Recently, we have been driving home the importance of marketing and how it will play a pivotal role in the success of your business in the coming months. We have been running a summer school for clients where we’ve covered the marketing integrations in TM3 such as MailChimp, Google Analytics, Facebook Ads and Google Ads and how they can help improve your digital presence. You might also have noticed a number of blogs in recent weeks, covering marketing tips such as How To Optimise Your Website For SEO.

By now, your business should have a fairly solid marketing plan which you should be executing and constantly evolving. However even the most seasoned marketers encounter problems or need a few pointers. With that said, we have collated a list of common marketing speedbumps and how you can avoid them.

Sell the benefits, not the service

When writing your marketing, landing page, email, advert, or website copy put yourself in the shoes of a potential client.

Think of your client journey as a sales funnel. You've already done the hard bit by getting them to land on your website, click your ad or open that marketing email. What you don’t want to do is lose them at this stage with a lack of information or by telling them things they already know. Unless you live remotely, the chances are that the landscape in your local area is highly competitive with many clinics or studios offering the same services.

So, what makes your service superior to that of the clinic or studio 2 miles down the road? What benefits will they see for parting with their money? Talk them through the benefits of your service, they already know what physiotherapy is but what will the benefits of your service be? They’ve been to a Pilates class before but why is yours different? Sell your benefits, not your service.

Don’t overlook your current clients

We have said it before, but we’ll say it again for those who missed it; it costs almost 5 times more to acquire a new client than it does to retain to an existing one. If you aren’t making use of your current client list, why not? If you take what you would spend acquiring a new client, you could use this cost to offer a packaged discount to an existing client. It's about striking a balance for new clients to existing clients.

Putting the cost-per-acquisition factor aside, you have a pool of clients there that you know are interested in your services. They trust both your staff and your brand which is the perfect combination for upselling. There are several approaches you can take to getting more from your existing client-base and reducing churn.

Enhancing client experiences

There’s a great quote that says, “Instead of using technology to automate processes, think about using technology to enhance human interaction.” We believe automation compliments enhanced interaction perfectly. By automating certain processes you’ll free up time to spend with clients that otherwise would have been spent on manual tasks – meaning they’ll get more of your time.

Email Marketing

Make use of email automations to upsell classes to your current client list, send them offers when they reach the last treatment in the journey or simply automate emails for their birthday to prompt a visit to your website/online bookings site.

Go back to the funnel we spoke about in selling the benefits, at the end of their bookings block they are almost out of the bottom of the funnel again. It will be far cheaper and easier to get them back into the funnel at stage 3 instead of stage 1 where you have to drive awareness and selling again.

Automating Payments & Forms

Use automated registration forms, allowing you to collect data ahead of arrival and giving yourself a head start on the issues meaning you can dive straight in on arrival. With TM3 Connect, your clients can manage their own forms, payments, and receipts via their ‘My Account’ section.

By putting your clients in the driving seat, you’ll reduce time spent on admin whilst also immersing them in a digital journey that allows you to focus on interactions in-person.

Enhancing Engagement

To improve engagement, use digital survey forms to collect feedback between treatments or classes. Use eSignature to gain consent or authorisation, if you are a practitioner then use digital clinical notes during treatments.

If you have taken payment online and collected registration for info ahead of arrival via TM3 Connect, you’ll have an extra 5 mins in person to interact. Sit and have a coffee with them before their class or appointment in this time. All of these small things will enhance engagement and in turn create advocates for your business.

Think horizontally, not vertically

When drawing up your marketing plans, it can be easy to pigeonhole yourself to the clinic or classes industry for tips and ideas on campaigns. You could spend hours looking at similar clinics or studios and your local competitors trying to draw inspiration but what's to say they are getting it right and seeing results? Instead of confining yourself to this space - look horizontally, not vertically.

Some of the best marketing ideas are adaptions of previous campaigns. Take a look at some of the most memorable campaigns that you've seen, write down a few ideas and then see if it can be evolved to suit your offering, if it works – it works.

Track your results and measure what matters

If you’ve been reading up on tracking your marketing efforts, analysing web visitors and tracking conversions then you’ll likely be confused by the plethora of conflicting information available. Should you measure bounce-rate? What even is a bounce rate? What about pages per session? Session duration?

The truth is that apart from a few staples, you should measure what matters to you. We would recommend setting a conversion goal for your online bookings via our Google Analytics integration. This will allow you to see how many paid, social, and organic visitors actually convert into a booking – allowing you to allocate your time to the channels that work.

For more complex marketing setups, TM3 offers Google Tag Manager integration however if you are using this then we assume you won’t need pointers on marketing analytics.

If you would like to know more about TM3 Connect, click here to get in touch with our sales team to arrange a demo today.