Investigating the Factors Affecting the Possibility of Choosing a Dental Office by Clients from a marketing perspective(Case Study: Dental offices in West of Mazandaran Province)

Given that in Iran, there is a potential need to address issues related to dentistry, this study attempt to explain the components that affect the possibility of choosing dental offices by patients to identify key roots of office.

This research is a practical research in terms of research purpose and the statistical population of the present study is all customers of dental offices in western Mazandaran province. The number of statistical samples based on Morgan table is at least 384 people using cluster sampling. In this study, to measure the factors affecting customer choice, the questionnaire (Kim, 2011), (Lu et al., 2015) and (Lee et al., 2013) were used. To determine the validity, confirmatory factor analysis was used using LISREL software. Data analysis was performed using descriptive and inferential statistics including Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and structural equation modeling.

The research findings indicate that each of the factors including facilities and equipment (path coefficient 0.61), services (path coefficient 0.57), dentist attributes (path coefficient 0.49), professional appearance of dentist (path coefficient 0.38) and dental practice attributes (path coefficient 0.44) affect the likelihood of customers choosing a dental office.

Due to the increase in dental offices and the intensity of competition between them, so by using the results of this research and by adopting a solution in the field of identified factors, especially the most important, ie appropriate facilities and equipment which have significant impact on the choice of customers, dental offices can improve their competitive position.