Uncategorized Archives - Page 2 of 3

Video Marketing – It’s Within Reach of All Physical Therapy Private Practices

This is a short post but I wanted to share a few ways that physical therapists can leverage video:

Reputation Videos – create a video to feature the five-star service that you provide at your practice.

Expert Interviews – share what makes you different from your competition, in a video.

Patient Video Testimonials – written ratings and reviews are powerful, but patient video testimonials are also useful and authentic.

Video is easy, affordable, and a great way to get the message out to your community.

If you have questions, don’t hesitate to email me at dave@e-rehab.com or give us a call at 800-468-5161.

How to Add Your Physical Therapy Practice to Apple Maps

There are a number of different ways to increase the visibility of your physical therapy practice throughout the Internet, and one of the most effective moves you can make is to have it listed on various navigation sites like Apple Maps Connect. Adding your practice to Apple Maps and other sites will make it easier for prospective patients to locate you in their area and find information regarding your services that can lead them to becoming a new patient.

Here’s a step-by-step guide to adding your physical therapy practice to Apple Maps Connect:

1. Perform a Google Search for ‘Maps Connect’

Using the Google search feature, type in the term “Maps Connect,” hit enter, then click on the first search result: https://mapsconnect.apple.com/.

2. Enter Your Apple ID and Password

Enter your Apple ID and password in each of the designated tabs and hit enter. If you don’t have an Apple ID, click below where it says “Create one.” You will then be taken to another page to create a free Apple ID, which is a brief process that only requires some basic information like your name, birthdate and creating a few security questions.

3. Click ‘Add My Business’

After you’ve entered your Apple ID or created a new one, the next page will prompt you to begin the process of adding your practice. To start, click where it says “Add My Business.”

4. Agree to the Terms of Use

Before adding your practice, you’ll need to agree to Apple’s Terms of Use. Read through the terms, tick the box that reads “I have read and agree to these terms of use,” and click “Agree.”

5. Search to See if Your Practice Has Already Been Added

There’s a chance your practice may have already been added to Apple Maps. To see if it’s been added yet, enter the name and location of your practice and then click “Search.”

6. Select Your Practice (If it’s Found)

If your practice appears in the search results, click on the business name to be prompted to the next page.

7. Claim Your Practice

On the next page, click “Claim This Business” on the upper right hand of the page.

8. Add Your Practice (If it’s Not Found)

If your practice doesn’t show up in the search results, click “Add New Business” on this page.

9. Enter Details for Your Practice

The next page will have you enter some details about yourself and your physical therapy practice. If your practice was already added, there may be some details entered in to begin with. If not, you will have to enter all of these details yourself.

10. Confirm Your Address

Apple Maps will search for the address you entered and ask you to confirm it if so that it matches the specific coordinates on their map. Click “Use Address” for the most accurate address for your practice.

11. Verify Your Phone Number

After you enter your primary business phone number, Apple Maps will need to send a PIN code to that number. When you’re ready, click “Call Me Now,” and they will call the designated phone number with the appropriate PIN code. Enter this code when prompted.

12. Confirm Your Business Location

Using a satellite image of the area surrounding your practice, drag the red pin to your building and drop it closest to the door that patients should use to enter. Once it’s dropped on the proper location, click “Continue.”

13. Enter Your Business Hours

Confirm the days and hours your practice is regularly open each week. When you’ve completed this section, click “Continue.”

14. Add More Details

The next page will ask you to enter additional details about your practice. If you have a website, Facebook page, Yelp page or any other sites connected to your practice, enter the appropriate websites here. When finished, click “Continue.”

15. Submit Your Profile

Once you have successfully and accurately entered all of your information onto Apple Maps, click “Submit Now.”

16. You’ve Got a Apple Maps Listing!

That’s it! Once you submit your listing to Apple Maps, it will be automatically added to the site. Patients will now have an even easier time finding your practice when performing a search in their local area.

