David Straight, Author at E-rehab

Fall Prevention – Good PR for Your Physical Therapy Marketing Plan

Fall Prevention is a good PR activity for the physical therapy marketing plan.

Some Quick Fixes to Transform Your Website and Draw More Patients in for Treatment

Search Engine Results - Your Site Number One Why is it that some websites consistently bring in new business, day in and day out, 365 days a year, while others just sit there, lost in cyberspace, not earning a single penny?

It can be very frustrating for owners of physical therapy practices with a non-performing website, particularly if their site has cost them a lot of money and they aren’t seeing a return for that investment.

This article is for any private practice owner who feels they aren’t getting enough new patients from their website and is wondering if it was worth it to start one in the first place.

[note_box]There a few quick changes that you can make to the content to transform your website to give it a better chance of converting visitors into patients. They will make your website come to life and be a true ambassador for your practice and earn you more money.[/note_box]

Ditch the Corporate Jargon and Make Your Site Patient-Friendly

Your website should focus on the needs of your patients and the benefits of your services. Unfortunately, companies are still using too much corporate jargon or tech-speak on their websites. As a result, most websites in the same business genre all look and sound exactly alike. There is little to distinguish a difference between them, so visitors lose interest very quickly, and many will decide not to venture beyond the first page of the site.

Instead of littering your site with jargon, try to engage your patients. Think of words and phrases they are more likely to use when searching for your services. Use those phrases as headers or key links on your site. When visitors see those phrases, they will know at a glance that your website contains the solution to their problem and they will be more inclined to visit your practice for treatment

Design Your Site Around Your Target Patients by Creating a Patient Persona

The best way to engage with visitors and encourage them to come to you for treatment is to write your site’s information with your patients in mind. You need to know that you are reaching the right people who visit your site and the information they find there is relevant for them.

The way to do that effectively is to create a prospect persona. In other words, you want to build up a clear picture of a typical patient who will come to you for treatment and speak to them through your website.

Creating a persona for your ideal customers helps you to target your message to that persona, making your marketing more effective as you create content and information that is relative to the visitors you are attracting.

This is not as daunting as it might initially sound. After all, you have a good idea what kind of person would be in need of treatment or other services from your practice. So, when thinking about content for your site ask yourself:

Who comes to us for treatment? Is there a particular demographic or industry that would benefit most from physical therapy? Start to shape the information on your site to speak directly to people in that industry. Chances are likely you will generally come up with more than one answer. That’s okay. More than one persona is good. As you learn who is most likely to come to you for treatment, your content will be more effective and begin to generate higher quality leads and result in more business for your practice.
Why do these patients come to you for treatment? Put yourself in their shoes: sometimes it’s by choice; other times it’s required. What physical problems will physical therapy solve for them? What challenges or obstacles will it help them resolve to make their life easier? As you think about the answers you come up with, you’ll have a much clearer picture of the challenges your prospects are trying to address and how you can create content for your website that speaks directly to them and motivates them to come to you for treatment.
Where do your patients hang out on the Internet? Where do they spend time looking for information? If you can determine their prime locations, it makes it much easier to reach them with the right message. For example, if your visitors mainly use LinkedIn or YouTube, then it doesn’t make sense to spend a lot of time creating content for Facebook.

Building up a patient profile like this helps you to get a better understanding and clearer picture of who your prospects are. It helps you tailor your website content to talk directly to them instead of trying to reach everybody. By shaping your message and content, you’ll be more effective at providing relevant content your prospective patients can relate to and find useful.

Add Testimonials and Real Case Studies

A great way to engage with your visitors is to create an emotional connection with them by featuring other patients who are just like them. It’s time to ditch those old brochures and generic case studies that are not only incredibly boring but a complete turn off for your visitors.

It adds so much more credibility if your website features some of your satisfied patients speaking in their own words, in their own environment and telling their own stories about how they were able to improve their physical condition through treatment received from your practice.

Testimonials are very easy to obtain. Contact your best patients and ask if they would provide you with one. If they are genuinely happy with the treatment you provide, then very few will say no.

If your client wants to write his own testimonial, that is great, but some clients don’t always know how to put their feelings concisely into a powerful statement. They may find it a chore to think of something to write. So although they might be willing to provide a testimonial, you might have to wait a long time to get it, if you get it at all.

A quick tip is to make it easy for them. Interviewing them on the phone or emailing them a short questionnaire of 3-4 questions can help to focus their thoughts, and then you can write the testimonial yourself.

Clients often appreciate you saving them the time and the effort of having to think about what to write or say.

Your questions need to be very specific, aimed at highlighting the benefits of your services and treatments. Ask them what they feel is the most important benefit they received as a result of treatment or an exercise program.

Here are some samples of questions that you could ask:

How did treatment directly benefit your physical improvements and overall success?
Describe the most outstanding strategy/trait that gave you the best result you were seeking
Was our practice: Easy to work with? Accessible? A Team player? “Went that extra mile”? Great with employees/patients?

Remember:

You need to write the testimonial from the patients’ perspective and really rave about how great you and your services are, and the dramatic results.
Don’t put words into your patients’ mouths. The testimonial needs to accurately reflect their feelings about you, your practice and your services. It needs to be something they are happy to put their names to.
Always allow your patient to review his/her testimonial and sign a consent form before you use it. This consent form can be a simple statement that says: “I understand that my testimonial and name may appear in any marketing or promotional materials created by (your practice’s name). I also understand that I will not receive any compensation for its use as stated and I waive my right to inspect or approve any finished product wherein my testimonial appears.”
While they may not be gaining any monetary benefit for providing you with a testimonial, they will receive other benefits. For example, it will raise the profile of their business by having their name and company name on your website and promotional materials. So it is a win-win for all concerned.
Remember to use testimonials in all your PR strategies, not just on your website. Add them to brochures, ads and sales letters.
If your patient agrees, you could even use audio and video formats on your site so people cannot just hear but they can also see how great people think you are.

