With Segmentation, You Need to Go Small to Get Large

Most Dental Labs wait too long to embrace customer segmentation. Done right, and done early, it can make a huge difference to your success.

Not so long ago, the art of the sale consisted of placing your best products in your front windows and waiting for dentist's to show interest. Today the model has flipped - it's no longer about the dentist finding you but about you finding them. Once you do, you can tailor your message to specific subsets of customers, maximizing conversions and propelling brand loyalty. While it may sound like a paradox, the way to build a large customer base is to think in terms of small segments.     

Yes, You Can (and Should) Start Today 

Many dental lab marketers think of segmentation as a process they should put in place only after they've built a suitably large customer base. But it can also be a powerful way to build that base. How? Because it can show you the type of dentist who is most likely to engage with your product or service, and (crucially!) how to reach them. "It's not just about trying to find the right dentist, but about finding them at the right time, in the right place, and in the right mindset to want to purchase," says David H. Khalili, president of DentalLabSupport.com.

And what better way to begin that search than right at home, with those people who are already engaging with your channels? By segmenting your current customers using the data you already have, you can learn their demographic, where they are (based on geography), and how they respond to marketing messages. In fact, you can drill down to discover how many ads they've viewed, how many times they've viewed them, and even the days and times they are most likely to do so. "There are so many nuances you can find within your data regarding who comes to your site and why," David  says. "And it's important to identify the various niches they occupy."              

Once those niches have been identified, you can then look outside: researching other channels, websites, and applications that attract similar audiences. These will be the ideal places to target your advertising campaigns going forward.

Driven by Data

With detailed niche information in hand, you are in an ideal position to start building your campaign. Now you know the day and time your ads are most likely to have an effect, along with how many ads to serve, how often to serve them, and on which type of device.

This information can be further honed by tools such as A/B testing (in which two alternative phrases, headlines, or other messaging components are offered and subsequently tracked to see which version draws the best response) in order to refine a precise call to action. "All of those variables are taken into account, and that's when we really hone in and start hitting our performance drivers," says David.

At DentalLabSupport.com, this work is augmented by a powerful real-time optimization (RTO) engine, a program that continuously evaluates consumer response and market behavior, allowing administrators to react swiftly to the smallest changes in campaign performance. The human and digital work are complementary; while the computer crunches and updates data, the administrator can make adjustments to optimize ad performance. "It's like a sports car that goes in a straight line all by itself, but then needs someone to guide it through the corners," David says. This same approach extends to pricing - by determining the cost and effectiveness of each ad, you can determine and execute an optimal spend plan over the course of a campaign.  

Tailored to Perfection

Segmenting your audience, both in order to identify and expand your list of potential customers, provides you with another enormous advantage: the ability to tailor your messaging to each segment, all the way down to the level of an individual user.

This can take two forms. First, segmenting can help you determine which audience niches should be exposed to your ad or commercial. For a movie studio, for instance, that could mean segmenting its first-party data (provided by email subscribers and so on) to promote an upcoming action movie to one segment, a children's movie to another, and a rom-com to still another. And, as we've learned, that includes selecting the right day, the right time, and the right communication channel so that the user is most likely to be paying attention. 

The second form is to actually tailor the ad itself to a given recipient. Say a user has visited your site and viewed several pairs of boots. Over the next few days, you can ensure that a dynamic carousel ad will appear when the user is browsing their favorite web pages, including those boots in its rotating slides to remind the user of their interest. If the user has visited your site several times without converting, the carousel can then be configured to include an offer for a 10% discount or free shipping - a further nudge towards purchasing.

Even better, you can offer a discount to one group and free shipping to another and see which offer works best, refining as you go. "The further down the funnel you go, you should highlight more calls to action," says David. "If you've got a sale launching that's going to end in a week's time, add a countdown timer, for example, to provide just the right level of urgency."

Don't Go It Alone

When choosing a partner in digital advertising, look for one who offers a number of features that both simplify and optimize the segmenting and message-tailoring process. In addition to the real-time optimization capability mentioned above, DentalLabSupport.com also offers a full creative suite along with a team of designers and developers who will build ads to client specifications or help them create their own. And, its unique A² coding language allows the company to offer rich-media ads at the same price as conventional units. So take advantage of the data you have, and explore the many possibilities of customer segmentation and message targeting. If you want your company to fly down the straightaways and be nimble through the curves, it's time to get behind the wheel of that sports car--and step on the gas.

For more information:  Contact a Dental Lab Support marketing specialist 1.888.715.9099.