclyn Nona

So I really think the difference between an agency and internal marketing is, when you have someone doing internal marketing for you, first of all, it's not doing TikTok dances. It's not silly videos all the time. It's whatever you want it to be for your brand. You're building your culture, you're controlling your name, your narrative, you're in control of your brand.

And really the bottom line is, it's showing up like a real person. So you're not a dental brochure, you're not a stock photo, you're not a cartoon tooth. Even something simple, like a behind-the-scenes team moment, or a day-in-the-life post—this is going to outperform a stock graphic every single time. Your patients just want to connect with you.

Paul Goodman

Tell us, just so we can deliver value—what's the downside of stock graphics or hiring space? They just post these pictures. There's one dentist who I've seen on the internet so many times. I hope he makes a lot of money from that one picture, because he is the stock dentist guy. So what is the downside of stock photography or stock stuff for social media?

Jaclyn Nona

I think your patients—honestly, your community, people in general—are dealing with a lot of ad fatigue. So if you're scrolling on Instagram, you've seen it yourself. Maybe every fourth or fifth post is an ad, and there's no connection to it. You're going right past it. You're bothered by the marketing gimmick. It's gimmicky, it's yucky. You're tired of seeing it—it's like a commercial in your space all the time.

Whereas, if you're posting, you know, a behind-the-scenes picture, maybe you're doing a 15-second video with your doctor—there is a real person that you're getting to know. So, I mean, what if people could know you and trust you before even meeting you, in a way that doesn't feel like an advertisement, in a way that feels vulnerable? That's the difference to me.

Rob Montgomery

Well, I think we all know that too. It's like, I mean, I get literally hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of emails a day. There's a mental filter. It's not even your spam filter in Outlook or Apple or Gmail, but there's your mental filter that's like: ad, ad, spam, junk.

Paul Goodman

Which is the problem, because some of these ads, Rob and Jaclyn, you probably need some of that stuff, right? Meaning, like, it's so overwhelming you just tune it all out, but you're probably actually passing by. I'll just use the dental CE course I wish I would take, but I just don't have the mental strength to go through the other nine that aren't there.

And I'm with you, and I think you're so right, Jaclyn, because I just did a little experiment for my own dental office. We don't do stock photos, but we even have nicely professional photography of us and our team, done yearly—classic stuff. And we use some of those, and they are nice. And there's places for them, right? There are places.

But I did a 30-second caption video with my daughter saying, "Hey, after you eat sugary food, rinse your mouth out with water." And of course, I used the cheat code of a six-year-old child, right? But it got six times as many views as any of our nicely curated pictures. So I think that connection piece you talked about is important.

How do you recommend, when you work with dentists—whether it's your own practice or others—maybe tell us a little bit about your own journey in developing this inside of the practice that you work at?

Jaclyn Nona

Sure. So we went through 10 years—a decade together—really of trial and error. When I came into the practice, it was a legacy practice about 70 years. You had Grandpa, you had Dad, and then the son was coming in. So you're looking at kind of a dynasty legacy practice, general dentistry, right?

Then he took over. He brought on a partner. We started hiring associates. It became a group practice, and there was a need for a full rebrand—to change our image in the community from the mom-and-pop general family practice to a real group practice that can do full-arch cases, implants, sedation, oral surgery.

We were able to change that whole perception in the community over about a six-month period, really spending a very modest amount of money on marketing, because it was a lot of behind-the-scenes introductions, quick videos, organic content. So we have a brand-new reputation in the community, still keeping our good name—for cheap.

Paul Goodman

Yeah, I like that. We went through a similar journey in our practice. I can see how important that is and how sometimes how flat-out difficult it is to tell the story to people who expect you to be one way and then be a different way.

And for our listeners, I'm so thrilled and proud that you guys have an associate dentist found through Dentist Job Connect. I'm glad—unlocking more freedom for your owners, fewer hygiene checks. That's our magic: fewer hygiene checks, right?

