Chiropractic Marketing | Chiropractic Advertising | Chiropractic Ads

Are you making this mistake?

I speak with quite a few chiropractors running my ads in their local newspapers. Recently a doctor sent an ad to me that he had ran. He wanted me to give him my opinion on my it didn’t work.

At first, I had difficulty identifying if it was even my ad. The photo certainly wasn’t mine. The headline didn’t look right or even make sense to me. And the spacing was terrible.

It could only be called “my ad” in the same sense a Filipino barber cracking someone’s neck could be called a “chiropractic adjustment”!

Then I realized where he’d gone wrong…

He had committed the biggest mistake when it comes to newspaper advertising.

Here’s the mistake.

Don’t let the newspaper rep or the art department direct you into wasteful spending. Their job is to sell you the ad space, not sell you the ad design.

Don’t be a victim to this one. If you’re new to advertising or it’s the first time you are running in a particular newspaper, an experienced ad rep may try and put the pressure on you.

For example, the first time they look at one of my ads, they might tell you that this is not the typical ad that they see. It doesn’t look like the tanning salon’s ad or the MedSpa’s weight loss ad. It does not have color, it does not have graphics, it was not designed by their design department.

Come one!

These people are clueless when it comes to writing an effective ad. How many courses, coaching programs, or classes have they had on copywriting, marketing, or even chiropractic?

Zero. Nada. Zilch.

A newspaper rep is trained in selling ad space. A graphic designer is trained in…you guessed it…graphic design work!

Any ad that they would design is based on what the designer or the ad rep thinks is a good ad. They have not been trained to develop proven, effective ads, nor do they know your business, the type of patient, and the type of emotional words and copy that would draw the best response.

Many of ad reps will not even know what a “copywriter” is, and yet they work in the advertising industry!

I don’t recommend ever letting the ad rep or the design department do anything to your ads, other than format them, to fit in their paper.
You do not want them to move paragraphs around. You do not want them to move the picture to the other said of the ad or to the top or to the bottom. You do not want to change the size of the headline.

Now they may need to change it from a 4 column to a five column ad, for example, but make sure when you see the proof, that everything is still there. And the photos are specifically place, so if they resize the ads, try to get the photo to stay where it should!

I’ve seen newspapers (and some doctors) horribly butcher the ads I wrote. Ads with a specific purpose, layout, picture, etc. Then the newspaper art department will come in and convince the doctor that they can “improve the ad”.

Which usually means completely rewriting the headline and replacing my ‘empathy building’ photo with one of their pictures of a guy holding his back.

What Should A Good Rep Do?

A good newspaper rep should simply assist you in placing the ad. They’ll give you the different numbers you need to make a decision. You know, make sense of the overly complicated price layouts they have. Compare the price between a half page ad and 10,000 inserts.

Then you make the decision and place the ad you already have.

If you get a belligerent ad rep who insists they can develop a better ad for you, one with less copy and more graphics, say this,

“Sure, you can design and run whatever kind of ad you want for me, as long as you do it for free!”

Then I’ll pay to run mine (your Ultimate Chiropractic Ad) and we’ll compare the results. We’ll compare the ROI.

What’s that Mr. Newspaper rep? Oh, you don’t know what ROI is? Well that stands for Return On Investment, something I track on every ad.

Come into my office, let me give you a lesson on marketing…

This and other problems dealing with newspaper ad reps can be found in section 3, Manual 1 or on CD-Rom #2  of my ad kit.

Other topics discussed in section 3 of the manual are…

• How to negotiate the best ad position for the lowest price.
• What section of the newspaper you should never, ever run an ad in.
• Use this special phrase with your ad rep and get 50-80% off your ads month after month.
• Negotiating tricks that ad reps use against chiropractors.
• How to choose between a big, metro newspaper and a small community paper. (This one may surprise you.)
• Why you should never agree to run multiple ads in a newspaper until you’ve done this!
• The 5 pitfalls chiropractors must watch out for when running newspaper ads.
• How to determine which ads to “roll out” in a big way in other marketing media.
• When to run your ad as an insert and when to your run it as a regular space ad.

