391: Don’t Miss the Boat on SEO

It’s time for another topic many dental practices don’t know enough about! SEO expert Evan Lazarus shares with Kiera the basic doctrine of SEO, or search engine optimization. 

For the non-believers, SEO equals visibility, and Evan talks about why good SEO makes you relevant in your community and industry. The most important aspect when it comes to hiring an SEO expert for your practice is to be educated — ask the questions and be willing to understand it.

Quick takeaways from this episode:

• Get your marketing budget in place

• Educate your team on SEO

• Ask questions of your marketers

Episode resources:

Connect with Evan Lazarus

Learn more about Simple Impact Media 

Reach out to Kiera

Subscribe to The Dental A-Team podcast

Become Dental A-Team Platinum!

Review the podcast on iTunes

Podcast Transcript:

Kiera Dent:

Hey everyone, welcome to the Dental A Team podcast. I'm your host Kiera Dent. And I had this crazy idea that maybe I could combine a doctor and a team member's perspective, because let's face it, dentistry can be a challenging profession with those two perspectives. I've been a dental assistant, treatment coordinator, scheduler, pillar, office manager, regional manager, practice, owner. And I have a team of traveling consultants, for we have traveled to over 165 different offices coaching teams. We don't just understand you, we are you. Our mission is to positively impact the world of dental. And I believe that this podcast is the greatest way I can help elevate teams grow VIP experiences, reduce stress and create A teams. Welcome to the Dental A Team podcast.

            Hello, Dental A Team listeners, this is Kiera. And you guys, I am so excited for the guest that I have today because he talks about a world that I don't understand at all. And that is, SEO. I get the principle of it but I don't understand how to do it. And he has been so nice. He's been working with the Dental A Team. So I have firsthand experience of working with him and his team. And I'm so excited because SEO, I get asked by several clients, how do I actually increase my SEO? How do I get more new patients into my practice? And Evan is the man. I was introduced to him from a mutual colleague that I respect heavily. So Evan Lazeris, he didn't become a marketer in SEO the traditional way. He actually went to Wall Street and started trading stocks and options, built a hedge fund, grew it to over $200 million and then one day he decided to walk away from it all. True story guys.

            That's who this man is. And along his journey, he also invested in several successful digitally charged businesses as well as a few flops. Of course, every business owner does that. In 2017, Evan launched Simple Impact Media, a boutique marketing and consulting firm that specializes in local search and web design and digital advertising. His marketing skills are a combination of his background and expertise in business operations, reliance on process building, entrepreneurial drive and core philosophy and hiring people that are much smarter than him. Amen. He and I are very similar. So he is just a go-to source for knowledge and local search within healthcare, and was recently named one of the 25 people in the Philadelphia area shaping hyperlocal marketing. He lives in South Jersey. He's got a 12 year old son and identical twin girls. And when he's not talking to docs about marketing and SEO, he definitely is a huge tennis fan and he coaches his son's basketball game while cheering on his beloved Philadelphia Eagles. So you guys, he is a wealth of knowledge. I'm so honored to have him. Evan, how are you today? Welcome to the show.

Evan Lazeris:

I am amazing. And thank you for having me. I appreciate that very, very sweet introduction.

Kiera Dent:

Of course. Well, it's fun to have an SEO guru and I just want to geek out on business a little bit. Because anyone who builds a hedge fund a $200 million, I think people's jaws might drop of like, wait, tell us how you did that. What were some of the things? So I want to digress from SEO just a smidge. What were one of the one or two things that you did to build a $200 million hedge fund and then just decide to walk away from it?

Evan Lazeris:

Well, the walking away from it is a whole story in and of itself that we won't get into or we'll save for a drink for another podcast.

Kiera Dent:

Perfect.

