With over 2.6 billion monthly active users and a sophisticated algorithm that understands intent and behavior, there is no doubt that Facebook is an excellent platform for advertising.
By placing an ad on the platform, your chances of reaching your target audience skyrocket. This is why it’s no surprise that businesses, big and small, continue to devote substantial marketing budget to Facebook ads.
Facebook advertising requires a bit of a learning curve. Many of us tend to make a lot of mistakes, especially when we’re starting out. Understanding some of the most common Facebook ads mistakes will help you get more bang for your advertising buck.
Here are 6 common Facebook ads mistakes that are destroying your campaign.
Choosing the wrong objective
If you’re running ads and you don’t know what an objective is, then that would be big problem. In this case, you’re probably just boosting the post (we can talk about that in a separate blog post).
Choosing the right objective is vital to the success of your advertising campaign. Facebook has 11 objects, and each of them helps get you closer to your goals.
Basically, you’re telling Facebook what you expect to gain for this specific campaign. Let’s say you want to make your video viral, then an engagement campaign would be a great option. If you want to generate leads, then choose lead generation as your objective. If you’re running an e-commerce business and you’re looking to get more purchases, then choose conversion as your objective.
Choosing the wrong objective will not only give you unfavorable results, you’ll also be wasting money.
Poor targeting
There are billions of people on Facebook. Showing your ads to all of them doesn’t make sense. That’s why it’s important that you know who your target audience is before you start creating a campaign.
Targeting is a vital element when creating an ads campaign. Try to be as detailed as possible with your targeting. Narrow down your audience by targeting by gender, age ranges, geographic areas, and interests. The more specific you can get with your targeting, the better results you’ll see.
Forgetting about Facebook Pixel
Pixel provides a way to track interactions that are happening with your ad. By installing it on your website, it would be easier for you to track your visitor’s behaviors and gather data.
From the data you have collected, you can learn how your audience engages with you off of the Facebook platform. It also provides a way to measure your ads effectiveness in driving results.
Without Pixel, how else are you going to prove that what you are doing to drive opportunity to your business is working?
Sticking to one type of media
The primary goal of creating ads is to get people to take notice and take action. But since most people aren’t on Facebook to shop or checkout ads, it can be extremely difficult to get people to do that.
It takes an intriguing, creative, and a compelling ad copy to capture the attention of your audience. Video ads are one of the most powerful ways to capture the attention of your audience. But if you’re using videos on all your FB ads campaign, it can start to feel a bit stale after a while.
Consider using a variety of media – videos, photos, animated photos etc. Also, create a variety of ad copies and test them out. This way, you can determine which one resonates best with your audience and provides the best results for your business.
Impatience
Like any other digital marketing campaign, it takes time to create and optimize a Facebook ads campaign. Your Facebook Pixel is smart, but you need to give it time to learn and gather data.
The problem is that some people get impatient, thinking that they are losing money but still not getting results.
For instance, if your Pixel is fresh and you set your campaign objective to conversion, Facebook may not even know what a “purchasing” customer will look like, especially when you’ve never had any sales before. You’ll have to wait until you’ve gathered enough data before making any decisions on your ads like pausing or tweaking them.
Don’t think of it as an expense. Rather, think of it as an investment. Remember, you’re paying Facebook for the data.
Set it and forget it mindset
This is one of the biggest mistakes we’ve seen over the years. While it’s important to be patient and allow Facebook to do the work, it’s also important to check your ad campaign once in a while.
If you leave the ad campaign as is after it went live, there’s a good chance that the results will diminish over time. Why? It’s because of ad fatigue.
Let’s say you’ve been running the same ad for a month and you didn’t make any changes since it went live. Chances are the same people will be seeing the same ad over and over again. Not only will people find it annoying, you’re also losing money in the process. Read the data and make the necessary changes to get better results.
Running a remarketing campaign can be an effective way to re-engage potential customers who may have shown interest in your product or service, but did not convert during their initial visit.
Final thoughts
It’s important to be aware of the six common Facebook Ads mistakes so that you can avoid them and have a successful campaign. A good way to start is by understanding your target audience, setting clear goals and objectives, and creating high-quality ads.
All the tips mentioned above will help ensure your campaigns are successful and are getting the results you desire.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Facebook-Ads-Mistakes-Blog.png12602240Kathlyn Angeles-Timbolhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngKathlyn Angeles-Timbol2023-02-22 10:04:342023-02-16 16:21:106 Common Facebook Ads Mistakes That Are Destroying Your Campaigns
With the digital space getting saturated by different brands trying to capture the attention of their target audience, social media contests provide an excellent way to generate buzz around their brand and re-engage their audience. When done properly and effectively, social media contests can bring a number of benefits to your brand. In fact, businesses, both big and small, are using this tactic to generate more leads, promote their products and services, and increase brand awareness?
While your brand might not garner the same level of enthusiasm that game shows get, you can certainly benefit from hosting a contest or a giveaway on social media.
Here are 5 reasons why contests should be a part of your
marketing strategy.
Give people a reason to follow your brand
Most brands would share interesting and informative content in the hopes of capturing the attention of their audience. But despite their efforts, many of them are having a hard time standing out from the competition. If you want to have more followers and expand your reach, consider hosting a contest on social media.
When running a contest, most brands would ask people to like their social media accounts and share their content. Knowing that they’ll get an opportunity to win something, most people would gladly do as they are asked. This is a win-win for both the brand and consumers. You get the opportunity to reach more people while they get the chance to win something – a gift, a discount voucher, a gift certificate or a free period of service.
If you’re looking to grow your fan base, contests and giveaways are a great way to do it. We’ve seen brands grow their following from 100 to 1,ooo or 10,000 to 25,000 in a matter of days or weeks. While some may argue that follower count is just a vanity metric, having more followers will certainly be beneficial for you if you can keep your engagement rate high. So don’t just stop at running a contest. Make sure that you keep your audience engaged and you’ll reap all the benefits soon enough.
Improve brand awareness
Most people aren’t aware that your business exists until they hear it from their family and friends. Social media contests allows you to get the word out about your business without directly promoting it.
Regardless of how well established your brand is, contests can be a simple yet effective way to improve brand awareness. If your contest includes a voting component, people would tag their family and friends for support. This strategy helps generate buzz around your brand. People are already talking about your brand and promoting your business on your behalf. People get to join in on the fun. Some even walks away with a prize, and you get to reach a wider audience. It’s a win-win for everyone.
Collect data
Often, people are hesitant to share their information for the fear of identity theft. Social media contests provide an easy way to grow your email list and collect data. People will be more willing to provide you with their personal information, knowing that they get something in return.
You can ask people to leave their name, contact number, and email address to enter the contest. Also, think of the type of information you need for your future marketing campaigns. Want to know how many of them went to the local university? How many of them have kids? Now is your chance to find out.
Increase engagement
Contests are one of the best ways to boost your engagement. When you host a social media contest, your post is likely to get a lot of likes, shares, and comments. It’s a fun and interactive way to get people to interact with your brand.
More than the number of fans and followers, engagement is the most important element in social media. The engagement rate represents the number of people who are talking about your brand. The higher the engagement rate is, the higher the reach rate. That means, your content will be viewed by a wider audience. In addition to that, hosting a contest gives you more opportunity to interact with your audience and deepen the connection as well.
Collect user-generated content
Let’s face it. Most customers won’t leave a review unless you ask them to. And if you’re looking for a way get tons of reviews and user-generated content fast, contests are the way to do it. Simply ask your audience to provide their photos to enter, and you’ll be flooded with user-generated content in no time.
Not only will you have lots of photos to use for your future marketing campaigns, but it will also give your target audience the perception that people love your brand. After all, those who submitted their photos are already invested in your brand.
Why social media contests are a good idea
Holding contests and campaigns
on social media is more popular than ever, and we don’t see that changing anytime soon. Any company can give out free gift cards or electronics, so that really is not enough to hold the attention of social media users anymore. What is taking your contest to the next level? If you are running a contest, you must make sure your contest stands out from the rest.
As we know, consumers are constantly interacting with social media on their mobile phones. This means it is vital to take advantage of location. Urge users to check-in on social media when they are interacting with your company’s physical location. Offer some sort of incentive such as a discount, a charitable donation, a few points in a contest, etc. Getting social media users to check in not only allows you to generate more traffic but also creates a deeper user interaction (physical and digital).
Do your users have a reason to keep coming back to your page? Include your fans and contest participants in every possible step of the contest. Brands often do this by allowing the fans to vote on a winner, respond to a question, or answer a poll. Get creative here and choose what seems most relevant to your brand and product.
Although your contest is Facebook based, ask yourself if other social media platforms would enhance your contest. For example, say you are the marketer for a line of gluten-free butter and your Facebook contest asked users to post pictures and recipes of things they made with your butter. In this case, it would make sense to start a Pinterest board, displaying the recipes. Using more than one social media platform can allow you to reach a larger audience. The key here is to make sure your second social media platform is relevant to your contest.
The general goal of Facebook contests is to allow users to interact with your brand. Anybody can make a Facebook contest, but your goal is to expand that user interaction as far as possible. Think of ways to take your contests to other social media platforms, physical locations, and beyond.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/5-Reasons-Why-Social-Media-Contests-Should-be-a-Part-of-Your-Marketing-Strategy.png12602240Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2022-05-11 10:46:352022-05-06 09:10:145 Reasons Why Social Media Contests Should be a Part of Your Marketing Strategy
You probably belong to at least 3 Facebook groups, right? But have you ever considered creating one for your practice? If not, then you should.
In this blog post, we’ll show you how to leverage Facebook groups for your medical practice. Read on to discover how to use Facebook groups to support and grow your practice.
Build a community
Your practice or organization most likely has a Facebook Business Page. We highly recommend that you create a Facebook group in addition to your page as a way to engage with your audience on a more personal level.
People who will join your group are likely your most loyal patients and followers. They’re spending their free time reading your posts and sharing them with their family and friends. With Facebook groups, you have an opportunity to engage with them directly and show them that you care.
Establish authority as a thought leader
If you want to build authority as a thought leader, a Facebook group is a great way to get serious.
The key to building thought leadership is to blog regularly. Make sure, though, that your blogs are relevant to the industry and add value to the reader’s lives. Your Facebook group is an excellent place to share your blog posts as well as articles on trends and issues that impact your industry.
Thought leadership also requires staying up-to-date on the latest news and trends. Is there a newsworthy topic or a new law affecting the industry? Feel free to share your thoughts and opinion within the group.
Beat Facebook algorithm
It’s no secret that Facebook rewards engagement. In fact, Facebook pushes the post back up to the top every time someone reacts or comments on the post. The more people in your group are posting and interacting, the further your reach in the newsfeed will be.
To keep the flow of content going, regularly post things that will spark interaction among group members. Another idea is to ask open-ended questions. If they’re a really chatty bunch, let them dictate where the conversation is going. Ideally, you’re a benevolent leader who chimes in with support or wisdom when needed.
Provide value to the community
Most people turn to the internet for medical information. Some would visit health sites, while others would go around asking people for advice.
Suppose someone in your group asks specific questions about their condition and treatment, the best thing to do is to send this person a private message and invite him/her to your practice to discuss their question in person. This will help keep their information safe and ensure that you do not violate HIPAA.
Of course, you can still answer to the best of your understanding without sharing or asking for additional private information. You can also share some health tips, advice, as well as some helpful articles to further educate them.
It is a good idea to have rules in place about what is and isn’t appropriate to post. You want to keep the patient’s information private, while still fostering a sense of community and belongingness.
Create a sense of exclusiveness
Everyone wants to feel special, right? Private Facebook groups can provide just that. You have the option to keep the group private and hidden to emphasize exclusivity, keep the community tight-knit, and to keep the quality of discussions high.
You can create a group that is dedicated to your email subscribers. Each subscriber gets a link once they opt-in, so they can join the group. And since it’s a private group, only those who are inside the group can see who’s in the group, the posts, etc.
People can request to join, but you’ll have to screen them first before they can enter. Having some sort of fo qualification for admittance to the group naturally builds a stronger community. People feel like they’re a part of a special club.
Patient support group
People who are dealing with chronic illness, mental health issues, and other conditions can benefit from a support group.
By meeting and talking to people with the same condition as them, they will realize that they are not alone. That they aren’t the only person in the world who is experiencing the same problem. Plus, it gives them hope, seeing others in the group who are further along their road to recovery.
A support group can be their safe haven. Here, they are free to share their feelings and life circumstances within a safe and supportive environment.
As a healthcare professional, you are free to offer tips and advice to help patients deal with certain issues. You can also recommend some books and other resources that will further educate them.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Facebook-groups-blog-1.png12602240Kathlyn Angeles-Timbolhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngKathlyn Angeles-Timbol2021-01-20 12:51:562021-03-12 10:06:16How to Leverage Facebook Groups for Your Medical Practice
Today’s podcast is about Facebook groups and how to utilize Facebook groups to get in front of prospects, to build a community around your services, and really create that brand image where you are sharing valuable information and building conversations with your target market. So Facebook groups really have a few different purposes.