If you haven’t picked up the Ultimate Chiropractic Ads yet, find out more here…

http://ultimatechiropracticads.com/ultimate-chiropractic-marketing-ads

I was recently thumbing through Dan Kennedy’s No B.S. Direct Marketing book, looking for a quote I had seen about chiropractic newsletters. While I did find the quote, I was reminded of something even more important when it comes to marketing.

In the first section of the book, Dan lists 10 rules to follow on marketing in your business. What he said in rule #9 can be directly applied to your chiropractic marketing. Here’s what he said…

Rule #9: Results Rule, Period.

Results are what matters when it comes to measuring the success of your marketing.

While there are certain caveats to this rule (which I discuss below), let’s look at what this really means for your practice.

“Results rule, period” means it doesn’t matter what your friends, colleagues, family, front desk CA, or even your spouse thinks about your advertising. When it comes down to it your own feelings about a certain marketing piece aren’t the determining factor of it’s success.

It doesn’t matter what your newspaper representative thinks about your chiropractic ads either. You would be surprised at how many times an ad rep wants to make changes to my ads.  They’ll tell my customer “I can make that ad look much better. Let me have our art department put a better picture in there. And I think you should cut this out and we’ll put you a pretty coupon right there.”

Then I get an email from the doctor asking me if he should let them do this. I tell him “Sure, if THEY GIVE YOU THE AD PLACEMENT FOR FREE! Otherwise, tell them it’s your money and you’ll spend it on the type of marketing you want.”

I once had a front desk CA proof read an ad I was about to run in the small community newspaper. She told me “the ad wasn’t going to do well, because she wouldn’t respond to it herself.” Then I asked if she had a herniated disc like the patients the ad was geared towards. Of course her answer was no. But she still insisted the ad likely wouldn’t do well. I then told her that we could run her rewrite of the ad, if she wanted to pay for it out of her next paycheck. That ended the discussion. (This ad brought in 13 new decompression patients for an ROI of 2062%.)

So who’s vote does count?

The only vote that counts is your patient’s vote, since they are the ones giving you the money. You then total the income from their case fees, and see if it’s more than you paid to run the ad. This is your ROI and it is the determining factor if the ad was successful or not.

So what’s more important when measuring ad results, the number of new patients you get from an ad or the actual ROI?

Well, if you ask most chiropractors, they would tell you it’s the number of new patients. But the ROI is much more telling. The biggest reason is because the ROI figures in the quality of the patient, how long they stay, and how much they spend.

For example, you could get 81 new patients in for a free exam and have only 4 of them actually ever give you money. Or you could have 15 sciatica patients pay $47 for an exam, 13 of which accept a care plan, spend $2000 each and get an ROI of 2500%. Which one would you rather have?

Figuring the ROI will also factor in the “caveat” I mentioned above to Dan’s rule. Here’s what I mean…

If you are measuring purely the number of new patients you got in, you could change the above rule to “Number of New Patients Rule, Period.” But this is not true, as it doesn’t account for the unethical, hyped up, immoral, and in some cases illegal advertising that goes on.

After all, if all that matters is getting the most new patients you can get from an ad, why not “promise a cure” and tell them the first visit is free? Hey, if you’re just measuring new patients, you did great, you got 101 new people in the door! Do whatever it takes, right?

But let’s look at your ROI. After 99 of them waste your time and never pay you a dime, 1 files a lawsuit against you for unethical advertising, and the state board fines you and yanks your license to practice, I’d say your ROI is about a negative 1 million percent.

With that said, I think we should modify Dan’s rule to make it a bit more speficic. “Return on investment rules, period.”

Do you agree or disagree? Post your comments below.

Some people say print newspapers are dead. And maybe a couple in the U.S. are dead or have been bought out by another company.

This means newspaper ads will no longer work for you, right?

Not from what I’ve been hearing. Chiropractic newspaper ads are still working well. In fact, certain conditions like neuropathy, herniated discs, sciatica, and numbness seem to be pulling better than they ever have before.

