Digital Marketing for Mental Health Agencies and Therapists
Tips For Online Marketing For Therapists In 2022
Step-by-step learn how to make great branding and digital marketing strategies for your small business.
1.
Find your target group
Your young patients are on social media. 79% Millennials and 97% Gen Z, all of them surf the internet more than once a day. This means you need to rethink your social media strategy as a way to connect with them. The goal is to make your team, office, and website visible to this group of people, when and where they are looking for help.
Instagram and Tik Tok are the most popular platforms among these generations. Post and answer questions regularly.
2.
Content is king
One of the most key aspects in social media marketing mastery is to get the most out of your content.
Businesses and entrepreneurs have so many things going on at once that it can be easy to forget that it’s not always necessary to continuously send out brand new content to be successful.
From what we’ve seen at Buffer, the more you can repurpose and make your content feel fresh in a variety of ways the less content you’ll actually have to put out and the more success you’ll have.
Experiment with creating shareable graphics throughout the post that people can use on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. You can also create a series of Instagram Stories to help promote the post. Or you might try creating a short video for Facebook summarizing the post (or even a more in-depth YouTube video!)
Every piece of content you create should have at least 2-3 other pieces of shareable content to accompany it. That way if the link doesn’t resonate then the video might. Or if the video falls short, maybe it makes for good Instagram Stories.
3.
Design and Build a Professional Website
Hire a good UX designer or digital marketing agency and make sure your website is easy to navigate. Don’t forget to include call-to-action buttons on your site, and make sure it includes a phone number, email address, and physical address.
Optimize it for mobile for people to reach you on the go. Doing so also makes sure you look professional and approachable however they look up your business.
4.
Make a commitment to social media
The first thing that businesses and entrepreneurs can do to find success is make a commitment to social media.
Like any other form of marketing, social media for businesses can be a real challenge. It’s hard to grow an audience, create great content, and increase engagement. All too often we see brands giving up on social media after just a few months.
We’ve found that it takes eight months to one year to really get the hang of social. Not only to get a consistent content stream going, but to figure out what your audience resonates with and what they don’t.
It all starts with planning. Create a social media strategy and write it down in order to hold your business accountable. Your strategy should include a basic company mission statement, content plan and goals. And most importantly, a powerful statement on “why” people would follow you on social media, what kind of content you plan on creating and posting, and what you hope to achieve.
5.
Show off your personality
The second social media tip for businesses and entrepreneurs is to always (authentically) be you on social media.
Take a second to think about the brands that you follow on social media…. What makes them special? What makes you follow them?
Chances are that there is something special about the content they post or the way in which they post it. We’re guessing they have a personality and aren’t just brand robots pushing out content.
Creating a great social media presence isn’t only about showing the value of your product or service to your audience. It’s about connection and experiences. The best brands out there share a common point of view with their fans.
One of our favorite examples of this idea in action is Merriam Webster Dictionary. They’re a dictionary and they’re seeing tremendous success on social media.
Digital Marketing for Mental Health Agencies and Therapists
EVERY BUSINESS NEEDS A MARKETING STRATEGY
Step-by-step learn how to make great branding and digital marketing strategies for your small business.
6.
Boost organic content to a targeted audience
What’s great about social media for businesses is that you don’t have to be an expert in order to see success with advertising.
Unless you have a team running your social ads or you’re able to invest a lot of time running experiments, you could end up wasting a lot of money on paid advertising.
The way we like to think about it is that organic social media posting (traditional posting) is the perfect testing ground for paid ads and boosted posts. In other words, you’re using organic reach to determine what posts you should put money behind.
The best part is that you can target specific users within many of the social platform ad managers.
For example, let’s say your goal is traffic to your website and you’ve identified a top performing post.
You can create an audience that is most likely to also enjoy that post. That could be a Lookalike Audience that is similar to your website visitors. Or maybe it’s an audience who has shown interest in your competitors. It also could be an audience based on demographics like location, age, or mobile device type.
You can then exclude traffic to your website in order to eliminate people who are already familiar with your brand.
7.
Experiment with video marketing
Content Ideas:
Video marketing is one of the most talked about topics in social media right now and so we’d love to share a few strategies that you can use to create awesome video content.
Many marketers tell us that they struggle with “what” to create video about. The best solution we have for you when it comes to “what” is to start with what works. Sort your blog content in order of most traffic and create videos around those topics.
Again, use Facebook Pages to Watch to figure out what kinds of videos your competitors are making and generate topic ideas based off of that. Use your customers as resources. Look outside of your specific industry to your favorite brands. The key is to start with what works and gain some confidence.
Best-Practices:
In terms of video best-practices, there are some scientific factors that people are more likely to interact with. One is video length. On Facebook, for example, the highest engaging videos are between 60-90 seconds. The second highest are between 30-60 seconds. Same holds true for Twitter. So keep your videos short and to the point. Save the best for first, if you will.
If you’re going to feature a person (or group of people) in your video, you’ll need a good lavalier microphone, natural light from a window, and a tripod. Sound, lighting, and camera stability are key in creating a quality video.
If animated or text-only video are more your style (which we do a lot here at Buffer) all you’ll need is great resource for stock video, quality background music, and a video editor. My two must-have sites for stock video are Pexels and Videvo and Animoto is our go-to video editor.
8.
Give back to your community
When it comes down to it, some people will not be able to afford your services. They may not have insurance, or their insurance may not cover the full cost. Donate your time in the community, and let the community see you working to make it better.
This can include donating therapy sessions, handing out information at a local festival, or any other volunteering opportunities that might be appropriate.
9.
Register/Update Your Google Business Listing
Google My Business is the best free marketing for therapists around.
With free tools that are integrated through Google Maps and Google search, claiming your business and keeping the information up-to-date is an easy way to organically reach the 82% of consumers who conduct “near me” searches (and the 90% who click on the first link that pops up!).
10.
Think on Branding
Think back to those items you prefer to use regularly. What led you to choose them in the first place? Marketing strategies such as advertising probably made you aware of those products or informed you of certain benefits they offer that similar items don’t.
It’s true, you’re a therapist, not a face wash. All the same, your services are a product you want to sell. Branding these services will, more often than not, help you reach more of your market: your ideal therapy clients.
You might feel somewhat uncomfortable at the thought of branding yourself or worry it means you’ve demeaned your practice or sold out. Perhaps you feel concerned it might have some negative impact on your professional career.
But branding simply means creating a specific impression of your therapy practice. This image can help you attract more notice in an ever-increasing field. Your brand helps potential clients find you more easily, as people who feel drawn to your brand may select you over other potential therapists. And clients who feel satisfied with your work will likely remember that success and develop a sense of trust in you—and your brand.
What People Say
Daniel and his team are absolutely fantastic. I could not recommend someone higher to take care of your website and digital marketing needs.
A2dd Branding and Daniel specifically, are absolute life changers! Daniel was so helpful and present throughout the entire building of my new website. He listened and took all my ideas and needs and created such a beautiful site. I highly recommend A2dd to anyone needing branding and marketing services.
If content is king, then conversion is queen.
~ John Munsell