You can view them as a forum on Facebook, you can view them as a way for people to connect with a community around a certain topic or even in a specific location. And we have seen great success for wellness coaches, dietitians, nutritionists, wellness centers, healthcare organizations, creating groups were their own prospects and members as a way to make sure that they have more consistent communication with those individuals.
Listen to the Podcast on Facebook Groups for Health Care
Watch the Video about Facebook Groups in Health and Wellness Marketing
Read the Transcript
00:00 Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome to this week’s episode of The Social Speak Network podcast. I’m your host, the sweet Caitlin McDonald, the founder over here at the Social Speak Network, and over the past couple of weeks, and moving forward into the next, maybe even a couple of months, we’re going to be talking about the top 10 things that your wellness practice Health Care Center can do on digital marketing to see a return from their investment. And so today, I’m going to be talking about Facebook groups and how to utilize Facebook groups to get in front of prospects, to build a community around your services, and really create that brand image where you are sharing valuable information and building conversations with your target market. So Facebook groups really have a few different purposes. You can view them as a forum on Facebook, you can view them as a way for people to connect with a community around a certain topic or even in a specific location. And we have seen great success for wellness coaches, dieticians, nutritionists, wellness centers, healthcare organizations, creating groups were their own prospects and members as a way to make sure that they have more consistent communication with those individuals.
01:42 S1: Now, in order to make this happen, you have to really make sure that you’re not making the group about you. The group has to be about fostering a community, fostering conversations, and relationships and making sure that you’re not just talking about your own services and your own business. Yes, it’s a great way to share content that you create, but that content that you create, as we’ve said over and over again, really needs to be educational information that your target market and your prospects can take and run with. So for example, let’s say you are a health coach and you have new programs that are coming out. And so these programs, you really wanna share to your community. Now, you could go ahead and share them to your Facebook group. But rather than doing that, I would recommend creating a behind-the-scenes information that somebody might be able to find more expansive version of within the group, excuse me, within the program itself. However, you’re sharing just enough to get them started on the right path. This allows people to do it themselves if they want to, or to understand your expertise, so that they can turn to you for help with guidance down the road.
03:09 S1: Now you don’t wanna just be in there, posting about the group, excuse me, posting about your services individually, because this turns people away, it’s not interactive. Instead of doing that, post questions, answer questions, hop on Facebook live just in front of your group members and really try to foster that, those conversations. Now, it is important to note that right here, I’m talking about a group that is specifically to build a community around your services, and your practice. However, there are a lot of other more broad groups that already exists on Facebook. So, before you create that next group on diabetes, let’s say, make sure that there aren’t groups already out there that are doing a great job. If you’re trying to recreate something that’s already out there, it’s going to take a lot more time and effort to get people to join your group, because they’re already invested in these other groups. Now, I’m not saying don’t do it [chuckle] Facebook Groups are great thing to create, for your practice, but it does definitely take more time if it’s already existing in your space and in your specialties.
04:33 S1: Now, what you could do, if there is a group already made in your area of expertise, is go ahead and join that group. Offer guidance and ask questions, comment on other people’s posts and really start positioning yourself as an expert in that space, and as someone who is trustworthy or as an organization that’s trustworthy. And doing this helps you get that brand recognition, but again, you can’t talk about your services in somebody else’s group. Typically, there are guidelines about this, and it’s just not very professional behavior. We call this in, I mean in most industries, coaching clients from somebody else. And yes, a lot of times, your clients may have worked with somebody else in the past, but you don’t wanna be too salesy as you are trying to build that trust, and really come across as a figure in the space. Then the next tip about utilizing Facebook groups, and this is going back to creating a group yourself, is to be really specific about the purpose and to recognize that it’s going to be difficult to manage the group by yourself.
05:51 S1: And so in terms of understanding and being specific about the group’s purpose, this really helps set the expectations for your group members as they’re joining the group, what they’re going to see, what type of content they’re going to see, and how they can utilize the group to help further their own knowledge, education, and health. And so you want to, if you have a specific purpose and you’ve written the guidelines for the group, it’s important to actually stick to those. So somebody joins, they see the guidelines, maybe they answer a few questions before being approved, then you have to make sure that you are really sticking to those guidelines and being truthful yourself as well as holding other people accountable. Then the second piece there, was [chuckle] inviting other admins and managers to the group. So, in a group, you can have multiple managers. We recommend not just having one person in charge of the group. This really makes it so that there’s less… What we’ve seen in our experience is that there’s less interactions if there’s only one manager. When there are more managers you can even help foster discussions between one another, and people always can have their questions answered more quickly.
07:13 S1: So you can either divide the management based on your own expertise and what topics you are comfortable talking about. Or you can divide it by day of the week, or even time of day. Depending on how active your group is, you might even need somebody on call over the weekend to make sure that those questions are being answered. If somebody’s posting something in the group, and nobody is commenting back in replying, people are going to stop writing back. Now, having multiple group member, or excuse me group admin also makes it easier to keep new conversations forming in the group. So by this I mean, let’s say it’s been a quiet week and no members are really posting anything. As a manager of the group, you can then go in and post something to start spurring the conversation. Maybe you have the first week of the month, you have a standard question that goes out and you see how it changes over time. Maybe it’s asking people for their favorite exercise routine or their favorite activity of the season with their family. Potentially, it’s posting recipes that have to do with a single ingredient that’s timely or seasonal. So all of these things are things that you can do to help boost that engagement on the group, and because you are managing the group, that helps you prove your own expertise and position within the space.
08:47 S1: One other thing I recommend is having individuals introduce themselves when they join the group, and by doing this, you are getting people one, committed, two, participating in the group. If the first thing they do once they join is they start posting in the group, typically they’ll keep on doing it. If you don’t ask them to introduce themselves, oftentimes, they’re not going to. And then another thing that you can do is make sure that when somebody’s requesting to join you ask them questions prior to joining. So you can ask them what topics they’re most interested in, so that you talk about those topics, and for their email address. Now, this email address, if you have a disclosure there, you can mostly add that to your newsletter as well, or you can check to make sure that they’re already on your newsletter and they have to be part of on your newsletter in order to then join your group. So it’s a great way just to build your email list as well.
09:53 S1: So above all, the biggest takeaway when it comes to Facebook groups is really making sure that you are being considerate of others. You aren’t selling yourself too much and that your really, your main goal is to build that community and those relationships with the members of your group. So again, my name’s Caitlin McDonald. I’m the co-founder over here at the Social Speak Network. And thank you so much for tuning into our podcast on Digital Marketing for Health and Wellness Practices. Next week, Amber is going to be diving into utilizing on some tools for social media. So be sure to stick around there. You can download and subscribe to, our podcast on iTunes as well as Podbean and it’s also over on our website, the socialspeaknetwork.com. Thanks so much, and I look forward to seeing you soon.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Podcast-Youtube-Image-fb-groups-healthwellness.png7201280Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2019-08-28 13:13:112019-08-28 13:13:11How to Use Facebook Groups to Grow a Health and Wellness Practice
In this podcast episode we talk about how Facebook Ads work and the top benefits for having a Facebook ad campaign running for your wellness business.
The first benefit is getting in front of new people, new prospects. So you’re actually helping your business see an ROI from the social media efforts that you have.
The second thing is that you are nurturing those relationships of people who have heard about your brand or your practice, but haven’t taken that step to come in and learn more or meet with one of your staff. Running these Facebook ads helps you make sure that you stay top of mind to the people who haven’t yet come in.
Then the third thing that it does, is it helps you re-engage with the patients who have been in to see you and just need a reminder every once in a while, that it’s time to come back in and schedule their next appointment.
Take a listen and read the transcript below!
Facebook Advertising for Healthcare – Digital Marketing Podcast Transcript
Hello and welcome to the Social Speak Network podcast. I’m Caitlin McDonald, one of the co-owners over here at Social Speak, and in today’s podcast episode, we are going to be talking about Facebook ads. Facebook ads are really important for health and wellness businesses and for healthcare.
Facebook Ads help you establish brand recognition and brand trust quickly and easily. They also allow you to get in front of the right people at the right time. Managing Facebook Ads for your healthcare business is really to not only build your prospect list, but also to nurture those prospects.
Last week, Amber talked some about creating a social media content calendar and figuring out how many times to post and what topics to post about, and so this is taking your social media presence to really another level.
Types of Facebook Ads for Wellness Center
On Facebook, there are a few different ways that you can advertise your business. There’s organic posting, there’s boosting those organic posts, and then there’s a whole slew of different ads that you can run from the Ads Manager.
In our digital marketing for healthcare we try and focus on the conversion ads. The reason why we do this is because it helps tap into Facebook’s algorithm for figuring out who’s going to be most likely to take that next step, and we’ll get into this in a few weeks, but that next step often is signing up to be a lead on your website.
This is something I’m going be getting into in a few weeks here. However, I did want go through a couple of real life Facebook campaigns that we’ve managed for some of our clients. The reason why I’m bringing up real Facebook Ad campaigns for some of our wellness clients is because I want to set the stage about the amount of time and effort is can take to nail down and optimize a Facebook campaign that’s going to work for your unique offerings and your unique target market. So let’s dive in.
The first business that I want to highlight is a Healthcare Education Association. They provide healthcare resources and education to constituents online and through live conferences and events. This group has a tremendous following, however, they are trying to grow and boost their new members. Over the years, just because of some ideological differences between some of the older members and the newer members, they have dropped some of their old membership base. Now they’re trying to really grow with new members that are more aligned with where their organization stands. This healthcare organization had only ever run boosted posts before. Yes, this does boost an organization’s exposure and engagement, but are you really seeing a return from that investment?
This is where the Facebook conversion ads come in that we created.
The Social Speak process with Facebook ads, typically, is having some sort of free resource or free download, even free consultation, that somebody can sign up for when they click on your Facebook ad. We’ve used webinars, e-books, and, in this case, we took articles that the client had previously written and bundled them together in the form of an e-book. Our first ads tested out the interest in this resource, which audiences lead to the most clients and conversions, ad what imagry and text were most effective. In this first go, there were three different audiences, but we did not see anything more than a 1% conversion rate. We spent about $160 in advertising budget spread across our A/B tests and saw one lead come in. Giving these tests a rest, we moved to the next digital project.
When optimizing Facebook ads for your wellness practice you shouldn’t just work on testing how you position your free resource or content upgrade, but also what offer is going to align most closely to the needs of your target market.
At this stage, we moved on to their next resource that we could offer and we did this a few different times, and we came across a quiz that they had. After repackaging the quiz so that it lived directly on their website we were ready to capture the leads directly into their email system rather than going through a third party. With this quiz, we found that through running the leads ads on Facebook rather than sending somebody to a landing page, we’re able to get the cost per lead down to almost $2. Additionally, we tried two different other campaigns, one for a fact sheet, and one for an e-book, focusing on a different topic, a different service that they provide from the first e-book, and each of these were able to get a sub $3 cost per lead as well. We’re still in the process of testing new services to promote new offers to promote, new educational resources to promote for them. We’re building another quiz that has to do with that second topic that we are talking about with them, and through this process, we’re continually able to decrease that cost per lead and get consistent results.
The reason why I shared this one first and kind of that failure story of spending $160 for one lead, is that your whole staff and your whole board needs to have the expectation that optimizing Facebook ads does take time. And so yes, you want to have an end goal of, I want to only spend $10 per lead, $15 per lead, $1 per lead. You need to have that goal, but you need to have the expectation that you’re not going to be there right now. So for this organization, we want that cost per lead to be lower, and we are working to get there. But we are testing out different audiences, different offers, different ad content, as a way to get there. I think in all, we’ve run over 100 or 150 different ads for them, that maybe it’s the same ad text but a different picture, different ad text, same video, or different audience, same audience, merging audiences together. And so it really is a process where you need to let the data speak for itself. And if it doesn’t stick on the first try, try again. So have kind of that budget in mind and that end goal right into the forefront.
The next client I wanted to share is a dietitian and health coach. She has been working with us running ads for over the past year. For any ad campaign, we do recommend giving it at least six months to make sure that with that first example is process that you are giving it time to really figure out if you’re getting results or not. Afterwards you have to then convert the leads into actual folks who are booking appointments with you, coming in, signing up for those paid services, or purchasing a product from you. So with this health coach, this dietitian, she has been running ads long before we even first sat down with her. And for her, our technique is really to focus on each of the different e-books, downloads, free offers that she has. She is very geared towards sharing educational resources, as are most of our clients. And for this client, we’ve had a few home run offers, timely offers, holiday diet tips and back to school tips and things like that, that have worked really well; with landing pages getting 60-70% conversion rates. However, the cost per lead has still been a little bit higher.
