Step-by-Step Guide to

Online Marketing

More and more prospective new patients are turning to the Internet to find professional services. The first thing many people do when searching for a provider is research them online. Chiropractic patients certainly do the same. By establishing a website, managing online reviews, and updating your social media you can easily grow your presence online; thereby, building your reputation as an excellent provider. Having a website and social media accounts can help you entice new patients, keep patients informed, maintain a relationship with current patients, become the authority in care, provide health tips, and promote events. With this simple guide, ChiroUp will explain each component of online marketing with easy steps to follow and supporting documents to ensure your success. PART I: YOUR WEBSITE Developing a great website is essential in today’s business environment. Your patients, and potential new patients, expect a website telling them about your practice, who you are, and what you do.

Website Creation & Content ü If you currently do not have a website, the first thing

you will need to do is to secure a domain name. Companies like Godaddy.com make this process simple and inexpensive. Your best bet is to secure a domain name that is the same as your practice name (i.e., 123 Chiropractic would be www.123chiropractic.com). Avoid using an excessively long name like www.westcoastphysicalmedicineprovidersinc.com. The website name must be easily remembered and searched on a smartphone.

ü There are numerous “template” sites that will create a website for you. The downfall of going this route is that there will be hundreds of other chiropractic sites that look exactly like yours.

ü A better choice is to hire a website designer that

can build a custom site that highlights your expertise and practice style.

ü Your site’s content is key. Your visuals are

important, but great visuals are never going to make up for weak content. There are five primary rules you need to remember when you’re

designing your chiropractic website: include your mission statement, a summary of services, biography, contact information, and make it all easy to navigate. See our Website Text Sample for ideas on content.

ü Include a blog on your website. Write articles on

your website’s blog frequently and then promote them on your social media accounts. This drives traffic to your website and helps you build a stronger and more trustworthy brand. Wordpress is an easy and free content management system to use for both your website and blog.

ü Be sure to

provide patients with the ability to schedule an appointment online through a simple electronic form.

Search Engine Optimization

Now that you’ve built a website, make it stand out.

ü Search engines are the guiding light to the web.

Having a great looking website does not necessarily mean that it’s being seen. Unless you’re showing up in the top 5 search results on Google and Yahoo your website is being missed by the majority of prospects. Search engine attention=web traffic=new patients. It’s as simple as that.

ü The primary factor in “search engine optimization” (SEO) comes from your site design. Your patients are going to type words like “chiropractor”, “find a chiropractor”, “chiropractic”, etc. into their search engine query box. Some patients search for symptoms like “low back pain”, “headache relief”, etc. Make sure you focus on those keywords in your website to attract the search engines’ attention.

ü Prospects will often include their city name in their

search- so include all of the towns or areas that you serve on your homepage.

ü Whenever possible, be sure to include keywords in your “title tags”, “page URL”, “Meta description”, “image ALT tags”, and “image file names”.

ü Linking your sites to other high traffic “partners”

will help your cause. When possible, splash these links throughout your text, not just on the “links page”.

ü Maintaining ongoing blog posts may improve your rankings, too. Don’t feel obligated to write a term paper for each post- sometimes simply making a 2-sentence comment about a new study or article with a link to that source will be appreciated.

ü Finally, keep your information fresh and monitor

your site’ health with a program like “Google Analytics” or “Google Webmaster Tools”. You’ll get important data about your sites: top keywords, speed, and errors.

PART II: ONLINE REVIEWS The first thing many people do when searching for a provider is research them online. By managing your profile on review sites and making it easy for your clients to add their reviews, you can easily grow your presence online.

Online Review Setup ü The first step is to set up your online presence

and/or update your practice profile information. Search your name and business name on all popular review sites. Be sure each site has your complete information, including contact info, website, email, office hours, photo, and treatment specialties. Here is a list of recommended sites: www.Google.com www.Yelp.com www.Healthgrades.com www.CitySearch.com www.RateMD.com www.Wellness.com www.Kudzu.com www.InsiderPages.com www.Wellsphere.com www.HealthCommunities.com www.DexKnows.com

ü Facebook offers a great service for businesses that

prompts page visitors to “review” a business on Facebook. These reviews show up on your business profile for new visitors to see. Your local media may also have business listings and review sites within their websites.