Evan Lazeris:

But the actual fund itself, like anything else in life, an idea, some luck, some timing and eventually with a little bit of persistence, you stay at something, eventually good things happen. I know $200 million sounds like a lot of money. It is a lot of money, I shouldn't say sounds like, it is a lot of money. In comparative terms, a $200 million hedge fund today is a sneeze. So it is small potatoes. I thought at the time it was something substantial. I walked away from it almost 10 years ago. So that's really what it was. I was one of those guys or kids I should say, that spent the bulk of their college career in their dorm room trading stocks.

Kiera Dent:

Okay. Perfect. So [crosstalk 00:04:19] what question now?

Evan Lazeris:

Well, people were going to math 101 or bio 101, I was trying to figure out how to trade Cisco and make money. [crosstalk 00:04:28] doing.

Kiera Dent:

All right, smart. So then this is like, we're not going to go down this path. I just want a quick yes or no. Are you a Bitcoin fan or not a Bitcoin fan? If you're trading stocks back then, where are you at today?

Evan Lazeris:

I'm not a fan of stocks, period. They're vehicles for making money. I take this very sort of I don't marry myself to anything. They're just vehicles for making money. It's like saying I like one Uber versus the next. They're all the same. So when you find yourself married to something or you feel like you're personally connected to it, like I love Bitcoin or this is the future, making those kinds of statements, you're generally going to lose money. This the [crosstalk 00:05:11] way.

Kiera Dent:

Sure. Smart. So you like Warren buffet and you're a fan of mutual funds or are you more like into stocks and bonds?

Evan Lazeris:

I'm not really a fan of mutual funds because I find the only ones that make the money are the funds.

Kiera Dent:

Sure.

Evan Lazeris:

I am a advocate of self-directed investing. So I am a fan of buying panic. Yes, Warren Buffet in the sense of, you buy fear and you sell greed. When everybody else is freaking out, that's when you have to step in and take advantage of something. And then when people are talking about it over coffee and over-friendly chit-chat because everybody's making money, you have to take advantage and sell and take your profits while you can. So I am very much against the herd. I am not a, if you have any idea of what I'm talking about, the herd gets slaughtered. I am not a herd guy. I've never been, I never will be.

Kiera Dent:

I like it. I like that. That was just like a total derail from SEO, which I know everybody came to the show to listen to. However, I'm like super intrigued by hedge funds and stocks and bonds. Probably because that's just a world that I don't even get. And I'm so terrified to even enter, I'm like, ugh, what do I do? What do I not do? And I just need to get over it and move along. So I appreciate your philosophies on it. So thank you for that.

Evan Lazeris:

I mean, truthfully, just to sum it up, the philosophy really is more about the concept of risk. And so if you want to, how does that apply to dentistry? If you're a dentist or a practice owner, you're a business owner. So no matter what you do in any business you own, you always have to think about what your potential risk is.

Kiera Dent:

For sure.

Evan Lazeris:

What's your potential upside versus what your potential risk is. And that's a concept that is very foreign to a lot of people. I think my background, forget the trading or the hedge fund or any of that, I was in the business of analyzing risk. And so that lends itself to, I think running a successful business in and of itself as the way I've trained my brain to look at things.

Kiera Dent:

I like that because you're exactly right. And I mean, people ask me all the time, like, Kiera, you started a business, and I'm like, there is an adrenaline junky side of me. There's a creative side of me. And like you said, it has to be about risk because no one's going to jump in and start a business without being willing to take a little bit of risk because you never know how it's going to go. And so that's where I think it's a good point to remember that business owners are willing to take risks and to remind yourself that that's how you even started the business. So I have to remind myself that often. Kiera, just jump into this. There you've already taken a risk, so you might as well. But then they go down a whole other rabbit hole of like, well, do I invest that or do I invest it into the business?

            What's going to generate the greatest ROI? But that's a whole other topic. Guys, Evan and I will definitely chat this either on air or off air, because I'm highly intrigued by this. But I definitely want to give him time to chat SEO, because that's what I brought him on to talk about. SEO is a world that I don't understand, I know we need SEO so that search engine optimization of how to rank higher in Google to get your phones to ring, to get more new patients or other areas. So Evan walk us through some of the things in the SEO world that you do, that you deal with. We have mutual clients together. You're helping Dental A Team. You're so gracious, I appreciate it.

