Episode: 276
Who: Anissa Holmes
Blog / Website: Delivering Wow, Jamaican Cosmetic Dental Services

Struggling to grow your business on Facebook?

Did you know that you can optimize your Facebook ads by targeting specific audiences?

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In this episode, I’m talking to Dr. Anissa Holmes from DeliveringWow.com, a website dedicated to helping dentists get more new patients by building fascinating brands and by getting the best ROI on social media.

She’s a practicing dentist, social media strategist, author, podcaster, and speaker, plus she was voted as one of Top 25 Women in Dentistry by Dental Products Report. Her Facebook page has nearly 50,000 likes and she knows how to get a high ROI from her Facebook marketing efforts.

Anissa’s Story

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How to Grow your Business using Facebook – with Anissa Holmes

Anissa has been running her own dental practice in Jamaica since 2010. A few years ago, she started working with a business coach to help her take things to the next level. Anissa’s goal was for the practice to be able to run without her. She wanted the business to be in a place where she could be there because she wanted to be there, not because she had to be there.

Anissa and her business coach devised systems to help build the business. These were so successful that her revenue has tripled! She was seeing fantastic ROI with her marketing strategies.

At that point, she had achieved her goal: the business was doing really well, and it could run without her. Her business coach asked, “what’s next?”

After thinking about it, Anissa decided she wanted to help other dentists run their businesses. So she wrote her book, Delivering WOW: How Dentists Can Build a Fascinating Brand and Achieve More, While Working Less! In order to promote the book, she started a podcast.

What she didn’t realize was that people would start asking her to teach them her Facebook marketing strategies. Anissa was getting 50 new patients per month, she had 50,000 Facebook followers, and she was only spending $500 per month on advertising! So she started teaching other dentists.

Getting Systems in Place

Anissa says that the first thing she thought about with her business coach was her brand. Ask yourself:

  • What do you want to be known for in your community?
  • What is your brand?
  • What do people say about you when you’re not around?
Delivering WOW: How Dentists Can Build a Fascinating Brand and Achieve More, While Working Less
Delivering WOW: How Dentists Can Build a Fascinating Brand and Achieve More, While Working Less

If you have the best Facebook advertising in the world, but your brand isn’t that great, people aren’t going to stick around. You want to have your brand on point. And if you’ve got that figured out, you don’t need to be afraid of what people will say about you in online reviews.

For Anissa, the brand is all about delivering the WOW experience. She’s focused on providing an amazing experience for her patients with over-the-top customer service.

Anissa’s dental patients are offered hot beverages and snacks on arrival, the get a free hand and arm massage, and they get headphones and iPads to help them relax in the dentist’s chair. WOW!

One of the systems that Anissa put in place with her business coach uses Facebook wifi. This is a really cool service that even I hadn’t heard of before! If you have a physical business, you definitely want to get in on this. Basically, you set up Facebook wifi for your business.

Then, when your customers want to use the free wifi, they’re taken to your Facebook business page and asked to check in. Once they check in, that shows up in their newsfeed, and they have the opportunity to leave a review.

Feedback
Some reviews left by their clients on their Facebook page.

Anissa uses this system to encourage patients to leave a video testimonial after their appointment. The system only works when everything is on point. The customer has to have been offered refreshments, a hand and arm massage, and an iPad. They have to have had the full experience.

And then, they’re asked three times about their experience that day: by the hygienist, by the dentist, and by the front desk. At the desk, they’re asked if they are willing to give a video testimonial, which is posted either as Facebook Live or as a standard video.

Great! But how can someone without a physical business deliver that kind of WOW experience?

Anissa says it’s all about showing up and going above and beyond expectations. Don’t just dump content on people, actually be there to help and make sure they understand.

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The brand is all about delivering the WOW experience.

For example, Anissa uses a private Facebook group for her Facebook marketing course. She checks in every single day to answer questions and make sure that everything is going well for her clients. That kind of above and beyond attention is what will set you apart.

Of course, Anissa says, there’s not enough time to do everything that you’d want to do every single day. But “there’s always time to do what’s most important,” and that level of customer service is so, so important. It doesn’t have to take all day. Most days it might be ten minutes. But it makes a huge difference.

Using Facebook to Bring People to Your Business

Anissa is quick to point out that she runs both a physical business and an online business, and that the funnels are slightly different in each case. However, she emphasizes that Facebook advertising is all about how you make people feel. You’ve got to show up, be consistent, answer questions, and offer value all the time.

After that, it’s all about targeted marketing. You want to make sure that you’re getting your message in front of the right people. Once people connect with you, they’ll want to do business with you.

Organic Reach

Anissa recently completed a study with her Facebook business page to test organic reach. She used five different types of post, and what she found out was that interaction is what counts.