Add a Phone Number

A telephone contact is such a basic, fundamental way of communication, yet it is surprising how many small practices make it very difficult for customers to contact them this way. Many websites still don’t include a number at all, or if they do it’s hidden away, making it harder for a potential patient to contact them.

Customer Confidence and Usability

Here are some reasons why your phone number should be on your website:

A phone number is an effective way to get your visitors’ instant feedback or to allow them to speak to you before they make their final decision whether to come to you for treatment or not.
A prominent phone number on a website builds the trust and confidence. The Internet is impersonal enough already for some customers. By adding the evidence of real people out there—like a physical address or a phone number—can make some potential patients feel more comfortable.
A telephone number also offers an additional, convenient way to schedule an appointment and, most importantly, it implies that a live person is ready to assist. Your sales will increase as a result of prominently displaying your telephone number.

These quick fixes will significantly increase business for your practice by encouraging more visitors to come to you for treatment.

[colored_box bgColor=”#788794 ” textColor=”#ffffff”]If you have more serious concerns about your website because it simply isn’t making any money and want somebody to cast a professional eye over it, please don’t hesitate to give E-Rehab a call. Sometimes it can just be a very simple change that makes all of the difference to help your website start converting visitors into patients.

E-Rehab is here to help your private practice grow by attracting new patients, so please give us a call or contact us through our website if you need any additional assistance.[/colored_box]

Effective Physical Therapy Social Media Marketing Campaigns

Fix your physical therapy social media marketing — It’s time for a plan for your physical therapy social media marketing

Some practices might make the mistake of thinking that physical therapy social media marketing is just a case of signing in to Facebook, Tweeting, creating a LinkedIn profile or signing up for Google Plus. Unfortunately, it’s not that easy. To get value from social media, you have to share value. That is the key to successful social media marketing that will help you to build a large following of loyal patients who will spread the word about how great your practice is. Here are 12 golden rules that will help you run an effective social media marketing campaign for your private practice:

1. It Takes Time

Although it is extremely effective, social media is not a quick fix. There are no shortcuts if you want to make your campaigns a success. Like most strategies in marketing, it takes time, commitment, consistency and effort. If you are not willing to invest in social media, it will never bring you the results your practice needs to grow.

[note_box]Social media marketing is a commitment that can’t be avoided or ignored. However, don’t let that put you off because the rewards for your investment and time are well worth it.[/note_box]

Studies show that small businesses and the self-employed are most likely to generate leads, close business deals and find partnerships thanks to their involvement on Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites. Patience is crucial, so don’t give up after a short time. It might not happen overnight, and it does take hard work, but you won’t regret it.

2. Use Images and Multimedia

They say a picture paints a thousand words, and a video even more. Your followers expect to see pictures and video, so make good use of multimedia to engage them and keep them interested in what’s going on at your practice or in general for physical therapy.

3. Nobody Cares What You Had For Breakfast

To get people to listen to you, you have to contribute something of value for them. If your posts are banal and boring, then you will be ignored.

Think about it: Why would anybody take advice from somebody who doesn’t know anything and just posts useless trivia about what they are doing that day?

Quite simply, if you are not saying anything meaningful, then you shouldn’t be saying anything at all. All you’re doing is adding to the “noise” on an already busy platform and you will be ignored.

Keep your posts fresh and consistent. If someone becomes your “friend” on a social network, it’s probably because they want to learn more about your practice and the services you offer.

Always make sure that you can offer valuable, useful advice to your fans and followers. If you position yourself as an expert in the field of physical therapy, they will rely on what you have to say and keep coming back for more information.

4. It Is All About the Quality – Not The Quantity

Don’t think that just because you are adding a dozen posts an hour on Twitter and Facebook that you are accomplishing great things for your practice. Remember, you need to be productive, not noisy.

So instead of being a serial poster, concentrate on adding friendly, concise gems of advice and information instead of constant irrelevant conversation.

5. Keep Up To Date

People get bored very quickly. What’s hot today may be out of date tomorrow, so it’s important to keep up to date with popular trends. If you make the mistake of talking about something that was “so last year,” your comments and opinion will seem outdated and irrelevant.

6. Listen First, and Then Speak

Listening to your audience and showing interest in what they have to say is one of the strongest ways to create engagement and make it a conversation. Don’t just talk and give your opinions without hearing your friends’ feedback.

It is important to remember that your aim is to encourage conversation, so give your followers and fans ample opportunity to air their thoughts. If you are monopolizing the conversation, it just becomes a boring lecture instead of a successful marketing strategy.

7. Make Your Followers Feel Special

If you make your followers and fans feel special and important, they will be much more likely to listen to you and tell their friends about your practice, so don’t ignore them if they try to make a connection with you. A simple re-tweet of one of their comments, or a reply to their post can show that you value their loyalty to your practice.

8. Be Professional

Because of the impulsive nature of social media, there can be times when followers and fans may not always be polite or complimentary. They might disagree with your content, your views or even treatment received from your practice.

But no matter what they say, allow them to speak and then respond in a professional manner.

Remember: Thousands of other people will be reading your comments too, and if they see you ranting at a patient or being disrespectful, it will do a lot of damage both to the reputation of your practice.

9. No Spamming

Nobody wants to read a blatant sales pitch from you every time you post. Doing that will only accomplish one thing, and that is to turn people off what you have to say.

Instead, you will gain more followers (and ultimately more patients) if you keep them engaged, keep them entertained, keep them informed and keep them wanting more.

10. Don’t Lose Focus

It’s very easy to get distracted on social media sites, so you need to keep focused on what you are trying to achieve.