            Because honestly, I get really frustrated when I search in dental consulting companies and we are ranked, and I'm Googling from own personal device, which I know should have better cookies to pull our own company up. And we're on page four, five, six, how are we supposed to rank higher? So that's actually why Evan and I got connected, was because I got frustrated that we weren't getting any organic leads. So Evan walk us through what you guys do. How does SEO even work? How does what you do apply to dental practices today?

Evan Lazeris:

So that's a loaded question.

Kiera Dent:

It is.

Evan Lazeris:

There's like key eight parts.

Kiera Dent:

You welcome.

Evan Lazeris:

Some of them [inaudible 00:09:22]. I don't want to get into the nitty gritty, the heavy tactical, the super detail, because I think it's boring. And I think we can save that again for a later conversation. But here's big picture. And I think having had the last couple of years having as many conversations with healthcare providers, a lot of dentists about SEO and the conversation generally always goes down the same path. It is, I had somebody, they were doing SEO. I don't know what they were doing or that it costs me X amount of dollars a month. It's something I think I need, because I read it somewhere or somebody told me. Or there's this adage somewhere that's like, you need this. And it's jammed down your throat, right?

Kiera Dent:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Evan Lazeris:

You get a website, get SEO and the phone just starts ringing. And yes, there is absolute truth to that, but like anything else not all SEO is the same. And I don't want to be cliche, but unfortunately the way I have to break it down so people understand is, you can buy a Honda Civic or you can buy a Porsche, right?

Kiera Dent:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Evan Lazeris:

They're not the same things.

Kiera Dent:

Right.

Evan Lazeris:

They're just not. And sometimes doctors, because they don't understand what bad SEO is and they don't understand what good SEO is, because they don't understand SEO period. They look for just, what is the cheapest option?

Kiera Dent:

Sure.

Evan Lazeris:

And it's very unfortunate because what they're really doing is they're just basically throwing money at something and they don't understand that B that's not going to get them any result that they then seek. That C most importantly we'll then just frustrate them and get them to a place mentally, we say rather, this crap doesn't work.

Kiera Dent:

Right.

Evan Lazeris:

I don't know what any of this is. This is all mumbo-jumbo, blah, blah, blah. And I get a lot of that. I unfortunately have been on the receiving end of that conversation because I am the recipient of all bad SEO.

Kiera Dent:

Yes.

Evan Lazeris:

But SEO is really, to make it in a very simplistic manner, it is visibility. If I could replace the word SEO with visibility, it's a much easier concept to understand. If somebody goes to a search engine and is looking for something that is categorically related to you, there's two different basic searches, indirect and direct. The dentist near me search is an indirect search. That searcher is querying or asking Google a question. They want something. They want to find somebody or a business that is this particular service that is near to them. They're not looking for doctor Bob Smith, which is a direct search.

Kiera Dent:

Right.

Evan Lazeris:

Looking for ABC Smiles is a direct search. Looking for doctor Bob Smith is a direct search. They're telling Google what they want to see.

Kiera Dent:

Sure.

Evan Lazeris:

So when we talk about the indirect search world, it's how do we make ourselves visible so that we at least are in the conversation. If you are not visible when somebody is looking for something that is categorically related to you, then you're not in the conversation.

Kiera Dent:

Sure.

Evan Lazeris:

You have no chance of being in the conversation. And the way that search has evolved over the last five, six, seven years, and continues to evolve. I'm a student of it. Even though I'm in the business, I am still constantly doing R&D and still studying because it's always changing. It is really down to a science of, if you're standing at your office and you're standing at your dental practice, and what somebody sees three blocks to the east could be totally different than what somebody sees three blocks to the west when they take out their cell phones and they type in dentists near me as an example of a type of search. Because it really is geo coordinated based on the location of the searcher. And so there are so many things that we do now to create authority and relevance to your business, because that's really how you get visible. Google really believes in one thing. It's, Google wants to know that you are an authoritative answer to the question the person is asking. That's it.