Every dentist—100% of dentists, Rob—want to check your hygiene page. You know, when they pretend to be happy to see you in the room to check your teeth, they're actually just distracted from the other thing they have to do. That's the hygiene check.

But tell us, how would you—using the story like you have a new associate dentist, they're coming into the brand—you want to incorporate them. How do you navigate that with your social media and videos and things like that?

Jaclyn Nona

So the thing about internal marketing and having someone who is on the ground is that that person's always available. So these don't have to be really serious, thought-out campaigns.

Rob Montgomery

Can you just hold that thought for a second, Jaclyn? I just wanted to stop—you’re talking about internal marketing. Let's just clarify what we're talking about. We're talking about, instead of outsourcing marketing and hiring a marketing company, somebody outside of your office, you're talking about people that are physically at the practice, that work for the practice, doing this marketing. Correct?

Jaclyn Nona

Correct. So instead of having an agency that maybe posts on your Facebook four or five times a month, this is someone who, depending on the size of your practice, could be working the front desk and giving three to five hours a week to this.

If your practice is larger—like we're about to grow to a practice of five dentists—I have a dedicated role here. But it can be implemented really at any size, right?

Rob Montgomery

Okay, I'm sorry. I just want to make sure our listeners understood what we're talking about—the distinction.

Paul Goodman

So go back. Now you have this person who's dedicated to creating this content. Let's say, in this example, you have a new associate—it could be a new piece of equipment, a new anything. Walk us through how they bring that to life through your social media channels.

Jaclyn Nona

Sure. I think it depends on your culture and the vibe that you're offering. A pediatric office is going to have different needs than an oral surgeon. But you can mix educational content with the fun content, the behind-the-scenes content.

The thing I like most about it is—we have two new doctors coming in June and July. If I showcase them once a week, let's say Dr. Meric is joining us in July. If I do a video with her on her first week here: "Tell us a little bit about yourself. Where did you go to school? What's your favorite food?"—and I start peppering her through our social media.

Now, all of our patients that follow us and are going through our Instagram reels—we're popping up in their living rooms twice a week. By the time they meet Dr. Meric in November, she's familiar to them already.

So I know you've all dealt with a patient that comes in and we say, "Oh, you're going to meet this new doctor today." And they go, "No, thank you. I would like my hygienist that I love and refuse to see anybody else," or "I would like my one particular doctor who may want a break from me."

But now that they've seen her over and over again for four months, they're coming in with built-in comfort, and they're not scared to see her during their hygiene exam.

Rob Montgomery

That's cool. I mean, it's the new front door. It's just like real estate—nobody goes to see a house now that they haven't completely vetted and analyzed online and looked at photos before they got there. Same thing—it's getting comfortable with a new dentist. That sounds great.

Paul Goodman

And I'll add, Jaclyn, as someone who's not just a producer of content but a consumer of social media, I'm a huge fan of making your website showcase your awesomeness. But people don't interact with websites the way they do with Instagram, in this example.

So it's like you said—now through Instagram stories or Instagram feeds, you're literally popping up and saying, "Look, my dentist has a new associate. Oh, look, this place in town now does this." And I'm just trying to break this down for some of our audience who might not use social media—it's different than your website. It's different than people finding out what hours you're open. It's truly, like you said, humanizing a place.

Where people, Rob, they still open up. Just to let you know—I just want to let you know I hate the dentist. They say that to us. I want to say, "You could have kept that in your head." Where else has that opener been helpful to you in life? "I just want to let you know I hate you."

So I want to ask, Jaclyn—this is a great conversation. I couldn't be more of a fan of this phrase: doctors don't really promote their practices despite it being their life's work. Tell us what that means to you.

