Most doctors, in fact, most professionals are very frustrated by their marketing because they spend a lot of money, put a lot of effort into things, and they see very little return on their investment. One reason for this is that they’re marketing backwards. They’re doing their best, they’re trying to put their best foot forward, they’re trying to tell people about their credentials, they’re trying to explain their experience and that, when you come to their practice, you’ll be treated as though you are a member of their own family.
The problem is that people just aren’t paying attention.
They aren’t focused on that. People are worried about their own problems and their own concerns. Another common frustration is that most podiatry offices are hearing from firms and companies, on an almost daily basis, who are talking about the Internet, about SEO – Search Engine Optimization. SEO is a critical component of good marketing, but it has to be done right, and in most cases, this is one of those places on the Internet right now where a lot, quite frankly, of snake oil is being sold. You have to be very careful and understand what it is that makes good marketing. Good marketing, good practice marketing is built on a foundation. So if you want to have a good marketing program, it has four major components.
1) You need to be different from everyone else in your market.
The best way to be different is to do what Robert Collier famously said:
The messages should not be about you, your experience, or your credentials. There is a place for that, obviously, because people do want to know, but what they’re primarily interested in is their problems, their worries, and their concerns. In other words, if you want to see more heel pain patients, you should be talking about heel pain. If you want to see more diabetic patients, you should be marketing and discussing what it is that diabetes can do to the foot and ankle and how you can help them.
2) You need to make people an offer.
The best possible offer that you can make someone is information that is available to them easily and freely. Information that will answer the concerns that they have. Simply going to your website and requesting your book or your information allows them to engage in a conversation with you and understand that there are solutions for their problem and that you may be the best choice for that solution.
3) You need a good marketing database.
As they request that information, you want to make sure that information and all of your patient data is in a good marketing database that can be used communicate with your entire list. It’s by using this system that you begin to generate referrals, reactivations, and convert prospective patients into patients – this is where the real marketing magic occurs.
4) You want to educate that list forever.
Most professionals can’t afford to market to an entire community. But you can market in an educational, non-promotional, informative, high-integrity way to your list of people – the people that know you, like you, and trust you. This is the number one resource other than yourself that you have in your practice and most professionals simply don’t utilize this nearly as well as they could.
At Top Practices, we focus on making sure that you have control over your marketing and that you never have to have that up and down rollercoaster effect again. I invite you to Join our group of goal-oriented professionals who are dedicated to masterminding together to achieving the success they deserve.