            Because Google does not know... And it's funny, if I had a quarter for every time a doctor said this to me, I'll say to a doctor, I'll say to a dentist, I'll say... They'll say, "How come I don't show up at Google?" And I'll say, "Well, your competitor up the street, that practice, they're very authoritative." "Oh, I know that guy. He's the worst dentist. He's the worst. They're the worst practice." And I said, "But it's not about how they practice medicine."

Kiera Dent:

That's true.

Evan Lazeris:

Google does not know if you are a good doctor or a bad doctor.

Kiera Dent:

Nope.

Evan Lazeris:

Google does not know if you have a good bedside manner or a lousy bedside manner. Now, it can look at reviews and it can pull out certain key words. And yes, there is a reputation component there based on people leaving reviews that does have some impact, but it's not the arbiter of who's the best or who's the worst. So you have to do things to basically make Google understand what you do, why you are the most relevant and localize it. Connect yourself to your community, build links into your community. Basically create a bridge between you and authoritative local places. Think about it like this, the way I explained it to people sometimes is, and it's kind of silly, but people understand it this way. Go back in your mind to when you were in high school or middle school, and kids are very cliquey. You have popular kids and you have jocks and you have nerdy kids, and you have all these different types of cliques of kids. And if I associate with, let's say the popular kids, then I am popular. Right?

Kiera Dent:

Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Evan Lazeris:

And it works that way in SEO. If your digital footprint online, if you are connected to authoritative, relevant businesses, community events, hotels, anything that has relevance, it will then, we call it passing link juice, it'll then make you more relevant.

Kiera Dent:

That's it.

Evan Lazeris:

So imagine Kiera, if the New York Times came along and said, "Hey, we hear you are just killing it with your dental consulting. We'd like to write an article in Sunday's Times about the Dental A Team. About you, what you do, the whole, and then we're going to put a link in that article to your website." Now the New York Times is an extremely authoritative vehicle, gets millions of eyeballs on any given day. It has what we call a very strong domain authority. It's a very authoritative source.

Kiera Dent:

Right.

Evan Lazeris:

And so that link is passing a lot of... It's an authoritative link. And so what do you think that's going to do for your business in terms of your digital footprint.

Kiera Dent:

It's absolutely going to grow it for sure.

Evan Lazeris:

Hey, this is the most popular guy in town and they want to hang out with you, and that now you are hanging with the cool kids. And I know that that sounds like a 12 year old explaining SEO, but that's really an essence at a very basic level how this works. And so a lot of doctors think, well, if I write a blog or if I write some article on my website, that's going to get me patients. That is not going to get you patients. It is literally a massive waste of time. Unless you do it in a certain way and you're doing it under certain guidance and structure. And so my point is that, again, you can go out and get yourself a Honda Civic or you can go out and get yourself a Mercedes. At the end of the day, the performance of what you put into it is going to be what you pull out of it.

Kiera Dent:

Sure.

Evan Lazeris:

SEO is an investment. It really is. And it's unfortunate that it has become so watered down and so frustrating for so many doctors because there's so much bad SEO in the market place.

Kiera Dent:

Well, and that's where I was actually going to go, is asking you, I understand that I don't know how to do that. I understand I don't know how to link myself to popular sites so that way I have more visibility, more recognition. And I've also accepted that cost is not the deciding factor of good SEO versus bad SEO. Whereas if I'm going in, I can do Edmond's Google reviews on certain cars to find out, is this car a good car or not? But I think that that's where the world of marketing is so terrifying to consumers, is there is literally no way for me to know what you're doing to know if it's working or not working. I don't know what you're doing.

