By: Chris Donofri,D.C.

   Are you using the internet to market your practice? If not, you're missing HUGE opportunities. The benefits are immense, but only if you truly understand how to use this powerful, yet complex tool.

   You see, for most Chiropractors, the internet is an enigma of complex components with a lot of moving pieces. Understanding how it all pieces together causes most doctors to throw up their hands and shout "forget it, I'll just keep doing what I'm doing to market my practice...it's just waaaay to complicated for me...". If I'm describing you, don't worry, you're not alone.

If You're Waiting For The Magic In-The-Box Internet Marketing System...You May Be Waiting A While

   Personally, I think most Chiropractors are hanging in there for that magical done-for-you, internet-in-a-box system that will magically hook itself up and spit out new patients while you sleep. Sounds pretty hot, but I'm going to make a prediction that you are not going to see that any time soon. Why, because the internet technology is constantly changing...even the rules change every day.

   That's why you really need to have some base understanding of the internet to make this one of the bullets in your marketing arsenal. The truth is...this bad boy isn't going away any time soon, so it benefits you to take some time and study why the biggest companies in the world use the internet as one of their primary tools to market and grow their companies to dizzying heights...and...at blistering speeds.

   What I would like to do, over the next few weeks (at least) is to help you "crack the code" a bit and at least create a base of understanding so you can keep up with the times...and possibly even use at least a few components go market your own practice. By the way, that's the great part about the internet...you can stay reaaaaaally simple...or you can set up reaaaaaaally complex strategies with layers and layers of marketing and technology. It's all up to you.

   As far as I can see, no-one within Chiropractic marketing has truly put it all together yet for Chiropractors. Bits and pieces, but not nearly "tapping the surface." Especially using social media like U Tube, Face Book, Twitter, My Space and other up and coming social media resources.

   And, since this is an area that I study intensely and am fascinated with, I think I can help to distill some of the mystery for you into usable components.

Let's get started...

   Here are just some of the benefits to using the internet to market your practice...

• It's inexpensive. Email is free...setting up your website (or multiple websites) is inexpensive and quick...website designers don't charge thousands of dollars any more to put up or manage websites.
• You can implement new strategies quickly. Your webmaster can have new technologies in place, a new website, a new domain name for you, etc... so quickly these days (often the same day), you can keep putting more and more strategies in place.
• You can reach mass audiences all at once. This is one of the biggest benefits. In the old days, to reach lots of people, you would need to do direct mail, telemarketing and other media. Today, one click of a button and you can reach as many people as your heart desires. And remember, marketing is all a numbers game. The more people you can reach, the greater the overall response.
• You can test cheaply and quickly. It's amazing. You can test a new marketing idea by releasing a blast email to a small list and see a response immediately. If it works, blow it out to your whole list. You can also test ads, website ideas etc... using Google and search engine tools. It's not complex and they give you tools that immediately analyze everything at the click of a button.
• You can market to your lists over a period of time and continue to warm people up until they are ready to buy (come in and see you). People often don't make decisions to see you right away. They need to have a level of trust. The internet is a great tool to communicate with them over time and build trust and expertise.
• The software today to help you market is incredible and extremely powerful. For example, at the bottom of this article is a "tell a friend" button. Just by clicking on that button and sending this article to a friend, we are exponentially reaching more Chiropractors...thank you! You can do the same thing. And, there's a tons of killer software out there to buy and test to increase your response rates. It's fun!
• Response to everything you do is immediate and trackable. That means you can try something and test the response immediately. If it doesn't work, there are not long waiting times like direct mail...you just move onto the next strategy.
• It's getting simpler and simpler to use. Most of what you get today is super user-friendly. I'm not a techie by a long shot, but it hasn't taken me long to glom on to a new technology and have it fully implemented that same day. You can too, trust me!
• And much much more... There are just way too many benefits to list here, but you get the idea-fast, inexpensive, powerful, effective, trackable, high tech, professional, and up with the times.