For example, she recently did a post for the Olympics featuring her patient and Jamaican running star Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce. As soon as the opening ceremony finished, Anissa was on her Facebook page posting about Fraser-Pryce with a photo that showed off her green and gold hairstyle. That post achieved huge, HUGE reach through audience engagement. Within a couple weeks, it was landing in thousands and thousands of newsfeeds through people liking and sharing the content.

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One of Anissa's post on Facebook featuring her patient and Jamaican running star Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce

The key, Anissa says, is to post something your target audience really cares about. You need to be posting shareable content, something that’s going to generate engagement in the crowded Facebook marketplace. Once you understand what’s shareable, you’ll start to see that free exposure and organic reach.

How do you identify engaging or shareable content? There are three keys:

1. Understand the culture of your audience.
2. Identify people’s problems within your audience, and then offer solutions.
3. Pay attention special events within your community.

You’ve also got to be prepared to pivot. Listen to your audience! Anissa didn’t expect to be teaching dentists how to use Facebook, but that was what her audience wanted from her.

Identify engaging and shareable content
Identify engaging and shareable content

How do you go about listening to your audience? Facebook is a great tool. Look at what people are asking on your Facebook page or sending to you through Facebook Messenger. Read your emails, too! Anissa plans her blog content based on what people are asking. She also uses Facebook Live to answer some questions right away.

It’s also important to keep your eye on what’s new and exciting to your audience. Try to be the first to post about new things if you can. Anissa jumped on the Facebook Live launch, for example.

What’s not working in terms of organic reach, especially since the recent algorithm change? Non-engaging content. You’ve got to stand out. You can’t just post what everyone else is posting and expect people to click on it. Anissa says that it’s not just about the content—it’s got to look different, too. Different-looking content makes people curious, makes them pause and take a second look. More clicks means more engagement, and more engagement equals better organic reach.

Using Facebook Ads

Facebook Live and paid ads are working particularly well since the algorithm change. Anissa says that advertising on Facebook is getting better and better all the time, so you’ve got to embrace the Facebook ad.

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Facebook Ads

For example, lots of people think it’s not necessary to boost your Facebook Live posts because Facebook is already prioritizing them. However, Anissa has found that putting just a little money behind those videos makes a huge difference. So once the live broadcast has finished, ask yourself, “who do I want to put this video in front of?”

Thanks to the ability to target different audiences on Facebook, you can be really, really specific. Do you want the video seen by people who have visited your website in the last 180 days? Done.

How about people who have visited a particular page on your website? It can do that, too. It can target people on your email list, people in a particular funnel, or people who have taken advantage of a low-price offer.

These days, you can and should be, in Anissa’s words, “super ninja” in how you target your ads.

Where Do I Start?

With Facebook ads, you can install a pixel on your website to track who’s been to the site but not signed up to the email list. You can then send those people a different ad to remind them to sign up or offer another opportunity to take advantage of a special offer. This significantly increases your conversion rate.

Facebook ads
Facebook ads

The Facebook Pixel is a line of html code that goes on your website. Once it’s set up, Facebook will provide you with a report on who has visited the page, who has signed, who has clicked through, who has purchased, and how much they’ve spent. Then, you can calculate the cost per conversion.

If you’re targeting correctly using Facebook ads, you won’t have to spend much at all on advertising. Once the pixel is set up, you can create a sequence of ads to target people based on what they have already opted in to.

Setting up the Facebook pixel is similar to the process for installing Google Analytics on a WordPress page. You can find the code and a step-by-step guide in the Facebook ads dashboard.

Create_Pixel
Facebook Pixel

What about the content of your ads? Anissa says that the image you use is really crucial, and she recommends testing out a bunch of different versions. Whatever you do, be sure to include a specific call to action.

Another tip is to let your personality shine through. Anissa really likes ads that have some fun to them, and that say things like “You know you want to grab this offer!”

Want to Find Out More?

Anissa will be publishing the results of the study she conducted on her Facebook page to her blog really soon. If you want to know more about that, or even if you just want to see what Anissa’s doing to get some inspiration, check out her site at www.deliveringwow.com. You can also subscribe to her Delivering Wow Dental Podcast.

Resources Mentioned:

Infographic

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How to Grow your Business using Facebook – with Anissa Holmes

About the Author Leslie Samuel


Leslie Samuel a business coach for high-performing entrepreneurs. As the host of the Leslie Samuel Show, he teaches how to build an online business. "Changing the world one post at a time” is the mission he strives towards. As a former university professor, he has a passion for education. He's the founder of Interactive Biology, a blog and YouTube channel dedicated to making biology fun for students and teachers. As the head of training for the Social Media Marketing Society, he helps social media marketers get the training they need to stay on the leading edge of social media.

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