Could this be due to the population aging? More toxins being in our food and environment? I’m not sure what the cause is, but I can tell you that focusing your marketing on very specific health problems is working better than ever.

In fact, neuropathy is so big I’ll be holding a webinar in a few weeks to show you how to market to these patients. And I’ll have a guest doctor joining us to teach how he’s getting neuropathy patients well.

So back to newspaper ads, do they work?

Well here’s two doctors that recently sent me their success stories with the Ultimate Chiropractic Ads…

“Wow!  My practice is recovering and so is our cashflow. “

I have been blessed with a large and successful practice… but after 14 years something started to happen… Maybe it was the economy or maybe it was my focus.  Life does get busy.

Bottom line: My practice had dropped by 20 to 30% from September of 2008 to July of 2009.  It was pretty ugly.  In August of 2009 I discovered Dr. Beck’s Chiropractic Ad’s and I took a chance.

Wow!  My first Neuropathy Ad brought in 12 new patients… about $5,000 and only cost $700 to run.  My practice is recovering and so is our cashflow.  Not only are the Ads great, I have started using his family and friends gift certificates and his home health recommendations booklet.  It’s great stuff.

-Julian Chipley, DC

“If I had his program 10 years ago, you wouldn’t be reading this,
I`d be fishing off my tropical island someplace!“

Years ago I had a practice which treated 150 patients daily for close to ten years. I eventually went to the DC/MD model when my body wore out and my marketing efforts declined since I was unique in our community regarding  interdisciplinary practice. Spiraling overhead eventually led me to return to solo practice, but the marketing that was successful in the past no longer produced consistent results, and ROI was low.

I liked everything I heard and read pertaining to Dr Beck`s program. I related to hid experiences, and the straight froward approach resonated with me.Unfortunately a lot of the marketing and consulting services available in our profession today use antiquated approaches that simply don`t work like they once did. Long winded scripting, 2-3 day reports, and high cost either out of pocket or with hefty percentages of practice increase are the norm. We all know that  getting qualified new patients in our doors remains THE most important aspect of a successful practice. The initial ad I ran was neuropathy. I`d written ads myself on the condition in the past and experienced modest success from them.

With Dr Beck`s ad I had 21 NPs and many of them have since referred other patients to us. The ROI thus far exceeds 20-1, and the tab is still running. The difference in my opinion is his copywriting skill. I`m actually a pretty good writer, but there`s a science to ad copy that I admittedly know nothing about. If I had his program 10 years ago, you wouldn’t be reading this, I`d be fishing off my tropical island someplace!

- Dr Ren Halverson

Don’t wait until everything slows down during the holidays. Pick up your ads now and get started next week with more new patients.

http://ultimatechiropracticads.com/ultimate-chiropractic-marketing-ads

This is part 2 of a two part series. You can read the first part by clicking here.

In my last post, we covered the first 2 mistakes chiropractors make when running their newspaper ads. Today, let’s look at the final 3 mistakes…

Mistake #3. Changing the Picture.

When it comes to a successful chiropractic ad, the picture really is ‘worth a thousand words.’ By using a well placed photo and a caption, much can be said in a very small space. When I write an ad, each photo is selected carefully to portray a certain meaning to the reader. Usually this is a photo that depicts the lifestyle or activity the patient wants to accomplish when they are well.

Also where the picture is placed can make a big difference. A picture placed awkwardly can make the ad seem out of place to the reader, causing him to quickly identify it as an advertisement and skip over reading it. This is why the large Ultimate Chiropractic Ads each have a photo and caption specifically placed in the ad. In some cases that is to the right of the headline. In other ads it’s embedded in the body copy text.

The point here is this: by making changes to the picture in the ad, you could be making a big mistake and hurt your results.

Mistake #4. Taking Out Sections to Make the Ad Smaller

To save some money I’ve seen doctors squish an ad down into a tiny space in the newspaper. Part of what makes an ad work is that it gets noticed. Yet, by taking an ad that was meant to be smaller than a 1/4 page ad and making into a 1/8 (or even 1/16) page ad, you’ve ruined it. It would have been better if you’d saved your money for a bit and ran it as a larger ad size.

