Actually, I wish a LOT of people (i.e. businesses) out here had websites! It is such a rare thing out here in this county. And when they do have sites, they are all image-based, or they just plain don’t offer much information or interactivity for the visitor. And most importantly, they do not engage the visitor. Which, I suppose, is the same thing as interactivity, but, it is so important – it’s worth saying twice in two different ways!

My son recently needed two root canals and I set to work looking for a dentist. I found one that did, in fact, have a website. And not only did he have a website, but, there was a LOT of good information on there about root canals and the whole process. I learned a lot from their site! And I was uber impressed with the depth and the “web 2.0′ness” of the website.

For various reasons, however, we wound up taking our son to another dentist in a nearby town. The guy is really cool – super nice, very into digital photography, even teaches it at a nearby college at night. Sounds like he’s tech-savvy, right?

But – he doesn’t have a business website. I was thinking how cool a site for a man that ‘up’ on things could be. And it could be completely littered with his own personal photography! And he was so good at explaining all of the different steps in the procedures that he was doing to my son – he could have a ‘knock it outta the park’ helpful-to-his-clients website! But he doesn’t even have a bland website, much less a website that matches his seemingly modern viewpoint on technology and his great teaching ability.

There is a San Diego dentist that has a very nice website that has some instructional information in a ‘Patient Library’. And they even have a way for you to fill out your forms before you come into the office! That’s definitely helpful – it’s such a pain to try to get all that information filled out, balancing the clipboard on your knees in the waiting room. So you can just relax and wait for your name to be called when you arrive.

Even they could do better, though, because, they have a newsletter and a blog – but, they are both outdated. And you can’t sign up to get the newsletter by email.

A really cool thing they do have on their site, though, is a ‘special offer’ that is exclusive to people who’ve visited their website! Awesome! It’s an incredible special offer, too – it is a coupon good for a Starbucks drink of your choice and a $129 Sonicare Professional Electric Toothbrush! Wow!

That is exactly the kind of thing I would love to see businesses around here start doing! (After they come out of the stone ages and get websites, that is!) Just think about it, if you heard of Dr. Smith, who did root canals for $800 and Dr. Jones, who did root canals for $800 plus you get a new $129 electric toothbrush – where are you going to go?

I thought so.