How to Get More Patients through Niche Marketing

Doctors, health coaches, nutritionists and other health care and wellness providers are struggling more than ever to have profitable practices.  As insurance reimbursements decline and become more complicated, many practitioners are moving to cash-based services.  But how do you compete with other providers in a saturated market?

It’s actually simpler than you think. You can get the attention of far more patients in your market with niche marketing. If already have too many patients, this lesson might not be for you. But if you’re asking yourself “How can I increase practice revenue and have a more profitable practice,” niche marketing is something you’ll want to learn quickly. Here’s why.

When you hang your shingle as a doctor, clients are supposed to just appear at your office. That was the case a long time ago. But right now,  there are too many doctors in any given community competing for business. One way to get around the saturation problem is to be a specialist. If you’re a foot doctor, for example, you’re all set. People know they should call you if they break their foot. And there aren’t that many podiatrists competing for all of the feet.

But what if you’re a general practitioner or a functional medicine doctor who offers a whole spectrum of services? How do you get patients to know that they should call YOU when they don’t feel their best? How do you stand out from thousands of other doctors, chiropractors, nurses, health coaches, nutritionists and other provider types offering general services?  

You guessed it. You use niche marketing to make yourself a specialist.  And here’s why. Most of what you do every day as a practitioner is not obviously helpful to your target audience. So if you put out an ad that says:

“We offer annual physicals, hormone replacement, nutritional counseling, lifestyle guidance and wellness coaching”, you’re not going to get anyone’s attention. Even if you say you take all types of insurance and list all of your credentials.

That type of advertising doesn’t separate you from anyone. People on the internet and social media don’t want a list of your services and details about your office.  They want a solution to THEIR problem. 

So if you want to attract patients that match the services you offer, market to your ideal patient a solution that fits ONE niche that you are good at and that you know will get patients to come see you, and pay you for.

One industry that really has niche marketing down pat is the pharmaceutical industry. Each pill on the market typically addresses one problem. Every time you turn on the TV you see commercial after commercial about a drug that solves one problem. And the ad usually starts with a question? Do you suffer from moderate to severe something or other?

Now when that commercial comes on, anyone who does NOT suffer from, say,
plaque psoriasis is going to tune out.  But the people that DO have plaque psoriasis
are fully engaged. They’re saying “WAIT, you can fix THIS?”

That’s niche-based marketing. The advertiser is focusing on the “niche” of plaque psoriasis. Compare that to an advertisement that offers health coaching or hormone replacement (or both).  What if the person watching or reading the ad doesn’t know they NEED hormone replacement or health coaching? You fail to engage a potential client. 

So instead of marketing about diabetic neuropathy, ask your audience if they have pain in their feet. Instead of marketing about hormone replacement, ask your audience if they have lower libido, hot flashes and so on.

Here are some examples of niche-based to advertising headlines that work:

• Are you overweight? 
• Do you have pain in your feet, back, knees?
• Are you tired?
• Are you suffering from low sex drive?
• Are you having trouble losing belly fat?

Chances are you have services for MANY of your potential clients’ needs and you’re wondering, which of your services should you advertise?  

Quite simply, don’t advertise ALL of them. That’s the big mistake most providers are making now. Pick one niche for one ad and try it out. 

The obvious choice is the service that you do best or that generates the most revenue or profit for your practice.  But you might also pick one that is a loss leader that also gets people to call you. Weight loss is a super obvious niche choice because most of the people watching or reading your marketing and who say YES! I do have those problems, are often overweight.  That alone could contribute to sex drive, foot pain, belly fat (obviously). 

So if you have a weight loss program in your office, try a print ad or a radio ad or a social media ad that asks some of the obvious questions and offer a solution.  

Make sure you’ve got a program to solve it, a procedure in place in your office to implement the solution effortlessly and a price point that gets people to buy that service from you.

If you want some example ads that work and some that don’t or if you are in need of a turnkey program that helps you to implement a solution for weight loss, for example, when patients start calling you, enter your email and we’ll give you great examples and additional practical advice on getting more patients and delivering a solution to the problem they came to you for, because of your niche-based targeted marketing.

Which of these do you think is going to get a patient’s attention? Post a comment below 🙂

Hint: the second ad is a niche-based ad. These are actual ads from just one cursory search of ads in two local markets. There are dozens of ways to handle the incoming leads from a niche based ad but the first step is getting the phone to ring or the emails to come in. 🙂

 

Looking forward to your feedback.