            I don't understand what you're doing. So Evan, what are some tactical questions or things that we can ask so we're more educated when interviewing SEO people to know, do they know what they're talking about or do they not know? That way we can actually educate our audience, because I literally my, I don't know, you seem nice. It's how do we educate patients if it's a good dentist or not? I feel like that's how we feel with when it comes to SEO as business owners.

            Hello Dental A Team listeners, thank you so much for listening to the podcast and being a part of our Dental A Team family. Truly you guys, I appreciate you listening, following along, sharing with us, emailing us and being a part of this incredible journey called the Dental A Team podcast. You guys, if you want to help us out, please leave us a review. The way you leave a review is super simple. Just scroll down, see where there's five stars, select the five stars. You can write a note if you want or just leave the five stars and that's as easy as it gets. So thank you guys for leaving reviews. Thank you for sharing the podcast and as always thank you for just wanting to level up you and your practice. That is truly what this podcast was made for.

Evan Lazeris:

So you ask a different person, you're going to get a different answer.

Kiera Dent:

Sure. Am asking you.

Evan Lazeris:

My answer to the question is simply, educate them. If you were interested in wanting to explore how do I expand my digital footprint. How do I leverage the web better than what I'm doing right now? Then you should sit down and educate yourself with somebody that really does understand it. Take two hours and set up a time and have them explain it to you. Ask the questions and have them walk you through it so that you understand what it is that's going to be done and why it's going to be done, and what the expectations should be thereafter. So that you go into it with some working knowledge. I'm not saying you need to be an expert. You don't need to get into the weeds. But if I was going to hire you, and I'm going to spin this back to you, and I am considering spending a considerable amount of money to bring in some large consulting group and work on some big project. Because I know or I believe that this could make me five X or 10 X as a result of this investment.

            I'm pretty sure that I would ask a lot of important questions and I would want you to educate me specifically on what it is you're going to do, why you're going to do it, why it matters and when I should start to see that potential, the fruits of that labor. There's no difference in SEO. The difference is, this is my experience, the difference is that a lot of the sole, and people I'm generalizing, pardon me for generalizing.

Kiera Dent:

Sure. Sure.

Evan Lazeris:

But if you are a sole practitioner or you're on a small practitioner, or it's you and you own one location or even you in two locations, but you're basically running the entire show and you're seeing patients all day. Guess where SEO falls or your digital marketing falls in your pecking order?

Kiera Dent:

Really, really low. Unless the phones aren't ringing, then it often becomes very high.

Evan Lazeris:

Really low. And then guess where it falls in, when we actually go to try to sit down every month and review what we're doing, how it's working, what's happening, it's like eighth on the list. 10th of the list. And it's unfortunate because you're basically saying, hey, I know I need this, I want this but I really don't care about it. So if you don't take the time to understand something, then it's not important. It's never going to be important. It's never going to work. It's built to fail. That's really the issue with SEO is that doctors don't take the time, I'm not saying they should be experts, they don't take the time to really ask the questions. And I sit in the driver's seat and I'd say 90% of the people I work with just by the nature of the industry, they've worked with somebody.

            They say to me, "Well, I don't know what they did or all I know is I got this email at the end of the month with like a PDF report. And I didn't even understand what it told me." Well, my response was, "It doesn't mean your SEO is bad. It just means why didn't you ever sit down and say, teach me, show me what I'm looking at. Educate me. What am I spending money on? So I understand." I think half the battle is just educating the customer. Educated customers are better customers.

            I will tell you from experience that when I work with healthcare providers, exponentially, for me as a marketing company, clients that come from your world, they have consultants, they have coaches are radically better equipped for me than those that don't. And that's not for sake of whether they spend money, the money is still irrelevant. It is they're motivated to want to improve their business period.

Kiera Dent:

Correct.

Evan Lazeris:

And so they're putting in the time to work on their business. The doctors that come to me and say, "Hey, I need patients. How do I get patients? Make my phone ring." And then I don't hear from them again, which is unfortunately, a lot of doctors. You get out of it what you put into it, unfortunately.

