Seasonal campaigns are an essential part of any marketing calendar. By theming your campaigns around a seasonal event, you will almost guarantee an increased uptake by taking advantage of the themes everyone is focused on. This allows you to dress up a very standard campaign to make it look like something completely new! With these campaigns, it’s not about ‘re-inventing the wheel’ or being overly clever. It is all about consistently running, tried and tested winners, whilst switching up the theme to keep the campaigns feeling fresh. If you haven’t already, then there is no better time then now to plan the remainder of 2023 and also your 2024 marketing calendar, so here are the three core elements that should be included within your seasonal campaigns.
Reactivation:
Many chiro’s are sitting on an absolute gold mine of patients without even knowing it. Most chiropractors will have a database of 1000’s of patients who have since dropped out of care. The reasons people drop out of care vary massively but are very rarely due to a negative experience that has turned them away from chiropractic for good. The majority fall into two categories ‘my problem went away’ or ‘life got in the way’. Both examples are people primed for re-activation. In the case of the first example, we know that chiropractic care is a maintenance process, and it is more than likely that their ‘problem’ (or a different problem) is very likely to return/persist. When it does, you best be right there is their inbox with a shiny offer for them to take up. In the case of the second example, they likely went through a busy period where life got in the way. All they need is a few gentle reminders and an irresistible offer to free up some time in their busy schedule and get right back into their usual routine.
Reactivation campaigns are usually run primarily through a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system and typically include a sequence of emails, texts and direct mail pieces. For these campaigns you are going to want to ‘segment’ who you send too. We will typically segment our list based on total spend, meaning we will either only send our offer out to people who have spent over £X amount, or we will send a different sequence/offer to people who have spent differing amounts with us in the past. For example, everyone who has spend £50 – £500 with us before dropping of, may get send an offer for a 50% re assessment and first treatment back. For those who have spend £500 – £1000 with us before, we may send an offer for a free re assessment and 50% off their first treatment back. For those who have spent £1000+, we may offer them a free re assessment and first treatment back. We can confidently offer this because we know these people are tried and tested quality patients, so are worth the ‘re-investment’ to get them back into regular care. Due to the extra investment, we would not send something through ‘physical mail’, to someone who has spent under £500 with us previously.
Ninja Move:
Upload your segmented list into a custom audience on Facebook and run an advert targeted just to these people. These campaigns are all about ‘touch points’ and showing up in as many places as possible. If you are conveying your message through email, direct mail and Facebook, you are almost guaranteed to have you message heard.
Facebook & Instagram Lead Generation:
Facebook & Instagram ads are the perfect way to reach, engage and bring new people into your practice. In a period where we cannot do much in the way of physical marketing. Facebook and Instagram adverts have become more important. For every seasonal campaign, it is important to have a ‘new patient element’ and these ads serve this purpose. The structure of a lead generation campaign is to put out an advert with an offer to come in for an initial consultation at a reduced price (I recommend between £30-£60 – UK). To claim the offer, people must fill in their details (Name, Email, Phone). You will then call these people to get them booked into your diary.
Once you have the general formula of an advert that works (text & images), you can rework this advert to theme it inline with the current season. You can do this by changing the wording slightly, adding themed emojis, switching up the photos or by adding a themed video. Switching up these elements will make the ad look completely different and will appeal to a whole new audience. For example, we all have that one friend who loves Christmas and will start celebrating it in November. This person may not be attracted to a Halloween themed ad but will be engaged by anything that is Christmas themed.
Ninja Move:
Produce some themed informational video content around the specific season (Top 5 tips to stay healthy this Christmas). You can then re-target the people who view these videos with your lead generation offer.
Internal referral:
The final part of the puzzle is an internal referral push. ‘Internal referrals’ are something you should always be pushing within your practice. The idea of an ‘internal referral’ is to allow your current clients a chance to refer their friends and family in for a free (or heavily discounted) initial consultation. This should consistently be communicated to your clients; however, you can place extra emphasis on this during seasonal campaigns. Our data shows that referred clients often make great clients. Our data also shows that referred clients often go on to then refer more people, so if you want a practice that generates new patients organically, you are going to want to focus on this strategy.
I suggest creating some themed vouchers for specific seasonal events. We have previously done things such as chocolate bars with a golden ticket within the wrapper at Easter and gift cards at Christmas. You can pair these with themed posters and decorations in clinic. You can also run a light email campaign to your current clients, gently letting them know that they can refer. You can include a link to a form in this email that they can share to their friends to make the referral process as smooth as possible.
These kinds of internal referral pushes can be quite energy intensive on your front desk staff (they should be giving every client a voucher, explaining the offer, and asking for a referral). To keep energy levels high and front desk staff happy, include an incentive (cash usually works best) for reaching a certain amount of referrals. This will increase your uptake and keep your staff happy.
Ninja Move:
To increase your uptake and make your current clients even more likely to refer. Include a prize draw as part of your campaign. Every time a client refers someone, they get one entry into your prize draw. Make sure to make these prizes good to really entice your clients. Remember, a new referral is likely worth £500+ to your practice, so you can afford to go all out here. If you have a large clinic, you can also experiment with 3 prizes (first, second and third). Some examples of prizes are luxury hampers, gift cards and money of their future care.There you have it, the three core elements that will make any seasonal campaign a success. Marketing is simple at its core. If you can successfully include these three elements into 6 campaigns a year, you are going to have a great year in practice! Here are my suggestions of the seasons you should target:
– New Year
– Valentines
– Easter
– Summer
– Halloween
– Christmas
