As a “busy” Physical Therapy clinic owner… it’s tempting to think that social media is just one of those things that would be a waste of your valuable time and that you can keep on overlooking…
But the reality is, Social Media now represents one of your best chances of acquiring new patients and moving your practice away from relying upon referrals from doctors – if you know how to do it!
What’s more, you don’t even need to be that skilled at marketing to make it work for you and it’s not going to cost you that much time either – which means you can keep up with the running of your practice and still grow a following of people in your town who will instantly think of you, when they or their friends or family need to see a PT.
We’ve bunched together the 5 essentials to get you off on a quick start.
When you’re brand new to the world of social media it can feel overwhelming. .
Everyone makes it sound so easy… tweet this, tweet that, post a few times on Facebook and LinkedIn and you’re sorted.
Not so fast…
In reality, it’s not as easy as simply posting a few things here and there, even though I’m sure you really wish it was! As with anything, there’s always a quicker and more effective way to do it, you just need to be shown how.
And to get you quickly up to speed… here on in, let me show you a solid strategy to copy and paste from:
In this article you’ll discover:
- Why, if you’re a small town clinic owner, you REALLY don’t need to worry about being on every single social media network – I’ll tell you the best ones!
- How to pick the people most likely to hand over their COPAY with less resistance… why waste your time on the people who don’t value what you do!
- How to automate the whole of your social media – meaning more time for spending at home with the family while your audience (and interest in YOU) continues to build!
Let’s dive in!
Step #1: Start NOW!
OK…you’re likely already confused about where to get started, so what’s the no.1 best thing to do?
Make a Start NOW!…
Don’t worry about doing too much too soon – all that will lead to is overwhelm and loss of your valuable time!
Yes there’s a looong list of social media networks out there, but there’s definitely no need to set up a profile on ALL of them, in fact there’s no need to set yourself up on the top 4 even.
All you need to do is pick 1 or 2 (maximum of 3), to invest your time in. Each network does have a learning curve, but none will be so complex that you’d need to be a social media Einstein to grasp the basics.
The key question is – Which social media networks make the most sense for you?
To help you decide I’ll tell you where we look for new patients on social media at my own clinic — Paul Gough Physio Rooms…Facebook and Twitter are our main social networks.
To help you find your ideal clients, I’d recommend you look here ^
More on why you should set yourself up on those in step #2
Tip: Choose just 1-2 social media networks to get started on – don’t spread yourself thin.
Step #2: Define Your Audience
Now you’ve decided what networks you’re going to stick with (Twitter and Facebook ;-)), you need to define your audience.
Ask yourself this – Who is YOUR perfect client?
All great marketing efforts begin with establishing the audience you want to target. When it comes to prospects for your PT business, it’s crucial to look at these 3 things:
1: Demographics (the who)
Grab a pen and paper and profile your best current patients (or the clients you want to have). – – – Are the majority male, female, or an even number of both?
– What’s their age range? 40-60 years?
2: Geographics (the where)
On that same piece of paper write down
– Where do they live?
– What part of town?
– What’s their zip or postal code?
3: Psychographics (the why)
Why are they coming to you? (Hint: you know there’s way more to it than just back pain).
Understand the emotional driver of your prospect at the time they are coming to you, and you’ve defined your point of connection and engagement.
Back to step #1 and why Facebook and Twitter are your go-to places, do you think the average 60 year old is on Instagram? Of course not.
The foundation of getting started is to understand who your audience is, and if the average PT client is in their 50’s, Facebook and Twitter are good places to be.
Tip: Profile your ideal patient — the who, where and why before using social media
Step #3: Build A Content Bank
Write, write, write!
Here’s where most businesses fail. They don’t invest time in building a content bank full of value.
You’ve got a blog on your website right? (Well if not I suggest you do!)
Now that you understand your ideal client, and have picked your networks, you can now start delivering value… “how-to” articles on things like back pain, knee pain, etc are a good place to start.
The more value you can provide – the faster you will grow your presence.
In order to make this easy, build up content that your audience will love.
Content can be anything!! –
Here’s a link to how I do it in my PT clinic for ideas.
But how do you get it seen? Read on for step #4 where all will be revealed.
Tip: Build up a content bank of value on your blog – the more helpful you are, the more people will come to you
Step #4: Get Followers By Asking Your Friends And Family To Share Content For You…
So, you’ve got all this content, but no one to share it with on Facebook and Twitter, pretty useless.
Without people seeing, or reading your work, you’ll be wasting your efforts.
Don’t worry – you can get over this obstacle. Starting from scratch is tough, but possible.
Don’t make the common mistake and buy your followers, simply follow your target audience and most of them will follow back (you can search by keywords on Twitter which makes it easy).
You should also reach out to friends and family, tell your current clients that you’re on Facebook and Twitter, have your social networks linked on your website, engage and interact with others – you’ll gain followers in no time.
Once you’ve made a start on growing your following, and you want to get your content out there step #5 will fill you in on an easy way to automate in your sleep!
Tip: To grow your following tell family, friends and clients – get them to follow you and spread the word.
Step #5: Automate, Automate, Automate…. Share Content While You Treat!
The great news is, all this can be automated!… At Paul Gough Physio Rooms we LOVE to automate as much of the marketing as we can … and our Social Media is no different.
Yep no excuses now, you really can spread your content whilst you go about your day.
Lets face it, if you planned on sending your blog posts out at 7am each day of the week, are you going to set an alarm EVERY.SINGLE.DAY to do this? No way. So what do you do?
Luckily for you there’s a bunch of free tools out there that do the magic work.
Buffer is a brilliant scheduling tool and it’s completely free (and incredibly simple to set up, bonus!).
- You sign up
- Link up your Facebook and Twitter accounts
- Create a sharing schedule (e.g. every day at 7am)
- Add your content to a queue with appropriate headline
- Voila! You can go about your day without breaking a sweat
Tip: To save you heaps of time – sign up to a free scheduling tool like buffer to do the work for you.
And when you make the most of Social Media – here’s an example of what can happen!… Happy patients spreading the word of your services:
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