Kiera Dent:

So I like that. So with the SEO then it's really educating ourselves, understanding, I mean there's YouTube university. At least knowing the basics of, like you said, I mean, geo, what was it? Google my business. I didn't even know that was a thing. And there are so many free resources to educate yourself on it. And then going, I also think it is on us as owners to make sure that we're saying, if we're paying for a service, finding out what they're doing, how it makes sense. Like my bookkeeper, oh, I give... Shout out to Preston with Panda Accounting. Guys, if you need a good CPA or accountant, Preston has literally taught me so much on bookkeeping over the last three years that I worked with him, and I call him and I'm like, I don't understand what this is for.

            I don't understand what chart of accounts are. I have no clue how to read a freaking balance sheet. Don't tell me that I'm all good on my accounts when my bank count doesn't match that. I need to understand and bridge that gap. And I have asked so many questions that I so grateful for Preston. One of the reasons I've stayed with him for so many years is because Preston is willing to hold my hand and guide me through it because I don't know anything. I'm not a CPA. I don't understand that world. And so I think Evan, from what you're saying is, find somebody on SEO who will hold your hand, guide you. Do your research beforehand, so you're not blindly led. So you can say like, hold on that doesn't make sense.

            I've read many, many, many financial books. I just bought Keith Cunningham's, The Road Less Stupid. I'm so excited to read it. I'm going to an event where I'm going to learn more about it so I can be smarter when it comes to my bookkeeping. And I will say, I'm like, I got started out as iPhone number one. And now I'm up to generation probably like five or six on accounting. I'm definitely not up to iPhone version 12, but I'm definitely getting smarter and smarter. And I think you're saying the same thing with SEO and marketing. And I feel like that's probably the missing link that I have yet to take on. I need to educate myself.

            I remember I had a mentor one time tell me, "Kiera, if you're going to know all these aspects of your business, you need to be able to put in the time to know enough to not be taken advantage of. Know enough of how to write contracts. Learn from your lawyers. Learn from your marketing people." I feel like I'm so much smarter on our marketing than I ever have been, but I'm still making a lot of mistakes. So Evan, what would you say if you were hiring an SEO person, what would be the top one, two or three things that you would look for in an SEO company?

Evan Lazeris:

I would want to, it's a tough question because I am one.

Kiera Dent:

I know. That's why I asked. That way they can call you and ask these questions. That's really what I'm getting at. I just told the punchline before you even answered. Dang it.

Evan Lazeris:

So, again, my answer is going to be skewed probably towards how I see things, but I work on a consultative basis. So what that means is, when I go in and I talk to a doctor and I'm just going to tell you what I see in the industry and the typical problems I see. And then how to then back into a question.

Kiera Dent:

Sure.

Evan Lazeris:

I see a lot of packages. So a lot of doctors sign up for these packages, package A, the gold, silver, bronze, whatever package. And every package has a different offering of services and a different price point. And that's not always the best solution for a business because that's like basically saying your business falls into one of three preplanned buckets, and those buckets are designed for what you need. And so I always think that it's better to take the time to figure out what it is you want to accomplish. What's the goal? If I hire you, and again, I'm going to flip it back to you, if I hire you, what am I hiring you to achieve?

Kiera Dent:

Right.

Evan Lazeris:

If I'm going to hire an SEO or I'm going to hire a digital marketing company, what is it I am seeking? What is my goal?

Kiera Dent:

And I would say-

Evan Lazeris:

So let's figure out what the goal is as a business. What is my business goal in doing this?

Kiera Dent:

So let's say the goal is to bring on more new patients. Because that's most of the time when I hear SEO, I need butts in seats. So we're like, great, let's contact SEO for that. So that's our issue. That's why I'm even reaching out to you. That's my goal, I want more new patients.

