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Before the year starts to run away from you, here is a simple checklist to make sure your practice is set up to grow in 2026.
These ten items will tell you very quickly whether your marketing is rolling along great or needs attention. This is a fairly baseline list to kick off your new year.
1. Is Your Google Business Profile Fully Updated?
Categories, services, hours, booking links, photos and description. If any of those are outdated or incomplete, visibility drops.
2. Do You Have Steady Streams Of Recent Reviews?
Google cares about velocity, not just volume. If you do not have reviews from the last few weeks, it is time to build a system.
3. Does Your Booking Process Work Cleanly On Mobile?
This is where almost every new patient interacts with you first. If it feels confusing or slow, you will lose people instantly.
4. Does Your Homepage Clearly Say What You Offer?
Too many dental websites bury the basics. Your homepage should answer: Who are you? What do you do? Where are you? How do I book?
5. Do You Have At Least Some “Anchor” Pages?
Treatment pages, FAQ pages, or educational content. This is what Google and AI tools pull from when giving recommendations. For AI specifically, you want long-form, conversational content.
6. Is Your Website Easy To Load & Easy To Navigate?
You do not need to test this yourself. Just ask your team one question: “What slows our site down the most?” Good teams know the answer.
7. Are Your Google Ads Focused On Booked Patients, Not Leads?
Clicks and impressions mean nothing without appointments. Make sure your reporting focuses on results, not vanity metrics.
8. Is Someone Checking Your Call Tracking & Missed Calls?
You can run perfect marketing and still lose money if calls go unanswered. Someone should be reviewing this every week. This is typically in-house but most agencies will offer solutions if you are willing to pay for them.
9. Does Your Practice Have Consistent Information Across All Channels?
Patients trust consistency more than creativity. But more importantly, Google and AI Search always fall back to consistent citations to rank authority.
10. Do You Know What Success Looks Like For 2026?
“Yeah, we want more patients and to make more money!” This is not a strategy. You need a locked in process that is assigned. If you cannot define success, you cannot build a plan to reach it.
If you can check every box on this list, you will be ahead of 95 percent of local practices.
If you cannot, that is completely normal. And it is fixable.
Reply to this email or reach out if you want help tightening your setup for 2026.
Talk next week.
-Kyle
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