In this recent campaign, she had a great idea of grouping all of the resources together and having a complete resource library that folks who enter their name and email would gain access to. We created a new conversion campaign for this and a new landing page. And rather than creating individual ads for each of the different items that we want to test, we used Facebook’s, it’s not new, but newer feature where you can actually test multiple headlines, bodies and calls to action in each of the ads that you’re running and images or videos. And then Facebook will automatically pair and match and test the different items for you. So it takes a lot of the guess work out of creating those 100 or 200 different ads to make sure that you’re testing all of the different combinations. So for her this new campaign, we’ve been able to bring her average historical cost per lead from about $3-$4 all the way down to $0.50 cents. Now at this 50-cent mark, she is just pushing money towards this campaign and we’re continuing to see Facebook’s algorithm lead to better and better results. Now for her, because she is getting this quantity now, we are making sure that we still have that quality.
We’re working on that next part of the campaign, which is that email marketing follow-up. And here, we’re testing to make sure that that open rate and click rate on her emails actually is going up rather than going down as we’re getting more quantity in there.
Setting Goals for your Healthcare Facebook Campaign
The goal for your Facebook campaign should be within the first, I’d say, three months to really start seeing movement in a positive direction. And that could be starting with a cost per lead or conversion of $60 and working it down. But you don’t want to throw all your money at something until you see that upward momentum towards positive return. So for this dietitian for example, we are telling her to throw money at the campaign because it is currently working, and she’s getting conversions from it. If it was that first example that I gave, we did not spend their whole monthly budget until month three [chuckle] when we were finally able to push the dollars behind a campaign that was getting the results in the price point that they needed.
Always start small, test multiple things at once, and utilize Facebook’s ability to really optimize the campaigns for you.
A trick for optimizing a Facebook Ad Campaign
Now, one of the tricks that we have for tapping into how Facebook can optimize this is utilizing a landing page or a lead page sort of alternative. You can put this directly on your WordPress website or Square Space website. We typically use LeadPages, which is a software to build the lead pages. You can send an automated email afterwards and test to make sure that it really works. I recommend doing this for your business, your healthcare center as well. But of course, if you need any help, we are here to help.
As I wrap up, let’s just talk again about those top benefits for having a Facebook ad campaign running for your wellness business.
The first benefit is getting in front of new people, new prospects. So you’re actually helping your business see an ROI from the social media efforts that you have.
The second thing is that you are nurturing those relationships of people who have heard about your brand or your practice, but haven’t taken that step to come in and learn more or meet with one of your staff. Running these Facebook ads helps you make sure that you stay top of mind to the people who haven’t yet come in.
Then the third thing that it does, is it helps you re-engage with the patients who have been in to see you and just need a reminder every once in a while, that it’s time to come back in and schedule their next appointment.
In terms of what to expect, don’t expect results in the first day. Yes, you might get lucky and you might find that combination where they are coming in right away. Most likely it might take upwards of three months. Now, don’t spend your whole marketing budget in those first three months. Wait for you to see that upward momentum and that path towards getting a positive ROI. From there, give it another three to six months to really run its course and make sure that you are getting after you get that lead, that prospect, that you are then getting someone in the door.
In health care, yes, there are services that need immediate bookings of appointments and somebody needs to come in right away for a consultation or even a surgery. However more often than not, for health and wellness, it’s about educating, teaching people why they need to come in and getting them to know, like and trust your brand. Again, my name’s Caitlin McDonald. This is the Social Speak Network podcast. You can follow us on Podbean, on iTunes or head on over to our website to check out our blog posts and social media as well. I’ll see you next time on the Social Speak Network podcast.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Podcast-Youtube-Image-healthwellness.png7201280Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2019-08-14 02:50:032019-08-13 23:05:46Facebook Advertising in Health and Wellness
As doctors, you tell patients all the time that an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure. Although we often use this axiom when referring to health, we believe that it also applies to your marketing strategy.
Knowing how to market health care services is important, even if you’re happy with your current patient volume. With so much information available online, patients no longer feel the need to visit clinics or hospitals near them. They can easily switch health care providers anytime. The last thing you want is to find out your patient database is nearly empty.
You are not guaranteed to keep up your patient volume forever. Having a planned medical marketing strategy will help keep your brand at the forefront of people’s mind.
Here are some tips on how to market health care services and grow your practice.
Referral marketing
Doctors and other medical practitioners aren’t entirely clueless on how to market health care services. In fact, many of you have been using this marketing strategy for years.
In order to make referral marketing work for you, you have to unleash your inner extrovert and put yourself out there. Make sure you get some face time with physicians, massage therapists, yoga instructors, health coaches, naturopathic doctors etc. These people can be great resources for referrals.
Professional referrals are based squarely on sound relationships. Patients, health care professionals and their staff will only refer someone they trust – someone they feel is the best. You have to make them feel comfortable about you – both as a health practitioner and as a person.
Referral marketing is not just about getting more people through the door. Rather, it’s an ongoing process of finding, attracting, and retaining patients.
Establish or enhance your social media presence
Social media marketing requires a lot of time and effort, and we know that time is something you may not have in abundance. But the benefits of social media are simply too great to ignore.
Advertising your practice on social media can help new patients find you with less effort on your part. It also allows you to connect with other professionals and your patients.
Devote the time to make daily updates and postings. Publish content your audience would be interested to read. Share some tips to educate patients. Share relevant information about your field of knowledge. By educating your audience, they will see you as a helpful doctor who is invested in keeping them healthy.
You don’t have to manually post all your social media content. There are lots of tools out there that will automate your social media publishing and scheduling.
Focus on branding
When we think of a brand, big companies such as Coca-Cola and Apple often comes to mind. As a medical practitioner, you can’t create your brand, can you? Of course, you can!
A brand’s identity is how a business wants to be perceived by its audience or customers. It is how you are currently perceived as a medical practitioner.
Having a strong brand allows you to build a positive image that makes people expect a certain level of quality from you. It helps people trust you and makes them want to work with you. Ultimately, branding can help increase referrals and expand your practice.
Professional website
Today, more and more people are using the internet to research treatments and find health care practitioners of all kinds. They’d want to learn more about you before making an appointment.
If you don’t have a website, then you’re seriously limiting your visibility online. It will be difficult for potential patients to learn about you and your practice. This puts you at a disadvantage.
Having an up-to-date professional website allows you to represent your brand the way you want it to be. Plus, it allows you to easily communicate with potential and existing patients about new services and offerings. Ultimately, it reduces the amount of time your staff spends on the phone by providing basic information and answers to commonly asked questions.
Final thoughts
For decades, medical professionals have gotten by without spending time and money in marketing and advertising their practices. Living in the digital age, having no online presence is simply not an option.
The internet has changed how people experience health care. They would turn to the internet to research health-related topics and treatments, and even shop around for health care practitioners. If you know how to market health care services, then you’ll find that there are lots of opportunities to grow your practice and reach new patients.
The Social Speak Network Podcast recently went into more detail about digital marketing for health care services, as well.
Top 10 Tips to Increase your Digital Marketing Presence in the Health & Wellness Industry
In this podcast episode, Social Speak Network co-founders discuss 10 Tips to Increase your Digital Marketing Presence in the Health & Wellness Industry. Over the upcoming weeks, we will be diving into each of these in more detail.
1) Social Media Strategy
2) Facebook Ads
3) Facebook Groups
4) Instagram
5) Pinterest
6) Blogging
7) Lead Generation
8) Videos
9) Podcast
10) Email Marketing
Watch the Episode
Read the Digital Marketing for Health Care Services Podcast Transcript
00:01 Caitlin McDonald: Hello and welcome to the Social Speak Network podcast. I’m one of your hosts today, Caitlin McDonald, and we’re also joined by Amber Irwin.
00:10 Amber Irwin: Hello everyone.
00:12 CM: In this episode, we’re gonna be talking a lot about tips to increase your digital marketing presence in the health and wellness industry. So we work with a lot of different businesses and organizations in health and wellness ranging from Pediatric centers to massage therapists, nutritionists. And they’re always asking, how can we increase our digital marketing, how can we increase our exposure online, so that we’re reaching the right target market? So today, we’re gonna be going through the top 10 tips to increase your digital marketing presence. And then over the course of the next few months, we’re gonna be diving into each of these more specifically. So either Amber and myself, will be really focusing on one of the tips moving forward, and this episode really is designed to be an overarching strategy, that kind of paints the picture for the next few months.
01:07 AI: Exactly. So let’s dive into the first thing that will help you have a clear direction of where you’re going. And that is having that strategy, whether it is just a social media strategy or a digital marketing strategy, again, with that overarching picture of What do you need to do? So, having a content calendar. With social media, and really, digital marketing as a whole it’s… Consistency is key, and if you don’t have that content calendar and that organization of what you need to do and what you need to prepare for, it’s easy to forget about it and not do it. So having a calendar, knowing how many times to post with social media is really important, because sometimes… The other day, we had somebody say, Gosh, three times a week seems like a lot. I think it should just be one time a week and we’re like “No.”
01:58 AI: So knowing your audience, whether that’s every day, maybe it’s just during the week or maybe your audience is on social media more during the weekends, so knowing your audience and knowing when to post and then also what platforms to use. So we’re gonna be talking a little bit about Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest, but there’s also Twitter and LinkedIn. So knowing where your audience is playing is really important, so Caitlin, why don’t you talk to us a little bit about the Facebook ads and Facebook groups.
02:27 CM: Perfect. So Facebook is one of those networks that we all wanna forget that it’s there, but we can’t forget that it’s there. [chuckle] And over time, it’s been more and more important to have an actual advertising spend. So you’re not only paying somebody just to manage the account and post the three times or more per week, you also then have to spend money on Facebook in order for those posts to be seen. And so over time, these ads have gotten more and more complex as well, so it used to be that you could just click and boost a post, and now what you have to really dive in and create an ad that’s specific for one segment of your market versus another.
03:14 CM: So let’s say you have some services that are more tailored towards women, or moms, or another section that’s more tailored towards baby boomers or children. You need to create different ads and different audiences for each of those so that you’re really speaking towards the networks they are. Now, in terms of the budget for Facebook ads, really this depends on your service. I think the most important thing here is to pay attention to those key performance indicators. So how much is each lead costing you? How many leads are then converting to schedule a follow-up appointment? And of those follow-up appointments, how many folks are then coming in for secondary services, sending referrals and things like that? So we currently have ads running for some companies where the cost per lead is $20-$30, we have other ones where it’s less than a dollar, closer to 50 cents per lead.
04:16 CM: And these are converting at the same ratio of lead to then signing up for services. However, the person who’s paying $30 per lead is completely fine with that cost, because their service is more money in general. Then there’s the next part of Facebook groups. Now Facebook groups are a great way to find your target audience, in communities that are already formed and it’s also a great way to create a community around your own services or offerings. So, we recommend joining groups and so this could be the admin on your account or the business owner. Maybe someone on the Board of Directors, joining groups on Facebook that align with your target market’s interests and posting on there, commenting, sharing articles that you’re writing and everything like that. And then also having a group that you manage for your own organization that just provides a little bit more information. So that your target audience can continue learning and building that trust with you and you building the trust with them so that when it’s time to come on in for that next appointment, they know where to turn. Amber, do you wanna dive in now to some of those other social media networks?
05:39 AI: Yeah. So let’s talk about Instagram first. So, Instagram is… A lot of people, this… Instagram’s a little overwhelming, I think. People don’t necessarily understand it or they’re… And most of the time, it’s just images and videos. You can’t put a link in the content. You could put links in your stories if you have over 10,000 followers. And below in the comments, I will put down a free tool. That’s called Linktree and that allows you to have multiple links within your profile, within your bio area there. So you have a link to your blog, you have a link to maybe a special offer, your YouTube channel, etcetera. So I’ll put that in the comments below. But Instagram stories are really important to make sure you are doing… And these are fun for… Maybe it’s a tip of the day, behind the scenes, introducing a new practitioner.
06:34 AI: These are just quick 15 second clips, or you can do images too. And they only see it for 24 hours. So this is a great way, if you are… If you have an event, if you are having a special on products, maybe it’s a blowout sale on just inventory you have in the office. This is a great way to just have those stories be more like your VIP area. You can track the analytics on those, so it lets you know how many people watched each story and who those people were. So then another step is follow up with them with a private message of saying “Hey, I saw you liked our story. Are you interested in our products? Or if you have any questions, let us know.” So it’s really about building that relationship.
07:16 AI: Instagram TV is really important. These are for your videos that are anything over a minute, because remember, on your News Feed, your videos can be one minute long. And on Instagram TV, they can be up to 10 minutes long. So taking advantage of that. And what Instagram TV has started to do is any time you upload a video to Instagram TV, it now gives a one-minute clip on your News Feed. So before, we would upload a video and then create a post about it, and now Instagram does that automatically for you. So you can have a cover photo in that, you can have a title and a description and put, “Hey, check us out.” What’s that call to action? So, “Sign up today on our website, check us out on YouTube.” So it’s important to make sure that you’re using all of the bells and whistles that Instagram has for you.
08:06 AI: The more you use… So, on Instagram stories, the more if you are doing like a mention, if you’re doing a gift, a hashtag, a sticker, the things that they already have there for you, they like that. And so, you show up more in the algorithm. It’s kind of silly, but they love it, so do it. And then obviously, the hashtags for Instagram. So make sure you’re doing your research. The one thing I love about Instagram is if you type in a hashtag, it’s gonna tell you… Like, if you search for a hashtag, it’s gonna tell you how many people are talking about that hashtag. And then you can also follow that hashtag and see everyone that’s mentioning it. So, it’s good just for that research.
