Does social media marketing bring new patients to a dental practice?

Paid ads on Facebook and Instagram, planned, written and run by our team.

The service covers five jobs:

• Planning the campaigns and who sees them, by location, plus age for cosmetic treatment.
• Writing the ads and choosing images from photos you supply.
• Sending people to a lead form, a message or your existing booking link.
• Checking every ad against Ahpra and Meta rules before it runs.
• Running and adjusting the campaigns inside hard limits.
• A written monthly report on enquiries and cost per enquiry.

Organic posting, filming and replies to comments and messages are not part of the service. How the campaigns are set up, measured and changed is explained step by step on Meta ads for dentists.

No. We run paid ads only, and we do not write or publish organic posts on your page.

Paid ads and organic posting are different jobs. Ours is the ads: who sees them, what they say, what they cost and which enquiries they bring. Your page stays yours, and so does everything posted on it.

If your team already posts, keep going. People often look at a practice’s page after they first see its ad, and real posts about your team, your rooms and your hours help them trust what they find.

Every post on a page you control is advertising under Ahpra’s rules, so the same care applies: no patient testimonials about clinical care and no promised results. We also run no before-and-after photos. That is our own rule.

No. We do not sell photography or videography, so there are no filming or shoot fees.

We build the ads from photos your practice supplies and has cleared for use. The ones that work best are:

• Your team, with each person’s consent.
• Your rooms and reception, so people know what to expect.
• The outside of the building and the entrance, so people recognise the place.

We never use photos of patients in ads, and never a smile or treatment result. If you need new photos, book your own photographer and send us the ones you are happy to use.

No. Your front desk replies, because they know the patient and can call them.

Comments and messages on your ads land on a page your practice controls. Ahpra treats that page as your advertising, so three rules matter:

• A comment that praises a treatment or its result can count as a testimonial. You may need to hide or delete it.
• A reply should never confirm that someone is a patient, or mention their symptoms, treatment or result.
• Publishing only the positive comments, or editing them, can be misleading.

Facebook reviews on your page are your responsibility too. Ahpra says turning that feature off is an allowed way to comply. This is a summary, not legal advice.

Facebook and Instagram, through Meta.

That is where most local communities already are, so it is where we start every practice. One Meta ad account runs both, and the same rules apply on each: Ahpra’s advertising rules and Meta’s own advertising standards.

Other platforms are not part of this service. Search ads on Google are a separate service, explained on Google Ads for dentists.

Many practices run both, because they reach people at different moments. Meta shows your practice to people nearby who are not searching yet. Google shows it to people who are searching right now.

Two separate bills: our fee, included in Always On at $498 a month per location, and your ad spend, paid directly to Meta.

Meta ads come with Always On, together with Google Ads, SEO, AI Overviews visibility, Google Maps profile care and blog posts for your website. The Custom plan, quoted, adds landing pages, websites and custom agents.

There are no filming or posting fees. Plans are charged to a card, monthly in advance. The plans are compared on pricing.

Ad spend is paid directly to Meta. We agree a starting monthly budget on the strategy session.

There is no minimum. We advise a monthly amount for your clinic's goals. The budget depends on:

• The treatments you want to advertise.
• The suburbs you want to reach.
• How many new patients you can take each month.
• What you spend on ads now, and what it brings in.

Our agents run the campaigns 24/7. They can raise ad spend by up to 10% a day when the data shows it will help. A bigger rise waits for your OK in the dashboard, and every rise shows its reason. Every change is logged with before, after and why, and checked about 4 weeks later.

Ad spend is a separate bill from our fee. Meta charges it to you directly, at cost, with no markup from us.

Agents make changes inside hard limits. Every change is logged with before, after and why, and checked about 4 weeks later. People at Shoutout set the rules, answer you and own the result.

Agents apply Ahpra’s rules and Meta’s standards to claims, offers and prices, and log every change.