[titled_box title=”Contact Us for Additional Guidance”]If you have any additional questions on the process of adding your practice to Apple Maps Connect or would like some other help with your website, E-Rehab is here to help. Contact us today to see what we can do improve your web presence and ensure that you’re getting the most out of all your online efforts[/titled_box]

Use Uplifting, Effective Images and Content for Physical Therapy Website Development

physical therapy website development

Physical therapy website development can be a delicate affair. You want your website to come across as positive and you want to create the idea of healing, but you don’t want to give to much attention to physical pain. This is why you have to walk a fine line between acknowledging the issues that lead people into physical therapy and encouraging them to get well. You can use content and images to create the kind of website that will attract patients and encourage them to utilize your services. Below are a few tips to help you improve your physical therapy website development:

Images

In general, images are very important to a website because they can make an indelible first impression on your visitors. Once a viewer has developed a certain first impression, it will become difficult to change, and this is why you need to make sure that you’re use the right images throughout your entire site. Here are a few examples that you can use to guide your decisions when it comes deciding on images to use:

Images of Physical Therapists: It’s always a good idea to take photos of the physical therapists and other staff members and upload them to your website. These can make a great impression and give a personalized window to your practice, especially if the therapists look professional and friendly in the photos.
Images of Patients and Therapists Together: When it comes to selecting these photos, try to use shots of people who have difficulty moving, but make it look like they’re enjoying the process of physical therapy and not in much pain. As long as your photos contain pictures of smiling people and people who look like they’re being healed, you’ll be more likely to attract new patients.
Images of Real People: You also need to make sure that your photos don’t look artificial. Sometimes, instead of using real physical therapists and real patients, people use models from stock photos instead because they look more attractive. Unfortunately, photos like this are likely to come across as artificial and posed, and very few people will be able to identify with them. So do your best to use images of real people instead.
Diversity in Images: Another thing you could do is make sure that you involve a certain degree of diversity in your images. All different types of individuals require physical therapy, and this means people of all races, ages and social statuses. You should therefore make sure to use images of as many different types of people as possible, so that everyone who comes to the website will be able to identify with the images they see.

Content

The first thing that people will see when they come to your website is your images, but once they’ve glanced through a few of these, they’re also going to read your content—hopefully. So it’s important to make sure you use content that’s both uplifting and informative when making decisions in your physical therapy website development.

Avoid Jargon

In order to appeal to all of your visitors, you need to make sure that your content is written simply. When it comes to medical fields like physical therapy, there’s a temptation to use lots of jargon, which ordinary people generally don’t understand. Of course in some cases, it might be necessary to use jargon, but you should try to avoid it as much as possible. In cases where you feel you must use it, it’s imperative that you try to explain what each means in simple English so that viewers don’t get confused by it.

Write in an Encouraging Way

Try to give your content an uplifting and encouraging tone so that prospective patients get the idea that they’re going to benefit by coming to your practice. You can use statistics, post positive feedback from previous patients and walk new patients through the process of having their first physical therapy sessions on your website. Try to simplify everything as much as possible so that they don’t feel overwhelmed by what they’re setting out to do. Physical therapy can sometimes be a painful and frustrating process, but you want to give your patients the assurance that you’ll be there to help them every step of the way.

We’re Experts at Physical Therapy Website Development

[highlight2 textColor=”#000000″]Still having trouble deciding what to post on your website? Well, that’s where we come in. At E-Rehab, we’re experts at all aspects of physical therapy website development, and we can help you develop a strategy that will have your website looking and performing better than ever. Contact us today to find out what we can do for you and your practice.[/highlight2]

I’m Kind of Fed Up with Something

Today I’m pouring my heart out a bit and asking for you to share your thoughts, but first here’s why . . .

Now, before you start to wonder what I’m selling today, don’t. I’m not selling anything but an idea.

I had a long conversation with a small practice owner the other day and I came away pretty upset.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love practice owners and I certainly love helping them, but what made me upset was this guy was throwing in the towel.

And, it didn’t have to be this way.

In fact, he had a great clinic, but he could never muster the time, energy, resources and confidence to generate consistent referrals effectively and so, eventually he simply ran out of steam while serving his patients.

He worked ridiculous hours and told me every time he felt like he was making headway something would fall apart and he would be forced to shrink back and try to simply make ends meet.

At some point taking a job became more appealing than building a practice.

To me, this is a crime – yes, I’m tired of hearing and reading stories like this and I’m not going to take it anymore.

This PT loved what he did, was so good at it, and I am certain saved a large number of patients from needless imaging, drugs, injections, and surgery.

So, what went wrong?

I don’t really know for sure, but I can tell you from experience that it’s likely he had no game plan, no vision, no systems – and perhaps, more importantly, no one to challenge his thinking and hold him accountable.

I think it’s borderline unfair what some small practice owners endure in the name of growing a business and I simply want to do more about it.

We’ve built a marketing system and successfully installed it in a large number of practices, but I know there’s more we can do and we are going to do it.

Owning a practice should be the most gratifying and freeing choice a PT can make and I’m on a mission to crack the code to make it so, but I need your help.

Let’s put an end to failed practices.