08:47 AI: Competitors, what are they talking about? What posts are they putting up? What engagement are they getting? And then for you to be able to create content for your audience and see what people are wanting to know about. And don’t always use the same hashtags. ‘Cause a lotta times, you’ll see the exact same hashtags in the exact same order on every single post. Do not do that. You’ll see formatting where it’s the post, three dots, and then hashtags. You can have, we usually say, between five and 10 hashtags per post. And then in the comments, if you do a first comment, you could have up to 30 hashtags. So hashtags play an important role in Instagram.
09:28 AI: So from Instagram, I wanna move into Pinterest, because Pinterest… These are both very visual platforms. And Pinterest, I really think of Pinterest as more of a visual Google. This is really where, if your target market is women, mothers, you have to be on Pinterest because this is where we’re finding our information. Whether it is, is this normal? To home remedies, to stretches, to work outs, to… Whatever it is to home interior design. This is where women are finding the majority of their information. So Pinterest, use it as a resource for your clients.
10:08 AI: If you look at, I’m just gonna throw out Home Depot. I think Farmer’s Insurance does a great job. They organize their boards as resources for their audience. So they have home gardening tips, they have like organic plants. They have all these boards that their audience really wants to know about. And so, using Pinterest as a resource for your clients helps build that value and that relationship. The other thing Pinterest is great for is building traffic back to your website. So, Caitlin’s gonna be talking a little bit about the logging and lead generation. And Pinterest is a great way to build that audience back to… Or that traffic back to your website and creating the right images.
10:52 AI: So again, in the comments below, I will put a really cool tool. Secret, a tool that we use for our clients and it makes Pinterest… It’s amazing. It really helps drive the traffic to your site, it helps you organize and schedule your pins, and it gives you suggestions based on your search history of what you should do. So Pinterest, it’s… I think that it’s something that is just a really great way… If your clients are asking a question and you have what we call power partners or a list of people that you recommend, you can pin from them too. So you can just have a board that says, “Resources” or “Referral partners,” and start pinning from their website to that board. So it gives your audience one place to go, it makes it easy and it’s, again, driving that traffic back to your website and your power partner’s website. So, that is Pinterest for ya.
11:49 CM: Awesome. And Amber mentioned this, but Pinterest really is like a search engine, which brings us to blogging and search engine optimization. And so starting… I guess this isn’t one of the points that we’re really diving into specifically, but I do wanna bring it up. One thing that’s important to remember with search engine optimization, is that there are a lot of other places that your website can be found or your organization can be found besides just your website. So yes, you want your website URL to show up and be kind of in the top 10 results on Google, however you can have your Pinterest boards and your pins show up in Google. You can have your YouTube content, we’re gonna get into videos, but you can have your YouTube content show up in the top 10 points of Google, your directory listings.
12:42 CM: All of these things really work together to help boost your website, but also just boost your overall brand presence online. So really keep that in mind as you’re working on search engine optimization, that it’s not just about doing one thing, it’s about doing a little bit of everything in a very smart way. [chuckle]
13:06 CM: So let’s jump into blogging. Blogging is one of our favorite tactics when it comes to boosting your presence in digital marketing and in the digital world. And basically, what this means is creating a well-written article and publishing it on your website. Long gone are the days where you can only write a post of 350 or 750 words. These articles should be a lot longer, meaning, between 1500 and 5000 words, and there are tools to figure out what’s the best length for a specific topic. And they should include lots of different types of media such as videos, Pinterest pins, little snippets of text that are easy for somebody to click and tweet. And so, you wanna make it as easy as possible for this blog post to then be shared to different networks.
14:05 CM: So our typical process for writing a blog or an article includes starting with that keyword research. So here, we like to focus on what are the main things that people are looking for if they want to come in and book an appointment with one of your specialists or physicians? So what are the top concerns that they have? What are the symptoms they have? What are the main questions that they have? From here, you can research what people are actually searching for online. And there are a few ways to do this. One of the easiest is just pulling up Google and starting to type in whatever that topic is, and Google will actually put in there related search terms, they are the phrases that people are really using. And so that’s a great thing to put into Google, or excuse me, into your blog post.
15:00 CM: Then, after you have kind of the idea of what that topic should really be… And as I’m doing the podcast episode specifically about this, we’ll talk about some of those tools that our company uses for it. [chuckle] But we won’t get into that now, because I could go on and on about that. But the next thing that you do after you have that basis of the keyword research is actually creating a blog outline. When I create a blog outline, sometimes, I’m already up to 500 or 750 words, and I haven’t written in an ounce of content. All I have are the headers and the sub-headers and a couple of little bullet points under each of them. So it makes writing a longer blog post a lot easier in the long run.
15:43 CM: After this, it really, as we mentioned is about formatting it and then sharing it. And so one of the good ways to share it is to have some sort of call to action in there as well, and so this brings us into the lead generation part of your website presence and digital marketing. And so, for lead generation, we always recommend having some sort of content upgrade or offer that you’re promoting, and so each of the blog posts that you write can then include a little snippet about that content upgrade or call to action, as a way to entice people to take the next step about learning more about your business and organization. For this lead generation piece, we always recommend having really valuable free information or free content that somebody can then gain access to. This could be a resource library that’s just for your subscribers, or it could be something like booking a free consultation as well.
16:46 CM: Both of those work tremendously well in health and wellness. And then, in order to actually collect the names and email addresses, we recommend setting up a landing page, and you can do this just on, let’s say, a WordPress website or a tool like LeadPages or somewhere else, where you collect their name, email address and sometimes phone number, you can play around with kind of conversion rates there, have them download or gain access to whatever it is, and then sign them up for your email newsletter. So we’ll jump into email newsletter later. But we brought up video a couple of times, I [chuckle].. With blogging and social media and everything. So, Amber, do you wanna jump into videos?
17:30 AI: Yeah. So I love that blogging is growing into this so much more than just contact. In a blog, like Caitlin said, you’re gonna have a lead magnet, you’re gonna have an image, you’re gonna have that Pinterest image, so you can pin that back to Pinterest, and you’re gonna have videos. So I… You’re really touching every type of learning, whether they’re kinesthetic, visual, audio. Because with videos, people, and a lot of times, people will watch videos without the sound, so captions are really important, because whether they’re at work or they’re just in a place where they can’t hear, their kids are running around… Whatever it is. So videos are a great way to really allow your audience to get to know who you are.
18:16 AI: And these videos can be on… Again, it goes back to that content calendar that you’re gonna be putting in place the first step. Because, maybe you have a tip of the day in your blog post, whether you have it broken out in different sections, you could have a video for each section, so it just maybe goes into a little bit further detail or showing them how to do something so they can read it and they can see it. And they can put it together based on how they need to. Maybe it’s recipes are really great for videos. So videos are just such an important piece of your digital marketing. And there’s a few things that you’re gonna do with these videos once you have them. Obviously, you’re gonna upload them to YouTube, and when you have them onto YouTube, there’s… And I’ll get in more like Caitlin said… As you go into these videos more in detail, we’ll give you all the tools that we use.
19:05 AI: But with YouTube, you’re gonna wanna create playlists and there’s a lot of little things that you could do with your videos to make sure that they’re getting seen more. So, YouTube is gonna be your hub. From that, you could put them into your blog post, you can upload them to Facebook into these groups that you’re gonna be a part of, but then also onto Instagram TV. So a couple of tips when you’re doing videos. When you’re doing an Instagram TV video, have your phone vertical. When you’re doing a… Most of the time, if I’m recording a video for YouTube, I’ll just have it from my computer or turn your phone horizontal. So it doesn’t matter, even if you do a video vertical for YouTube, YouTube… There’s no more black bars, they have the image back there, so it looks really good, but having these videos on all of your platforms is really important because, again, it just… It brings that name to face and you’re able to answer questions. A lot of times what we see with pediatricians, they will get questions, they’ll take notes of weekly questions that they’re getting from their patients and then at the end of the week, they’ll do maybe an FAQ Friday and they’ll answer some of these questions that the parents had or they’ll talk about a topic.
20:23 AI: So again, it’s listening to what your audience is looking for and asking for and doing those videos around their needs. And this is, again, where those Facebook groups come in, because you can do videos just for that group, based on those questions that are coming in, so you can get really intimate with your clients and then you have ones that are just for YouTube that anyone can view. So, videos are really important, and again going with the videos, taking it a little bit further with podcasts. So Caitlin, let’s talk a little bit about podcasts before we kind of wrap it up with the email marketing piece. Podcasts are hot right now, but everyone wants to do one. What are, how do you start your own podcast and what are a few tips people should know?
21:12 CM: Yeah. So with podcasts, the process is a lot easier than you might think. There are hundreds, maybe not hundreds, but there are a handful of free podcast, kind of hosting companies, or ones where it just costs under $10 per month to sign up for it. We use Podbean. There are a bunch of other ones. With Podbean, we also can hook it up to iTunes. So our podcast is on iTunes. And it’s something that, as long as you’re being consistent, it just provides that extra little piece of personality behind your organization. So, it’s a great place to take the content that you’re sharing in those videos and turn it into a podcast episode.
22:00 CM: It’s also a great way to interview people. So let’s say, you have 10 physicians on staff, go through and interview each of them on anything from kind of giving a little bit of a personal background to who’s in your practice through to their specialities. If you’re an health and wellness coach, reach out to other health and wellness coaches who might have a slightly different perspective and having this podcast and being the interviewer automatically positions you as an expert and also gives you a great ideas for what to do for your own practice if you ever are stuck finding clients, let’s say, or with… Maybe one regimen isn’t working for a client, you always… It always works.
22:45 CM: So tap into the knowledge of the people that you’re interviewing, and see what else they recommend, any other solutions that they recommend kind of turning to. So it’s a really fun, easy way just to have a different piece of media that you can share on your website, and then it also provides a great basis for blog posts. So, [chuckle] you do the podcast episode, you record it for YouTube, you upload it to Podbean or wherever, to iTunes, so then you can share that, you can share the video and then you’d make a transcription of it using one of the many softwares that are available online and you have a full blog post kind of without doing any work that then goes on your website, helps with that search engine optimization and provides a different type of content to share online as well. So podcasts are hot, they’re one of… It’s one of the growing, quickest growing avenues online for marketing your business and practice. So I say jump on the bandwagon, give it a shot.
23:55 AI: Exactly, and then once you have your blogs and your podcast, then that kinda comes into that email marketing piece. And email marketing kinda plays two roles in your digital marketing because you’re gonna have, whether you have weekly updates. We do a weekly digital marketing email or a monthly newsletter and so I’ll talk a little bit about those monthly newsletters and weekly emails, and then, Caitlin’s gonna talk a little bit about how that email marketing plays a role in your lead generation with the automation piece. So when you have and again, everything comes down to consistency. So when you are creating all this content, you can kind of see how it’s this little spider web and how everything connects, but your website is your hub of where everything lands and so, your whole goal is to have everyone, have all these resources back to your website. So email marketing, whether these are patients, people you’ve met at events, people that signed up for your lead generation, you wanna make sure that now you are communicating with them, whether that is weekly, bi-weekly or monthly, it doesn’t matter, as long as you pick what you’re gonna do and commit to it.
25:09 AI: So the worst is you get an email. I signed up for something, I’m so excited. I get that intro email, I love it and then I’m like, “I haven’t heard anything from them. What’s going on?” So making sure that you have that plan and you know what they’re talking about. So again, your newsletters are gonna be more content that’s just for them. So again, this can be a video that’s maybe just an FAQ video. Asking people to join your Facebook group, giving them tips, maybe it’s finding other articles of resources that you have approved that you want to send out to your audience. So, really, it’s tips giving a lot of value, that’s where people… You’re gonna keep them reading. And then at the end you would have your links to your blogs, you would have your links to your social media, but really come up with original content for your newsletter. So Caitlin, how does email marketing play a role with lead generation?
26:07 CM: Yeah, absolutely. So with lead generation, and as Amber just mentioned, somebody is really excited. They just signed up for whatever resource or free consultation that you decided to offer as that content upgrade, and now you need to make sure they know who your organization is and that they… So, know, like and trust you. And so, email marketing and creating automated email campaigns for that first two weeks of your relationship with this new prospect is really important. And so, we recommend not only having that weekly or monthly newsletter, but also having an automated email campaign that every new subscriber’s signed up to. And so with this, you’re trying to be educational, you’re trying to provide even more content that’s gonna benefit this prospect. And then, over time throughout those first two weeks, you can introduce some of your services, you can have a video in there, interviewing one of your physicians or the person that this individual might see.
27:19 CM: And your goal really is to get them to trust you enough, to want to sign up for one of your paid services, or come on and schedule that initial meeting with you. Because, just because somebody signed up for the email list doesn’t mean that they’re necessarily ready to take that next step. So having this email marketing is something that’s really easy to create and have play in the background, and continue building that trust so that you don’t have to sit there and email or call every single new sign up. So, it really helps with getting people to know, like, and trust your brand.
