The Business of Dentistry – A Seven Part Series: Part 4

Segmentation

Who do you want to serve? It is your choice. You can't serve everyone everything, but you can serve a segment of the population very well and be successful. How you choose to segment your patient base is directly correlated to how you position your dental business. You can segment your patient base by:

• Demographics—age, gender, education, occupation.
• Geography—what radius do you want to serve?
• Behavioral—oral home care, attitudes and responsiveness to treatment.
• Psychographics—lifestyles, values, personality.

Your positioning and segmentation create the foundation of a marketing plan to attract new patients. For example, if your dental business is positioned as high-end spa dentistry, where are you going to advertise and what is going to be your message? You want to advertise where affluent people who want to look their best will see it. Your message should incorporate a world-class business, where quality matters and price doesn't.