Social Media has become the most influential virtual space available today. This plastic surgery marketing: what’s working now strategy gets you in front of new prospective cosmetic patients.
Now that 59% of the world’s population is online, it’s no longer optional if you’re looking for new cosmetic patients.
Social media marketing for plastic surgeons is here to stay so you might as well embrace it. It should become an important part of your marketing plan, branding and gateway to new patients. It also keeps you in touch with your current patients so they return to you when they are ready for more.
Social media marketing for plastic surgeons done right can increase your website traffic, generate leads, portray you as an expert and build relationships by interacting with your audience.
And, the beauty of social media is that you get to tell your story your way. You are the actor, producer and editor all in one. You control the narrative and create your own image.
That’s powerful, but also daunting, so this post gives you lots of social media marketing ideas for plastic surgeons you can use right away.
Types of Plastic Surgery Social Media Posts
Since you are a business, remember your main objective of social media is to grow your plastic surgery practice. So, your social media posts need a balance of posts that are:
- Educational
- Informative
- Interesting
- Entertaining
- Compelling
To help you get started, use this guide of social media ideas for plastic surgeons:
While social media marketing for plastic surgeons can take a chunk of your and your staff’s time, use these tips to help you be most effective:
Choose the Right Platforms for You – Marketing for Plastic Surgeons
Unless you have a marketing agency doing this for you, you most likely have a staff person handling this and 10 other things so their time is limited.
Focus on one platform first. Get good traction and then spread out to more platforms. For example, Instagram is, by far, a favorite for the plastic surgery industry; however, facebook wins hands down for sheer volume and results if you are looking to monetize your efforts.
The good news is facebook owns Instagram so when you post on facebook, it automatically posts on Instagram and visa versa (check your settings).
By the way, Tik Tok is the latest craze and you can build an audience early there; however, that takes time and the audience skews very young. That means they want to be entertained so I hope you can dance!
Use Lots of Social Proof
The most serious prospective cosmetic patients looking for a plastic surgeon care most about your social proof and that includes patient reviews and photos.
Prospective patients want to see before/after photos. They want to know what kind of results to expect. And, patients want to see other happy patients enjoying their new look.
That means you want to show off your before/after photos and encourage your patients to do the same like this:
A photo really is worth a thousand words so don’t hold back. Show off your great results.
User Generated Content
And here’s another new trend to complicate things….
85% of consumers find User Generated Content more influential than brand content. That’s the content that is created when your audience comments on your posts.
You see plenty of examples of this on social media when the surgeon asks his audience a question. Or,
shows the audience a video and a stream of responses appears.
That’s user-generated content that engages prospective patients to interact with you. Test what inspires your audience to share content and how you can engage patients to create user-generated content.
Examples would be:
- “I’m going hiking this weekend. What are you doing?”
- “I’m thinking about getting this new technology. What do you think?”
Video is Super Popular
Patients prefer video to all other forms of content when learning about new procedures and services.It’s also a great way to position you as the expert when you answer prospective patients’ most common questions.
Tour of Your Practice Explain FAQs of Procedures
So, you can start your own YouTube channel and designate an outside videographer or a tech-savvy staff person to capture and post content in video to then be shared throughout your social platforms.
For example, do an office tour, interview a patient to describe her own journey, and shoot educational videos going over FAQs of popular procedures.
Authentic Personality Posts
Prospective cosmetic patients want to know you. Your headshot on your website doesn’t cut it anymore.
They need to see you in action as a surgeon, speaker, person, parent, athlete and so on.
To keep it simple, select someone in your office to be the “Roving Reporter”. Their job is to follow you around with an iPad or iPhone to capture moments of “A Day in the Life of a Plastic Surgeon.”
You are the content. It’s you preparing for surgery, doing surgery, your post-op visits, consulting with new patients, interacting with staff and so on.
It’s endless content for you since no day is the same and you have an endless stream of patient stories and results.
Collect Contact Information
Here’s the big challenge when you build your web presence on social media such as Facebook, Instagram and TikTok ….these social media platforms can kick you out and/or raise the rent at any time.
That means you are at the mercy of their rules. They can shut you down for offensive content and they can force you to “pay to play”.
One way they do that is to “strangle” your list of followers, so they no longer see your posts. So now you have a false sense of comfort thinking you are communicating regularly with your audience, when in reality, less than 10% are seeing you.
These social platforms want you to advertise which would be fine except, if you have been trying to advertise on social media platforms, plastic surgery does not get along well due to the nature of the content.
You are one step away from porn, you are seen as persuading consumers to have medical procedures, and you are hurting the consumers’ self-esteem.
That’s why it’s so difficult to get your ads approved.
As a matter of fact, social platforms’ organic reach will be non-existent in the near future. They only show your posts to about 10% of your audience since they want you to pay for advertising just like you had to with TV, radio and newsletters but do you see the catch 22?
They will force you to advertise YET they won’t approve your ads – crazy!!
So, here’s what you do…..you collect your own data of your followers by using an opt-in landing page like this one:
So, the link in your bio goes to a customized landing page for the prospective patient to give you their name, cell and email, as well as the option to ask a question or request a consultation.
Influencer Marketing
Influencer marketing will continue to be popular; however, consumers are waking up to the fact that most influencers are promoting for the sheer motive of getting paid and that hurts your brand.
Word of mouth has always been and will continue to be a huge patient attraction strategy. When you get patients talking about you on social media, you build brand awareness and credibility, and set yourself up for more patients.
One way to drive social word of mouth is to partner with influencers. Influencers are people who have a large following on social media and can draw the attention of their followers to you. Just google “influencer Marketing platforms” and they will partner you with influencers.
Of course, it would be great if you could get one of the Bravo housewives to be your influencer but it’s not necessary.
Start by getting to know your current patients to find out what kind of local following they have and if they would be willing to spread the word for you.
Local followers are more likely to follow through then followers who have to travel cross-country to see you.
Social Media Tools to Help You
There are loads of tools to help you if you decide to do it yourself. Hootsuite is a popular social media management tool since it allows you to respond and engage without having to log into each of your individual social media accounts but there are many others.
And, if you need help making your graphics eye-catching, Canva is popular because it’s so easy to use and has a huge library of creative deliverables done for you.
Video editing is also becoming a big part of social media to make your content more eye-catching and engaging so I suggest starting with free apps, such as Apple iMovie and OpenShot for PC.
Conclusion
As you can see, there is a lot to social media. But like everything else in life, you get out of it what you put into it.
If you believe social media is an important aspect of your brand and marketing plan, you need to put the time and investments into it.
See you on Social!
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