27:55 AI: Yeah, I love it. So as we said, over the past following weeks… Or upcoming weeks, we are gonna be going into more detailed tips and tricks on each one of these points, so you have a better understanding of how it can work for your business and why it’s so important to your digital marketing strategy, because really, it seems like a lot, but they all flow together. So you can’t just do one piece without doing another piece, so we’re gonna show you why and how to do each of these. Until next time, we will see you guys later, if you have any questions, comments, please let us know and we look forward to chatting with you on our next podcast.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Podcast-Youtube-Image-amber-and-caitlin-1.png7201280Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2019-07-24 17:22:552019-09-06 13:36:19How to Market Health Care Services Plus the Top 10 Tips for Digital Marketing in Health Care
Farotech is a comprehensive, growth-driven digital marketing agency that implements a systematic approach to lead generation, nurturing and conversion by utilizing scalable web design, cutting edge inbound strategies, and creative video development.
In this interview with CEO and founder, Chris Carr, we focused on inbound marketing, web design, and video marketing for the healthcare industry. We covered:
How Inbound Marketing, Web design, and video for large orthopedic brands relate to short-term and long-term strategic marketing decisions.
Current trends for wellness practices with SEO marketing in 2019.
Tactics that were expected to perform well or had a lot of hype, but failed to take hold in 2018.
The effect of video on digital marketing for healthcare.
The top 3 things that a wellness center should be doing online to see a return from their SEM efforts.
The top strategy that should be followed, but often marketing teams get wrong.
Marketing strategies Farotech is currently testing that many other agencies aren’t implementing for their clients.
Please be sure to subscribe to the Social Speak Podcast for more interviews with experts in digital marketing for health and wellness businesses. To learn more about Farotech, click here.
I had a blast during this interview with Chris, and was blown away by how in depth and actionable the information was that we discussed. Some key takeaways included:
Don’t just change your website if you think it can work better to reach the KPIs you’ve identified for your practice. Install software to create Heatmaps. These heatmaps show how prospects are engaging with your site and allow you to test different layouts and understand how design effects conversions. [6:50]
Dive deep into your buyer personas or patient personas. Your goal is to create content that creates an emotional connection about how their life can be after they come into your practice. Cast a wide net, but also tap into individual niches. [14:23] and [27:01]
Though you will benefit from a professional video on your homepage, lower cost, authentic videos for asset pages or pages that answer commonly asked questions about your specialties. These can then be repurposed for a variety of uses. [16:45]
Dive into both Local and Traditional SEO tactics. First consider the commonly used, but less competitive keywords to grow your domain authority, then progress to the more competitive keywords when writing your blog content. Additionally, create and follow an editorial calendar to be more Proactive in your marketing rather than reactive. [32:11]
Hiring a scalable team of specialists can be less expensive that hiring employees in house. [3:18]
Transcript of Podcast Episode with Chris Carr
Hello and welcome to the newest social speak podcast episode. My name’s Caitlin McDonald and I am one of the co-founders at Social Speak Network and today we are joined by Chris Carr, the owner and founder of Farotech, a Gold Star HubSpot partner. Farotech, is a comprehensive growth-driven, digital marketing agency that implements a systematic approach to lead generation, nurturing, and conversion by utilizing scalable web design cutting-edge inbound strategy, web design, and creative video development. So, let’s give Chris a warm welcome as he joins us on this podcast episode.
Caitlin McDonald: Chris, thank you so much for joining us today.
Chris Carr: Yeah, thank you, thank you for having me.
CM: To kick this off, tell us a little bit about your background in digital marketing.
CC: Well, I started Farotech in 2001, so it’s been nearly 18 years and we started out just as web development company. It was just myself and then, eventually one other individual. Now we have about 50 people working for our agency and we service companies throughout the United States in healthcare who are business to business, business to consumer, you name it. We started about 18 years ago, it started out as a web development company. And then the natural progression would be “Hey you know what, you guys create a really great website but nobody can find it.” And so we went from a web development company to really getting into SEO. And then the next progression after that was, “Hey, you create really great websites. I’m on the first page of Google, but for some reason my phone isn’t ringing, my email is not blowing up, what do I do about that?” And so we spent the latter half of the last 18 years really, talking about conversion science.
Hitting traffic at the wrong part of the buyers turning they’re not going to convert. So it was really important for us to solve the actual problem that they had not just give them marketing ease or marketing answers because that’s easy to do. The sales are down. I’m like, “Yeah but I got… Yeah, 100 Facebook likes.
CM: Right exactly, those vanity metrics aren’t going to cut it anymore.
CM: Your business, Farotech, focuses on inbound marketing, web design, and video for large orthopedic brands. Can you describe how the three of these relate to short-term and long-term strategic marketing decisions?
CC: Sure, well let me share my screen.
One of the things we try to do is, we try to really affect the hiring decision and reason why I’m saying that is that the average orthopedics practice usually might have one person who’s in charge of marketing. And when you see on the slide here, you can see my computer, correct? [3:18]
Marketing is moving extremely fast. The expectations have never been higher. Most marketing directors expect their health practice to be on the first page of Google. They expect it to be a thought leader. They expect you to have a social presence, you name it … Basically, the list goes on and on and usually what happens is orthopedics go and they hire a marketing professional or CMO or something like that, and we call that person, it’s a HubSpot term, but they call a Marketing Mary a Marketing Mary wakes up one day and realizes that all of this stuff is more than a one-person job. And so they need support.
And so what happens is, is that Mary usually finds a content writer and then they maybe tap on the shoulders of a social media vendor or something like that. All the PowerPoints and all design stuff still needs to be created. So maybe they might have a project manager doing that.
Then you have a web designer and basically you’ve stressed your web guy and everything has to look pretty with graphic design, what happens is you wake up one day and you got a lot of money going out the door. We sort of got the niche is we do what’s got a team-based solution and the team-based solution allows your marketing person to still stay in place, but we become your team behind that marketing person.
And so what happens here is with the really large or small practices need to scale, but they don’t want to hire five people to do so. So what they do is, is they hire an organization like ours that is scalable and we’re able to do all the things that they don’t have time to do.
A lot of times we bring our expertise and our approach to it, but sometimes it’s just that we have the time that they don’t have.
How does it affect the short-term, in the long term? Well, the short term is, is that we try to implement a strategy, but the long term is that we hope to be your solution to scaling your marketing team.
CM: Great, great. So providing those the quick positions that need to be filled, but also long-term growth of the team when the organization is growing as well.
CC: Yeah and then they like it because if they don’t like their writer, we can deal with it.
CM: Well let’s jump into trends. What current trends are you seeing for the health industry with inbound marketing in 2019?
Current Digital Marketing Trends for Orthopedics Practices in 2019
CC: There are a lot of trends and one of the things that I wanted to talk about is fighting the trends first and then adopting the trend second.
So usually what happens here is, let’s pretend like it a website company or a decision to basically take on a marketing campaign.
Usually what happens is that if you see you on the bottom left corner, you go and you create a really great website, right? [6:50]
Website Evolution for Orthopedics Clinics
And then what happens is, is that a lot of Orthopedic practices get really busy, and then they don’t continually evolve their website. And so a couple of years later if someone’s like, “Oh well, you know what, we really need to create a new website” and they do. Maybe two to five years later. They create another website in another website. But if you were really ask some hard questions, like What did you learn from website number one that made you decide that you needed website, number two, what about site number three?
And usually what happens is that they don’t really have a clean answer they just know that it has to be better than it is now, and obviously graphic design ages with time.
It’s pretty funny. I can look at a website and think oh look 2007. What our view is that every time you change that website or that campaign, it’s like reinventing the wheel.
But if you can basically be in a scenario, like you’re seeing here, you can develop a system and a foundation. If you look at the orange line, we recommend that orthopedic practice develop a strong foundation and then make micro adjustments along the way. learning and learning and learning and learning. And so, let me show you how we do some of that continual adjustment.
CM: And just for everybody listening to the podcast I will create a link that goes directly to this place of the video so you can see that graphic as well, so that will be down in the description. [8:20]
CC: So usually what happens here? So I go and I built that website. It’s the foundation, right?
I usually recommend that orthopedic practices put on heat mapping. This is about one of my clients, but this is their old website. You’ll notice that one of their critical buttons had no… Basically, no high balls on it. Or basically people’s mouse proofs as were going there, and they spent a tremendous amount of money and effort on these videos, but the people go into that, so they had to make adjustments, on the website and they did. Other things that I got graded on is how many appointments could I get for this organization?
You notice 15% of the audience. Did they scroll down far enough?
We do the same testing and mobile.
You look at all the clicks that they’re going to do, of a variety of different filters such as search terms. What part of the country or how long are they take to click? So the ore in a new drip marketing is going to be better to know it at 6 O’clock at night or 10 AM on a Tuesday morning.
We look at every KPI that they do, and we basically try to make adjustments on each of the smaller goals too.
We look at mouse movements to find out what parts of the website are confusing. We look at your forms to figure out why people aren’t converting.
We look at pages that aren’t converting and try to create attribution pages, and then later on, we’re going talk about video, but I’ll talk a little bit about it.
What we try to do is as we try to look at videos and we have a scale to figure out our videos too long or people dropping off at certain points.
So when you know all this usability data about your website essentially what you’re able to do is you’re able to create basically a system that if you imagine it’s like a spear you’re making this spear sharper and sharper.
Heatmaps help your practice to understand how you health center website helps you reach your digital marketing KPIs.
CM: That makes sense that absolutely makes sense. So creating new heat maps is actually something that any website can have on them. There are different apps out there, different softwares and programs out there that your team has access to and can just install a code on your website so you can start gaining traction and insights into how people are actually acting and reacting to your own website.
And so Chris, thank you so much for bringing that up. It’s so important, rather than having a new person, a new marketing director come in and say “we need a new website,” really think clearly about what those goals are and see how your websites currently performing compared to those goals. because you might be surprised that the thing that you think everybody’s clicking on not getting a single click.
CC: Yep, we’ve adjusted words on the home page and a five to 10% up-tick. Honestly, sometimes we did it by accident” on for measuring and so we’re like, “Okay good.”
CM: Exactly. And it might not work the same way the next time, but for that one center it works great.
So, you brought up video, so let’s jump into a video. Can you tell us how video effects, digital marketing and what you’re seeing with video right now?
Video Marketing for your Health Clinic
CC: Sure, well, I think the first thing you want to probably say we are using the word orthopedic practice but if you’re a healthcare and let’s just say it’s interchangeable, but I’m going to keep using that word.
So they were on a level playing field. Essentially, what you’re kind of doing here is, is that in terms of video, you need to realize that each practice is unique. So a lot of times it comes down to the quality of care, the quality of outcomes, the resources as the technology provided all that stuff. But at the end of the day if I tore my ACL I need my ACL fixed that. So one of the things that’s going to be really important is that you are not only your home page, but also your specialty pages really trying to display differentiation.
And so, we do this in a couple different ways. The first thing we want to be able to do a video is you need to know the way the audience thinks.
And what I mean by that is that there are different parts of your buyer’s journey, such as the beginning stages, you are in the awareness stage, and then later on, as the pain lingers on or you’re really in a spot where it’s critical, you’re in the decision level stage.
What we try to do from a video perspective is a video that’s neutral to each of those stages, but that explains how you’re different from other practices. Very simply – as simple as we can.
Use simple videos for your digital marketing – our attention span is only 7 seconds.
There’s this running joke that I tell our beat to death is that the average goldfish has an eight-second attention span and the average human has a Seven second attention span.
Essentially… we’re losing to gold fish.
So what that means is that it’s really important when they come to your website that you give them the information they need as quickly as possible, and in different formats, because some people are readers, some people are video watchers.
I personally am a video watcher, I don’t know what it is, but one of the other things that video gives you the power to do is, in my opinion, if you were to say what is in marketing is a race to emotion.
And earlier I can get you involved in that process, the more likely I’m going to get you to convert. So of course, they want to get their ACL fixed, that video is going to say, “Do you want to dance at your daughter’s wedding?”
It doesn’t matter why you’re here, what you want to be able to do is life beyond treatment.
So we try to create videos that are going to do that, but we use the technology in a really cool way as well. The first thing we do is we use a technology like this to find out how long videos should be. [14:23]
You’ll see that on the top right-hand side, you’ll see that this graph is dragging down to the right. Alright, you’ve seen the video over to the left. But through critical calls to action, whether it’s at the beginning of the video, the end of the video or even 15 seconds into the interview, I’m able to collect people’s information into our database, so we could drip market to them.
What’s really cool about this is I’m able to find out who’s watching my videos by name. So if you have these two case studies here you have Oliver, who watched 98% of the video.
Utilize drip marketing and remarketing to individuals based on how much of your video they watch
So if you’re going to talk about treatment options at the end of the video, Oliver knows the full story, now, 10 Bailey as you can see here an OR and she’s wrong a couple of times but he’s only watched 59% of the video.
