Facebook Made Simple with Dr. Matthew Loop and Genesis Chiropractic Software!
After watching the majority of fellow chiropractors use Facebook haphazardly, while making things more complicated than they need to be, I felt compelled to offer some guidance. A handful of doctors are harnessing the enormous social network the right way to become famous locally, create surges of website traffic, and attract a swarm of new patient referrals. Here are a few tips to jump-start your Facebook practice marketing in the right direction: Be empathetic with your friends, fans, and audience Chiropractors really need to put themselves in the position of other friends on Facebook. You cannot dominate the conversation and expect to build strong relationships. It’s important to listen to what others have to say first, then respond appropriately. You can provide user feedback by “liking” status updates, using the Facebook share button, or by commenting on a friends post. Spend a few minutes each day doing each thing mentioned. The news feed makes it easy for you to make this happen. Be warned… the quantity of feedback / value you offer is directly proportional to the credibility, trust, and liking your create with your Facebook friends and fans. Use the Appropriate Etiquette Here’s the deal. When other users accept your friend invitation, it doesn’t automatically give you the right to spray links to your website on their wall. That’s not what people are looking for. This makes you look stupid and isn’t polite. Secondly, don’t throw your links in messages when you send a friend request. It’s more annoying than anything else and your acceptance rate will be minimal to zero. People can sense your true intentions. Don’t Alienate your Friends / Fans, Engage them: Realize that people on your list are not the same. Not everyone thinks health is a top priority. Don’t always post the same type of content. Mix it up with quotes, open-ended questions, and jokes. Show a human side that makes you appear genuine and real. Never Assume Others Want to Be in Your Group Don’t automatically add people to groups that you create. That will get you in trouble quick. This was one of Facebook’s bonehead ideas, to let other people just ad anyone to groups. Always get permission first before adding others. Invite them and let them make their own choice. Get a custom Facebook Fan Page Built The first thing to do is to create a Facebook business page, also called a fan page. You can go to Facebook.com/pages to do this. You’ll want to have a custom fan page created that looks professional. This particular page is where visitors will land when they initially see you. The goal of this unique page is a couple things. First, you want to get the Facebook user to “like” your fan page. Next, you must provide an ethical bribe so the user offers-up their contact info (name / email) to you. I would definitely recommend that you get a professionally done video with your Facebook fan page. It ads a WOW factor and separates you from the rest of local doctors. There’s an old saying that goes “you never get a second chance to make a first impression.” Start Using Facebook Ads Of the many ways to get an avalanche of targeted local traffic to your chiropractic website, this is the fastest way. It’s literally like flipping a switch. The Facebook ads platform can be a little complicated, hence the reason I created an entire training around it. You really have to be detail specific to be successful with Facebook advertising. If you’re serious about becoming a master of Facebook Advertising WITHOUT making the expensive mistakes that most initially make, you’ll want to grab a copy of Social Media Elite. In it, you’ll discover what’s called The Ultimate Facebook Ads Marketing Blueprint. It contains all of the most effective strategies from a chiropractor that’s spent over $101,000 on this medium to date. You’ll learn which images pull clicks and traffic like gangbusters, how to attain a rock-bottom cost per click (CPC) every time, expensive mistakes 97% of chiropractors are making when using Facebook Ads, the RIGHT way to follow-up with an interested prospective patient on Facebook (most chiropractors NEVER do this), and much more… Use Facebook’s Check-in Function for Smart-Phones I absolutely adore this feature. You should have EVERY single patient that has an iPhone or Android “check-in” on Facebook from their smart-phone whenever they’re at your clinic. This gets you mass exposure quickly since all of the users friends on the social network will see where they’re at. Offer some type of incentive (if your state-board allows it) for current patients so they’re motivated to check-in at your practice for all of their friends to view. This is simple, endorsed viral traffic. Create Valuable Content that Facebook Users Feel Compelled to Share It is critically important that you provide value-driven information your Facebook audience feels compelled to share and take some form of action with. This action may include them commenting, clicking the LIKE button, or using the SHARE icon to spread the content to their friends. This is really endorsed referral traffic and the best form of visitors you could get. The people that come from this type of “attraction” marketing are high quality and are likely to select you as their chiropractor. In this article, I’ve laid-out a few important strategies you can implement today as a chiropractor so you can begin to use Facebook the correct way. This is only a small fraction of what you need to know, though. Visit my Marketing Blog: http://DCincome.com/blog This electronic message contains information from Dr. Matthew Loop that may be privileged and confidential. The information is intended for the use of the addressee(s) only. If you are not an addressee, note that any disclosure, copying, distribution, or use of the contents of this message is prohibited. If you have received this e-mail in error, please contact the sender. As you can see, if you’re not all over the internet, and even
How Genesis Chiropractic Software Can Help You Build Retention In Your Practice!