Evan Lazeris:

So then the answer would be, I need to find somebody that's going to help me put together a plan to do that. A plan has to incorporate a couple of pieces. It has to incorporate what does that look like for me now? What is my digital footprint? What needs to happen? Am I in bad shape? How much work needs to be in time and effort and work needs to be put into this? Am I already dominating my market? What are my competitors look like? So somebody has to do that audit to make a determination of where you fit into that mix based on what you do. So not everything is the same, unfortunately. That's why I hate the bucket concept.

Kiera Dent:

Sure.

Evan Lazeris:

A doctor in a very rural area with very little competition, may not need very much to do if any at all versus a doctor in a densely competitive market. If you are a specialist with, let's say you're an endodontist and you're one of two in your market, you may not need to do all that much.

Kiera Dent:

Right.

Evan Lazeris:

If you're a general dentist and you are one of 60 in a five square block radius in Manhattan, there's work to be done.

Kiera Dent:

Maybe that will work.

Evan Lazeris:

So you need to go evaluate what the landscape looks like. And then from there, you have to back into them, what is the strategy to accomplish the goal? And so that's why everything we do is custom designed to fit the needs of whatever the practice looks like and wants to accomplish. But it's going to be primarily to get butts in seats. It's going to be a function of possibly rebuilding a website, redesigning a website so that if we actually drive clicks there, we drive eyeballs to the site. Does the site actually convert people? Are there call to action buttons throughout the site?

            Are we asking somebody to raise their hand? Is there any live chat function to answer the questions that people may have? Is your business open 24 hours a day? Can I connect with your business 24 hours a day? And so these are the things that I help businesses accomplish. And then potentially advertising. What do we need to do to be seen in the market? I will tell you a real quick story that was maybe the most valuable lesson that I learned. The gentleman is since deceased. He was a dentist in New York city, on the upper east side. And he had a pediatric practice and he used to advertise on the New York City Subway. And if you've ever been in the subway, there's those big ad inside the cars, at the top of the cars.

            So this guy had this double sized ad. It was two ad spaces combined to be one ad. And it was very colorful and it had his face on it, right smack in the middle and it said Dr. Z. And anybody that is in and around Manhattan may have a familiarity with Dr. Z. But anyway, his practice over a course of like 20, 30 years became massive, absolutely staggering at how big this practice became. It became an entire floor of a New York City office building, 15, 20,000 square feet.

Kiera Dent:

Wow.

Evan Lazeris:

Built all knowing that, if you think about New York City Subway system, not everybody lives in the upper east side.

Kiera Dent:

Yes.

Evan Lazeris:

Bronx, Queens, millions of people. Very few of them were actually his actual patient base. But the brand, he built such a brand because he understood the value of creating awareness and visibility. And doctors really, really miss the boat on the concept of awareness and visibility. And so, like we run ads for a lot of our clients using social media just to drive awareness, hitting their target market over and over and over and over. Not ads like book now, call now, schedule now. More like learn more about us, over and over and over. And the idea is that you want to get those clicks down to such a cheap cost. And you just want to serve up impressions. It's like, you want your brand to be seen over and over and over as much as possible, forever.

Kiera Dent:

Right,

Evan Lazeris:

Forever. And doctors think that if they spend a dollar that a patient needs to come in. And they miss the boat. It's an interesting phenomenon. I don't know if you ever get into this, but for every 10 docs that I talk to, I will ask them, what is your marketing budget? And I will tell you, factually, 8.75 out of the 10 will tell me they do not have one. So everything they do is basically shooting from the hip. They don't have a budget for SEO. They don't have a budget for advertising. There's no functional operational allocation towards what is going to be spent on an annual, then broken down into a monthly basis. And then from there, there's no strategy as to how those dollars actually get allocated.