So what our system will do is is that when Tim leaves the website, we’re going to be able to deliver emails about features and benefits and cost of progression in testimonials, things like that.
Yeah, there’s going to be this blanket statement. I do need to make early and so I do. You’ll get comments and crazy stuff, but I… Obviously, HIPAA does apply. So make sure that you’re getting counsel on how you communicate. We’re well versed in this but just know that we know, that heaters, not only to you but also to us as your agency, yes, is that an important thing to point out? You need to make sure that you are HIPAA-compliant with everything that you’re doing when it comes to collecting names and email addresses and re-marketing to them. But this is pretty incredible that you can even tailor that follow-up series based on how far they’ve watched that video.
CC: Look at kind of explain a little bit more on video.
So let’s say a patient is your site map in the buyer’s journey that I explained before using an ad, you’re going to have awareness, consideration, little content and decision level content.
We do something and lead core in which basically means we give visitors a certain level of points for every time that they come to our website, and they embrace it. Engage with marketing. So, what we’re able to do is we’re able to… We’re able to find ways where individuals come to our website and so they go to our hand and wrist page, assuming they’ve got a cookie on their computer, when they leave, the website and email automatically gets kicked out to them and that email we’ll have a video in it, that’s 30… 60 or 90 seconds long.
So what we’re trying to do is get video in the hands of as many people as possible, and if they haven’t gone deep enough into our website to get the critical assets, we create a system that if you’re not going to come down so we’re going to get it to you.
One other factor that I would say here is we also to try to develop these asset pages. [16:45]
What asset pages are, are all the most frequently asked questions or common objections about a certain treatment, area or something like that, but they’re all on one page. But what happens, this is the one they click on that answer that question we have a video that plays for them that is maybe 60 or 90 seconds long. What we’re doing is we’re giving them quick and simple information in a format that is digestible. Because it’s a video format I can use that asset on my website, I can use it in my social media, I can use it in my drip marketing, I can use it in apps, you name.
So the more video assets that I can create sort of the better scenario, that is a better outcome, I can have.
CM: And so, I’m going to stop you right there. So one thing that we hear time and time again, is to re-purpose content so video Chris is describing that video is such a great asset to have in your database because you can use it over and over again, you can use it on the website to answer question, social media, email marketing, and apps, really all of all of the different channels that you could be marketing on video fits in there. So thank you for bringing that up. Is so important to reiterate that don’t spend your energy trying to recreate something new for every single channel, you use the same thing that you’ve already created.
CC: That’s right, yeah.
I think one of the reasons why we always say that is because the research and the original writing is the most expensive part of the journey. So why do you keep repeating the most expensive parts when you’d rather be really solid on one critical area and then be in a scenario you’ve created great content that I can scale rather than just constantly… We use a phrase here we call “making the no nuts.
We were in a spot in 2015-2016 when the Google hadn’t totally grabbed a hold of quality versus quantity, we were at a spot as a company, we were putting out about a thousand content pieces a month.
And what I mean by that is that Don’t do what I did. My point is focus on great content.
CM: Okay, so were there any tactics that were expected to perform well or had a lot of hype but failed to take hold in 2018?
CC: Yeah, and nobody’s going to like this, but social media.
So if you were to check out some of the largest orthopedic brand in the States a ton of money goes into social media. [20:24]
This is a Forbes article and this talks about the… And if you’ll notice right here and he calls it the reach Apocalypse. A Jason was on to something. And it’s something that we’ve experienced essentially, what it means is, is that we go and we really try really, really hard to get Facebook likes or things like that, right?
The reality is, is that Facebook is a publicly traded company. And so let me read this one line here.
It says basically, organic reach. Which you’d think I’ve got a 1000 people to like my page everything I post a thousand people are going to see it. And you are in for a wild ride here. You would be lucky if it’s like 11% of the people seeing the content.
Organic Reach on Facebook Moves Inversely to Facebook’s Stock Price
I’ll read this. As organic reach dropped from approximately 12 to 6% (and now often at 1%) Facebook’s stock moved from nearly $50 to nearly $70, adding billions of dollars in marketing capitalization.
What does that mean? Facebook wins when they show your audience less of your materials.
The result is go on Facebook, go on social media, we’ll get your content to your audience. You just have to pay them to do it.
So all these companies, all these practices go, we have to get really big and social media.
Well, for what? Unless you’re willing to pay for social media, you’re not going to see results. Now, you absolutely have to do it, but you do not bet the farm on it.
I’d much rather my double my energy on SEO, paper advertising, content marketing, establishing yourself as a thought leader, PR, all that stuff, rather than resting all my hopes and dreams on social media.
CM: It’s one of those things that you still have to be on social media, but just don’t think it’s going to change your practice.
CC: This is the approach that we use [23:22].
Alright, so we believe for all practices that you need to know who your buyers are inside and out – your ideal buyer patient personas, then you want to be able to do a thing we call usability conversion notes. It was all that heat mapping stuff didn’t show – How are your clients resonating?
SEO, content strategy, lead nurturing, which most practices do not have. And I can talk about that social media, but only if you were on the pay-to-play, then you still do it but you just don’t do it nearly as hard. Have a really firm grasp on your analytics and your data.
Some value –added services, I usually call this video, and pay per click advertising budget provides it, yes, what you’ll notice here, as I’ve mentioned, almost everything in the marketing circle, if you believe in silver bullet marketing that says, “You know what, I’m just one SEO campaign away from it,” you’re wrong, you need the whole thing.
So if you were to make a cake and you just… I don’t know, I’m not a baker .. focus on one ingredient, but everything else was horrible. It’s going to taste terrible.
Yes, but we do it all the time, in marketing, because it’s sort of a path of least resistance type of stuff.
Don’t rely on just one marketing effort to grow your orthopeadic practice
CM: Yeah, and you hear of that one case where just focusing on email marketing transformed the practice, that’s one case, it’s not everybody. So maybe you’re going to find that one email sequence or the one way that you can use email to really transform your practice and I do believe email can transform your practice, but at the same point, you’re going to have to do all this other digital marketing to see what combination works for you in your own business.
CC: I would I couldn’t see it any better.
CM: Okay, so what are the top three things that medical centers, orthopedic Centers, should be doing online to see return from their digital marketing?
I think you kind of just nailed it on the head with this description right here, but are there three bullet points, things that marketing team should be focusing on?
CC: Yes, I… Let me show one [25:35] and then I’ll talk about two.
Obviously with orthopedics, you’re going to have a wide net, right, you’re going to… Let’s say, daily, you have multiple specialties at your organization, so that’s hips and joints, and spines, and other stuff like that. You want to cast as wide a net, as many patients as possible it.
And as many patients as possible to your practice, but other things that you want to be able to do is you want to be able to find niches within or communities within your group and get really solid with those communities. So there’s one of the large orthopedic practices is low kid in Philadelphia, one of our clients, one of the things that they do is that they find these sub-groups of these niches and they communicate right to the heart of that niche. They’ll do that with a number of different things. What they do is they create marketing materials directly to that niche.
So, right, not only do that, they also so market to the influencers. Because in behind a man with the pain, there’s a wife who’s tired of her in about.
Narrow down your audience to niches and then work to build influencer relationships and created tailored messaging that fits their buyer journey
So what happens here is that what we try to do and we recommend you do, would you probably won’t because it takes time, is is that you literally sit down and you have a really hard… A really deep dive into who are your buyer personas? [27:01]
Left hand side, we want to ask were really great questions about who are it patient personas, and I want to be able to find out is how do the answers to these critical questions change from one patient persona to the next patient persona.
Because what you don’t want to do is have a one-size-fits-all marketing plan. If I have a torn ACL, I don’t want to hear about your spine center.
I start hearing about knee pain and my conversion rates are going to go way up.
We want to basically find niches in communities and we want to market to them about the things that matter to them, most rather than just blanket. Due statement marketing that we hope that resonates with all.
CM: So do you feel as though it’s best to take your time, just go through all of these different patient personas, and then choose the one that you feel is that lowest hanging create all the resources for that and then slowly create all the other resources. If you don’t have the time or the budget to have a team like yours jump in and create everything at once.
CC: Well, obviously, you want to make sure that your foundation is good. So I talked about the wide net. Don’t go in unless you have the wide net.
Let’s pretend like you do have the wide net, what I would probably try to do is try to find organizations that would fit multiple buyer personas.
And what I mean by that is, let’s say hypothetically, I’m just going to use a random scenario here. Say I want to market specifically to roofers with bad knees or climbing a ladder. It’s a tough job.
A lot of individuals who have torn their ACL or hurt their knee really bad they get treatment, from a Northrop practice. So, you’re communicating to roofers and you’ve got them for needs. What’s great about… Well, not great, but let me rephrase this a tendency that also happens, this is that once they get their new fix their hips next. Same with baby boomers. Same thing with student athletes, or athletes.
So that the… Yeah, so if I market to a niche of baseball players because I’ve got a really great shoulder department, that’s a really great idea.
CM: So what are the next two things that you recommend?
CC: Obviously, we talked about video. What I would recommend you do is have a really strong home page video, but the other videos that you do well, it might feel like you’ve really lowered the bar. I would rather have a lot of content, even shot with an iPhone right that is very authentic.
Then you saving up all year long to create a 1000 videos over and over and over again, so you can buy a 20 microphone from Amazon, you connect it with an iPad, your iPhone. What I even recommend again, is there’s 15 the disease gambles so you don’t have shaky hands-on I but what I do is, is that I would just have these candid interviews with doctors in your practice or physicians.
Start to talk about just issues better in relevant at the time or tendencies that they say, “You know what, let’s say Lindsay Vohn, she takes a nose dive at the Olympics, right?”
Get a doctor, and says, “You know what, looks like your knees really banged up it’s like, “Well let me tell you, this is something the tendencies that we see with skiers because your feet are clamped in it. torques and then it’s the first thing to give because it’s a, it’s a pliable it’s plantings, like that. go a long way in a in…
So we talked about buyer personas, know your ideas, we talked about video. And then the other thing I would probably say that you would need to do is that you want to be good at two forms of SEO.
One is local SEO with your pin packs and your maps and then the other one is more organic SEO, and let me give you a real quick, I’ll give you my hand pitch on SEO real quick. [32:11]
Alright, I usually… What happens here is that if I’m a knee specialist I need to be found locally with these local impacts, and then I also want to be found organically.
Understand the difference between Local SEO and Traditional SEO
Now what happens is is that there’s a different science for local SEO than there is for traditional SEO, so if you’re going to work with a vendor make sure that they know the difference.
Okay, so, so when I’m talking about… obviously you want to be in a scenario where you’re getting the best keywords.
These are the keywords that everybody wants. Everybody’s going to type in to find your services.
The problem is, is you’re probably not the only orthopedic practice in town and there’s also national providers or at least real providers that have much deeper pockets than you, so they’re going to try to gobble up the sky screeners. These are the really big key words, right?
Yes, so what we recommend is to try to get found on the first page of Google for a number of other keywords, keywords that have really high visibility but with less competition, and what we’re able to do is that you’re able to reach a tipping point.
So if I’ve gotten clients on the first page of Google for hundreds of keywords, I’m increasing what’s called my domain authority. And then once your domain authority, reaches a certain level, you’ve essentially to earn the right to be heard in the eyes of Google.
That means is you can actually go after some of these skyscrapers later on because you’ve sort of earn that klout.
Other things you need to know is if there’s algorithm changes, and if you cheat to try to get to the top, you’re going to wake up one day and you’re going to see something like this.
CM: Now, when you are focusing on as is this in addition to the site structure, are you creating content that’s tailored directly towards those long-tail keywords that aren’t those big skyscrapers, but kind of those lower-tier ones that’s right, some longer-tail keywords are sort of the smaller buildings.
CC: Yeah, I so what happens here is, is that when you start to go after a lot of keywords here, I blocked out the name of this client, but when they found us, I basically they were promised around a 25% increase in the number of keywords on the first page of Google.
We’re able to increase that to 247%. It translates to traffic.
Yeah, no work word. You do the better to where you do it. Basically, it works.
So, this organization just their blog alone, we were able to get them to increase in entrances by 856% or 63000 people were reading their blog to now over 607,000.
I might say, “Well how do I know that’s even quality traffic? Well, I increase their pages by 639%, so people were staying on online 700% or 600% longer. What we believe is the more educated consumer usually converts.
CM: Yes, now with this, I can hear a lot of Marketing Directors seeing these numbers and saying, “Oh my gosh, there’s no way that I can do that.” Can you give us a perspective of how many new pieces of content you created for this organization?
Utilize Editorial Calendars to remain Pro-Active rather than Re-Active with your Inbound Marketing Efforts
CC: Yeah, now this was over three year. The first year, I was the mill. We do about three blogs a week. Those are all SEO optimized blogs, and stuff like that.
We write everything in collaborative documents.
Everything should be connected to an editorial calendar.
You would know, what’s going out in the next 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, a year or whatever it is. So you are proactive rather than reactive.