Another mistake is thinking that by removing the picture from the ads, you can save a bit on ad space. The biggest reason this is a bad idea is because the caption on a photo is the second read thing in the ad, after the headline. Each of my ads has a photo and caption for this purpose. I want the reader to feel an irresistible urge to read the ad after seeing the headline and photo.

Mistake #5. Writing in Your Own Copy

Unless you have special training in advertising and copywriting, it’s a bad idea to write your own copy into the ad. Even if it’s a small paragraph, this can ruin the flow of the ad and cause it to fail. You’d be better off changing any number of variables — including running a different ad, changing the size of the ad, trying a different paper, running inserts instead of space ads, and more — before trying to write in your own parts.

This was a common mistake made with older ads that have been around in chiropractic. We were told to “write in our own chiropractic story” in to the ad. The problem was that “our own story” made up the first 40%-50% of the ad. And this was the first part the prospect began reading! This meant that if you weren’t trained in copywriting, the success of the ad was almost completely dependent on how well you wrote. Not on the skill of the consultant who wrote the rest of the ad.

It’s better to use ads that require only minimal changes in your contact information (name, number, and address)

Have you ever had less than stellar results with a chiropractic ad that’s worked for everyone else?

I’ve spoken to many doctors who now use the Ultimate Chiropractic Ads to bring in new patients. But occasionally a chiropractor will tell me their results were less than expected. After breaking it down the fault usually lies in 5 categories of changes made to the ad.

Let’s take a look at the first 2 ways you can ruin a good chiropractic ad.

#1. Changing Font Size Proportions.

This one happens more often than you might think. You simply change your contact information on the ad and send it to the newspaper. They tell you the ad needs to go up in size to fill your half or full page order. Then you see the proof. If you’re not watching closely, the newspaper editing department may have completely diluted the effectiveness of your ad.

How? By enlarging the body text of the ad, but not changing the headline in proportion. This makes the ad look weird and any regular newspaper reader is going to notice this point. If you’re using my ads, you know they aren’t designed to look like an ad. But when the font size is disproporti0nate, it’s much easier for readers to say “Oh, that’s just an ad, I’ll skip over that.”

To fix this, simply make sure the original font size ratio stays the same when the ad is enlarged. If the headline is 3 times bigger than the body text before the newspaper gets it, the headline should still be 3 times larger than the body text after they make their changes.

#2. Charging Too Much for the Special Offer.

The question of “how much to charge” for a new patients first visit always seems to get sparks flying with chiropractors. I understand both points of view. Some doctors don’t want to ‘water down’ chiropractic by giving away free exams and x-rays. Other chiropractors are struggling so bad they can’t give away exams even if they wanted too.

Here’s the point…

Marketing is about ethically persuading people to come in to your office and see if you can help them get well. And make no mistake, we must market our practices to be successful (even referrals are a type of marketing.) I’m not saying you must give away anything for free. But if you make a special offer, many people will get over their procrastination and skepticism to come in and see you.

In my ad kits, I recommend between $25 and $50. (Of course this excludes all federally insured patients, Medicare, etc.) This appears to best at weeding out the people who only want a free exam while still maximizing your ad response. In some cases more than $50 is justified if you’re doing a specialized practice. But realize that the higher you go with your price, the lower the number of new patients.

What about the loss of revenue from giving too much away? It is true you loose a small bit of revenue from this first visit. But if you’re set up your fees properly, and know how to do a report, then you’ll bring in plenty on the patients care. There is no need to be so greedy about the first visit you miss out on the huge blessings in store for your practice later on.

Also, see my previous article on this subject entitled “Is Your Marketing Classy and Effective“.

Which months are the best to advertise in? Is December or January really a waste of money?

Everyone has an opinion about when to market and when to be a scrooge with your marketing dollars. But there are certain months I have discovered are great to advertise in.