If your social media marketing efforts are not leading to conversations or some sort of productivity for your practice, then you are wasting your time and all of your posts are pointless. Plan in advance what you want each post to achieve and if it doesn’t perform as expected, then make the necessary changes that are needed.

11. Build a Relationship

Successful social media campaigns are all about building trust and a relationship with your followers and patients. This takes time.

If you make the right connection with people, they will respond favorably to you, but it’s important to remember your fans and followers are not required to listen to everything you say.

They certainly don’t owe you anything just because they happen to follow you. Just like in the real world, you earn their trust and respect over a period of time.

12. Don’t spread yourself too thinly

Don’t be tempted to join too many groups, as this will hamper your marketing efforts. Spreading yourself too thinly will harm your campaigns, so always limit the groups you participate in to just a small number that you can easily monitor and contribute to.

[colored_box bgColor=”#788794″ textColor=”#ffffff” ]P.S. Remember to have fun.

Social media marketing is meant to be fun, so if you are not enjoying yourself then you are not doing it right. Social interaction should be enjoyable and purposeful. If it is a chore and too much like hard work, then you need to adjust how you are doing it.

Keeping these pointers in mind in your social media marketing approach could make a big difference and help your private practice grow by bringing in new patients.[/colored_box]

5 Ways to Improve Facebook for Physical Therapy Practices

Facebook for Physical Therapy

Are you disappointed about the lack of success you’re having with Facebook? Perhaps you only have a few people liking your page or nobody is talking about your practice.

If your Facebook activity leaves much to be desired, don’t get disheartened.

It takes time to build and grow a loyal following of fans and to create a community. Social media marketing takes patience and long-term thinking, but the investment in time and effort certainly pays off when it is done well. That is why so many small physical therapy practices are willing to invest in marketing on social media sites such as Facebook: because they see great rewards from it.

Here are 5 main reasons why your Facebook campaigns may not be working for you and how you can make them right:

1. You Don’t Have a Social Media Strategy

Some private practices set up a Facebook page because they know their patients expect them to have one or because their competitors have one. But when asked what the goal of their Facebook page is, they don’t really have a clue. So, let’s think about your Facebook page for a moment:

Do you want to get more likes?
Do you want your Facebook presence to increase awareness about your practice and the services you offer?
Do you want to increase sales?

Your reasons for having a Facebook page could be one, two or all three reasons, but whatever you want to achieve, you need to have a concise goal and plan of action. Knowing what you want to achieve will help you to determine what tools and marketing strategies you need to use in order to make it work.

2. You Don’t Update Your Content Often Enough

After the initial novelty of having a Facebook page wears off, many small practices sadly neglect them a month or two down the line. Then, because they aren’t seeing any results from Facebook, they claim that it doesn’t work.

It’s important to remember the only reason anybody would ever want to visit your Facebook page is because of the content. Simply put, if you don’t post anything, then nobody will bother to visit your page. Even if the content you posted a few days, weeks or months ago was fantastic, you can’t afford to rest on your laurels. We live in a fast-paced world where information quickly becomes outdated or people just move on to the next big thing, so it’s vital that you post often. But how often? At the very least, it should be once a day, but four or five times a day would be better. Follow some of the big companies and study how they engage their followers by adding quick pithy posts that grab the attention and encourage commenting.

3. Yawn…Your Posts Are So Boring!

If you look at the posts big companies and savvy business owners add to their pages, their content is light-hearted and fun. It entertains their followers so they keep coming back for more. They give away coupons, have contests and engage their fans. That is the secret: providing content your followers want to read. When people visit your page, they don’t want to read sales promotions or posts all about you. It needs to be fun and interesting.

So as the owner of a private physical therapy practice you could:

Post videos of patients who were satisfied with the treatment they received
Blog about important physical therapy news to educate patients
Describe some of the most common treatments offered by your practice; you can include video of some of these treatments too
Introduce your staff in a fun way to help patients better connect with them
Include pictures or videos showing people around your practice

The list is endless but you can see how you need to make the content relevant to your practice, but at the same time interesting enough to engage with your followers and get them talking about you.

4. It is all text and you don’t include photos or graphics

Visual content is essential on Facebook. Visitors literally only have a minute or so to visit your page, so if you are posting long messages people are not going to read them, no matter how interesting or informative they might be.

[note_box]To be successful on Facebook it will be worth your while to invest in posting your own good quality pictures that attract attention. These can be about your practice or service, so include photos of your premises, your staff, and the results of treatment. You can even visit sites like Pinterest and re-pin images that you find to your Facebook page. Again, look at how other companies use images for inspiration.[/note_box]

5. Your Facebook Page is Anonymous and Your Brand is Invisible

Facebook is extremely popular. It enables you to reach a huge worldwide audience and it would be a crime to not use it to its full potential by not clearly branding your page.

By having a clearly branded page and addressing the previous four issues, your Facebook campaign will be far more successful and you will increase your chances of attracting more loyal patients over time.

If you need help and want to learn more about how to use Facebook to your full advantage so that you too can bring in more patients on a regular basis, contact us at E-Rehab so we can share some additional Facebook tactics with you and help you create a laser targeted branded page.

This will help your practice engage more with a wider target audience and encourage them to spend more time on your profile. Call us for some exciting advice that will transform your online presence and attract extra patients to help your practice grow.

13 Easy Ways to Improve Physical Therapy Websites and Attract More Visitors

Some of the private practice clients we speak to have spent huge amounts of money on their websites, but are still unhappy with the results. The majority don’t do anything about it, as they think it is going to incur more huge expenses and make the assumption that having a better website actually means having to start creating a brand new website from scratch.