One of the major problems I see what practices they start out, they can get all fired up to get into marketing and then fires happen and then you look at their blog and it’s like the last blog was in 2017.
No, it just gets away from you. But if you live and die by an editorial calendar, you’re going to create content.
But what’s great about the content that you produce, is that a lot of companies will have technology that will allow you to optimize for a certain keyword and, you’re probably not going to have the in-house, but vendors basically marketing companies will say with technology like this that I’ll say, “you know what, before this contents even published Live to the web, I can see the rating here is poor. I can see that the readability is below the target, and just even the number of words on the page is less than the 840 where Target wooly using two out of the 20 keywords that need to be used.”
If I loaded this I published this piece of content I should have no hope that it’s going to be the competition, right? So this software is going to basically look at the top 10 results and it’s going to say, “You know what, you’re going to have to be critical adjustments.” It’s better to know this early rather then publish and pray.
CM: Yes, and that is one of the reasons why that editorial calendar is so important is that you can write that blog a month two months, however long before it needs to be published so that you have the time and you’re not feeling that “time Prince before you click Publish to actually look at these stats and everything, to say. Oh, you know what, if I just click publish, it’s not going to do anything for my business correct, yeah, right. So what is the top strategy that should be followed? But often, marketing teams get wrong?
CC: They try to do it all in-house.
Even if she’s working 180 hours a week, or is that possible at Ellen in A, the I alone the Lorimer is she doesn’t go home, she just works, right?
Yes, I can be able to be a specialist in SEO. It changes every day. She is not going to be a specialist in social media. It changes every hour. So what happens is, is that you need to make sure your marketing person is the quarterback who’s running a team of specialists and those specialists only focus on their area of expertise.
You can get a team-based system for the price of hiring one other employee.
If you imagine that Mary marketing is one employee and then the whole team is just another employee, the price you’re paying an initial team is about comparable to hiring a second employee, it’s scalable.
It’s profitable, and it’s fireable.
CM: Yeah, I oh yes, absolutely. shift the blame to someone else.
Oh goodness, let’s see… And I just have it just a couple more questions for you. You’ve shared so much valuable information for our listeners.
You founded Farotech and it’s now a top ranked inbound marketing agency. Do you want to just dive into your company and services a little bit, give a little pitch?
CC: I think the sales pitch that we would say is, is that we are truly partners. By being true than partners is if you’re looking at you, the company, you’re hiring to do your marketing as a vendor right, you’re always going to treat it like a vendor and the results are going to act like a vendor.
Now a partner is responsible for the things that you are responsible for. So if I’m the CMO and my job, my dependency is about getting appointments, making sure that critical physicians are seeing, you’re opening up a new practice, making sure that I have enough walk through traffic, digital traffic, whatever it is.
I want to make sure that as a partner that they’re on the line for the same things. And that is what we do and I, we sort of put ourselves in the line, we find out what matters to you most we bring strategy, we bring people but we bring accountability.
Yeah, and that’s the critical part for us is that our butts are on the line too and so if you’re going to walk out on the ledge we’re going to walk out there with… So you yeah, and so how do we plug ourselves? Would you really great work?
We obviously see we had really very results we work a really large brands, but we also work with some medium such brands as well.
But what’s exciting for us is just the transparency we have with our clients. It’s funny I got married and I had clients that weren’t even invited to the actual wedding come to the actual reception. I’ve got clients that call us and say, “Hey, what do we say about this particular treatment area?” We’re so ingrained that you know what I mean.
And so, then they do a critical they say they’re going to expand they come to us first, because not because we’re getting the commission, but they come to us first so they know what data they need to know before they make decisions, and that’s what I live. A good partnership looks like. And what I believe a good vendor looks like, and I think that’s what a good marketing company looks like.
One other thing is, is that I hire, I love the 99.9% of all my employees. I hire really great people that are passionate about their clients. That’s important because you’re going to spend, you spend most of your waking hours behind a desk, so right, so if you don’t love what you do don’t work here at Farotech and don’t work for my clients.
CM: Yeah, great, I love that. And then lastly, to wrap this up, are there any marketing strategies that your team is currently testing that you think other agencies might not be implementing for their clients?
CC: Yeah, one of the things that we’re trying to do right now is being a scenario where we’re doing a little bit more outbound email.
So here’s what happens. Let’s say, hypothetically, on your patient intake form they work for a really large provider, say a pharmaceutical company, right?
So oftentimes, we don’t go back and look at our database as the source or the well of where people are. And so what happens is I can go back and I make sure that I ask “Who is your employer?” And I also ask what your business title is. And the reason why I’m doing that is because if I know your employer and I’m able to get email addresses to your employers and do lunch and learns at your employers.
That’s a really good thing. So I want to be able to go to each of the large providers in my area and be that guy that practice, or that organization.
I want to be in a scenario where, let’s say, the medically, it’s a C-level executive, I can’t guarantee it. The people at the bottom of the totem pole are in the same place as the C-level executive is. So I want to know how quality is my list. And if their middle-of-the-road, or the title feels been on the road I freeze it.
Other things that it does is it says, you know what, if this guy went to my practice and his insurance basically he’s covered by his insurance at my practice basically his insurance is valid. I know that everybody else in that company.
That’s right, that’s right, and right. So I’ve been doing orthopedics for a long time, my wife has to drag me to go to the doctor’s office, drag me like literally, I know better. I know you have to figure that for every patient you have, there’s 10 patients that have nagging pain that are just like me, that just refuse to get there.
So if I’m going to get you a market and create really critical arguments for an idiot like me.
CM: Well Chris, thank you so much for your time, thank you for the valuable insights and information that you’ve been able to share. Are there any questions that you feel I should have asked that I didn’t?
CC: No, I think usually what happens is, is that the first question I get is, “How long does it take?
It really depends on how much do you want it? If you’re willing to put it in the hard work, and get your foundation straight and get your blogging straight and consistently stay proactive not reactive, and you can see how your results work by the 90-day mark, and you can know how it should progress.
If you are sitting in the dark, if you are not in a scenario where if you’re a reactive marketer we’ll never know when this is going to pay off.
Get that editorial calendar, get focused, work hard, and know what the next 90 days, six months, one year.
CM: Thank you again, Chris, it’s been such a pleasure having you on the show, thank you, I appreciate it. It was wonderful, it was a wonderful experience for me to know right I so thank you again to Chris with barite for joining us today it was such a pleasure hearing about his expertise and about some of those tactics that you should be implementing for your own health center.
So again, my name is Caitlin McDonald, and please tune in for a next episode of The Social speak podcast.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Copy-of-Copy-of-Social-Speak-Podcast-chris-carr.png7201280Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2019-03-20 12:00:352019-04-22 23:01:58Behind the Scenes Look at How Your Orthopedic Practice Should Use Digital Marketing - Interview with Chris Carr founder for Farotech
Scratching your head about whether to ‘boost’ a post on Facebook or to utilize the power of Facebook ads? Boosting a post is sometimes ‘simple’ but not always the best answer to get to the folks that really matter to your brand! Remember, Facebook is not a spray and pray proposition. Getting into the newsfeeds is getting harder and harder for ranking capability. Soooo…get ready to dig into your pocketbook, whether boosting or using Facebook ads.
Boosting a post on Facebook, let’s face it, is easy-peasy, as opposed to going behind the scenes and utilizing the awesome tools on Facebook Manager. All you have to do is hit the ‘boost post’ button and off you go, right? WRONG. Hang on ‘pardner…
In the past, boosting did not have many of the attributes that Facebook Ads Manager had, but now the Boost post button might not be such a bad strategy after all. You can now actually re-target and optimize your boosts to actually drive traffic for developing your brand followers!
There are some key factors that come into play when boosting your posts. You must consider:
What is the goal for the boost?
DO NOT boost a post that does not benefit you, such as a resource post that does not lead back to your website, as an example.
Again, boosting is not a ‘spray and pray’ proposition. Make sure that you are targeting your demographic for the post.
It’s all about the Facebook Pixel!!!! In order to get the best traction, make sure that you have installed the Facebook Pixel (it’s FREE) on your website so you can get your tracking enabled.
So why is Facebook Manager a greater preference for ads? Let’s be frank, candid and honest…Facebook Ads Manager does have a learning curve…no doubt…but it does have the ability for in-depth targeting, which is a HUGE coup! AND AND AND…if you are an organizational freak, the only way to keep completely organized with your ad spend is to create campaigns within Facebook Ads Manager. You don’t have that ability with boosting posts.
For example, if you want to stay organized on Ads Manager for ‘campaigns,’ you can organize your campaigns strategically:
App installs
Engagement
Brand Awareness
Reach
Traffic
Video Views
LeadGen
Messages
Conversions
Product Catalog Sales
Store Visits
If you are merely ‘boosting’ a post, you do not have the ability to categorize your ‘boosted posts’ into strategic campaigns on Facebook to examine analytics per campaign goals.
So, to wrap it up quick and easy…boosted posts will help you develop a fan base and reach, and ads can actually help you transition your brand’s presence into tangible brand outcomes!
We’ve all heard that we need to have a presence on Facebook for our businesses, but what does it actually look like? Over the years, Facebook has turned from a free marketing platform that was easy to grow to, to one where only about 16% of your Likes will see any give post.
Recently, we’ve seen a lot of businesses turn away from even wanting to market on Facebook, but it still is an essential network for your business big or small. In this blog, I’m going to take a look at the important steps to build a viable Facebook marketing strategy, dos and don’ts of Facebook for business, and little-known tips to make sure your business sees a return on your investment in Facebook marketing.
Building your Facebook Strategy
Facebook, just like any modern marketing avenues, is much more than just sharing a piece of content. Our tribes are composed of smart individuals who no longer want to be told what to do, but appreciate brands that help them to discover new, meaningful things. Facebook, luckily, is the perfect avenue to increase our presence and set ourselves apart from competition.
Step 1: Complete your Business Page Profile
Your profile picture, cover photo (or cover video), and about section of your business profile create the first impression your business gives to your Tribe on Facebook. It is very important that these elements are all completed mindfully, rather than just putting up the first thing you see or think of.
Let’s start with your profile picture.
Your business profile picture should be an easily recognizable image that conveys who you are as a brand or company. Many solopreneurs, freelancers, or businesses with an individual as the face of the company should and can get away with using your headshot as the profile picture. On the other hand, businesses that have a brand identity should use their business logo as the main profile image. The Facebook Profile picture is the thumbnail image that appears next to all of your social media posts, comments, and messages, so it is important to take your time and choose this image wisely.
A little later in this post, I’ve included an infographic from TechWyse with the exact dimensions of each type of image you can use on Facebook so you can be sure your pictures always appear crisp and clean. A profile picture should be 170px by 170px.
Next we have your Cover Image.
Facebook just recently changed the cover image so you now can also include Videos! This exciting change can really help your Facebook Business Page stand out among competition. Your cover image is prime real estate on your Facebook page. It is wonderful space to highlight a marketing campaign, seasonal offering, or exciting news for your brand.
In this image or video, you can include a call to action, and even entice individuals to use the buttons directly below the image to Contact you, Claim an Offer and more!
Businesses that coordinate their cover image, profile picture, and pinned or promoted posts see a much greater return from their Facebook pages than those who don’t.
Your About Section
All too often, we see businesses with incomplete About sections that link to old websites and don’t fully explain their business service offerings or their brand promise. The good news is, once you have this written correctly the first time, you can reuse it or similar content for other social media networks.
A preview of your About section appears below your profile picture, so it is important to make sure this information is relevant accurately conveys your brand. Companies with ill-planned About Sections on Facebook are doing themselves a disservice. Try playing around with the language you use and measure the responses to those changes.
In your About section of your Facebook Business Page, be sure to describe your business, use keywords, and include a call to action to get people liking your page or heading to your website.
[clickToTweet tweet=”Three steps to creating a income-generating Facebook marketing strategy #FacebookMarketing #TheBIMSTeam” quote=”Three steps to creating a income-generating Facebook marketing strategy #FacebookMarketing #TheBIMSTeam”]
Step 2: Posting to your Facebook Business Page
As you begin posting to your Facebook Business Page, it is important that you follow a strategy to remain on point and brand. It always surprises me when some business owners still want to post only about their business. The truth of the matter is that 80% of your Facebook posts should be about something other than linking directly back to your website. The other 20% can be blogs, promotions, and information about your company and business.
By sharing information that is not directly linking back to your website, you are helping to show your authority in your niche. You are sharing resources that your market can benefit from, quotes and images that can engage your tribe, and more generally, information that will interest your followers.
When you are posting, think about:
What other businesses are in your space
The information that will appeal to your market
Things you are passionate about in your business
Other influencers with whom you could engage
Then, create a plan for how you will share your content. Make sure you include:
Videos
Images
Tips
Quotes
Questions
Calls to Action
Throw back posts
Educational Articles
Your blog posts
Lastly, use this infographic to make sure all of your images display properly in your Facebook Business Page posts.