If you feel like you’re not making the progress you should, if you feel like something is missing in your business, if you feel like working for someone else is starting to sound pretty good, if you feel like you have no idea what to do next to grow your practice – I want to hear from you.

I want to hear what

Your greatest constraint in business is?
Your greatest threat and fear?
Your greatest challenge?
Your greatest need?
Your greatest joy?

I want to know

What you would do if you knew how to consistently generate new referrals?
What you would do if you had the confidence to successfully market your practice?
How would you business improve if you knew both what to do next and could actually get it done?
What value would these ultimately bring to your practice and your life?

And finally . . .

I want to know what you’re going to do to make 2016 your greatest year in physical therapy private practice?

Take 15 minutes right now and share your thoughts via reply. I promise you’ll be glad you did.

Happy Holidays,

David Straight, DPT
Certified Duct Tape Marketing Consultant
Co-owner
E-rehab.com
(760) 585-9097

PS: 2016 is going to be a great year. We have some new services and training that you will be hearing about. We are going to significantly increase our marketing support and try our best to make sure you are taking advantage of all of the tools we provide you.

Why Physical Therapy Patients & Practices Prefer Google

It’s common knowledge that Google has the market share of eyeballs for search. But Bing.com, while trying to make a push for users, has screwed up again…and at the expense of business owners.

We had a few calls today from upset physical therapy practice owners complaining Bing.com is showing old Yelp reviews which were inconsistent with their current Yelp reviews. Moreover, they were only showing dated reviews (many months to years old) and more often than not, bad reviews.

Here’s an example: we did a search for RSM Physical Therapy at Bing.com.

Notice that the Yelp reviews are inconsistent on their Bing listing, i.e. 2 Yelp reviews. Then, look at the listing right underneath which is the actual Yelp page with 11 reviews and a 4 star rating.

You would think that big companies like Yelp and Microsoft would attempt to get this right. While Yelp is often at the center of controversy with respect to the representation of small business owners’ reputation, you would think that Microsoft would want to get this right and attempt to pull more users away from Google. How would you do this? By providing what Google is currently doing better right now…more accurate and consistent information.

We can only hope this improves.

For now, there’s no obvious way to fix this. We can only hope that the juggernauts, Yelp and Bing.com, will correct this problem and provide consistent information about physical therapy practices to their users.

Here are some links that referenced the mergers some time ago, but it is only now that we are seeing the fallout for PT practice business listings.

Bing Partnership with Yelp

Yahoo Partnership with Yahoo

PT versus MD: Physical Therapists are the Clear First Choice!

Physical Therapy Marketing Opportunity: More Reasons Why Consumers Should See PTs First

Physical therapists know that they are just as capable of evaluating and treating patients for musculoskeletal disorders as medical doctors. While society (both consumers and physicians) still generally think of physical therapy as an ancillary service, physical therapists know better. Consumer direct access is now legal in all 50 states. Go here for FAQs about direct access.

In a previous infographic we referenced numerous advantages of seeing a PT first…from financial benefits to lower utilization of specialists, injections, drugs and surgery.

The point of this infographic is to empower PTs and remind them of the variety of reasons why seeing a physical therapist first is the best choice.

In the top half of this infographic, the data is clear:

PTs see patients quicker,
There’s little to no waiting in a lobby, and
PTs spend more face-to-face time with patients.

Who Are You Going to Share This With?

Would you dare share this with your current patients or are you fearful that it might hurt your physician referral relationships? You make the call. In any case, there are many compelling reasons why consumers should see a PT first.

Reference: Thanks to the Twitter posts and those PTs that were presented at the 2015 CSM meeting. #skipMDs

Physical Therapy Social Media Tip – Create a FB CTA Button

A Practical Tip that You can Implement in 2 Minutes

Make sure your Physical Therapy Facebook Fans (Facebook users that have “Liked” your Facebook business page) can contact you fast and easy with Facebook’s new Call To Action Button.

In this video, I will show you how easy it is to create a call to action button that both desktop and mobile Facebook users can view and access with a simple click.

It only takes a few steps and about 2 minutes.

1. Log in as your Facebook page administrator.

2. Click on the “Create Call to Action Button”.

3. Follow the steps to make the button read “Contact Us”.

4. Insert the contact page URL from your website.

5. Insert your mobile website URL (it could be m.yourdomain.com, or a .mobi URL; ask your webmaster).

NOTE: E-rehab users, for mobile, simply add in your website URL.

6. Click Create and you are done.

Learn more about the Call to action button here.