Your practice remains responsible for its advertising, including ads a contractor writes. Only these two changes wait for your OK:

• An ad spend rise over 10% a day
• A campaign you asked for

No. Neither belongs in an ad for a dental service.

Under section 133 of the National Law, advertising a regulated health service must not:

• Use testimonials, including patient reviews or quotes about clinical care.
• Be false or misleading.
• Create an unreasonable expectation of benefit, which before-and-after photos and promised results risk doing.
• Offer a gift or discount unless its terms are in the ad.

The maximum penalty is $60,000 per offence for a person and $120,000 for a company. We build ads around your team, your rooms, your hours and the services you offer. We also run no before-and-after photos at all. That is our own rule. See Ahpra’s advertising page. This is a summary, not legal advice.

Not by their health. We reach people by location, and the ad names the service.

Meta’s rules and Ahpra’s rules meet here:

• An ad must not tell the reader they have a condition. “Embarrassed by a missing tooth?” breaks that rule. “Dental implant consultations near you” does not.
• Treatment and condition names must not appear in audiences, event names or links.
• Ads for cosmetic treatment are shown only to people 18 and over.

So the targeting is a location, with an age range only for cosmetic treatment, and the treatment lives in the ad itself. Meta does not put dentistry in a special ad category, but these health rules still apply to every dental ad.

No. Patient records stay with your practice.

Some agencies upload a practice’s patient list to build “lookalike” audiences. We do not, for two reasons:

1. A list of people who had a treatment is health information, and Meta’s rules say health information must not go into its audiences.
2. Patient records are protected by the Privacy Act, and we never ask for access to your practice management system.

We find new people by location instead, adding age only for cosmetic treatment. Your practice keeps its patient data, and we never need it to run the ads. More on how we handle data: AI and patient data.

No. Ads bring enquiries; your front desk turns them into booked patients.

The ads send people to a Meta lead form, a message, or your existing booking link. We add your booking link to the ads; we do not set up booking systems. An enquiry is a person who wants to hear from you, and the booking happens when your team calls them back quickly.

That is why the monthly report counts what matters, not likes:

• Enquiries from the ads.
• Cost per enquiry, against the target we agreed.
• Ad spend, against the agreed budget.
• The new patients you tell us you saw.

The same day the campaign is agreed, once three things are in place.

1. A signed onboarding form, then partner access to your Meta ad account and Facebook page, which you can remove at any time.
2. The monthly budget and the cost-per-enquiry target, agreed in week one.
3. Only a campaign you asked for and an ad spend rise over 10% a day wait for your OK in the dashboard.

Week one is when the access, the budget and the target come together. After that, a new campaign goes live the same day it is agreed, and nothing runs before you have seen it.

Enquiries and cost per enquiry show up in your first monthly report. We do not promise followers or bookings in week one.

You do, before, during and after working with us.

We work through partner access, which you can remove at any time. Your practice stays the owner of the page and the ad account, and you pay Meta directly, so the spend history is yours too.

If you leave:

• Plans are month to month, with 30 days notice.
• You keep your page, your ad account, the campaigns and the change log.
• We remove our access within 5 business days.

There is no exit fee, and nothing to hand back to us. The next team, or your own, starts with everything that was running.

We work for free until we hit it.

In week one we agree a cost-per-enquiry target with you. On the Custom plan, if the target is missed at day 90, our management fee is free each month until it is reached. Ad spend paid to Meta is not included.

It applies when:

• The agreed budget is kept.
• Access is given in week one.
• The two changes that need your OK wait for it; we ask you to answer within 2 business days.

The promise covers marketing results, not clinical outcomes, and it sits on top of your rights under the Australian Consumer Law. The full conditions are on pricing.

It is the same service. This page answers one question first: does social media mean posting, or ads?

For us it means ads. Many agencies sell “social media marketing” as a posting calendar, filming and comment replies. We do not offer those. We run paid ads on Facebook and Instagram and judge them on enquiries.

Both lead to the same plan, the same fee and the same people.