In some cases that might be true, but from our experience, just a couple of tweaks here and there are enough to make the difference between a site being successful or not.
If your concerned that your physical therapy practice’s website isn’t attracting enough visitors and new patients, here’s a list of our top 13 quick fixes that have converted non-performing websites into 24-hour sales machines:

1) Have a Call to Action on Every Page

Every single page on your website needs to be working for you by making every visitor take some sort of action. For example, you might want them to give you a call, leave a testimonial about successful therapy, watch a video or leave a comment.

Whatever it is, make sure you tell them what it is you want them to do. Make it easy for them. The last thing you want is for them to be wondering what to do. Don’t assume that they know what to do, even if you think it’s perfectly obvious. Tell them instead.

2) Put Your Phone Number on Every Page

Although this might seem like common sense, it is surprising to see how many companies bury their phone number deep within a site, making it hard for potential customers to contact them.

[note_box]In a lot of cases, visitors have actually come to the site to look for your phone number, so don’t make them hunt for it. Putting it at the top right hand corner is best, but you can also put it in the footer of your site. Remember, patients are visiting your website to find you, contact you, and get directions to your office. Make your contact information easy to find. [/note_box]

3) Add an ‘About Us’ Page

“About Us” pages often help customers better decide who you are and whether or not they want to take their business to your practice.

Whether they are a businessperson or a consumer, when a person selects a company to do business with, they like to know a bit about their background, so don’t be afraid to give your visitors a brief history that will help them better understand what your practice is all about.

NOTE: The Staff page and About Us page serve different functions. On the staff page, adding photographs of you and your team with short bios about them, helps you and your clinicians become real people, not just a faceless practice.

Listing your experience and credentials is important, but also engage your visitors, tell them a bit about your hobbies, your family life and things you like to do for fun. Letting the visitor see the real you builds their confidence and trust when doing business with you.

4) Add Your Opening-Closing Hours

There is no such thing as typical opening hours these days, so you need to tell your visitors when you are available.

Making your business hours known is very helpful to patients and can solve their frustration if they visit or ring you when you are not open.

5) Don’t be Afraid to Use Big Bold Images

Images speak louder than words. The Internet is very visual and people respond well to images, so include images on your site that a potential patient will engage with.

You don’t have to spend a fortune on fancy graphics. Simply take pictures of your team in action performing therapy on other patients, shots of your local area, your premises, recent community or team events you all have participated in.

All of these things help to engage your patients and lets them know more about you and your practice.

6) Make Your Site Mobile-friendly

Mobile is huge. Thirty percent of your visitors are using smart phones and with over 200 million in use in the States today, more and more people will be visiting your site via their smart phone or tablet.

You need to make sure visiting your site on a mobile device is an outstanding experience. Sites that are not optimized to be seen on tiny screens can be frustratingly difficult to navigate around for your potential patients. They won’t persevere, they will simply move to another site.

There are a number of ways to make your site mobile-friendly and we will be happy to give you advice on that.

7) Add Success Stories

Your existing patients are a huge asset to your practice. They can provide real-life case studies and testimonials that will inform potential new patients of how successful their treatment was, how you saved them time and money or how knowledgeable and efficient your staff is.

How do you get testimonials? Just ask right after you receive a compliment. Most patients will be more than happy to oblige if you ask them.

8) Match Your Company Branding Always!

For continuity and to help create instant brand awareness ensure your online presence matches your bricks and mortar business. It helps patients to both recognize your practice and to remember you.

9) Take Off the Music

Do you enjoy listening to elevator music? Probably not. Neither do your patients. Never put music on your website. It isn’t relaxing or funny. It’s just annoying. Just because you can do it, doesn’t mean that you should.

Remove anything that might appear annoying to your customers (music, flashing images, etc.) or anything that might distract them from doing what you want them to do: navigate your website, get a good impression of your practice, and hopefully commit their business to you.

10) It’s Time to Get Social

Have you embraced social media yet? Your patients sure have. They interact with thousands of people on the Internet all the time and are very influenced by it. People listen to other people’s recommendations and are interested in their like and dislikes.

If you haven’t already done so, it’s time your business went social. Get started with a Facebook page or a Twitter account. Focus marketing on that platform, and then move on to another network.

We know it can be quite daunting, but we have some great tips for you, so please contact us at E-Rehab or read other blog posts on the subject if you want to know how and where to get started.

11) Be an Authority Website – Add a Physical Therapy Library and More

If you want to be known as an authority site in physical therapy, add some resources to your site that show potential patients how well-versed you are in the field.

These resources could be reports, research papers, infographics, helpful physical therapy website links, videos and more. They all add credibility and will encourage visitors to buy from you rather than from a competitor.

12) Know Your Site’s Main Purpose

So many businesses forget about this. All they know is they need a website, so they just slap one up without thinking about who the target audience is, how they will use the site, and what their objectives are when visiting your website.

Ask yourself: Who will visit your website? Why do you have/want a website? What do you want visitors on your site to do?

Spend some time thinking about your answers, then make it your top priority to see that your website accomplishes that goal.

NOTE: Avoid putting your mission on your home page. Put some additional thought into it.

13) Start Again from Scratch

While starting again is not ideal because it takes a lot of time, money and resources, sometimes a site is so badly designed that you have no other choice.

For example, if you have an old site that was set up in the 90’s, it probably looks old and dated by now. Starting again with brand new technology and a new fresh design, instead of trying to patch up the old site, could be a smart move and pay for itself many times over.

Even if you have zero tech skills, you can still determine your site’s purpose and what you want it to do. Sketch out a quick design, along with a plan of what you would like the site to accomplish, then hire a team of professionals who can make it happen.

[colored_box variation=”steelblue”]

Take Home Message: Hire a Professional

The Internet has changed so much in recent years. What worked well five or 10 years ago doesn’t work now.

If you have been looking after your site yourself, or used an unprofessional friend or relative to create your site, it may well be worth calling on our professional services at E-Rehab to come in on the project. Not only will we bring in fresh new designs, but we’ll also share our experiences, expertise and creativity to improve your website. That is what we do. Not only can we give your site a fresh new look, more importantly, we share our marketing skills to make sure your site converts customers 24 hours a day.