Monitor & Increase Your Reviews

ü Regularly monitoring what patients say about your business will give an idea of how people perceive your office. Remember, you may not receive glowing reviews each time. Providers can sometimes learn from negative reviews, although they rarely come in the form of constructive criticism. Take the time to read these reviews and reach out to the patient that left the review, trying to correct the issue, if possible. If a review is completely false, contact the online review site’s customer service.

ü One of the keys to getting patients to submit online reviews is to ask for the review promptly. People are most likely to give you feedback at the time of service - the more time between the service and the request,

the likelihood of getting reviews drops precipitously. (*ChiroUp members who have not "opted out" of "Outcome tracker" will automatically give their most satisfied patients the opportunity to rate their practice.)

ü Another idea is to purchase a dedicated laptop or iPad. These handy devices can be set up to quickly connect your patients to review sites in order to leave comments during their visit. You need to either have the ability to connect to Wi-Fi (after securing the network) or purchase a data plan for your device.

ü This device should be dedicated solely for the purpose of reviews. Patients should not have access to other programs and certainly practice or personal files/data. You should create desktop shortcut icons to all of the review sites that you intend to use.

ü Place online review patient instructions on a laminated card inside the devices’ case. Your office staff should be trained to use our script to request online reviews from satisfied patients while they are waiting for treatment or in therapy.

ü Post a sign to stimulate online reviews. Also, offering a gift certificate for a local restaurant or service can increase your patient’s willingness to submit a review. See our online review request contest sign or request for Google review sign as examples. *

ü By monitoring your profiles on online review sites every month or every other month, you can note new reviews and follow up with patients. Thanking patients the next time they are in your office or with a simple word or handwritten note is a nice gesture to acknowledge that someone has taken the time to write a review.

*When hosting contest or prizes, be certain that you are aware of, and do not violate, State or Federal "anti-kickback" (AKS) and Federal Stark laws that regulate health care gifting and prohibit any form of remuneration that could be construed as payment in exchange for referrals of business. Anti-kickback laws prohibit giving anything more than "nominal" gifts. Unfortunately, "nominal" is undefined by AKS law; however the OIG has defined "nominal as gifts that are not cash or cash equivalents, and they have a retail value of less than $15 individually or an aggregate value of $75 per year per patient. This advice is for informational purposes only- to alert subscribers of potential pitfalls. Providers should consult with a healthcare attorney for legal advice.

PART III: SOCIAL MEDIA Social media is quickly becoming one of the most important components of any business marketing plan. Astounding majorities of people (almost 75%) use social media to get their news, research businesses, and interact with friends.

Social Media Marketing Basics ü There are many social media sites you might

explore to interact with your current or future clients, including: o Facebook o Twitter o LinkedIn o YouTube o Pinterest o Instagram o Google Plus o Tumblr o Flickr o Periscope o Plus many more!

ü Practices should not attempt to have a presence on

every social media platform. Choose the largest and most popular for your patient base. We’ll cover the three platforms that are most beneficial for chiropractors at this time – Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

ü Keep in mind that social media trends are always

changing, so be sure to stay abreast of the current social marketing trends. Always go where your audience lives and your online marketing will thrive.

ü FACEBOOK was the first widely utilized social media platform and still remains the top social networking platform to date with over 1.8 billion active users per month. If you had to pick just one platform to be on, Facebook should be it. It has almost every demographic segment to fit the customer base for any business. Facebook is a low volume/high value network, so don’t post too frequently and make each post count. Your posts should be professional and valuable to your audience.

ü TWITTER is the second largest platform with over

300 million active users per month. Twitter is a high volume/low value network because of the fast pace of conversations happening. You should post frequently and use content that you or someone else has curated that is relevant to your business. You can save time by using a social media management program, such as Hootsuite, to schedule your tweets automatically throughout the day. Keep in mind that it will take time to build a high quality list of followers, but it is well worth the effort to market your brand on Twitter.

ü LINKEDIN is a great platform to use for targeting the B2B segment and a professional audience. It’s also another great way to get your company to show up on a Google Search, as each company profile on LinkedIn will be given their own unique URL (www.linkedin.com/companies/yourcompany). To add your company, you must first have a personal profile on LinkedIn.

Social Media Enhancements & Tips ü Create content. Spend some time creating an

editorial calendar to schedule and organize your topics. Keep posts concise and easy to read. It’s a good idea to follow other Facebook pages, Twitter accounts, and LinkedIn Company profiles for other Chiropractic clinics to get an idea of what others are talking about.

