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opinion | ters. How it looks and performs on a smartphone is what counts. Google AdWords is unlikely to succeed. In any event, digital advertising in dentistry often attracts price shoppers and bargain-hunters. Dentistry is going to have to learn how to communi- cate with patients online to a greater extent than ever before. I am already seeing tech start-ups looking at the dental space and thinking about how best to keep patients informed of their oral health and how to make their patient experience seamless. Wearable technology This brings me to how that communication will take place (between patient and dentist and vice versa) as the year unfolds. The start-ups I mentioned are devel- oping electric toothbrushes that send data back to an application that monitors not just brushing technique but also simple issues around patient health. Data is analysed and then sent back to the patient’s smart- phone to provide dental health education. Notwithstanding the issues around the confidential- ity of that data and its storage, we are seeing the be- ginning of wearable tech playing a major role in health- care generally. E-zines and blogs like those published by Dr Bertalan Meskó (the Medical Futurist) show that progress is exponential. Cue the watch that can feed back dental health information, allowing both patient and dentist to predict problems before they occur. Getting attention The science and technology are compelling for early adopters and frightening for laggards. Any debate as to the future of digital dentistry has long since left the late adopters behind, and I am seeing many of my cli- ents racing to keep up with change. However, inde- pendent dentistry is a business whose purpose is to solve patients’ problems, but whose objective has to be to make an ethical profit, so we cannot ever afford to be distracted from the focus on attracting the right type of new patient and from charging the right price for what we do. These are the challenges that occupy the majority of my time with clients, and the changes I have referenced in the first part of this article have to be embraced in order to survive and prosper in busi- ness. Experts estimate that, as consumers, we are bom- barded by up to 5,000 advertising impressions per day, so how do dentists make themselves heard among this noise? In my experience, there is little point in trying to shout loudest by spending money on ad- vertising. The average e-commerce company in the UK now has to invest about £30,000 per month to be heard in the digital marketplace, so a dentist inves - ting £500 per month in search engine optimisation or The good news is that social media channels al- low us to generate internal digital patient referrals in numbers that could never be foreseen in the old days of word of mouth. Thus, a carefully planned and well-executed social media marketing plan is now an essential component of every practice’s overall goals for new patient generation. Facebook, Instagram and YouTube are the marketing domains of 2018. Prices The interesting irony here is that digital dentistry, once we have moved from the innovation stage of the adoption cycle, through early adopters to the late ma- jority, will actually have the effect of reducing the cost of providing dental healthcare and treatment. I have clients right now who innovated in digital dentistry and are seeing a consequent improvement in their bot- tom line profit as costs of sales reduce. That may not sound like great news for laboratory and materials suppliers, but that is the inevitable consequence of technological progress. I am also realistic enough to agree that little of that cost-saving is being passed on to the patients at the moment. That is because we are still in the early stages of the digital adoption cycle, and the pressure on prices will not occur until much later in that cycle. It is time, indeed, for the innovators to make hay. Prices will stay firm in 2018; costs can reduce. An interesting year ahead 2018 will see the continued acceleration of the im- pact that digital communication and commerce will have on our lives. The dental practice of the future will fully embrace not only digital dentistry but also the way in which they connect with their patients online. The smartphone will be the place that happens, until smartphones are replaced by the next generation of wearable devices. contact Chris Barrow is the founder of the Coach Barrow consultancy practice. An active consultant, a trainer and a coach to the UK dental profession, he regularly contributes to the dental press and social media and elsewhere online. Barrow can be contacted at coachbarrow@me.com. CAD/CAM 1 2018 07