[info_box]Share this tip with our PT colleagues and let’s all do a better job of using social media to share our practice brands in our respective communities. How are you using Facebook to market your physical therapy practice? Let us know.[/info_box]

Have questions about how we can help you with Social Media Marketing for your physical therapy clinic?

Give us a call at 800-468-5161 x 1101

What’s a Physical Therapy Marketing Funnel?

Visualizing How Patients Choose Your Practice Online Can Help You Improve the Process

In marketing, we talk about funnels to describe the process of identifying patients and getting them to know, like, trust, try, buy, repeat and refer.

This infographic is an online marketing funnel for physical therapy practices.

Note: at the bottom, in the red circles, are some Internet technologies that you should leverage in your physical therapy marketing efforts.

A mobile website for those looking at your brand on their smartphones is a must. Thirty-five percent, on average, are looking you up on their smartphones.
Email newsletters be used to welcome patients, thank them and to build a long-term relationship with the practice. It’s fast and easy.
Your reputation everything. Make sure you have a great reputation online for those that are comparison shopping or confirming a physician is a good one.
Video should be used to build engagement, trust, and to make sure you tell viewers exactly what you want to them to hear.

How to Use E-Mail Lists as a Beneficial Marketing Tool

As a private practice owner you’re probably always looking for better ways to bring in new patients and market your business in the most effective way possible. New patients are essential to keep your practice growing, and the best way to draw them in is to have a strong presence in a number of different web formats. Among all the options out there, it turns out the most cost-effective and profitable marketing strategy is actually e-mail marketing.

E-mail marketing can help your practice in a number of different ways. For example e-mail marketing:

Allows you to reach many people at once

Gives you an unlimited number of contacts

Is much more affordable than regular mail

Is easy to update

All of these points are very important for any business, but especially for small private physical therapy practices such as your own.

Let’s look at each of these points in more detail to see why you should implement e-mail marketing for your practice.

E-mail Marketing Allows You to Reach Many People at Once

When you read that statement, it is important to realize that this literally could be hundreds and thousands of real people, all of who could be current or potential patients.

[note_box]For example, you might have a hundred e-mail addresses to work with and e-mail marketing will allow you to send a targeted message to all of them at once. That is the beauty of e-mail marketing: not only can you e-mail many people, but you can e-mail them all at once with the same message and at the same time, no matter how many people are on your mailing list. [/note_box]

Gives You an Unlimited Number of Contacts

E-mail lists can be unlimited. There are many tools that will make it much easier for you to manage your list of contacts – from getting your site visitors to subscribe to your mailing list to easily sending out a newsletter or e-mail to literally thousands of interested people.

It is More Affordable than Regular Mail

The cost of postage for regular mail may be cheap, but if you’re a small practice, sending out one mailing to all of your contacts can quickly add up and get expensive. However, when you send a letter it’s not just the price of a stamp; there are other costs to also consider like the paper and envelopes.

Those are just the outside costs. Mailing a letter through the posts incorporates many other costs. For example you will have to make multiple copies of the letter, which you might do yourself on your printer or if there are thousands you will outsource it to a printer. All of this costs time and money.

Then you need to address the envelopes.

You can either do this by hand which would take hours or you could do it on your printer. However, you would need to type and enter the address data before printing it on to special sized labels. Again, all of this takes time and money.

When you break it all down, sending out hard mail to multiple contacts is time consuming and expensive.

On the other hand, sending an e-mail to a modest sized list is free. It doesn’t get any better than that does it? When it comes to marketing campaigns there are not many things that are free or as cost-effective as e-mail marketing.

E-mail marketing eliminates all of that extra wasted time and money you would have spent on sending your letter or advertisement to your clients through the post.

It’s Easy to Update

One of the most difficult parts about regular mailings through the post is that some details of your practice or services are constantly changing.

Whenever some aspect of your product or service changes, it’s always good to be able to notify your customers and mailing list so that they are aware of the changes.

Doing it the old way through regular mail as we discussed earlier is time consuming and expensive. However with an e-mail list, you write to your patients and keep them up-to-date on any news or developments within your practice without having to send out a single piece of physical mail.

Using an Autoresponder Service to Build Your E-mail List
One of the easiest and most convenient ways to build and maintain a database of your subscribers is to use an autoresponder service.

There are many autoresponder services available and they all vary in price and capability. Contact us at E-Rehab to find out which one we recommend for your specific practice.

In most cases they are an all-in-one solution to building, maintaining and e-mailing your database.

In addition, you can personalize your e-mail correspondence with your subscribers’ details such as their first and last name as an autoresponder collects those details for you when they subscribe.

