Marketing Assistance from the AAO
Pam Dwyer, Public Relations Coordinator
Clark D. Colville, DDS, MS
Marketing a successful Orthodontic practice is a continuing and ongoing challenge for all practitioners. How to maintain and grow an active and positive referral pattern from general dentists has always been an exercise in relationship development, good business planning and innovative thinking. Additionally, orthodontic specialists are challenged to create and implement new ways to involve existing patients in their practice marketing and development. Marketing a specialty practice needs to be fun, creative and productive.
The Public Relations Coordinator position for Dr. Clark D. Colville in Seguin, Texas introduced many exciting ideas and questions. The implementation of these new and exciting ideas led us to the AAO website, www.braces.org , to find out how to inform patients and referring doctors of the excellence of our practice. We found a lot of helpful links but still had many questions, so we decided to call. Our initial contact with the AAO was with the Marketing Consumer Relations Manager, Pam Paladin. We spoke with her and she was very excited to help with all of our marketing needs. She mailed a "care package" for a Career Day Presentation, emailed several links to help with our new website, and answered the many questions we had accumulated.
Recently, we called her with questions regarding Media Relations and she emailed information regarding April's National Facial Protection Month (NFPM). Pam gave us valuable insight to marketing research done by the AAO for a Direct Mail List search specific to our field. She also took the time to look at our new website and offered additional information for links.
The purpose behind marketing is to educate our referring doctors and our customers in order to grow the practice. The AAO helps us to reach these goals and brings out the best in our work. Many orthodontists are probably not aware that this kind of help is free for the asking! We highly recommend contacting the AAO and taking advantage of this member benefit.