From Seth Godin. He describes the process invariably used by dentists to “sell’ oral health and good dentistry. If we can just educate our patients, if…
If you knew what I know…
“you’d see it was obvious.”
This is the foundation of the rational pitch, of the fact-based marketing campaign.
Two challenges:
1. Can you teach us what you know?
and
2. Once we know what you know, will we actually think it’s obvious, or is this also a matter of belief or worldview?
It’s a very different thing to say, “If you believe what I believe, then this path would be obvious…” because getting someone to share your beliefs is far more difficult than getting them to know what you know.
Obvious is a good place to be if you can get there
via Seth’s Blog.
Of course we can’t teach our patients everything. And even when we do manage to teach them something, a lot just don’t care. If education and telling worked, everyone would floss, no one would smoke and we’d all be at our ideal weight.
The fact is that in order to have people accept our recommendations we need to communicate effectively and engage people emotionally. Digital technology, which includes photos, x-rays, video, patient education and even the Internet allows us to do that faster and better.