123 Dentist : Launching a National Brand
Building a Brand
The West Coast Dental Clinics was a small collective of 7 dental practices in the Lower Mainland of Vancouver. They were working under individual local office brands but behind the scenes were operating as a consolidated corporation. While profitable, they struggling to see a path forward to some real exponential growth.
The first opportunity I had was to rebrand under a new umbrella entity. The naming had to reflect “easy”. Easy to find a dentist, easy to schedule appointments and even easy to sell your dental practice. Marketing budgets were consolidated across the practices to leverage better ad placements. With fully vinyl wrapped vehicles creating awareness in local neighborhoods, radio and tv commercials on air, print and digital ad campaigns firing, and staff donating time to food shelters they have really been able to gain traction with the public and the industry as a whole. During my time collaborating with 123Dentist, they grew from 7 to over 200 practices across Canada, and becoming the largest Canadian owned dental corporation.
Keeping Some Individuality
While managing the corporate brand, there was still some need to develop each individual practice. Brands for the newly acquired practices would need to be designed and developed. The project work would include the design and development of storefront signage which included approvals from municipalities and vendor management. Projects were holistic to include the design of window coverings, point of sale advertisements, in-office digital screens and even sandwichboard placements.
How Different Can Dentistry Be?
Part of the 123Dentist.com family, La Vita Dental was eager to connect with the younger demographic in Kitsilano. Their previous web presence focussed on the expertise of the doctors but it seemed to get lost in the noise in the sea of dental sites. They wanted to standout, to make an impression and pique the interest of the neighbourhood.
To develop a creative direction successfully, I made a very conscious effort to speak directly to the desires of neighbourhood of Kitsilano. People of this neighborhood make a conscious choice to live here in part because of its close proximity to all the wonderful amenities that Vancouver has to offer and more importantly are willing to pay a premium for it. With this in hand, the site was developed with a persona instead of designing around the dentist. It spoke to the lifestyle and choices of the neighborhood.