Let’s look at a few conditions…

For auto accident ads, you want to advertise during the times of the year when the weather has an effect. It’s been shown that during icy periods, rain, or fog, more people will get into accidents. This doesn’t mean you can’t run a PI ad during good weather, but after bad weather is best.

If you live in warmer climates, then you would want to run ads that affect people who are more active like golf, etc. Contrary to popular belief, patients do see chiropractors in the summer and you should be marketing then.

It’s much smarter to run ads and keep your marketing up during the summer, than it is to listen to consultants telling you to take the summer off from advertising.

Does the consultant to take off all summer from his marketing to chiropractors?

There is a period of time where you should curtail your marketing, but it’s a short period of time at the end of the year. That’s means the last two weeks of December you should not have a new ad coming out.

Not because people are spending more money at this time, the money is low, and all that fluff.

It’s simply because people are less likely to be considering their health during this time, based on their travel schedule and the things that they have going on. Readership in most newspapers drop during this time too.

No matter what any consultant or colleague says, that’s the only two weeks you should not consider having a live ad in the paper. (That right, all other Holiday weeks are great.)

I would definitely recommend having an ad the first week of December though!

January is typically a decent month only because a lot of people will be considering their health and their new year?s resolutions then. I don?t find January to be the best month, in my experience, but it certainly is a good month for marketing.

Funny story on January.

One consultant I had said that I should market hard in January, because that’s when everyone is “thinking about their health”.  Another consultant I had later said “no, absolutely don’t spend any money on advertising in January, because that’s when everyone’s deductibles start over!”

Who’s right?

Who cares! What month do you not want new patients to come in?

Really, every month is a good month for marketing, even December.

Don’t get the idea because I said don’t advertise in the last two weeks of December you should take the whole month off.

A lot of chiropractors make the mistake of saying…

“I’m going to take December off from marketing. And nope, can’t market in June and July because kids are out of school. November? Well shucks, there’s Thanksgiving, so I better not spend money there. April has Easter weekend, May memorial day weekend, and September has labor day weekend so I can’t market in those months either…..”

You get the picture. Don’t be like this fool who always has an excuse why they aren’t marketing their practice. That mentality is going to hurt your practice.

I’ve known doctors who’ve done these stupid things and have struggled just to keep the doors open. All because they put their marketing on halt for awhile. They thought their referrals would keep them going through these “non-advertising months”.

But where do most referrals come from? They mostly come from new patients or newer patient who’ve started care in the last month.

With all that said, there are some months that have proven to work better for me and my coaching clients.

The best months I’ve found to market were in the middle of the spring and fall (March and April, October and November). I can’t say for certain why that is. I have certain theories, but it doesn’t really matter. The fact is that’s when I’ve found my ads have the best response.

This does not mean that you should only run your chiropractic ads during these months!

It only means you should have more ads running than the normal during these times. November has always been a very good month for me, even with the Thanksgiving holiday in the U.S.

But this is not a hard and fast rule. I only mention it to you so you can test it. One year July was my biggest ever months when it comes to collections and new patients.

Occasionally I’ll get an email asking if my newspaper ads really do work like I claim on the website.

And while I can’t say that they will work 100% of the time in every town, since there are factors outside my control like crummy newspapers, they bring in quite a few new patients.

I often wonder “why are chiropractors so skeptical of good marketing ideas?”

But, then I remember all the hyped up, over-exaggerated claims out there in our profession.

You know the ones that make huge claims with very little to no proof. Websites with almost unbelievable crap. Smooth sounding salesmen on the phone with a rough, scratchy ‘I’m-your-buddy’ voice. Or ads in chiropractic journals with headlines like… 

“208 New Patients with One Ad!”

or

“I have the BIGGEST practice in the whole world and make $145,270.16 per month!!!!”

(I particularly like this last example. I’m thankful he put the exact number down to the penny, because until I saw that 16 cents I was really doubting it. Alas, now my doubts are resolved.)

Maybe these claims are true. It’s certainly possible to get hundreds of patients and have the biggest practice in the world. Yet not very probable.

But it sure would help if they gave some real PROOF to back up these enormous claims!