Jaclyn Nona

So for me, your practice is your baby. Okay, it's June, right? It's graduation season. Anyone who has a kid—whether they're graduating pre-K, fourth grade, high school, college—you're going to be posting your kid on social media in their cap and gown. You're so proud, teary pictures. You're going to be saying, "I'm so proud of Claire. She just graduated fourth grade. What a champ."

It makes no sense to me that a degree you spent so much money on—maybe you went through a residency, you're so fully invested in your practice, and I know you're doing great work—that's your baby. It's your life's work. It's time to show it off. You have to promote your practice, especially as a young dentist, maybe coming in with a lot of student loans. There's no better way to do this than organic marketing. It's cheap, it's widespread, you're going to get a good reputation. Show it off. This is how you stay relevant.

Rob Montgomery

Well, it's also so much more nimble. Similar in our world—years ago, we hired an outside marketing company to help us with this kind of stuff, and it was like, "Okay, we want to have a post." Yeah, we have the post, we talked about this post—like, it's just a social media post. "When are we going to post it?" "The day after tomorrow." That's not okay. You just can't do things quickly and responsively, spur of the moment, if you have to involve somebody that's not physically in your office.

Paul Goodman

And that's also—sometimes I get some flack, Rob knows my wife well, about posting things at family events. "Can't you do that later?" And she has some good points with these things, right? But also, there's a genuine "when it happened." Even if you try to make it happen another time, there's a life to this stuff. These day-in-the-life things are about the day in your life.

It doesn't mean you can't repurpose content, but I just think—this is one of your other points, Jaclyn—how does this create more happiness for the team, or team buy-in? Because I have a lot of team members who say, "Oh my, they hide from the social media person. They don't want to be on video." So talk to us a little bit about how doing this has a component of fulfillment, camaraderie, or celebration.

Jaclyn Nona

Yeah, yeah. We have to talk about the culture. I do want to say one thing about your earlier point about responsiveness. There is something to say about real-time responsiveness. If you're at a community event, there's someone there on the ground making decisions with a deep patient understanding.

I think the person who is talking to your community and managing your community should be part of your community. There's no one that knows your story better. There's no one that knows your patients better. There's no one that knows your demographic better. And I mean, this is your reputation. The dentist is such a vulnerable place for so many people. Patients want to feel safe. They want to feel sure in this relationship. Dental offices are really so much more based on relationships than I think people realize, or that I think is taught in school.

Rob Montgomery

Totally with you. Dr. Paul Goodman knows this—he realizes this right now. You always say these are people businesses, right?

Paul Goodman

Not pizza places. There are so many words that describe how misled dental students are. Could be sad, could be responsible—about what the true skills you need to succeed are. And it's not just—it goes for your team just as much as your patients and your vendors.

I often ask people who meet me at events, who say, "I followed your group for so many years, thanks for doing this." And it's really nice. They say, "How do I seem? Do I seem like the person you thought you would meet?" They say, "Yeah, I saw your videos. You seem exactly like that." Happens every time.

And I think that's what you can do in your dental practice. You could be that person in your town. You could be that person in your city. And like you said, Jaclyn, when you appeal to dentists—what I call dentist cheapness or frugality—and you couple it with just taking a photo, taking a video, putting it on your phone.

But I want to ask you—let's say you're talking about a starter pack for an office. Someone's listening to this saying, "I'm on board. I'm going to get my office a phone, and I'm going to get an Instagram account." Any other tools that are kind of like starter tools, whether microphones, lights, that your team members use?

Jaclyn Nona

So I actually cover this in the courses we have on our platform. A lot of them are related to social media. I also have courses based on designing your brand, what kind of equipment and resources you need, how to create content, some mock content planners, running campaigns.

So this can really be as big or as small as someone wants it to be. If you're starting out with this, every single person in the world has a smartphone in their pocket. When I started doing the marketing and social media for our office, I was doing it all off of my personal iPhone. Eventually we went to having a little microphone or ring light. I have a camera now that I take video and DSLR photos on. So the equipment has gotten better in time, but there's no reason someone can't do this in their office. You've got a cell phone. Everyone has a camera in their pocket. Everybody.