How’s your Patient Retention? Picture this; you start noticing a strange phenomenon going on in your office. You can’t explain it, but people seem to be disappearing. Every time you think of a particular patient, you look through your chiropractic software for their name, and realize they are no longer in your practice. Another face pops up in your mind, and they are gone too! What is going on? These patients were not “one-timers”. They have been in your office many times. They told you they were ready to regain their health. You thought these people understood the principles of chiropractic. So, what happened? You have been hard at work ever since you started your practice—,putting in long hours, networking, marketing, getting new patients in the door, then educating and orientating those new patients while trying to cultivate a community of practice members that will be with you to the end! And yet, here you sit, in front of your computer, looking at your office stats for the month and saying, “Where the HELL have all my patients gone?!”… Does this scenario sound familiar to you? You may find yourself thinking that maybe it’s just the “name-of-the-game” in chiropractic. Maybe you should just accept the fact that people come and go while you have to work your butt off for the rest of your life to fill the vacancy of every patient who mysteriously disappears; is that it? I’m here to tell you (thank goodness), “That’s not the case! You don’t have to be the Bermuda Triangle of chiropractic anymore.” Something happened to all of those patients, yes. They slipped through the cracks in your office. That’s what happened— some offices have “cracks” and others have huge, gaping holes! Either way, as the captain of your ship you are responsible for finding and fixing those leaks. Leaks in your office could be anything that causes (or encourages) a patient to leave before they should. A “leak” could be caused by one, or more, of four things: poor education, poor service, poor procedures, or poor organization in your office. Now, I’m going to show you FOUR TIPS TO STOP LEAKS IN YOUR OFFICE NOW. By following this advice, you will be able to help more people, grow your practice to the next level, and sleep easier knowing your patients will still be there when you go to work the next day. 1) Educate: Education is key. Most chiropractors educate their patients in some way, shape, or form, but are you really providing the patient with a valuable education in health that will change their life forever? Are you really teaching them the chiropractic story with passion? After all, there are hundreds of thousands of self-proclaimed “health gurus” bombarding your patients with info every single day, but simply “providing info” is not educating! Start passionately educating your patients about the body’s healing power, adding value by instructing them how they can maximize that power! 2) Great Service: Do you train your staff to give great service to each and every person who walks in your door? Does your staff greet the patient with a smile every time they come in? They should. Great service should start with the first phone call and continue throughout the patient’s interaction with your office. Make sure you and your staff are trained and conscious about giving exceptional friendly service. Now let me ask you another question related to service: How long do your patients have to wait when in your office? If your patients are spending hours in your office, that is bad service. Even if they love the care they are receiving from you, people just don’t have time to spend hours in a doctor’s office anymore. Get your procedures down and start creating a smoother, more efficient visit for your patients. This single tip could blow your retention through the roof! 3) Get Your Procedures Down: Allow me to give you a sports analogy— Do you think there has ever been a world champion team that couldn’t run a proper play? No way. That’s one of the first things coaches go over in the beginning of a season. If you can’t run a play, and I mean run it with perfection over and over again, then the synergy will be off. If this is the case with your office, be aware that patients take notice. You must have your procedures down and train each your staff members to know their position in your office. If you do not do so already, set up a weekly staff training session where you practice running through office procedures. You may even be surprised by how many questions your staff members have about their specific roles and responsibilities. 4) Get Organized! This may just be the single biggest reason behind your poor patient retention. Your patients are walking out of your practice, and you don’t even know it! This happens to so many chiropractic offices it’s not even funny. A patient who has been coming in for years suddenly stops coming in, and by the time you realize you have not adjusted Mary in a while and check the schedule, she has been gone for two months. Now, what do you do? Do you call and check on her? Oh yeah, that will look great, “Hi Mary I noticed you missed your appointment.” Mary replies, “Yeah, two months ago Doc. You’re just now calling me?” Don’t do that to your patients and don’t do that to your practice. The fact is that Mary didn’t just quit your practice two months ago. She started showing signs of leaving way before that. Maybe she started asking you questions about how her spine was doing, and whether she was “fixed” yet. Perhaps she’d already missed an appointment or two. Maybe she didn’t show up to the workshop she told you she would attend. All of those things are just some of the signs of a patient who is
Is your chiropractic website about you or the patient? | Understanding patient personas