Even just applying one or more of the tips here will have a significant effect on your site and increase your business profits. Simply pick a couple that you can identify with and make the changes to your site.

Don’t forget that at E-Rehab we are always here if you want any website or marketing advice, and we help take physical therapy websites and physical therapy private practice to the next level.[/colored_box]

Get Patients to Read Your Physical Therapy Newsletters

Smart Phones Have Transformed the Way We Communicate

If you haven’t already noticed by now, smart phones and tablets are drastically changing the way that we interact with the world. Currently, 9 out of 10 new phones being sold is a smart phone, and if you happen to one of the minority that doesn’t have one at the moment, chances are likely within the next 12 months your contract will expire, and the next phone get will likely be a smart phone.

Taking note of this fact and capitalizing on it can change the way you communicate with your patients, and if it’s focused on carefully, can actually improve your web presence and improve the business of your practice.

When It Comes to Physical Therapy Newsletters, a Typical Viewer is a Smart Phone User

To illustrate how important communication with your patients is, try and picture an average smart phone user:

Rachel is in her mid-thirties and she has owned a smart phone for 8 months. She uses it every day for things like changing her Facebook status and to Tweet about the movie she saw the evening before. She will check the weather, text her friends, watch a funny YouTube clip, read her e-mails and take a photograph, all while she drops off the kids to school, picks up a latte, walks to the office, and buys her lunch.

There is so much information on Rachel’s smart phone fighting for her attention. In fact, there is so much competition that nothing wins her undivided attention for long. So if you want your message to grab her attention, you need to use smart tactics.

The rules have dramatically changed and you need to know them in order to win and get someone like Rachel to visit your practice. Here are some winning tactics to help you to do that:

Winning Tactic Number One:

Come Up With a Strong or Catchy Pre-header
When Rachel receives your e-mail on her smart phone, her eyes will quickly scan her inbox and she is going to see three things right away. The first is who the email is from (you), the second is the subject line and the third thing she is going to see is your pre-header. The pre-header is the first few lines of your e-mail, and it’s this section that will determine whether or not Rachel is going to open your e-mail or not. In fact, if it doesn’t grab her attention or interest her, she might even decide to delete it without opening it.

Your goal is to get Rachel to open your e-mail based on what she reads in your pre-header. To achieve this, you need to come up with something catchy and interesting. It doesn’t have to be cute or too clever for its own good, but it should be inviting. It should make Rachel want to open up the e-mail to see what else you have to say.

Winning Tactic Number Two:

Make Sure it Looks good on Rachel’s Smart Phone
Your e-mails are not going to look the same on everybody’s smart phone. In fact when Rachel opens up the e-mail, she might find that the image in your e-mail has not loaded properly, or you have used a double columned newsletter format that is difficult to navigate on her phone because it has been shrunk to fit on to her screen. Perhaps you put three links in your email and they have stacked one on top of the other, making the middle one impossible to open. This can be frustrating to someone like Rachel.

You don’t want Rachel to encounter any of these problems, so the best way to avoid them is to check what your e-mail will look like on a variety of mobile devices beforehand. Your web site designer or offline consultant will know how to do this, and will provide demo versions for different mobile devices. This will ensure that your e-mails are understandable, readable and clickable, no matter what screen Rachel uses.

Winning Tactic Number Three:

Make it Short, Sweet and Easy to Share
Rachel never stops. She is always on the go. This means she won’t have time to read your e-mail if it is the same length as War and Peace. You need to keep your e-mails short and sweet. The best way to do this is have a tightly focussed call to action in the e-mail that makes it easy for Rachel to respond to. Briefly state a bit about your practice and how you can be of service to Rachel if she happens to have an injury or has been experiencing any nagging pain that she’d like to get checked out.

Remember, Rachel, like so many of your other potential patients, is part of a highly connected network of people who are all within a click of her phone. She might even be one of those who is addicted to Facebook and Twitter and posts regularly, which can be of a great benefit to your practice.

By reaching Rachel with your mobile marketing campaign, you can reach all of her friends and family too, but only if you know how to play the game and employ the tactics revealed here. Hone in on your e-mail marketing skills, target smart phone users, and you’ll be sure to bring in more business to your private practice.

Winning Tactic Number Four:

Make it Transactional
Think about how you can use email to complete something that will improve your customer service. Here’s how we approach it. The E-rehab.com Physical Therapy Newsletter System is designed to help educate and improve the customer experience. Newsletter 1 is a welcome message with links to downloads and patient education. Newsletter 2 is a thank you message and addresses some of the most common concerns patients have with billing and scheduling. Newsletter 3 can be a survey to gather customer feedback. Newsletter 4 and beyond helps our clients stay in touch with their customers/patients.

Make sure you take advantage of rich media as well. For example, provide them with a high-quality video that enables social shares, offers great interactivity, and the make sure the message can be re-purposed across multiple marketing platforms like G+, Facebook and Twitter.

[note_box]The popularity of smart phones and tablets means that we rarely read our e-mails on our desktop or laptop computers anymore. Instead, e-mails are usually read right at our fingertips due to the convenience of a smart phone.[/note_box]

Physical Therapy Marketing – Is Yelp Advertising Worth It?

Yelp – is it worth it?

I get calls from my clients almost every week – “These Yelp sales people are hammering me,” is what I heard yesterday. They share numbers that aren’t likely to be accurate (e.g., number of leads & page views) and try to convince them them they are missing out.

I thought I would share my perspective on their advertising program.

Here’s what Yelp offered one of my PT clients:

“We offer 6 programs that vary based on how aggressively you want to advertise your business on Yelp. All packages include the mentioned* features and are based on an annual agreement.

