Chiropractic Marketing For Challenging Times
Whether you're a chiropractor, dentist or some other variety of health care specialist, you face the same challenge that all small businesses face: getting new customers. This may be especially difficult anytime the economy is tugging patients in directions other then attending to their health. Because there wasn't a chiropractic marketing course in chiropractic college, you may find yourself distracted from your primary mission of helping people. Even more frustrating is not being able to appropriately assess the overtures of practice marketing experts, advertising gurus and any other sales rep who can call your practice telephone number.
Worse, it's the inclination of many small business people to make a common mistake during a downturn. Cut back. However, this is the very time to use your reserves to increase your profile. It feels counterintuitive, but by increasing your visibility and being in motion (at the precise moment rivals are likely cutting back), means your dip won't be as serious, and you'll be the market leader when things turn around. Which they consistently do.
Here are some simple chiropractic marketing suggestions that can pay big rewards during these challenging times:
Create or strengthen your practice website. If you've disregarded the Internet as a source of new patients, imagining it's merely a fad, or projecting your use of the Internet onto prospective new patients, you're missing the boat. Over a million people each year use the Internet to search for a chiropractor. Can those future new patients find you? Can they learn about you and tour your practice without leaving home? Can they download your admitting paperwork? Can they watch a video detailing your philosophy and practice vision? Start here.
Encounter as many strangers as conceivable. This is the least costly, most efficient form of chiropractic practice marketing. Being "aggressively friendly" as the Disney organization refers to it, is a potent marketing tool. Introduce yourself while waiting in line at the grocery store or movie theater. Frequent more than one dry cleaner, lunch place or oil change service. Handout your business card. (Be sure your website URL and email is included!) Be friendly, curious and show up as a helpful source of information rather| than a determined pickup artist at a singles club. Your objective is to become familiar. Most people have developed a fear of strangers. This sheltered you well as an 8-year old walking home from school, but now it stands in the way of expanding your business.
Deliver more talks, workshops and lectures. So many chiropractors are constrained by the phobia of public speaking that your ability to face the fear and share your vision of health and healing in front of a group of people is a enormous marketing advantage. Whether inside your practice, or giving talks at service clubs, civic organizations, support groups or other events, tell the chiropractic message. Where else are they going to hear it? Public speaking is a learned skill that anyone can acquire. Become a member of a Toastmasters group and learn. As a marketing strategy, public speaking, lay lectures and spinal care classes position you as the expert.
Track the origins of each new patient. It doesn't seem like much, but many chiropractors are especially lax about this important patient feedback. Many, just thankful that someone warmer than room temperature has shown up, fail to collect key information about the motivation behind the patient's visit. "How did you find out about our practice?" "Do you know any of our other practice members?" "Have you visited our website?" Find out what marketing efforts are returning new patients and which ones aren't. Do more of what works.
Contact your inactives. One marketing adage suggests that "the people most likely to come to your practice, are those who have already been." A steady stream of inactives is the mark of a successful practice. As patients have their inevitable relapse, most will want to return to the familiarity of your practice. Yet, many, because they stopped their care with a formal goodbye, feel a bit awkward returning. A postcard, newsletter or some other indication that it's safe to return without an "I-told-you-so" scolding, is all it takes.
Deliver a better adjustment. A review of effective marketing wouldn't be complete without an admonition to deliver the best office visit possible.Is there clutter that steals the serene and peaceful experience you're trying to create for patients? Is your office carpet or furnishing showing their age? Are you 100% present with the patient in the adjusting room? Delivering a more valuable adjustment does not mean that you have to move every bone! Focus with clear intention. Visualize the ripple effects of helping each patient. Be ready to listen, yet reluctant to force feed patients your chiropractic dogma. Show up interested, and you'll be perceived as interesting-a powerful practice marketing technique.
Be grateful. When your numbers are down and you're being seduced into scarcity thinking, it's difficult to be grateful. When your practice volume is eroding and you have a tendency to worry, it's difficult to be grateful. But be grateful anyway. Focus less on the no shows and the early dropouts. Instead, lavish your attention and gratitude on those who want what you have. "Birds of a feather flock together." In other words, people who value their health enough to seek care in your practice these days, have friends with similar values. Remember, whatever you apply your energy to, grows-whether it's no shows or health-conscious families who "get" and want chiropractic.