Step 3: Growing your Likes and Engagement on your Facebook Business Page
It is great that you are now posting on your Facebook business page and following a strategy, but how do you actually grow your Likes and Engagement? These tips will help you to make sure that your business is on its way to a profitable Facebook presence.
Invite your Email List and Personal Friends to Like your Business Page
Many business owners with whom we work are nervous about sending an email to their email list or inviting their personal friends to Like their business page. You’ll be surprised, however, to see how many people respond to your request! As someone who often keeps my personal life and business life separate, I forget that many of my personal connections may actually be interested in learning more about digital marketing or may be starting their own business.
Facebook makes it very easy to invite people to Like your page. If you go to your Page and scroll down, on the right side of the screen you will see a box that says “Community”. In this box, there is an option to “Invite your friends to like this Page.”
When you click this link, Facebook will prompt you to select the friends you would like to invite to Like your Facebook page.
With your email list, I recommend sending an email rather than utilizing Facebook. In the email you can explain some of the perks of Liking the Facebook page and what people can expect from following your account.
Share your posts to your personal profile
Another way to increase your page Likes and to gain more engagement is by sharing your business posts to your personal profile. While I don’t recommend sharing every post, consider sharing your blog posts, videos, and images that represent your brand and personal values. These posts won’t come across as you trying to sell to your personal relations, but that your goal is to better educate them on what you do and your industry.
If you work with a team, you can even ask your employees and contractors to Like, Comment, and Share posts that relate to them, as well.
Boost Posts and Run Facebook Ads
I won’t go into much detail here, as this would create another LONG blog post, but using Facebook ads and boosting your Facebook posts is a great way to increase engagement. Here I recommend playing around with boosting the post to:
Your current page Likes
A custom audience made of your email list
Specific targeting of your tribe’s demographics.
Facebook’s targeting options are incredibly advanced, so just like with any sort of marketing, I recommend testing very specific niche’s rather than typing in everything demographic or psychographic identifier you can think of. This way, over time you will be able to more easily tell which interests or job titles, for example, lead to the highest number of new likes, follows, shares, and comments.
Post share-worthy content
Of course this needs to be listed. I’ll go into more detail below, but one of the most important pieces of your strategy to gain traction on Facebook is to post content that people want to read and share. This means that in addition to finding other articles and resources, you need to be making these for your own website, too. Take your time and really come up with pieces of content that will WOW your tribe!
Dos and Don’ts of your Facebook Marketing Strategy
Your Facebook Marketing strategy needs to change as Facebook makes changes to it’s algorithms and adds new features for business owners to take advantage of. Regardless of the nuances of Facebook’s algorithms, there are some items that you need to be sure to include in your Facebook marketing strategy. Above, I reviewed some of the steps to create a Facebook marketing strategy for your business, but here I will be highlighting those items you must include and the common pitfalls of business owners as they jump into Facebook marketing.
DO: Plan your posts ahead. Just as with other marketing strategies, you never want to be stuck wondering what you will post the day something needs to go out. It is better to plan ahead, even if it is for the entire month, rather than coming up with posts on the fly. This way, you will be sure your Facebook posts align with promotions, holidays, and other important events in your business. One way to do this is by using this free editorial calendar to manage your calendar!
DO: Use Facebook’s scheduling feature. I absolutely swear by tools like Buffer.com and Hootsuite.com for scheduling social media posts, but on Facebook, it is more advantageous to schedule your posts out directly through their publishing tool rather than a third party. Yes, you can still incorporate some posts scheduled with Buffer, but a majority of your posts, especially those specifically about your business or from your blog, should be published directly through Facebook. Why? These posts have been proven to reach a wider audience than those that are scheduled through a third party.
To schedule a post on Facebook, write the post as you normally would, but rather than clicking “Publish”, select the drop down carrot to its right and select “Schedule”. One perk of doing this is you can play around with the different types of posts you use from multiple images to galleries, slideshows, and carousels.
DON’T: Only post links to your own content. Talk about boring, right? Our tribes are too smart to follow businesses on Facebook that only talk about themselves. Marketing is no longer a one-way street. It is about building a community around your brand. And to build a community, you need to set the example by listening and sharing rather than just pushing information.
DO: Include images, text, and video in your posts. The more diverse your posts, the more likely you are to capture your audience’s attention. You can use Facebook’s slideshow creator to build short videos with music and captions for your Facebook posts if you don’t have software on your computer to create your own from scratch.
Better yet, try a Facebook Live event and put yourself out there as the face of your brand every week as a way to engage your audience in a whole new way!
DO: Collaborate with other businesses on Facebook. Start reaching out to businesses that are similar to yours or who work with the same individuals you do. By commenting, sharing, and collaborating with them, you are introducing yourself to their audience and helping to boost both of your businesses in the process.
DON’T: Overlook the importance of setting goals. When we set goals for our business, we have a very clear sense of how to understand what is working and what is not working with our strategy. It allows us to aim for something rather than just taking successes and failures in step.
DON’T: Forget to measure your results. You can’t set goals without the following step of measuring your results! Luckily there are incredible, and free, tracking services available for you online. The top ones we use are Google Analytics, Facebook Insights, and Pinterest Insights. The rational here is to see how your efforts have effected your movement towards achieving your marketing (and Facebook) goals.
DON’T: Just post the article title as your post. Say something meaningful about what readers will find if they click the link or take a quote from the article that highlights your main takeaway. Though titles should be descriptive, the same content will appear directly below your post in the link display.
DO: Test the effectiveness of Albums, Slideshows, Carousels, and single Thumbnail images if you are linking to something with many images. Each of these different types of posts will lead to a different response from your followers. We have a photographer, for example, who posts a link with a thumbnail when she first edits a wedding album and creates a blog post as a first peak. Then, she creates a slideshow to reengage the couple and their networks once all of her edits are complete and the couple has access to the images.
Little-known tips to make sure your business sees a return on your investment in Facebook marketing
Facebook is always changing, so it is necessary to take a look at some of the lesser-known strategies on Facebook that maybe you haven’t considered for your business. Some of the strategies below are ones you have seen others implement, while others may be brand new!
Facebook Groups for you Clients and Prospecting
Most users on Facebook are a part of numerous Facebook Groups. These groups are great for your business for a few different reasons. One point to emphasize here is that the groups run through your personal profile rather than your business page. Make sure your personal profile on Facebook links to your business page, is branded with a professional picture, and has the proper security settings.
Joining other groups in your niche provide an avenue to position yourself as an expert and to meet new prospects for your business. I recommend finding 1-3 groups that are active on Facebook and seeing if you can share information that the members will benefit from. Many groups have guidelines about selling to members, but providing valuable information is always appreciated.
Creating a Facebook group or groups for your clients. This can be a great add-on to your services or courses that you run online. Because only paying customers have access to the group(s), you will be more motivated to participate and engage.
Think twice about creating a group for your email list. Recently, many very successful Facebook group managers have been shutting down their ‘public’ Facebook groups. They find themselves spread too thin to really focus on the public group and the specific groups for their clients. I recommend starting small and being engaged with your paying customers rather than trying to create a huge group to prospect from.
Create Custom Audiences when your run Facebook Ads and Segment!
Running ads on Facebook can transform your business or they can be a waste of money. One of the most successful ways to see an ROI from your Facebook ads is by being very niche focused and targeting specific people. By this I mean:
Upload your email list and promote posts or specials directly to the list
Add a PIXEL to your website and integrate retargeting to your website visitors. You can set the campaigns up to only target people who are been to specific pages on your website. For example, you can show ads only to people who viewed a specific landing page or who downloaded an ebook.
Use look-alike audiences to find other individuals who are similar to the people who have responded to your ads.
When you create the audiences and run the Facebook ads, make sure your offer, image, and landing page all are in alignment. Your tribe will pick up if things seem disjoint or like you are targeting too wide of a net.
Add a Video to your Facebook Page Cover Image
This new feature can transform your engagement on your Facebook business page. Guidelines for Facebook Cover Videos are below:
Video Dimensions: 820 x 312 pixels
Length: 20-90 seconds and can look
Sound: Though you can include sound, Facebook automatically mutes the video for user experience
So, what should you do now that you can have a video as your Facebook Cover? Try creating a slideshow video or a quick iphone video that captures your brand. This can be simple to start, but the movement when someone first goes to your business page is sure to keep folks on the page for longer and be more engaging. You can also test out interview style videos or webinar style videos are your cover video.
Wait to Boost a Post
As you can tell, I am all for businesses using Facebook ads to increase the engagement on posts and the traffic to your blog or landing pages. When you plan to boost a post, hold off on pressing the Boost button until the post has had a chance to gain organic exposure first. This organic exposure can really help with gaining more traction and keep your costs down.
Test out Lead Ads
These ads are incredible! If you have a content upgrade on your site or can automatically register people to a webinar, the Lead Ads may work well for your business. Basically, when you create the ad, you also create a form. The form can then be set up to capture someones name, email, and other information. When a user fills out their information, they will be redirected to a page of your choice. For example, you can direct someone to the ebook download page on your site, or to a webinar sign up thank you page. These ads can also be to build your email list.
We’ve found these ads to have a much lower cost per conversion than a lot of other marketing efforts.
Schedule your Facebook Posts
Now you shouldn’t always schedule your Facebook posts, but if you are like most business owners, you are pulled in many directions and hoping on Facebook every day may not be realistic. I recommend using Facebook’s scheduling functionality for most of your Facebook posts as a way to batch your efforts. Take one day a month and find all the relevant articles, make all of your custom images, and schedule your promotions to be published in advance. Then, as you write blog posts over the course of the month and have other items to share on a daily basis, you can log in and specifically share that content.
We used to always use Buffer for scheduling content for clients, but have found a higher level of engagement when posts are created directly through Facebook.
Add a Call to Action Button to your Page
This is fairly easy to implement! Most of the time we see our clients create their CTA when they first set up their business page. If you haven’t already, however, go to your Facebook business page and click the blue button that states “Add a Button”. Here you can select your CTA and a landing page for any user who clicks the button. Tracking is available through Facebook Insights.
Use fb.com as a URL shortener rather than typing facebook.com
Surprise! fb.com is a URL shortener for all facebook.com addresses.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/facebook-login-1475585_960_720.jpg640960Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2017-10-12 23:45:412018-08-27 17:16:03Facebook Marketing in 2017 - Action items for your business to reach the next level
Facebook live has become increasingly popular with businesses, organizations and the general public. It allows you to stream and share live videos with your fans and followers. It has opened a whole world of opportunities for businesses from around the world.
Facebook live in more than just broadcasting a brief episode on Facebook. It can add a personality to your brand and really work to broaden the sincerity and breadth to your business on Facebook.
What topics can you discuss on Facebook Live?
Whether you are camera shy, feel like you don’t have anything to put out there, or are just dragging your feet, I highly recommend jumping onto Facebook live. This list should help you feel more empowered to find a topic to discuss live!
Hot topics in your business or industry
Q&A or review the FAQ on your website in a video
Breaking news
Conduct an interview
Are you a performer? Perform!
Give a behind the scenes look at your profession
Record a demo or tutorial and teach your fans.
What topics have you found to get a lot of response from your viewers?
Now that you have decided on a topic, there are some tips to help you get the most views and engagement.
6 Tips for Better Facebook Live Engagement
Tell fans you are broadcasting
Make sure you have a strong internet connection
Add a description to your live before you actually click to go live on Facebook
Take the time to say hello to your live viewers and respond to their comments in real-time
Don’t always keep it short – longer broadcasts pick up more viewers
Use a closing line to signal the end of a broadcast
Here are 4 ways your business can capitalize on Facebook live.
Real time engagement
One of the biggest benefits of using Facebook live is that you get to engage with your audience real time. You can see how many people are watching your video, ask for their opinion, and determine whether or not your content is working. Because of the real time connection with the audience, studies suggest that Facebook live gets 10 times more comments than other contents.
Most business use social media to interact with their audience. You can take it to the next level by using Facebook live. We’ve seen a lot of business use this to conduct Q&A sessions. People can ask whatever they want. Since this is a live version, they can get an answer to their questions in an instant.
It is more convenient
Business owners have a lot on their plate. Sometimes, creating new content can be time consuming. If you want to increase engagement without spending too much time creating new content, Facebook live is the way to.
You can conduct a Q&A session without all the big production behind the content. Live streaming also provides an easy way to disseminate information to your fans and followers. It’s a lot easier than writing a blog post or newsletters.
Create better relationship with your audience
Live videos are spontaneous. They are not rehearsed. There are no cuts. There are no edits. People want authenticity. It’s the total transparency that draws people in. Through these videos, they get to see the people behind the company and interact with them directly. It humanizes your brand and creates a new level of trust. It also provides a more intimate level of engagement.
Reach more people
People have a very short attention span. They prefer to watch a 1-minute video than to read a 1,000 word blog post. Considering that there are more than one hundred million active users on Facebook, you are likely to reach more people with Facebook live. What’s great about live streaming is that it people can watch the video even after it has ended. That means you can engage new audience.
Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2017-07-25 14:01:322018-04-07 21:04:33How Your Business Can Capitalize on Facebook Live