An autoresponder allows you to put attractive forms on your website so visitors can enter their details to be updated with news about your services, get tips, download a report and so on.

If you have a special message or offer that you want to send to your e-mail list, simply send a broadcast message and they will receive it instantly no matter where they are.

An especially useful feature of using these types of autoresponder services is that you can schedule messages to broadcast on specific days after someone subscribes to your list. This makes it a very effective sales tool.

Top Tips to Get the Best Results from E-mail Marketing

E-mail marketing can have a huge impact on your business. Here are some great tips to help you to get the best results:

Use the Split-test, click tracking and open rate features to maximize your results. Most major Autoresponders have features that allow you to see which e-mail gets opened the most and how many clicks each post gets. You can even test two versions of the same e-mail to see which converts best. Monitor the results of each e-mail to get great results.

Have attention-grabbing subject lines: You want your e-mails to be opened and read, so it’s important to have a captivating subject line to increase open rates. The very first thing your subscribers will see other than who sent the e-mail is the subject line, so it needs to arouse their curiosity and engage with them in order to get them to open your e-mail.

One autoresponder site gives this expert advice: “The best e-mail subject lines are short, descriptive and provide the reader with a reason to explore your message further. Trying to stand out in the inbox, by using splashy or cheesy phrases, will invariably result in your e-mail being ignored. In short, keep your subject lines simple and to the point.”

Be consistent: The last thing you want is for your subscribers to forget who you are and why they subscribed to your list in the first place. It is a good habit to e-mail on a consistent basis. That could be once a month or once a day. People will want to know when to expect to hear from you.

Segment your list: It is a good idea to segment your list so that you can laser target your content. You will get a much better response from subscribers who are actually interested in a specific topic. Segmenting your list helps you to send the most relevant e-mails to your target audience.

Use e-mail to drive traffic to your website: E-mail marketing makes life so much easier and helps to convert sales. For example, you could write 1,000 words and make your subscribers read a long e-mail or you could simply tell to click on the link to view the message on your website.

The idea is to get your subscribers to visit your website. You could send them to a blog post or a page with new information. You want them to engage with your content so that it results in them considering your practice for their business.

How Often Should Your Contact Your Subscribers?

This is the dilemma that most business owners face. When it comes to contacting your subscribers how often should you contact them? You don’t want to leave it so long that they forget about you but then you don’t want to bombard them with e-mails either.

So what is the right frequency that works best? The simple answer is there is no one rule that fits every business model.

It depends on your own practice and how you actually use your e-mail marketing.

A simple tip is to let your subscribers know what to expect right from the very start when they opt in to your mailing list. If for example they are signing up for your newsletter, tell them what day you publish your newsletter. You could also tell them that you will be sending them other news and updates that you think will interest them so that they know to expect other e-mails from you too.

We Believe In Doing Things Right

[colored_box bgColor=”#788794 ” textColor=”#ffffff “]Whether you need a little help getting started, or you just want to enhance your existing e-mail campaigns, here at E-Rehab we want to help you make your e-mail marketing a successful component of your private practice.

We can help your e-mails to showcase your brand, company and messages to increase open rates and resulting in sale. Contact E-Rehab for more information.[/colored_box]

Physical Therapy Marketing – Secret Tip How To Generate Reviews

How to get a patient review in about 1 minute

When it comes to physical therapy marketing, you should make reputation marketing a high priority. Here’s why.

Ratings and reviews are the second most trusted form of marketing after word of mouth (i.e. referrals).

Reviews show up all over the place:

Your Google Business Listing on Search Results
Google Maps
Google Local Listings
Google+ Local Listings
Google Adwords

Reviews can help someone that is comparison shopping choose you over your competition

Patients will look you up online before they come in. Reviews will reinforce a referral.

Problems Collecting Reviews

Many think that you need a Google+ account and if you want to do a review on an iPhone or Android you also need the Google+ app. This isn’t the case.

In the video I show you how to use Google Maps to get the job done in under one minute. The Google Maps app is common on iPhones since Apple Maps just isn’t quite as good (but is improving every month). The Google Maps apps is installed on all Android devices too.

So, ask your patients for reviews and have them do it on their smartphone right in front of you.

(Note, your patient will need a Google Account).

Action Item

Have patients pull up your listing on Google and post a review. Have patients do this right on their smartphone and guide them through the process. They will need the Google Maps app installed on their smartphone (most have it) and they will need a Google account.

Fall Prevention – Good PR for Your Physical Therapy Marketing Plan

Fall Prevention is a good PR activity for the physical therapy marketing plan.