Ultra Premium- $2,200/mo – includes 6,500 targeted ads per month
Super Premium- $1,600/mo – includes 4,650 targeted ads per month
Premium- $1,050/mo – includes 3,000 targeted ads per month
Standard- $800/mo – includes 2,100 targeted ads per month
Basic- $550/mo – includes 1,200 targeted ads per month
Intro- $350/mo – includes 500 targeted ads per month

*Mentioned features include: video production, video hosting, picture slideshow, Call to Action button, competitors ad removal, tracking in your business owners account, and an Account Manager.”
[note_box] Most of these things aren’t clear.

Video production – who produces the content for the video? Who owns the video? Can the video be used on your website?
Call to action button – what is that?
Competitor ad removal – does that mean that others that are advertising on Yelp, will be removed? I bet not.
Tracking – how is this accomplished to demonstrate if a patient truly came into the practice?

These are not easy questions to answer.

[/note_box]

Will Yelp Pay for Itself…Probably Not

Financially, there are 3 ways that I see you can analyze this opportunity and see if it makes sense for you.

A. Straight Profit and Loss Analysis

Remember, you have costs to treat/run your business (i.e,. salary & overhead) for every patient and what you have left over is profit of course.
Each one of you is different but the typical profit on a patient case is 10-20% and average revenue per patient about $800 (so, profit per patient case is $80).
If you aren’t getting a minimum of 4 patients from your Yelp advertising, you are losing money.

Conclusion: No one I have spoken with (well over PT practice owners about this) has used Yelp’s paid advertising and made a profit. Note: 1-3 patient per month, for most PT clinics, even if they advertise at the cheapest level, will not result in a break even ROI.

B. Lifetime Market Value Analysis

In this analysis you take into account the number of patients (generated from your advertising campaign) that will return when calculating ROI.
For example. Let’s say you spent $550/mo on Yelp ads (the basic package noted above). You have a year contract as well so your annual expense is $6600. Applying the rationale from Straight Profit and Loss Analysis, you need to generate at least $6600 in new patient revenue to break even.
Let’s say you generate 5 patients/mo (this is very aggressive and unlikely but let’s use this number). That is 60 patients per year. Your profit is $80/patient and your ROI from your Yelp advertising is 60 x $80 or $4800.
Now, let’s consider that 30% of those patients will come back (that’s 18 total over the course of the year). The number of new patients you generated from your Yelp campaign might be considered to be 60+18 returning or 78.
Now multiply 78 x $80 and you get $6240 of profit.
You still don’t break even.

Obviously, this analysis depends on a number of factors. The total number of patients you get per month, your profit margin, and the percentage of patients that return to you (i.e., Lifetime Market Value of your patient).

Conclusion: Looking at ROI over the long haul. This is a reasonable way to analyze your ROI for an ad campaign but your ROI is recovered over a longer period of time (i.e., the time it takes for the patients to come back a second time, or even a third time).

C. Gross Revenue Out and In Model

In this analysis of your campaign spend, you aren’t concerned about profit. Rather, your objective is just to cover your costs, pay your salary, your staff and your overhead. In other words, you want to keep your doors open It looks something like this.

You generate 60 patients (5 per month) in one year from your Yelp advertising at a cost of $6600.
Your gross income generated from the advertising campaign is 60 new patients created from Yelp ads x $800 of revenue/case = $48,000 of gross revenue from Yelp Ads.
Assuming a 10% profit per case, your profit is $4800 (i.e., 10% of $48,000 gross revenue).
Your cost to do the Yelp ads, again is $6600.
Your total $4800 in profit – $6600 in Yelp ad costs = ($1800) loss.

NOTE: if you consider Lifetime market value (i.e., your ads generated 78 patients), your profit is $6240-$6600 in ad costs and you still lose $360.

Conclusion: If you are more interested in getting people in the door, then this might be a way to analyze your advertising costs. In the end, you are still losing money and most practices can’t afford to do that anymore.

Things to Consider

These analyses heavily depend on the number of patients you get from the Yelp advertising. Five new patients per month, that would have NOT come to you anyway, is a large number. I don’t think this is possible except in the largest markets like San Francisco and NYC.

Opportunity Costs: Finally, you need to ask yourself, if I am committing to spend this kind of money (i.e., $350/mo+) on marketing, is there a better use of this money doing something else? For example, Google Ads, Doctor Lunches, Novelty Items like shirts, postcards mailing, patient follow up campaigns, etc., etc. I think there might be some better options. What do you think?

[colored_box variation=”deepblue”]Take Home Message: I don’t believe, based on the input of many others that have advertised, and the financial analysis, that Yelp advertising is a good use of your dollars. However, you have to plug in your own values (percentage of profit margin/case, number of patients you get from Yelp ads, lifetime market value, and the number of months you are committing to run the Yelp ads) to arrive at your own conclusions.[/colored_box]

Please share your thoughts too and help your colleagues and help your colleagues make good decisions about how they spend their ad dollars.

How to Use Social Media for Your Physical Therapy Practice

Simplicity of Technology Breeds More Competition

More and more physical therapy practices these days are joining the online revolution and giving their business an online presence. On the one hand, technology has made it so much easier to accomplish this. Almost anybody with virtually no technical skills can take their business online.

However, on the other hand, with so many practices going online, the level of competition is getting tougher as each day goes by.

As a private practice, you have a tough challenge ahead of you, as you need to get yourself noticed, build your online brand and attract new patients to bring in more business.

The good news is that it isn’t all an uphill struggle.

There are so many online marketing strategies that you could use to promote your practice, but one of the best marketing methods is the use of social media. Small businesses and large-scale corporations alike are using social media to promote their products and services.

How to Use Social Media for Your Physical Therapy Practice

With the use of social media, you will have that much-needed leverage to not only stay in the game, but also positively flourish and enjoy huge profits that you wouldn’t have had if without the focus on an online presence.

