A common mistake dentists make when establishing an advertising plan is assuming reach (displaying your ad to more people) is more effective than frequency (showing your ad to less people more often).

Seth Godin said it best in Permission Marketing where he states:

“Given the choice between reach and frequency, many unseasoned marketers make the mistake of going for reach instead. They argue that touching one hundred people with a brilliant ad is more effective than reaching twenty-five people four times each”.

To borrow the words of marketing guru and father of Guerrilla Marketing, Jay Conrad Levinson, “Remember, familiarity breeds confidence, and confidence serves as the springboard to sales”.

To be familiar, you must be frequent. Frequent means this: it is better to show your advertisement to 1,000 people 10 times than to 10,000 people once.

In fact, Jay Levinson figures you have to run an ad twenty-seven times against one individual before it has its desired impact. Why? Because only one out of nine ads will be seen, and your audience has to see the advertisement at least three times before it sinks in.

If you can accept that frequency is more effective than reach without experimentation, and only run an ad when your business can commit to running the same message twenty-seven times in the same medium, you will be far ahead of other dental practices in your area.