10 Ways to Market and Grow your Practice

We weave some ideas throughout that you can try. Some of these suggestions may be more than what you want to do, some may not fit with your business model.

But hopefully, this article can give you some more insight into how to develop your services, or your business in general.

1. Identify your target audience:

Have a think and understand who can benefit from your services. Who would be your target group? Maybe include:

• Athletes / sporty people
• Individuals with musculoskeletal conditions – tendinopathies
• People seeking pain relief
• Those looking for non-invasive treatment options.

Maybe you want to target runners or triathletes? Possibly, look at office workers or go down an occupational health route?

Do you specialise in a particular field? Or do you want to offer a comprehensive service? Either is fine.

It is okay to be a “jack of all trades and a master of none, as oftentimes this is better than being a master of one.”

One thing to not forget is your current audience. These are the patients who have already been through your service and have used and trusted you. This group should be a top priority to re-engage with.

2. Create a compelling brand:

Developing a strong identity for your service will help build trust and reputation with your target audience.

Maybe design a new web page, or have a logo?

Choose appropriate colours and fonts to create a cohesive visual identity for your clinic all play into building a strong brand.

People like things to look good. People are “shallow” and will have an impression on your business within 7 seconds. Presenting your services well with give your prospective patients confidence in you and what you offer.

3. Develop a professional website:

Build a user-friendly webpage that shares key information about what you do.

• What is it you do?
• Why do I need your services?
• Why should people trust you?
• How can people book in with you?
• What services do you have?

These are all key questions to answer. Provide simple and compelling answers that will engage and inform your potential patients.

Intertwine success stories or testimonials from satisfied clients and use clear imagery of YOU delivering your services. Maybe a short video is an idea as this would be more engaging.

Try to avoid, lifeless stock photos. Patients want to see you as this builds a personal connection, so when they come in to see you, they feel like they already know you.

It is important to include a clear call to action (CTA). This is usually a contact sheet or booking system so patients can reach out or book their appointments.

3. Optimise your online presence:

Have a look into search engine optimisation (SEO) strategies to improve your website’s visibility.

This is a little more advanced but can help you out especially when targeting locals. Being at the top of a Google search, will help drive traffic to your website and, ultimately, bookings for your clinic.

Using relevant keywords related to your services in your website content, meta tags, and headings will improve overall performance.

Additionally, create informative blog posts or articles about the benefits of what you do to attract organic traffic.

All of this will also help build your brand and reputation.

Keep your content simple.

4. Leverage social media:

Social media is a megalith and is changing how we do things constantly. Apart from search engines, social media is one of the leading ways people find or research what companies can offer.

Creating clear, consistently named, well-designed, profiles on popular social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, is all part of building a strong brand and awareness of your services.

Set aside some time to schedule and share educational content, success stories, before-and-after pictures, and promotional offers.

It is also important to spend a bit of time engaging with your audience by responding to comments and messages and sharing other people’s posts.

Your content is not always the best content, so jump on others’. Follow “industry experts” and share what they put out. All building your credibility.

5. Collaborate with local healthcare professionals:

Establishing partnerships/referrals with other healthcare providers can help build your service quickly. Although it may be a tough one to approach it may be seen as competition.

Approach this wisely and strategically. Think about how a referral will help THEM not you. People, understandably, can be selfish. Why would referring their patients to you help their business and reputation?

Think about a referral fee. Maybe rent out space or any specialist technologies you have that others may not have access to e.g. shockwave therapy/diagnostic ultrasound?

How can your services ADD VALUE to their service and patients? If you are confident enough, you could provide educational workshops/open evenings to other clinicians and patients about the benefits of what you do and help build awareness of your services.

6. Use email marketing:

Sending engaging newsletters with useful and relevant content, special offers, and updates about your practice is a great way to engage your audience.

Try not to overdo it with emails, less is often more. We don’t want to pester people so keep the information engaging with a tone of how it adds value for your patient.

To start you could send out a survey to find out what your clients would be interested in hearing about. Incentivise people to engage in surveys/booking by offering “free” sessions, or prizes.

Avoid talking yourself up and saying how amazing you are, focus on how well your patients are doing, and think about how you can educate your patients.

If you can, personalise the emails to make them more engaging and useful to the recipients.

7. Offer promotional packages:

Create introductory packages or incentives. You could do discounts, but this can devalue the service you are trying to promote. It is a fine balance.

The aim is to get people excited about a new or proven service and encourage them to book with you.

Promotions or incentives may not be for you or your business model, but if you are promoting a new service, it can be a great way to get patients engaged quickly.

As a trade-off for the patient, if you are offering a discount, can there be a case study you can share? Get a good result, can they give you a testimonial?

Referral incentives to existing clients to refer friends/family to your practice is always an effective and simple method of increasing bookings.

8. Gather testimonials:

Encourage satisfied patients to share their positive experiences with you and your services.

This is something that is easy to do but hard to ask for. Naturally, as therapists, our first thought after a successful treatment plan, is not to ask them – “can you leave me a testimonial?”. It can feel quite disingenuous.

Most clients will be very happy to share some feedback. To break down the barrier, once you discharge a patient, you could send a follow-up email with a link to provide some feedback.

Incentivise this too. Maybe you add them to a monthly draw to win a £100 gift card?

Getting testimonials is social proof to those who don’t know who you are. Share these testimonials on your website, social media platforms, and marketing materials to build credibility and trust.
And keep proactive with them. You can never have too many!

9. Monitor and adapt:

If you can, track the effectiveness of your marketing efforts and adjust your strategies based on this data.

You could analyse website traffic, social media engagement, appointment bookings, and conversion rates.

Best to do this quarterly, and maybe look at working with someone who understands this.

Summing up

Marketing is all about consistency and keeping it relevant and engaging. Dipping in and out and doing this ad hoc, may not weald great results.

Pumping out the same material will get boring, so try and keep it interesting.

It can be difficult, but just because you are not getting ‘likes’ or impressions, doesn’t mean people don’t see you.

Remember about your current clients. We can get caught up in chasing new clients and new patients, instead of looking at how many people come back to you.
Those who have already been through your doors are THE MOST IMPORTANT CUSTOMERS. Value these people and keep engaging with them.

All the above ideas are brilliant, but one of the best things is word of mouth. All the activity above will help drive word-of-mouth referrals. You don’t know who is seeing your information or who they talk to.
If you do a good job and look after your current clients, the new ones will find you naturally.

Good luck, and if you need any help, advice or support, reach out to one of our team.