Paul Goodman

I am with you on that. I mean, it's no excuses. It's like, just hold your phone up. And I always say to people—this is all from Gary V repeating. I've learned so much from him. If you're not someone who wants your face on video, there are other things you can take, right? You can showcase your team. You can showcase other things.

It's not just about—I think there's this misconception, Rob, and I don't know where it comes from, because most people aren't constantly taking selfie videos where they have to talk to a camera with their face to do social media. But when I look at your account, Jaclyn, the focus isn't selfies. It's showcasing the team, the facility, the story. So maybe speak to how, if you're going to get started doing this, you don't have to become the selfie king or queen.

Jaclyn Nona

No. And the most important thing in any office, if you're going to be implementing this with your team, is you do want to make sure everybody's comfortable. I have one employee at our front desk—she never wants to be on camera. That's no problem. She doesn't have to be on camera.

I have five other girls up there who are comfortable being on camera, and I'll work with them. And I'll always double-check with her, like, "It's your birthday. I would like to shout you out. Instead of me taking a picture of you that might make you feel uneasy, why don't you send me a picture of yourself that you really like and are comfortable with, and we'll post that way."

One thing about the culture is, since we've started doing this, it's a really great way to show appreciation to our team—shouting them out when someone just got certified in a new skill, someone's an EFTA, congratulations.

We also just found our most recent hygienist that's joining the office through social media. She'd been following our social media for a little while, and she saw us on Indeed. She told our practice manager, "I have to apply. I follow you guys on Facebook. I think I'm going to love it there."

Paul Goodman

I think that's it. It's always about how you move people forward. There's a great book, To Sell Is Human by Daniel Pink. You would love it, Jaclyn, if you ever read it. Rob, it's just a phenomenal book about selling and moving people forward.

And, you know, there's probably some dentists listening to this, Rob, who are thinking, "I ain't doing it. I ain't doing it." But now they heard, "Oh my gosh, you got a hygienist out of it. I might do it." Right? Because that's our pain. Running a dental office is like running a football team—hygienists, assistants, front desk people. You're missing one team member, and it's a huge problem.

So I think that is a huge motivation to people who might not have been totally bought into it so far.

Rob Montgomery

Collateral benefit.

Paul Goodman

Yes, exactly—positive.

Jaclyn Nona

Oh, and retention. And not even that, but we have service reps that follow our social media. Then when we call them, I feel like we get great service, because it's like talking to a friend. It comes up in every conversation. I'll call our Patterson rep, and it's like, "Oh, I just saw this video that Dr. Weber did on your Instagram. You guys are so funny. What do you need? What can I do for you?"

So you're not just building relationships with your patients, but with current employees, prospective employees, future associates, service reps. It's so much more far-reaching than I think people realize.

Rob Montgomery

Yeah, that's cool. Let me just shift gears a little bit—actually, go back to something we were starting to talk about a few minutes ago when we talked about building the brand, and the importance of a brand and standing in the community.

To kind of work into that, though, I want to start off with a question that's sort of a negative thing—to find out why so many dentists seem to be resistant to this. Like, I saw a post the other day on Nachos, client of ours, Ailey Blystone. Great office, right? I looked at it and thought, "Yeah, I want to go there." I'm not a dentist, I'm not in a dental office, but I look at that and say, "That looks cool."

But it's hard for me to say with the algorithm as it were. I spun through a bunch of comments, and there was a lot of negative stuff there.

Paul Goodman

I want to, Jaclyn. I just want to understand this more, because Ali reached out to me. I think she'd be happy for me to share this, because she has an awesome practice.

So a couple things—Nachos can sometimes get 40 or 50 post approvals a day, and on the weekends, I approve them myself. I saw someone just linked a video to someone's new practice. I thought, "I don't know why they're linking it, but what a nice thing." That's just what I thought in the moment.

