Chiropractic practice building is like training for a marathon – it’s not fast – it’s not easy – and it doesn’t happen by accident.  Building your chiropractic practice is not something you do overnight.

But you already knew that.

Instead – building your chiropractic practice takes time and planning.  One of the most important, practice building tools you can put to use to grow your practice is a comprehensive marketing strategy.

There are three words that keep chiropractors poor and holds them back from building a successful practice.  Those three words are:

“I HELP EVERYONE.”

When that is the basis of your comprehensive marketing strategy – when you’re targeting EVERYONE – in essence, you’re targeting no one.

The KEY element to building a successful chiropractic practice lies in these four words:

IDENTIFY YOUR TARGET PATIENT.

Your target patient is your ideal patient.  So ask yourself, “Who is your ideal patient?”

Try not to think about which procedure is the most “profitable”… rather look back on your day and ask yourself which days seem to FLY by.  Which patients bring a smile to your face when you see their name on your schedule?

What if you could have dozens of patients – just like those that bring a smile to your face – booked back to back every day?

This “ideal patient” is the key to building the chiropractic practice you’ve always dreamed of having.

For one chiropractor – there was nothing more heart warming than the sounds of children playing in the waiting room.  So she targets her practice towards families with children.  Her “comprehensive marketing strategy” includes creating a child -friendly environment in the reception area of her office.

The walls are adorned with the hand prints of each child she’s seen and treated.   When the children return for a follow up visit, the first place they go is to their hand print on the wall – to see how much they’ve grown since the last time they were seen by her.

When she advertises her clinic – she chooses family friendly publications – like the area homeschool newsletter.  She’s also invited the local homeschool group to come visit her clinic on an annual basis – and the families have responded enthusiastically to her generous offer.

If this doesn’t sound like “traditional” marketing and advertising advice- it’s not.  However, it is the kind of advice that, if you embrace it, will literally change the face of your practice.

For another chiropractor – his passion is sports. His busiest days seem to FLY by when he’s treating area athletes for their injuries – and it shows.  His waiting room is adorned with motivational prints showing athletes in competition.  ESPN is playing on the television in the waiting area and the magazines range from golf to racing and every sport in between.

This chiropractor is a dedicated youth athletics sponsor.  If there’s a sport in season – chances are good you’ll see this chiropractor’s name emblazened across an entire team’s chest.  Their appreciation plaques adorn the walls of his office.  He even offers school physicals at a ridiculously low rate – just to entice area high school athletes to visit his office for their yearly sports physicals.   He does this because he knows his passion for sports will help him make a connection with these high school athletes.

By focusing on your “ideal” patient – you can then begin the process of developing a comprehensive marketing strategy – with that ideal patient as the “centerpiece” of this marketing strategy.

Once you have a clear picture of your “ideal patient” in mind – then marketing your chiropractic practice can become positively easy – maybe even fun.  You’ll find you can quit playing a game of “spray and pray” with your marketing and advertising dollars.

With your idea patient in mind – you can decide whether placing an ad on a placemat at a local bar would be a good investment of your advertising dollars.

If you’re the first chiropractor – the one who targets families with small children – the answer is probably “no”… while a few of the parents may be regular “bar flies” – a majority of your ideal patients probably won’t ever see that ad on that placemat in the bar.

However, if you’re the second chiropractor – the one whose ideal patient is the injured athlete – and you know for a fact that the placemats will be used at the local watering hole for the men’s softball team you sponsor – then the answer is a resounding “YES”.

Not only does your comprehensive marketing strategy let you know WHERE to place your ads – it also allows you to decide WHAT KIND of ad to place.  The second chiropractor – the one whose ideal patient is the injured athelte – might decide to purchase a large display on the placemat – and include a sports trivia quiz as part of the ad.

One of the most closely guarded chiropractic practice building secrets is to identify your ideal target patient.  It’s covered in complete detail in the 7 week comprehensive e-course on internet marketing for chiropractors.

Creating a successful chiropractic marketing strategy is essential in establishing a six figure chiropractic practice.

If you’re a chiropractor who has a love/hate relationship with your marketing and advertising, then you’re in good company. Many chiropractors often find themselves chasing after an array of marketing tactics instead of implementing a cohesive chiropractic marketing strategy.

Unfortunately, marketing tactics which may result in great success for one practice may fail miserably for the next. Yet many chiropractors attend seminars, buy books and subscribe to newsletters that do little more than provide a never ending list of various marketing tactics. They keep gathering these crumbs, hoping to collect enough crumbs and the finding the magical marketing tactic(s) that will turn this collection of crumbs into a slice of toast.

The search for tactics to increase the return on investment dates back to the earliest recorded history. One tactic used by early farmers to improve their farming “return on investment” was to plant discarded fish parts to improve their production of corn. Modern science has shown there are practical scientific principles behind this ancient practice. The decaying fish parts provide the steady supply of nitrogen which corn needs to grow abundantly. It seems the decaying fish parts are a great “lo-tech” method for providing the steady fertilization needs of growing corn plants.

It turns out that in ancient cultures there were two schools of thought about the role of the planting fish with corn. On one hand, there were the cultures that, at some level, seemed to recognize the science behind the practice. Farmers in these cultures believed that the corn was literally feeding upon the decaying fish. So while they used the “tactic” of planting fish parts with corn, they were aware of the overall strategy behind the tactic which was to provide nourishment for the plants so they could produce an abundant crop.

However, there were other cultures that also planted fish parts with their crops but did so without any understanding of the science behind the practice. For these cultures, the fish were thought to have magical properties. They believed that the spirit of the dead fish magically helped the plants to grow. These cultures were using the same tactic; however they were using it without any understanding of the strategy behind the tactic’s success.