This is great news for businesses and gives you the perfect platform to promote your practice. If you’re looking for an affordable means of marketing your practice, then social media is definitely the direction you need to go.

With so many different platforms to choose from, you will be able to find the perfect one that suits your practice and start reaping the rewards very quickly, compared to the traditional means of marketing.

A Brief Overview of Social Media Marketing

When it comes to reaching a wider target audience, the numerous social media sites on offer will not let you down. The most popular social media networking sites have millions of active users all around the world.

You will have a much better overall Internet marketing strategy if you include social media as part of your marketing campaign. With it, you’ll be able to easily promote and market your company, as well as the products and services you are offering.

It’s an incredibly effective method of gaining better company branding. In addition, it is easily one of the most affordable online marketing strategies, and allows you to share content, photos and video sharing that will engage with your customers and fans which will then, in turn increase your web traffic, online and presence and sales.

Benefits of Social Media Marketing

[note_box]There are several things that you can do with social media marketing that will help your practice by providing you with various benefits such as:

• Better company brand recognition
• Increase the public’s awareness about the services and treatments you offer
• Interact, socialize and build a stronger relationship with your patients
• Gain new patients while also retaining existing ones
• Provide excellent customer service in an effective way[/note_box]

Here are some other reasons why your practice should be involved in social media marketing:

It Helps You Establish the Identity of Your Company. You can use this to your advantage and make your services more recognizable to the public. With social media, you can create the buzz for your practice and attract lots of new patients.

You Get More Exposure. Almost all of the social media sites have a ‘share’ feature, which means that your fans and followers can help spread the word about your services by sharing your posts and content with other people that they know. Testimonials such as a successful recovery from an injury are a great way to get the word out as well, and can be easily shared on social media.

Great for Feedback. Social media marketing quickly allows you to get to know what other people are saying about your practice and how they feel about the treatment you provide. This feedback is invaluable because you will be given the opportunity to improve your services when needed and adjust them to better suit the needs of your patients. You will also be able to answer any questions that your patients might have in a professional, timely and interactive manner. This will help you to attract even more potential patients.

Enjoy Higher Search Engine Ranking. By making good use of social media marketing, not only will you get all of the great benefits mentioned above, but your website will also have higher search engine ranking. Sites like Google are rewarding websites who have a good social medial reputation. If your practice is active on these sites, then your website could get a much higher ranking in the search engines.

General Strategy for Super Social Media Marketing

Despite its many advantages, some small businesses are daunted by the prospect of promoting their businesses on social media sites. It is fast-paced and constantly changing. Don’t let that put you off, as these traits can actually work to your advantage.

Here are some tips that will help give you a solid foundation in social media:

Figure Out Which Platform Will Work Best for Your Practice:

Unless you happen to have unlimited resources at your disposal to set up an advertising campaign on every social media platform available, chances are you will just want to focus on one or two sites instead.

In fact, depending on your practice, not every social media site is going to suit your marketing, your audience or what you are trying to achieve.

For example:

For a business heavily reliant on SEO, then Google+ and blogging might be the way to go.

If your practice is trying to get involved with community building, then Facebook, blogging and Twitter will be better for you.

If you’re undecided which platform to use, the best advice when you are first starting off is to experiment with the social media platform that you think will work best for your practice, and then measure the progress, or lack thereof. If you are not getting the results you expected, then you can refocus on other platforms that might suit your practice better.

Once you are established and comfortable on, for example, a Facebook, Twitter and YouTube account, you can then start thinking about expanding on to Pinterest or Instagram. Use whatever is best for you and your practice.

If expanding doesn’t work or is too much for you, then concentrate all of your efforts on the social media network that works best for your practice. You don’t want to run the risk of spreading yourself too thin and becoming a jack-of-all-trades but master of none. Trying to be active on too many sites will only drain you of time and resources and you won’t achieve what you wanted to from social media marketing.

Define and Access Your Goals

Know in advance what you want to achieve from your social media marketing. Whether it is brand awareness, more sales or customer loyalty, stick to one main goal at a time. For example, your goal might be; “I want to increase traffic to my website by 15% in the next three months”. During those months, evaluate how your marketing is going and make the changes needed in order to reach the goal.

Test, Tweak, Re-test and Repeat

It is unlikely that you are going to get everything right on your first attempt at social media marketing.

With that in mind, don’t be afraid to experiment. Test the waters with new ideas, tweak old ones and repeat what works for you. It is imperative that you evaluate your progress with social media marketing regularly and brainstorm ideas on how you can improve your ongoing marketing campaign.

Slow and Steady Wins the Race

Social media success doesn’t happen overnight. Just like in real life, friendships and bonds between you and your patients can take a long time to build. Keep working at getting results. So many small businesses dive into social media marketing with so much enthusiasm, only to give up not long afterwards because they didn’t have the 1.5 million Facebook fans and a ton of sales in their first few weeks like they imagined. Be patient. It takes a lot of time and dedication but they rewards are huge once it happens.

Don’t Over-promote: Build Relationships

We can’t overemphasis this point enough: the vast majority of social media users do not visit Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the like to be given the hard sell by companies.

Your job is to build trusting and loyal relationships on the social media sites by being friendly, sharing great content, helping people and earning their trust. Just like in the real world, social media followers will relate to a name and reputation that they can trust. All of this hard work will build a positive image around your practice’s name and will soon convert into more business.

The Rule of Thirds

An easy way to balance out your social media output is to think of the rule of thirds: For one third of your time, share your own content, another third with material related in topic but from another source, and then interact with your patients and help them out on a one-to-one basis for the final third of your time.