For example, if there is a testimonial, how about giving the person’s full name and town they live in. And I’m not talking about “Dr. T — California” or “P.M.–Montana” either. I’ve heard of marketers (especially internet marketers) out there who flat out lie and make up testimonials to put on their site. So, just having someone’s initials isn’t enough proof to back up a claim. Especially a big, unbelievable claim.

If a doctor got 202 new patients from one ad, I want to see his name, age, town…maybe even a video of him showing how excited he is.  200 new patients is more than some chiropractors see all year.

What really sets a customer’s mind at ease when buying a marketing product is having a 100% money back guarantee.

If these products and marketers had a guarantee then you could feel better about taking the risk when buying their material. If their claims are hyped up, you’ll know when you buy their product and you can simply send it back.

When I wrote my Ultimate Chiropractic Ads, I knew there would be some skepticism. This is why I put in a 90 day guarantee. If someone isn’t happy — for any reason — they can send it back for a full refund. All I ask is that they run at least 1 ad. That’s fair isn’t it?

So be careful out there. Examine every claim with common sense and reason.

But don’t assume everything that has to do with chiropractic marketing is hype. There are marketing strategies and tools that work to bring in an extra 10, 20 or 30 new patients a month. For most doctors, these are welcome numbers to be adding to their other new patient endeavors.

Everyone has an opinion on what works in marketing a chiropractic office. Some will tell you just to “get your name out there” or “hang your shingle”. Others will tell you that if you aren’t speaking at an event every week or holding a spinal screening daily, you aren’t growing your practice.

But the question remains, what truly works to grow your practice?

I have found 7 chiropractic marketing tools that work consistently over time to grow a practice. Before I list all 7, it’s important to mention two important factors that limit your marketing: time and money.

Therefore, you must choose where to spend your time or money wisely. For example, spinal screenings take a lot of time. Since time equals money, most doctors find that their time spent at screenings doesn’t bring in enough money to justify the time spent.

The same goes with your money. If your marketing budget is $2000 per month, you may not be able to do as much marketing as you want right now. So you should spend that $2000 where it will have the best return on investment.

With that said, let’s jump into the 7 Marketing Strategies…

#1. Newspaper Ads.
Don’t think for a minute newspaper ads are dead (see my previous article “Are Chiropractic Ads in the Newspaper Dead?“). It’s by far one of the fastest ways to get new patients in the door. And I’ve heard from many doctors that are getting high returns on their investment, that even during a down economy. For example, a doctor in Northern Ireland wrote me last week to say he’d ran one of my small ads and gotten a 23 to 1 return on investment. Do newspaper ads work every time? Certainly not! Many times the paper is just terrible and has completely lost its readership over the years by ignoring their readers interests. Even my Ultimate Chiropractic Ads don’t work 100% of the time  in papers that are failing. But even in a bad paper you can try different conditions and hit on one that works well — like Dr. Carter in Oklahoma did last week with his first neuropathy ad.

#2. An Effective Web Presence.
Everyone knows you have to be marketing on the internet. But the question is what exactly should you be doing there?

The key to marketing your practice online is to think of it like a library. When I take my kids to the library, I want it to be nice and clean, but of utmost importance is the information they have there, i.e. the quality and number of books. And I want that information easily accessible, not buried away in a box somewhere that’s hard to find. The same goes with your internet marketing. People want information and education, not flashy pictures, graphics or 250 links to click on!

Also, notice I mentioned the word “effective” in the subtitle above. This means your only reason to be on the internet is to get new patients. To do this, you need to use tools like email marketing, landing pages, pay-per-clicks ads, facebook, twitter, and more.

#3. A Strategy for Getting Referrals.
We’ve all heard about the mythical chiropractor who gets 50 new patient referrals each month without lifting a finger. But for those of us in the real world, we need to have a strategy laid out to accomplish this. Sure, a few patients will refer people in even if you never did anything. But why not ad a few subtle strategies that make it easier for people to refer. (Realize I’m not talking about forceful procedures either.)  Chiropractic referral strategies should include new patient stick letters with referral coupons, monthly print newsletters, email newsletters, blogs, patient appreciation days, and much more.