ü Get followers. The more followers you have, the more interactions and sharing of your site will occur. Use hashtags in your tweets so they get noticed. For Facebook, there are many ways to gain fans, or “likes”. You can run contests and promotions online or within your office. Promoting your profiles and creating valuable content will be the key to getting followers.

ü Promote your presence. Add social media links on your website, making it easy and convenient for visitors to click onto your pages. Add your social media website addresses to brochures, invoices, newsletters and any other customer communications. You may want to avoid placing these social media icons at the top of your page to avoid immediately losing easily distracted viewers to the social media “black hole.”

ü Create signs for your office encouraging your

patients to join you on social media, such as: o “Like Us” sign o “Sign In” sign o “Like Us” business card These signs can be customized with a QR code that links to your practice’s Facebook page.

ü Consider creating a contest for “liking” your page. ü Develop your social media “personality” and

engage visitors. Social media is meant to be in casual conversation, so speak in the voice that you would normally. If you haven’t already defined your unique business characteristic, you should. Then promote that trait repeatedly across your social media profiles so your audience knows exactly who you are, what you do, and what you believe in.

ü Use attention-grabbing verbiage for your posts. Studies show that the right words make a difference. See our social media sample posts for examples.

ü Humor and wit (chiropractic jokes and photos) go a long way on social media, as well as personal posts, in-office photos (without patients) and inspirational quotes.

ü Try to use photos or videos in posts as often as

possible. Photos get liked, commented, and shared the most. You can even ask a question at the end of a post to encourage fan interaction.

ü Don’t sell all the time. Very few people log into

social media to make a purchase. Use your posts and interactions to gain interest and to become your visitor’s “go-to”.

ü Share your blogs. Be sure to promote them on your

social media accounts to drive traffic to your website and help build a stronger brand.

ü Be sure to monitor posts regularly so that you do not “abandon” or neglect patients who are corresponding with you.

ü Keep your personal pages personal and never post

pictures or information on any page that you would not want your patients to see.

ü Stay HIPAA compliant. Do not disclose any

protected information publicly. This includes posting patient names, pictures, or x-rays. Do not discuss specifics of anyone’s diagnosis or schedule appointments publicly- contact these patients personally to carry on that conversation.

Promote Using Social Media

ü Set aside a small advertising budget for Facebook.

Edgerank is an algorithm developed by Facebook to govern what is displayed on the Newsfeed. There are many factors that are considered but ultimately it comes down to how much engagement you are getting from your audience. It’s a bit of a cycle. And they won’t see your post in their newsfeeds unless Edgerank has deemed the post(s) “popular”. This is where advertising comes into play. If you’re just starting your page, it’s always good to start with a small ad to increase your page likes. Make sure the content on your Facebook page is interesting and complete before inviting people to like your page,

or they will be turned off right away. You can also run an ad simultaneously that will boost visibility on one of your really interesting posts. Continue to create great posts consistently to create engagement and gain the “edge” on Facebook’s Edgerank.

ü Twitter also offers promoted tweets if you are interested in using a small advertising budget on that platform and there is also an option to advertise on LinkedIn. Manage your Time. Social media does take some time to set up and manage. Regular posting keeps your followers engaged and you on the top of their mind. Always respond to comments and messages as soon as possible to keep conversations going.

ü Utilize a social media management system, such as

HootSuite, to help you track and manage all of your social media channels within one dashboard. There is a free plan you can use if you only have 3 or fewer social media profiles to manage.

ü Post at the right times. You should be scheduling your posts and tweets to occur when the majority of your audience is online. You can monitor your insights on your Facebook account to gain some of this knowledge. It’s been widely recognized that the best time to post on Facebook is between 1-4PM, Twitter between 1-3PM, and LinkedIn 7-9AM or 5-6PM.

ü Practice good social media etiquette. It’s good

practice to “follow back” some of your followers, on Twitter and Instagram especially. You are not obligated to follow everyone. Follow back those that have followed you and are in the same industry/share similar interests as you. It’s usually considered a snub if a friend or colleague follows you and you do not follow back.

ü Learn how to interpret your

Insights. Both Facebook and Twitter will display analytics for your posts/tweets. If you are passionate about improving or optimizing your content, it is a good idea to research and learn how to interpret the data.