I had seen her on Instagram before, followed her, and I didn't know she was your client or anything, so I just approved it. I watch our algorithms, Jaclyn, and I thought, "Probably 100 people will look at this." But over 18,000 people have seen this because it said "spa dentistry," which, Rob, I don't know how to say this in legal terms—spa dentistry can be polarizing to a dentist.

Tell me about that. Because one of the things, Jaclyn, you can chime in—many dentists make a mistake. I read a book on this about Yellow Pages marketing—that's how old it was. Most dentists make mistakes because they think of themselves as the customer or patient, and they're not.

So you are not a dentist. You think, "Wow, what a cool office, they're offering these amenities in dentistry." Some dentists find that hokey. Some dentists think it's not necessary. Some are fairly stodgy people—they're not the most fun at parties.

Then there are dentists who have comfort menus and Netflix. So it's a bit polarizing. Some dentists think, "Why do you have to have these nice things for your patients? Aren't you just there to fix their teeth?" And then other dentists who get it think, "We want to have these."

And just so you know, our office is more on the amenity side. We don't promote as spa dentistry—not because we don't want to, but we don't offer enough things to consider that. But I thought Ali's post was awesome. I was shocked, but she messaged me. She said she went on Instagram and said this post was on Nachos. Most of the comments were positive, but some were not so positive. "Should I respond to them?" So I don't know, Jaclyn, what you think of that. The outcome was awesome for Ali.

Rob Montgomery

I don't usually post on that kind of stuff. I'm like...

Paul Goodman

Actually, let me go back. We probably confused things—why are dentists resistant to building a brand? Why are they resistant?

Rob Montgomery

Let me ask. But I just want to throw something out before we turn this back to Jaclyn, though. A lot of our clients—well, most of our clients—are people transitioning into practice ownership. They're either doing startups or they're buying practices.

I mean, is the expectation that those people should just go and do something that's sort of in the past, or not cutting edge, or not competitive? These people are opening up practices in very competitive environments with big corporate practices, DSOs, other established practices. How do you differentiate yourself if you're just going to open up a practice or buy a practice and keep doing the same old, same old?

Jaclyn Nona

Well, You're not going to differentiate yourself. I mean, if you don't stand out, if you don't put the word out about what you stand for and what you're like, then people are not going to follow you. New patients aren't looking through the phone book for dentists—they're just not. They're checking your Google reviews, and they're looking at your social media.

And if you're not there, someone else is going to be there. So whether you agree or not—if I'm a patient and I want to go to the place that offers spa dentistry, or holistic dentistry, or family dentistry because I've got three kids—I guarantee you those patients are researching everyone in their area.

And if you're too—I don't know—too tired to make a brand, or you don't feel like it, or you don't think it's important, or you're afraid of what the feedback is going to be, you're not going to be there at all. Someone else will, and that's the practice the patient ends up at, not yours. I think this is a smart business move. I think when you're building a brand, you're building equity, to be honest.

Rob Montgomery

Well, that's great, absolutely. And this is something that Ideal Practices does really well—the importance of branding. And when you talk about that, it becomes obvious that the people who are playing in those spaces, those social media spaces—they're the people you're trying to appeal to.

They're the people who are going to help amplify your practice, who are going to write good reviews, who are going to post on social media, who are going to help the algorithms. You want to cater to that population—that's what helps things be more, quote-unquote, viral.

Paul Goodman

We have to connect you—follow Ali, Jaclyn—because I'm just looking this up. Ali herself has 12,000 followers. And it's not a follower contest, it's context, right? She has 12,000, but she just opened her office and already has 1,144. For context, my office only has 1,000 as an existing office.

So it's not a contest for followers. Maybe you can tell us about this, Jaclyn—why it's not a follower contest. She already has all of this amazing engagement right when her doors opened two days ago. So tell us about that.