“Does your organization (chiropractic clinic) offer great services? Well get over it! Marketing is not only about you. The most important thing to remember as you develop a marketing and PR plan is to put your services aside for a little while and focus your complete attention on the buyers of your services (your patients).” – David Meerman Scott. Devoting all of your attention to your prospective patients and away from the services you offer is difficult for many chiropractors, but it always pays off in the form of bringing you closer to achieving your new patient goals. When it comes to your website, what is the first thing a prospective patient see? Is it a complicated mix of fancy chiropractic terminology? Is your home page or most of your site’s content filled with “BS” words like “subluxation”, “Q-lasers”, “Dorsal/Thoracic” and “Sacrum” or is it focused on patient conditions such as headaches, lower back pain, poor sleep quality, dependency on pain medication or poor mobility? If you are guilty of using this outdated “it’s all about me” approach you are not alone. As a matter of fact, you would have do heavy searching and investigation to find a member of the chiropractic community whose site didn’t fall victim to this self-centered marketing approach. For those of you reading this, thinking to yourselves, “I don’t fall into this category,” because you have some small portion of text on your site that says “It’s all about the patient”, think again! The only one buying that line is you. We, as a society, have learned, “If you have to say it, then it probably isn’t . . .” A patient persona would basically be a characteristic or condition you use to organize the different types of patients your clinic focuses on treating. When patients search for solutions or information regarding a condition they aren’t typically looking for specific techniques and often times are not looking for chiropractic services at all. To build a website that is a functional part of your marketing strategy you must first focus on the prospective patient experience. You may have multiple techniques for helping a patient eliminate chronic headaches but is your websites content geared toward attracting this type of patient? Creating an online experience that is focused on the patient’s condition and the problems this condition creates makes it easier for your target patient personas to find you. A truly patient-centered site should speak to the patient in a special way; a way that makes him feel that you truly understand his condition and the impact it has on his life. By doing this you are creating a feeling of trust and authority and only after that will your attempts to educate the prospective patient on the techniques you use and the technology you possess be well received. Creating a site that is centered around the patients condition lets potential patients know right away that they are at the right place when they do find your site. Once your prospective patients have found your site by searching for solutions to a specific condition you can further enhance their website experience by showing that you understand the problems their condition may cause in their lives, offer persona specific testimonials and last but not least talk about you and how you have the experience, technique, tools, staff or facility needed to give them back the life they used to have.
CBP Club! Helping Students Find Their “Why”
This past Friday I had my first ever opportunity to speak to the CBP club students at Life University in Marietta, GA. It has been a few years since I have been back on campus and I was happy to see all of the changes. From the huge cafeteria to the new apartments and day care I could not believe what I saw. The parking deck! Man we could have used that when I was a student. When I was a student we had to park in Roswell and walk to class up hill both ways. 😉 When I left campus 10 years ago the school was in crisis. Accreditation just got pulled and I stuck out of there like Indiana Jones reaching under the rock door and grabbing my hat before it came slamming down. When I got to campus I was graciously greeted by the CBP club president, Ryan Stamp. He recently took over the reigns from the former president Rachel Stockwell. He did a great job letting the students know I was coming and putting on a great event. We had 37 students show up! Great job Ryan! It was a great experience trying to prepare for the talk. It forced me to think about what I could speak about that would help the students the most. It made me really think about how far I have come in the past 10 years since graduation. It is truly amazing how much information I have gathered over the years. If I only knew then what I know now……. Actually there is not a lot I would change. I would have probably just been where I am now in half the time :). Trying to sum up what I have learned or pick some of the most important points was a challenge to say the least. After all I decided to focus what I have come to believe is the most important skill a doctor can learn both from a patient care perspective and business perspective. That being Patient Relationship Management. That is how to help patients realize the true benefits of care and coaching them to the place where they can determine their own reason/s (Their big Why) for committing to life time chiropractic care. From a business perspective I spoke about the 3 types of risks to patient relationships that can be measured in a practice. These are the tings that show the doctor patient may have forgotten their Why. Patient Retention Cash Flow Compliance The other Why was the doctor’s why. Learning why you do what you do is more important that learning how you do what you do. I thought this was important for students. They are always so focused on what to do. CBP docs especially. Hoe to fix a spine, what new patient process to follow… In the real world teaching chiropractic is met with a lot of resistance and without a big enough reason for doing what you do, that little resistance can be enough to discourage a doc right out of practice. At that point it does not matter how good you are at the “how”. We spoke a little bit about the hows too. Communication and confronting objections, billing, chiropractic software (of course), EMR/EHR, SOAP notes, the right forms, etc. I would say that if anything could be learned that would change the potential for success it was finding your big why. Why will you go to the office when you are exhausted? Why will you be willing to confront a patient who has missed a visit? Why are you committed to learning CBP if that is your chosen technique? Why are you willing to help patients find their big why? Or as Garret Gunderson says the “Soul Purpose”. If you are a student or doc and you are reading this, please share your Big Why. Was it a patient or family member who’s life was changed by chiropractic? Was it your own chiropractic miracle? Please share! Maybe if we hear others we can also use them to add to our motivation!