Even the uniqueness of your office can get you more referrals. For example, my J-Tech ROM system and it’s report I sent home would impress patients so much, they would insist their spouse come in to get tested on it. One lady said “I just had to come in and do this since no other chiropractor I’ve been to has this program.” I could’ve just put the printed reports in their file after going over it, but by sending it home with them it generated more family referrals.

To be continued…

(Today’s blog post is from Section 3  Ultimate Chiropractic Ads manual and is entitled “How to Get the Best Ad Placements and Save Thousands of Dollars With Your Ad Rep”)

When running an ad, much of the success of your ad will depend on the price you get to run the ad, and the newspaper that you run the ad in.

In this section we’re going to talk about how to get the very best rates. I’ll show you negotiating tips and tricks that you can use with ad reps to get great prices. And we’ll discuss the major pitfalls where most chiropractors mess up big time and waste money.

The First Contact: Don’t Waste A Lot Of Time

When you first select the newspaper to run in, call or email the ad rep that you found from their website. Once you get a hold of an ad rep, you’re going to ask for their media kit. Now they may give you this information over the phone, or by email.

Many of them will push to set-up an appointment at your office, so they can sell you on a big ad package. You don’t want to set up an appointment right now. You haven’t determined if this newspaper is actually going to worth your time and money.

If you set up appointments with everybody, you’re going to waste all your time meeting with ad reps. You’re not even sure if their newspaper is good enough to advertise in yet. And they just spent an hour of your time trying to sell you on how great their paper is.

Let the numbers determine how good their newspaper is first; not what the ad rep says.

When you get the media kit, it’s going to have some very important information in there. One of the things that you’re going to look for is the number of subscribers that they have.

If you’re looking at a large newspaper, it’s going to have subscribers for the different days of the paper. For example, Sunday’s subscriber rate may, and usually is, much larger than the weekly subscriber rate.

Typically you’ll see a weekly subscriber rate, a weekend, and then a Sunday subscriber rate. You will also see the number of papers that they sell through the boxes and vendors on the street. This should be a separate number and not included in the subscriber totals.

I should also mention here the coverage of the newspaper. If you’re in a suburb, make sure the papers you are dealing with covers your area. Some ad reps will insist that the paper gets delivered near you, but it may turn out to be in very small amounts.
All of these numbers are important, but the main thing you want to look at is subscribers. That’s what you can compare from one paper to the next.

Smaller, local papers are many times free and they’re not going to have a subscriber rate. They’ll simply have a distribution rate, or how many papers they throw or mail.

Typically, some of the free papers will mail these to homes and apartments. Because they have no idea how many actually get delivered by the post office, you can’t always trust the numbers.

If there’s too many newspapers to choose from in your area, then you should…

Ask You Patients Which Paper They Read.

If you keep getting the same answer from different patients, you know that’s the newspaper to be advertising in. You may want to even do a more formal survey where you ask them to fill out a short questionnnaire. On the form, ask them to list the top three newspapers they look at on a monthly basis.

Just because a paper is free doesn’t necessarily mean it’s not a good paper to advertise in. That will depend on the quality of the paper, where your competition is advertising, and other factors in your area. For example, one of the best return on investments I ever had was with a local, free paper. After testing major metropolitan papers and local paid papers, I wasn’t getting a great return.
That’s when I decided to give this more local, free paper that only went out once a week. It mailed to the businesses and homes right around my practice. As I investigated further, this paper had the best layout as far as geographically of where my patients came from. And it was free, so almost everybody in the community got it in the mail.

Plus, it was the only newspaper really covering the local sports teams.

Side-note: Sports coverage is very important for smaller suburbs. The major metropolitan papers will not give great coverage to smaller sports teams. You potential prospects will want to read about their kids and grandkids sports teams. This is one reason why newspapers will be around for many more years to come.

Using the strategies I reveal in this manual, I got a great deal with this local paper. I still tested all the other papers, but that little local one always came back to me as my best return on investments.