   Here's a big caveat to this whole thing though. DO NOT rely on the internet alone to market your practice...EVER! I don't care how great you get this thing to work for you. My philosophy is always and will always be...multiple pipelines of marketing, using multiple media (internet included), all at one time. It's that simple. If you haven't checked the archives of my articles, make sure you read the one on "The Days of One Hit Marketing..." to really understand the pitfalls of marketing your practice this way. It's a recipe for disaster!

   Let's get to the meat of this ezine and give you an overview and then over the next few weeks I will showcase specific strategies for you.

Would You Like To Know The Components Of The Internet You Will Need To Market Your Practice With Lethal Effectiveness?

As a Chiropractor using the internet to market your practice, there are a few key strategies you NEED to understand to make this work. First, you need a killer website. Some place that prospects, current patients and inactive patients can go back to over and over again to get valuable information (content from you). Don't rely on pre fab sites. You want one that you can customize over an over again. I will literally go into a whole ezine about templated sites and the benefits and drawbacks.

Hire a good webmaster. Someone with experience and someone who is fast and reliable. Get a recommendation for this.

Content is king. So don't rely on someone else creating content for you. You need to think about what's valuable to your prospects and give it to them for free, on your website. The Chiropractor with the best content always wins. I will tell you why in the next ezine. Space prohibits it today.

Next, you'll need some traffic (visitors). If you don't have traffic to your site, you can't market to new prospects each month. You'll find $99 per month SEO (search engine optimization) companies out there all the way up to thousands per month. You've heard the term "you get what you pay for"-it's absolutely true. Don't skimp on this, but don't get "taken" either. My suggestion is to get a good recommendation from someone who is using a proven, reputable and reasonably priced company. Remember, the more people you have coming to your site, the more chances you have to get new patients in your door...and to market over time to the ones that need to be "warmed" up over time.

Next, you'll need to focus on building a list of names you can market to. Buying traffic (above) is one way and there are a whole host of ways (payed and free) to build your list. This alone is a study in and of itself. Just remember, focus on getting as many emails from new patients, current patients and visitors to your site as possible.

Now that you are building a list, you will need an email delivery system that gives you the capability to blast email, autoresponders (a sequence of pre created emails that get released on specific days over time that you chose), and create ezines like this one to continue to market to your list. You can be set up in a matter of 5 or 10 minutes and be using it that day to send out your first emails. A subscription to one of these services is dirt cheap too.

Buy some video and audio equipment. The technology today is very inexpensive, can be used for personal enjoyment as well, and is easy to learn. I recommend "Flip Video" to shoot short videos to put up on your site and simple USB mics that connect directly to your USB port in your computer. It generally will come with simple audio software. I will go into more detail about how to use this stuff in future ezines. Just know that this is what you need today to thrive in internet marketing-multimedia.

Don't Get Overwhelmed...Just Get Started

   That's a lot do digest right now without overwhelming you. The goal is to just get started...don't rely on pre made sites (it's a start though)...start to study other marketers and how they are using the internet...go through the list above and start plugging away at each one...and have fun experimenting with all the fun gadgets and tools the internet has to offer.

   You should know, this is the future (actually the present) of marketing your practice. If you bury your head in the sand, you are going to be way, way behind. If you use the internet personally right now for all kinds of things, realize that so do your patients and your potential patients. Remember, one of the keys to marketing is to go where your prospects all ready are and market to them with media and formats that they already like and use.

I Need Your Help

   Finally, I want to hear your comments. Everyone's been asking me to coach them and put together tools for them to help them market using the internet. I've been helping a handful of private clients behind the scenes, but I want to know what you want. So, please, go to my blog or email me and tell me your thoughts and ideas and where you need the most help with internet marketing. I will respond to EVERY SINGLE email.

   Please pass this ezine off to your friends and colleagues. It's my promise to always give you killer, actionable, and more important valuable content...totally free. My goal is to get this information into as many Chiropractor's hands as possible. So, if you like the information each week, please use the "tell a friend" button on the bottom and send this off to a few Chiro friends each week. Thank you!

Here's to your highest response,

Dr. Chris Donofri
www.NewPatientMultiplier.com