The 60/30/10 Rule of Marketing

Kirk Behrendt
ACT Speaker & Coach
One of the questions that we get frequently is, “Where should we spend our resources in marketing?”  The answer is…it depends on how well you and your practice have evolved.  If your practice is ready for an external marketing effort, and you are willing to embrace the risk that comes with it, then allocate your resources generously in those avenues.  If you’re practice is not ready, and you aren't really sure what you are doing, then it is best to stick with the highly efficient 60/30/10 rule of marketing.
 
External marketing can often be an expensive and non-productive effort that leaves you quite deflated after a good run.    Most “marketing specialists” will tell you that in order to see specific results in any campaign you have to stick it out for at least 18 months.  While that may be true in some cases, exposure and repetition aren’t the only elements of a marketing campaign that prove to be gauges on how successful an effort actually is.
 
In truth, you can waste a lot of your cherished & limited resources on external marketing if you don’t follow a simple rule of thumb.
 
That is why, after a couple of careful questions, I tell most dentists to use the 60/30/10 rule.  This rule has been used by a lot of “marketing specialists” in the last few years, most notably by authors Michael McLaughlin and Jay Conrad Levinson of the Guerrilla Marketing Fame.  McLaughlin says that the key is to allocate your marketing resources—your time, energy, effort, and your marketing budget appropriately. You must find the right balance in marketing to three groups:
 
  1. Existing Clients
  2. Prospective Clients
  3. Broader Market
 
The 60/30/10 rule allocates resources in the following manner:
 
1. Current Client Efforts: This market includes active patients in your practice….most specifically, the ones that you enjoy working with.  Activities include (but are not limited to): improving yourself (behaviorally or clinically), improving your business to better attract & keep the patients, appreciation efforts to current patients & referring specialists, enhancing your  website, improving the esthetics and ergonomics of your physical space, enhancing your practice newsletter, thank you cards and referral ladders, rewarding realtors that send you patients, fun & exciting patient appreciation gatherings, taking beautiful patient portraits, random acts of kindness for wonderful patients, before and after care calls, and most importantly…inviting new referrals. 
 
Most practices skip over developing this first category when patient flow slows down and move on to the next two categories.  This is an expensive mistake.
 
2. Prospective Client Efforts:  This market includes people who could potentially benefit from your dentistry (directly or indirectly) but just haven’t worked with you yet.  Some of this market includes the specific demographic that exists in the highest percentage in your practice.  Activities include: search engine optimization, contacts with specialists that don’t send you patients yet, attending/participating in events that patients attend who fit your ideal demographics, networking with spas & health clubs, writing a column in the health section of a publication, meeting with neighboring businesses, participating in local charities, getting involved in organized dentistry, networking with plastic surgeons, MD’s and other health care professionals. 
 
3. Broader Market:  This market includes everyone else that is not in the other 2 groups. Activities include: external marketing that includes advertising in a major newspaper or high end publication, mailers, radio interviews & ads, large exposure PR opportunities, press releases, billboards, television ads & interviews, etc.  The broader market is a horribly inefficient area to spend resources if the two others haven’t been extremely well developed.
 
McLaughlin says, “The key is to find just the right balance in marketing to these three groups. The 60/30/10 percentages are rules of thumb, and are not set in concrete. If you're just starting a practice, you'll expend more of your marketing efforts attracting prospective clients. As your practice grows, move toward the 60/30/10 percentages.”
 
Your game plan has to be well-thought out and then executed appropriately for your practice type, profit level and philosophy.  If you have a mature practice and it is struggling with new patients, there is usually an obvious reason for it. You have to find out what it is.  If you don’t, you will always be guessing, and chances are you will be focused on spending your cherished & limited marketing resources in the last 2 groups.
 
Bad move.
 
If you are looking at the long haul of being effective with your marketing efforts, it is probably best to embrace your team’s ability to think creatively and stick to the 60/30/10 rule. You’ll be glad you did.
 
See you on the road,
 
Kirk