Jaclyn, what if someone says, "I've done this before, but I only have 25 followers. It's not worth it for me to post on social media. I only have 200 followers. No one's going to see my stuff." Help that person.

Jaclyn Nona

Oh, I love this question, because I would disagree so strongly. First of all, a core benefit of social media is—let's say, talking about our office—I'm inside running our social media. I'm also talking with our website developer. I have the opportunity to train our front desk on how to answer the phone.

So I will get to the follower count question. But the first point is that if you have someone inside handling your marketing, you're showing up on social media, on your Google business profile, on your website, at your front desk. No matter where a patient's first point of contact is, the branding is consistent. The messaging is consistent. Whether they find you on Instagram or Google, when they call, that brand carries through everything on and offline. That's a strong brand.

Another thing I would tell this person with only 25 or 200 followers—where's your engagement? I know people in the industry I will not name, but it's very common to buy followers, to buy bots. You could be a person with 40,000 followers, but if 38,000 of those followers are fake, and you're not getting any engagement on your posts, Instagram knows that. They're going to bury your posts in the algorithm.

Now let's say you have 25 followers, but they're all real patients in your community who care about you and come to your practice. They're liking your posts, they're commenting, they're engaging. The more of that you get, the higher you go in the algorithm, and you reach more people.

And there are cheat codes. If you're advertising, you can boost a post to people within a 10-mile, 15-mile, or 25-mile radius. There are plenty of ways around that. I would not worry about follower counts. I would worry about engagement.

Paul Goodman

That's really good value. I have a lot of sponsors at Dental Nachos, and people are competitive. They say, "Oh, my post only got two likes." But they don't see the back end—how many people were engaged and viewed.

Ali's post was an example. Rob, I never in my wildest dreams thought a third of the community would look at her post, but it just took off like wildfire. And you just need some of these that get the opposite of buried.

I don't—we need a word, Jaclyn. What's the opposite of buried? Stuck on people's feeds, or they get the opposite of buried, and everybody sees it. Then they say, "Look, her story's so awesome." People are looking today saying, "Oh man, I didn't know there's a new dentist in my town." And she probably...

Jaclyn Nona

Another thing I would encourage people to think about is they get so stuck online. But imagine if you painted a picture, or if you showed a new piece of equipment in your office, and 20 people were standing in front of you clapping for it. So people say, "Oh, only 200 people saw my post. That's not that good." That's really good. You just reached 200 people in your community. Imagine if they were all standing in front of you, and you were telling them about your new CEREC. So I think it can get a little warped being online all the time, when there really is a big impact for not a lot of money—sometimes no money at all.

Rob Montgomery

That's great. Great point—perspective and context. That was like the old—I forget the guy that wrote that—1,000 followers, right? Paul, yeah, 1,000 followers.

Paul Goodman

Everyone starts with one. Gary V—something I want to teach my own children, because they can easily get caught up. I heard them say already, "Likes" and this and that. And you have to look at who's looking at it. Like, I love your thing—if 20 people were clapping for your picture, you'd be pretty darn proud of it, you know?

Rob Montgomery

Yeah. I mean, you don't need a million people to like it, right? If a million people walked in the front door of your dental office, you'd have problems.

Jaclyn Nona

No. I mean, how many conferences have you been at when you're standing on a stage in front of 50 people that are really, truly engaged in your messaging and listening to you? That feels amazing, that's so rewarding. And you're talking about this dentist that had 18,000 people view her post—that's nuts.

Paul Goodman

I also—if we're going to wrap it in maybe—but there's a funny Seinfeld episode where George does everything opposite of how he thinks he should do it, and his life turns out better. He goes, "I am going to do the opposite of all of my instincts." And he gets more dates, and he becomes more successful. It's very funny.