From our 21st Century perspective, it’s easy to see that the farmers that viewed the fish as having magical properties were putting themselves at a severe disadvantage. Without being aware of the underlying strategy of feeding the plants, the farmers who subscribed to the fish spirit as magic tactic could not understand how placing too much fish in with each seed could actually lead to undesirable results. (If you are a dog owner and have brown spots in your lawn, then you’ve seen firsthand the results of excessive nitrogen on vegetation.)

Imagine that you were a farmer who subscribed to the fish as magic school of thinking. At some point as you watched your corn fail to grow, you would have to ask yourself: Is there such a thing as too much magic? How can some magic be good but more of the same magic be bad? Only when you adopt the scientific view of using the fish as part of a fertilization strategy can you begin to see where too much of a good tactic can actually lead to undesirable results.

The same is true in modern marketing. For example, offering a limited time discount is a time honored way to improve patient counts initially but when used excessively, consumers become conditioned to wait until the next big discount to buy. Even the biggest players in the market, like GM and Macy’s aren’t immune to the underlying principles at work.

No matter what size your practice, the going gets tough when you learn that there is such a thing as too much marketing magic.

When you understand the underlying principles behind creating a successful marketing strategy and successful marketing message, then you’ll be able to choose the right marketing tactics that will help you to achieve your marketing objectives.

Pick up a copy of the book Beyond the Niche: Essential Tools You Need to Create Marketing Messages that Deliver Results to learn more about developing a marketing strategy for your chiropractic practice.

You know that finding new patients is the KEY to establishing a successful chiropractic practice.  You’ve been to seminars, you’ve talked to other chiropractors and you’ll hear over and over again that you never have to “market” your practice.  The underlying message is that if you’re good, if you’re worthy… your practice will magically grow via word of mouth.

There’s a reason that word of mouth advertising is the “holy grail” for chiropractors.  It takes the “burden” of marketing your practice squarely off of your shoulders and places it squarely in the hands of your patients.

However, there are many reasons why a gifted and talented chiropractor’s business won’t benefit from word of mouth advertising.  The most important reason is your patients are NOT qualified to evaluate your expertise.

What they do know is whether your receptionist knows them by name.  What they do know is whether their visit was pleasant.  They can recognize a clean office… they probably can’t recognize why your services are better than the massage therapist at their spa.  (ouch!)

Because we all tend to be “blind” to what’s familiar to us… let me give an example of why relying upon your patients to deliver your marketing message is a really bad foundation for your practice marketing strategy.

Let’s say your receptionist mentions that her car is making a funny noise in front of a patient.  The patient who has overheard the comment is a woman in her 60’s who is as dear as she is sweet.  As a matter of fact, she’s one of your FAVORITE patients.

This patient overhears the receptionist’s comment and offers her suggestion of a mechanic.  She’s very enthusiastic in her recommendation, but it’s not based on the mechanic’s skills or even his trustworthiness.  Instead, your dear sweet patient goes on and on about how much she adores the mechanic’s “shop cat”.  She tells you the cat’s name and describes his physical appearance.  She tells you how old the cat is and how much he weighs.  She also tells you how she brings it treats every time she takes her car in for an oil change.

Are you or your receptionist likely to be inspired to take her up on her recommendation?

Probably not.

However, if you were to ask your next patient about this mechanic, a patient who works in a body shop and who knows a bit about cars…. if he were to confirm the mechanic recommendation… then you’d probably trust his recommendation.

Keep in mind that when you’re relying on your patients to refer other patients, they probably can’t evaluate the quality of the service you provide.  Which is why, when your dear sweet elderly patient talks about how sweet your receptionist is… it may not be enough to get her son to schedule an appointment.

That’s why Word of Mouth Advertising makes a LOUSY foundation for building your practice.  It’s a great “gravy” for practice building…. but focus on providing ways of establishing your expertise to potential patients.  New patients want to know if you can solve their problems.  Give them proof that you can.

A chiropractic website with video testimonials from satisfied patients can be the best Word of Mouth Advertising you can get for your chiropractic practice!

The “go-to” form of advertising for chiropractors is the yellow pages. However, if you think he is simply going to call the biggest ad on the page… think again.

To help illustrate this point, I ask clients to think about how THEY use the yellow pages to find a roofer. Unless you’ve recently been hammered by a natural disaster, you probably haven’t thought about hiring a roofer lately. (Trust me, your best potential patient isn’t thinking about needing your services until they start to hurt!)

So think about WHEN you’ll pick up the Yellow Pages to find a roofer. Chances are your roof is already leaking or is missing. As you scan the Yellow Pages, try to pay attention to the listings that are drawing your eye. Chances are, your thought processes are moving in this direction:

“Hmm… Ralph’s Roofing… big ad… oh, there’s his picture… he looks like a good guy. Let’s see what else is here. HEY! Ron’s Roofing… the listing is definitely smaller but I remember when my Aunt Harriet replaced her roof… she used Ron’s Roofing and he did a GREAT job for her!”

In essence… size doesn’t determine the success of a yellow pages ad. The success of your yellow pages ad is based on how FAMILIAR you are to your potential patients.

There’s an element of “Hey, I’ve HEARD of this place! They must be good.” Whether it’s Aunt Harriet… or the nice man on the radio…. familiarity breeds business!!!

Now, if you’re in a market where every chiropractor spends ALL his/her advertising dollars in the yellow pages… then you have a GREAT opportunity to find new patients by putting your message in front of your best potential customers.

Yellow Page ads are an essential part of your marketing mix. However, they should not make up the foundation of your advertising.  Reduce your ad and direct prospective patients to your chiropractic website.