How To Market Your Chiropractic Practice
There are several different ways to generate external leads. Keep in mind; you must have some kind of offer and some kind of exchange. You must be d...
There are several different ways to generate external leads. Keep in mind; you must have some kind of offer and some kind of exchange. You must be different from everyone else and get a unique selling point. What is different about you? What is the difference between you and other chiropractors? We will explore a few different ideas for external marketing for new patients.
Telemarketing: We need to make certain that we align ourselves with some kind of charity group or organization, especially when using telemarketing. When offering free service: check into your state laws on marketing to new patients. Check your state boards on laws for solicitation and marketing. Charity Day: Offer a day of services in exchange for canned goods or “keeping faith strong in the community”. Keeping Faith Strong in the Community is where the patient can come in for day of care and have a set office fee, which is donated to a local charity or church. Keep a thermometer board in the lobby to show how much we have collected and donated on behalf of the patients. Radio is a good tool to solicit patients.
Primary Care Physicians: Most patients come in and are treating with an MD. MD’s are at their wits’ end giving out pain medications for musculo-skeletal complaints. Doctors are now required to register with the DEA, and each time they give out a prescription for pain medication they are monitored. They are actively looking for other solutions to treat musculo-skeletal problems. Physical therapists are making a huge move to make themselves individual providers and alienate themselves from the MD’s., so we need to find a way to foster a relationship with MD’s. Start by looking for patients in your office who have common medical doctors. Call these doctors and discuss with them: “I’ve had the opportunity to treat several of your patients, and I would like to come in and cater lunch for yourself and your office staff and talk about a condition that I have treated successfully for your patients. I would also like to fax over a little note that the patient wrote about their care here.” Get a testimonial from the patient in their handwriting, thanking you for the care and thanking the MD for allowing them to receive the care. This is your welcome mat to present case. Don’t talk about anything else other than ONE case, keep it musculo-skeletal in nature and make it something the doctor is not having success in treating with medication. Example: headaches.
The doctor could have prescribed Imitrex with no results for the patient. Talk to the doctor about your personal success about getting headaches under control. Explain how the care you are delivering is going to help with those headaches and how your treatment is very conservative. Tell them how you are going to treat the patient and that the patient will remain THEIRS. Reassure them you will send their patient back to them once the headaches are gone. You will want to go the extra mile and bring GOURMET LUNCH. You will find if you splurge a little, the doctor’s staff will remember you and will refer patients to you as well. To facilitate this program: Assign 1 staff member to make 1 appointment per week or per month with an MD. When you go to the MD’s office, bring paperwork and literature with you to establish facts. Do a power point presentation to step it up a notch. Ask them for the opportunity to treat a few patients so they can see the validity of the treatment. CPR Instruction: Align yourself with the city’s Fire Department. One of the Fire Department’s duties is education of the community. Get in touch with their training division and ask if they have a community wide effort to educate the public on CPR. Become an instructor/trainer in CPR and work in conjunction with the fire department to teach the community CPR. When you teach the course, you foster a relationship with the people attending the class, affording you the opportunity to “soft shoe” chiropractic care. You will have an open door to local businesses when you certify them in CPR. By marketing yourself as a CPR instructor, you will have little to no resistance coming in to their businesses. Many people will ask where you practice, will discuss their conditions and ailments with you and you can make appointments for them without having to ask. It is labor intensive, (the classes are a few hours long) however you can build a relationship with the community on a level previously unknown in this profession. Staff script when calling to set up classes: “I’m calling from Dr. Goroway’s office, and we’re calling because it is his goal to certify as many people as possible in CPR, and we would like to schedule a free class at your business for all the employees at your organization. We will fax over a bulletin you can pin up in your break room or your company bulletin board regarding the class. We would like to schedule a time for off hours to have all your employees certified in CPR. Each employee would receive a certificate of completion to show they are certified in CPR. The reason we do this is so we can give a wonderful gift back to our community.” They will thank you for giving this gift. In order to get started, call the local fire department and get in touch with their training division. Find out if they work with the American Heart Association or the Red Cross. You will need to attend the basic course and then attend instructors course.
Keeping Track: Purchase a yearly planner for your “Calendar of Events” for marketing. You should schedule 1 CPR class per week, 1 MD presentation per week and fill them in for the rest of the year. You can provide these services in conjunction with other services. For example, you can do a presentation on “The Power’s On Energy Lecture” at a company you have provided a CPR class for. “The Power’s On Energy Lecture” is about increasing staff productivity. After you give CPR course, you can talk to the business about increasing staff productivity. The lecture discusses such topics as food combining, hydration, exercise and proper spinal hygiene. With these items in balance, you get a healthy individual who can produce more in the workplace. After you go in to a company with something soft (like CPR) you can go in and offer any other lectures. You are fostering long-term relationships. Become an expert at certain workshops and offer them to the businesses. Keep in mind: For effective marketing if you do a CPR course at XYZ business, you should schedule another workshop 3 weeks later at the same facility
Dr. Has had extensive experience in Chiropractic and offers his experiences and advice freely to anyone in the industry