So, how do you find your ideal patient on Instagram? Or any social media platform for that matter. If you don?t know who you?re talking to when you?re marketing your practice on Instagram, you will end up screaming your message into a huge black hole. No one will hear what you have to say and you won?t see the results that you want to have from marketing your practice on Instagram. If you?ve been in business for a while you?ve most likely heard people mention things like having an ideal client and maybe even an ideal patient.
If you haven?t, I want to take a minute and explain to you what exactly an ideal patient is and why you need to get clear on who yours is before you get too deep into marketing your practice on Instagram. An ideal patient is essentially the representation of the patients that you love to work with the most. This is the kind of patient you get excited about having on your schedule, who you have the best conversations with, who does exactly what you tell them to do, it’s the patient who needs and is motivated to have your favorite procedures completed by you, and so on. They are your version of the perfect patient. Now, this doesn?t mean that they themselves are perfect but they?re a good picture of what perfect would look like to you.
Once you know who your ideal patient is you can start to get intentional about finding them on Instagram. And when you get intentional about finding your ideal patient on Instagram, you?ll start to see better results from your marketing efforts.
Now, that you know what an ideal patient is, I wanted to talk about how to actually go about finding them on Instagram. It?s not enough to know who an ideal patient is for you. You need to have a strategy in place for how you will go about actually finding them. The tips that I?m about to share are tailored towards Instagram but you can use them for any social media platform, or any online marketing strategy that you may be using in your business.
Tip #1 | Find Like Accounts
One of the best ways to find your ideal patients will be to find accounts that are similar to yours. If you can find accounts that have your ideal patients as their followers then you can easily find people who you should be engaging with and connecting with on Instagram. Spend some time searching for other healthcare professionals that do what you do and start engaging with not only them but the people who are following and engaging with them as well. If people are following them then they are likely to want to follow and connect with you as well.
Tip #2 | Use Hashtags
Hashtags are a great way to get in front of your ideal patients. There’s something called “stumble upon marketing” and that’s exactly what can happen when you use the right hashtag strategy on Instagram. For example, if you grab a coffee from your favorite coffee shop and you post it, and use a hashtag for that coffee shop, somebody may “stumble upon” your post and see your account and think “wow, this is what I’ve been looking for.”?
You want to make sure that you?re using hashtags on your post to get in front of your ideal patients. But, you also want to make sure to think outside of the box when it comes to your hashtag strategy. ?You don’t want to be using hashtags that other healthcare professionals are using. ?You want to be using hashtags to be found by your ideal patient. Think outside of the box and get creative!
You also want to be engaging with things that your ideal patient may be posting when using those hashtags. This will help you get directly in front of those who need you and others who are influencers in your profession which will help to associate your account with there’s.
Tip #3 | Create Engaging Content
The best way to ?find? your ideal patient on Instagram is to let them find you on Instagram. When you create content that your ideal patient can relate to and see themselves in, you?ll find that they connect with you more and want to know more about your practice. How do you know what kind of content to create for Instagram? Get clear on what your ideal patients? main pain points are and create content related to those things.
Basically, you want your ideal patient to feel like you are speaking to him/her directly. You want that person to feel that the content was created just for him/her.
So, those are my top tips for finding your ideal patients on Instagram or any social media platform that you?re engaging on. As you can see it?s not complicated but can be very effective if you?re clear on who all of your marketing efforts are supposed to be attracting to your practice. If you implement these tactics you?ll find that instead of always having to push new followers and patients to you, they?ll start finding you and seeking you out which is an amazing place to be when it comes to marketing on Instagram.
And, as always, I have a great freebie for you! If you want to dive deep and figure out exactly who your ideal patient is, then you’ll want to download the PDF below, and get started on it right away!