Engage With Your Fans…But Do It the Right Way

One of the biggest traps that many businesses fall into is that of posting certain kinds of posts as bait to encourage likes and comments. The most obvious examples are; “Fill in the blank” and “Click LIKE if you think X is X…” and so on. While these are great for occasional use, they do not give you a very accurate overview of fans and customers who are really engaged with your content and how successful your efforts really are. Anybody can post an image of a cute puppy to get ‘likes’ but what real impact does it have on your fans opinion of your brand?

Create a Content Calendar

Translate your social media policy ideas into concrete steps for action. An excellent way to do this is by creating a content calendar that can be edited as time goes by. Plan what content you are going to put on your social media site and when.

Your Social media Marketing is Important, So Be Careful Who You Assign to Run It

You get what you pay for, and the cost to your practice could be more detrimental to your business than positive. Remember, thousands, even millions of people could be watching how your business presents itself online. You need to watch over it and make sure that the right message is getting out there.

Put Your Audience First

Think about your target audiences needs, wants and challenges. Use market research to find out where your social media efforts are best targeted.

Spend Time Listening and Observing

One of the most powerful planning tactics for social media marketing is to watch and listen to what people are saying about your practice and the physical therapy industry. Use this information to tailor your approach as time goes on.

Never Attack Your Competitors

Unless you want to damage your brand considerably, never attack your competitors maliciously on social media sites. Instead use social media to communicate and sell better than them.

Have Fun

As mentioned earlier, social media is all about building relationships. Be consistent, present, real and genuine in all of your communication if you want to encourage genuine interaction with patients on a slow and steady path to creating long-lasting relationships.

[colored_box variation=”steelblue”]Social media marketing has become an indispensable tool for local businesses just like your own private physical therapy practice. It gives you the perfect opportunity to build relationships, engage with customers and increase sales like never before.

Feel free to contact us at E-Rehab for expert advice and support in your online marketing campaigns. We will be glad to help.[/colored_box]

Physical Therapy Marketing with Instagram

Instagram and physical therapy marketing

Though the first image that might come to your mind with any mention of Instagram could be the constant flow of filtered personal pictures sent between so many with no real objective in mind. Physical Therapy Marketing with Instagram can also be a powerful tool if you are trying to reach a younger audience. When used properly, the extremely popular and successful photo sharing application has the capability to increase your practice’s exposure, increase your name recognition and increase demand for the physical therapy services you provide.

[note_box]With over 150 million users it is no wonder that so many businesses are turning to Instagram to engage consumers and boost their brands. Recent statistics on Mashable.com revealed that 40% of the top 1000 videos on Instagram are from big brands. MTV, Starbucks and TopShop are regularly featured in the top 10 brands using Instagram.[/note_box]

They invest time and money into marketing on Instagram because its been proven to work. To take full advantage of the power of Instagram and to bring in more patients for your physical therapy practice, sign up for the application and follow these six tips:

1. Show Your Services in Creative Ways

Instagram has so many advantages and one of them is to be able to promote window-shopping by using Instagram to show off a collection of your services.

You don’t even need to be an expert photographer as the application already comes with filters and editing options that help you to be very creative. It is so easy to add your style to your photos. This will help grab the attention of users to your photo.

Photos attract users but it is the conversations that engage them. You want your pictures to be good enough to provoke a good reaction from your followers so that they ‘like’ the photos and add their positive comments. It is even better if they decide to share the photo on other social media platforms as well.

Instead of just writing out the different types of services you provide, add a picture or a sequence of images to better illustrate these services in action to give prospective patients a better idea how they work. Visualizing the treatment and seeing how things work inside a practice will always be a more attractive option to patients than reading form a list.

2. Post Behind-the-Scenes Photos of Your Practice

You can take a shot of almost anything and share it on Instagram. A great suggestion is to post behind-the-scenes photos of your practice, such as a patient receiving treatment.

You will find that your followers really like these kind of photos and will be keen to ‘like’ and comment on them. Why? Because on the whole, we are a curious breed and it’s interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes of any business. Let your patients and followers see what you are doing to provide them with the best offers and service.

3. Show What Your Services and Treatments Can Do

A good way to increase demand for your services and treatments is to show patients ways how they can benefit from them. Engage your followers by inviting them to comment and let you know what they think of the work being done by your practice. You can create an Instagram contest, which is a very effective way of guaranteeing their involvement and spreading the word. For example, ask users to share photos of them after recovering from an injury as a result of treatment from your practice.

4. Update Followers on Your Latest News and Developments

What better way to get the word out about your practice than using Instagram to share the latest activities and events that are happening. Post photos of new staff members, services offered, local news or anything else that you think might interest patients.

To get even more publicity don’t forget to use popular hashtags like #physical therapy, #back pain rehab or #dry needling, etc. This will make it much easier for people who are not following you on Instagram to find out about your offers.

5. Introduce your Employees

Introducing your employees to your followers on Instagram will bring a human touch to your brand and will increase customer loyalty even more.

Use the caption box to share a little bit about your employee such as their role within the company or what their hobby is.

You can spread these posts out and make spotlighting a member of staff a weekly feature. Include all departments within your company and put a human face to your brand. Your followers will love you for it.

6. Expand and Grow Your Audience

You don’t need to confine your followers to Instagram. Why not connect your Instagram account to other social media networks and use relevant hashtags (e.g. #yourbrandname ) to make it easier for people to find your account.

Your followers will love it and reward you with their loyalty if you respond to their comments. You can encourage dialogue by asking questions in your photo caption to engage them.

Your goal is to make them want to interact with you and make some sort of positive response whether it be a comment or simply a ‘like’.

Ideas for Physical Therapy Inbound Marketing

After the trite (but probably necessary) statements on your website, like we are the best, 1 on 1, individualized, hands-on, etc. , what content should you include on your website that will really give you a competitive advantage? Try this infographic on for size for some ideas about physical therapy inbound marketing.