It was also the least risky too, because it was the lowest cost. This allowed me to test new ads and try new strategies that I wouldn’t want to risk in other papers due to the higher cost.

Each geographical area (and the way you practice) is different, so I can’t tell you exactly which ads will work best. Or which ads to start with. But here’s a few tips to help you make a good decision.

Start with an ad that’s typically the type of patient you see come into your office.

What type of patient comes in regularly? Which condition would you like to see more of?

For example, if you see a lot of lower-back patients or headache patients in your office, start with that ad. You already know your practice draws these types of patients, so that’s a good ad to start with.

You’re typically going to get some good results with that. If you have a decompression office, for example, then you would pick one of those ads to start with. Same with cold laser ads.

All the ads can work well for your area, but some will pull bigger than others. Remember, we’re just testing out which paper is likely to give you the best return on investment.

Once you find out with paper that is, you can start running other ads. I do not recommend you just stick with one condition or one ad. You should diversify your practice!

Other topics discussed in section 3 of the manual are…

• How to negotiate the best ad position for the lowest price.
• What section of the newspaper you should never, ever run an ad in.
• Use this special phrase with your ad rep and get 50-80% off your ads month after month.
• Negotiating tricks that ad reps use against chiropractors.
• How to choose between a big, metro newspaper and a small community paper. (This one may surprise you.)
• Why you should never agree to run multiple ads in a newspaper until you’ve done this!
• The 5 pitfalls chiropractors must watch out for when running newspaper ads.
• How to determine which ads to “roll out” in a big way in other marketing media.
• When to run your ad as an insert and when to your run it as a regular space ad.

If you haven’t picked up the Ultimate Chiropractic Ads yet, find out more here…

http://ultimatechiropracticads.com/ultimate-chiropractic-marketing-ads

To bring in high quality new patients, you need to focus on specific niche markets. A niche market is simply a “subset” of a larger market.
There is everyone who could be a chiropractic patient, but within that group, you can divide them even further into specific niches.

Niche marketing can make a huge impact on your practice. The spinal decompression boom of the last 4-5 years shows this to be true. But you don’t have to invest in expensive equipment to do niche marketing. Just match up good advertising with niche conditions, and do what you already know how to do…help people get well!

So what are the best conditions to focus on in 2009 and beyond?

The answer to the question of “what niches should you focus on” will depend quite a bit on how your office is set up. If you have special equipment, like detox machines, decompression tables, or cold la-sers, you’ll want to focus on those niches first.

With that said, there are some very good niches that will bring you good quality new patients, thereby being more profitable. Here are my top 5

1. Fibromyalgia. Fibromyalgia affects at least 6 million women in the US each year, and these patients aren’t getting answers anywhere else. The key is connecting with these patients on their level. These patients usually need nutritional and lifestyle advice as well. Important to recognize if you sell products in your office that can help their condition.

2. Herniated/ Degenerative Discs. These patients have usually tried multiple medical routes with little to no help. Many of them are facing surgery and would love to find a more natural solution. This market is available even if you don’t own a decompression table. But having one can help.

3. Arthritis. Osteoarthritis alone affects nearly 21 million people, accounts for nearly a quarter of primary care visits, and half of all NSAID use in the U.S. This group focuses on the baby boomers which are currently the most affluent group in America. You may be thinking you’ve been helping people with arthritis for years, but are you using the term “arthritis” specifically in your marketing?

4. Neuropathies. Sciatica, numbness, tingling, radiculopathies, and other never problems fall into this group. This is a very motivated group that must hear from you soon so they will not be confined to a life of surgeries and dangerous medications. This is the newest of the 5 listed, because so many people are getting neuropathies these days. One doctor recently sent me the following email about doing neuropathy marketing…

5. Headaches and migraines. Approximately 22 million women are affected by migraines alone in the United States. Because these patients have suffered for many years (some since childhood), they will be a very good patient and can be easily helped by chiropractic care.

There’s my Top 5 niche conditions to focus on in 2009. You could probably add a few more but you’ll find the 5 above to be excellent quality patients when it comes to staying, paying and referring.