And I say this with my people—when dentists think some marketing idea is really terrible, it's probably pretty good, right? There were mostly positive people on that post, and the naysayers—they weren't wrong, but it's just because it was different. Like you said, Rob, it's no more Yellow Pages, right? There's no more all word-of-mouth.

I'll give Len Tau credit for this—he says "word of mouse," right? People don't use mouses anymore, but it's word of your thumb scroll. So I think that's an important point for everyone to take from this podcast. It's inexpensive, it can be fun once you get started doing it. I'm sure people want to do more of it. And it's something that makes dentistry—you know, we're all entrepreneurs—and it makes you stand out from the people in your community.

Jaclyn Nona

Well, ultimately, you're creating an environment where your staff and your patients both want to stay. Patient acquisitions are hugely important, but you're also looking at patient retention and loyalty. Staff loyalty. My practice manager here has been with our office for 40 years. No one's going anywhere.

It just becomes like a huge team, and you're retaining these people because the culture is so good. You're showing them appreciation publicly. They can share it with their family and friends. It's such a boost to culture and your community—and so inexpensive. It's crazy to me that people aren't all over this.

Rob Montgomery

Good stuff. Well, Jaclyn, thanks. Thanks for taking the time to be on the show today. If people want to learn more about Clever Dental Co. or get in touch with you, what's the best way to do that?

Jaclyn Nona

Sure, you can always go to www.cleverdentalco.com—that's our website. And because we are in the world of social media, we are all over social media. So you can always send us a message on Instagram or Facebook. I'm on LinkedIn, and I will see that and respond to you as soon as I can.

Paul Goodman

Awesome, awesome. Jaclyn, thanks for sharing with us. Really appreciate it.

Rob Montgomery

Yeah, thanks. Great stuff, Jaclyn.

Jaclyn Nona

It was so fun, guys. I really had a good time. I appreciate you taking the opportunity to talk to me.

Rob Montgomery

Thanks. See, I like the idea of internal marketing. I mean, I still think it makes sense. Possibly we didn't get into this—so unfortunately, Jaclyn doesn't have the ability to defend this statement. But I think it's probably, a lot of times, working with a combination of a traditional marketing company that's supporting you. But then, it seems like marketing—state the obvious—is only as good as the time that you put in.

Paul Goodman

Yeah. I think with dentists and maybe business owners, especially dentists, it's something they don't think they can touch and feel and measure. But you can measure certain things now. And the impact is just magical. Every dentist wants new patients. This is not a new way, but it's the newest way to get people to pay attention to what you're doing.

Rob Montgomery

Well, it's competitive, right? And this is one of the avenues you have to be able to compete against people—DSOs, large groups—that have much larger advertising budgets. You can do this in a grassroots way and still be effective with that, totally.

And Paul, we'll put this up in the show notes too. For our audience, you mentioned To Sell Is Human by Daniel Pink, which is a book you found impactful. Speak to the crew about that.

Paul Goodman

Yeah. I mean, it just is. We're always trying to move people forward—from your children to our spouses to our team members to our patients. And there are strategies to do this that you wouldn't have thought of without reading the book. It's phenomenal. It'll help anyone at any age or stage. Highly recommend you check it out.

Rob Montgomery

Cool. So we'll get Jaclyn's stuff up there in the show notes, but we'll also have a link to that book too. And now you've inspired me, Paulie.

Paul Goodman

Thanks. I'm glad, Rob. That's what we're here for.

Rob Montgomery

Thanks for listening, everybody.

Bumper

Thanks for listening to another great podcast with the Dental Amigos. And don't forget to tune in next time to have the dental business demystified. If you're looking for more information about today's podcast, you can find it on the dental amigos.com if you're looking for Paul, you can find Paul at drpaulgoodman.com and if you're looking for Rob, you can find him at yourdentallawyer.com This podcast has been sponsored by Orange Line Media Group, helping dentists and other professionals create content people love. Find out how we can help you take your business to the next level at www.orangelinemg.com. Till next time.

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