Turns out that marketing your chiropractic practice in difficult times is the same way you market your chiropractic practice in good times. The key is to recognize that marketing is part of running a successful chiropractic practice. These are chiropractic marketing ideas that work, regardless of the economy, the weather or the time of year.
Worse, it's the inclination of many small business people to make a common mistake during a downturn. Cut back. However, this is the very time to use your reserves to increase your profile. It feels counterintuitive, but by increasing your visibility and being in motion (at the precise moment rivals are likely cutting back), means your dip won't be as serious, and you'll be the market leader when things turn around. Which they consistently do.
Here are some simple chiropractic marketing suggestions that can pay big rewards during these challenging times:
Create or strengthen your practice website. If you've disregarded the Internet as a source of new patients, imagining it's merely a fad, or projecting your use of the Internet onto prospective new patients, you're missing the boat. Over a million people each year use the Internet to search for a chiropractor. Can those future new patients find you? Can they learn about you and tour your practice without leaving home? Can they download your admitting paperwork? Can they watch a video detailing your philosophy and practice vision? Start here.
Encounter as many strangers as conceivable. This is the least costly, most efficient form of chiropractic practice marketing. Being "aggressively friendly" as the Disney organization refers to it, is a potent marketing tool. Introduce yourself while waiting in line at the grocery store or movie theater. Frequent more than one dry cleaner, lunch place or oil change service. Handout your business card. (Be sure your website URL and email is included!) Be friendly, curious and show up as a helpful source of information rather| than a determined pickup artist at a singles club. Your objective is to become familiar. Most people have developed a fear of strangers. This sheltered you well as an 8-year old walking home from school, but now it stands in the way of expanding your business.
Deliver more talks, workshops and lectures. So many chiropractors are constrained by the phobia of public speaking that your ability to face the fear and share your vision of health and healing in front of a group of people is a enormous marketing advantage. Whether inside your practice, or giving talks at service clubs, civic organizations, support groups or other events, tell the chiropractic message. Where else are they going to hear it? Public speaking is a learned skill that anyone can acquire. Become a member of a Toastmasters group and learn. As a marketing strategy, public speaking, lay lectures and spinal care classes position you as the expert.
Track the origins of each new patient. It doesn't seem like much, but many chiropractors are especially lax about this important patient feedback. Many, just thankful that someone warmer than room temperature has shown up, fail to collect key information about the motivation behind the patient's visit. "How did you find out about our practice?" "Do you know any of our other practice members?" "Have you visited our website?" Find out what marketing efforts are returning new patients and which ones aren't. Do more of what works.
Contact your inactives. One marketing adage suggests that "the people most likely to come to your practice, are those who have already been." A steady stream of inactives is the mark of a successful practice. As patients have their inevitable relapse, most will want to return to the familiarity of your practice. Yet, many, because they stopped their care with a formal goodbye, feel a bit awkward returning. A postcard, newsletter or some other indication that it's safe to return without an "I-told-you-so" scolding, is all it takes.
Deliver a better adjustment. A review of effective marketing wouldn't be complete without an admonition to deliver the best office visit possible.Is there clutter that steals the serene and peaceful experience you're trying to create for patients? Is your office carpet or furnishing showing their age? Are you 100% present with the patient in the adjusting room? Delivering a more valuable adjustment does not mean that you have to move every bone! Focus with clear intention. Visualize the ripple effects of helping each patient. Be ready to listen, yet reluctant to force feed patients your chiropractic dogma. Show up interested, and you'll be perceived as interesting-a powerful practice marketing technique.
Be grateful. When your numbers are down and you're being seduced into scarcity thinking, it's difficult to be grateful. When your practice volume is eroding and you have a tendency to worry, it's difficult to be grateful. But be grateful anyway. Focus less on the no shows and the early dropouts. Instead, lavish your attention and gratitude on those who want what you have. "Birds of a feather flock together." In other words, people who value their health enough to seek care in your practice these days, have friends with similar values. Remember, whatever you apply your energy to, grows-whether it's no shows or health-conscious families who "get" and want chiropractic.
Turns out that marketing your chiropractic practice in difficult times is the same way you market your chiropractic practice in good times. The key is to recognize that marketing is part of running a successful chiropractic practice. These are chiropractic marketing ideas that work, regardless of the economy, the weather or the time of year.