Kiera Dent:

Which is crazy, and I love that you brought that up. So to wrap this up, I think it's a matter of, like you said, that brand awareness. I love that you mentioned that and having SEO. Drive that, so the number of clicks to our business makes sense. And then also I will attest, we drove a bunch of traffic and [inaudible 00:36:15] our website was not converting, because we had over 2000 clicks through and yet zero conversions. So we realized there's a problem broken on our website. And so I love that you brought that up, that there's multiple facets of SEO, but once you get that dialed in correctly, then you get cheaper clicks. Then it's easier. You're attracting the patients that you want. And that takes some refinements. Sometimes those ads might bring patients that you don't want. It doesn't mean your phones aren't ringing, but it's not creating the ideal customer that you want.

            So I think all in all, it's one, do your research, understand what SEO is. Also have a budget for marketing so you know how much you can spend, how much you want to spend. I'm usually between three to 5% of your collections, is what I typically recommend is a healthy marketing budget. Of course, if you're a startup practice, it needs to be much higher than that because you're trying to drive a bunch of business there as opposed to a GP practice. Now, Evan you might have different numbers, that typically tends to be where I have around advertising and marketing depending upon the company and what their goals are. But then setting that budget and then knowing what you're going to do with it, and then testing it out and then checking in and having your SEO/marketer teach you, what are these reports? What is it showing me? Educate me so that way you can be smarter long-term.

            I think that's my massive takeaways from today's podcast of things that I need to do better. One, I need to educate myself more. Two, have a better budget so my team knows exactly what we're looking for and actually give that to my marketing team so they know what they can use those dollars for. And then three, really using our SEO team to teach us more about it. Those are my main takeaways. So Evan, anything else that I might have missed or things that you'd want offices to know regarding SEO and marketing from your standpoint.

Evan Lazeris:

You're good. You retained all that?

Kiera Dent:

I have a really good memory. That's something I'm worried about the day I ever have kids.

Evan Lazeris:

That's impressive, I'm going to give you an A.

Kiera Dent:

Thank you. Thank you. I try really hard. It's interesting, I was very interested and trying to also summarize it of what my action item list is to execute on this to be smarter. I believe that if we're going to listen to podcasts and dedicate our time to doing so, we might as well take something away from this. So thank you for that. I appreciate that. And I would say for all of you listening, take those as your action items, get your marketing budget in play, give it to your team. Educate yourself on SEO and then go to work and have your marketers teach you so that way you're not just spending money hoping that something's going to happen.

            I believe that when we took on that hat of ownership as business owners, that doesn't mean that we're just here to make money or to run our own life or whatever it is. I truly believe that a business encompasses all the facets of being a business owner. And it is our job and our responsibility to make sure our business is successful to learn those to at least some level of intelligence. So Evan, if people are interested, they want to work with you, they want to find out more about what you do, how is the best way for them to connect with you?

Evan Lazeris:

My email is always a good place. It's evan, E-V-A-N @simpleimpactmedia. You can visit my website, simpleimpactmedia.com.

Kiera Dent:

Awesome. Guys, go check him out. I think he's fantastic. I've interviewed a lot SEO people. You guys, I have marketers constantly message me to try and get on the podcast and I turned most of them down, because I'm real choosy. You guys know I got burned on an $80,000 zero ROI. And so I'm very choosy and selective. Evan has helped us with our SEO. He has a lot of outside the box thinking and I think his team does a really great job. So connect with him if it's something you're looking for. But before you contact him, make sure you know what your intention is of what you're trying to achieve with SEO and marketing. And that way you guys are investing correctly. And Evan, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate your time, personally for myself and our company and also for your time on the podcast.

Evan Lazeris:

It's my pleasure and I love being here. Honestly, talking to you is the best. Let me know when you want to do the Bitcoin podcast,

Kiera Dent:

The Bitcoin podcast guys, get ready. Email in hello at the Dental A Team. If you want us to chat Bitcoin, it's a hot topic right now. But as always you guys, thank you for listening. And as always, thanks for listening, I'll catch you next time on the Dental A Team podcast. And that wraps it up for another episode of the Dental A Team podcast. Thank you so much for listening and we'll talk to you next time.