Past Tense

Every time I have a chiropractor come-up to me at one of my live events, going on and on about how great pay per click is for advertising on Yahoo and Google, I just chuckle to myself. Its common for chiropractors or other business newbies to internet marketing to get really excited about these paid mediums for marketing themselves. Just marketing on the internet feels like a huge new step to them that theyre proud of. Im not saying its impossible to have a great Google Adwords campaign, but in reality youll waste thousands of dollars on this form of marketing with absolutely no returns. So much for being a newbie!

In the realm of chiropractic marketing, Im sometimes called the expert, sometimes referred to as the YouTube chiropractor, or innovator of social networking and video marketing. I like all these terms, and I use my expertise to teach other chiropractors how to utilize free marketing to bring new patients through their doors and excess money into their pockets. But first, let me confess something—

I confess that I once spent upwards of $10,000 dollars on a huge pay per click advertising campaign. Well, I was getting about 15 new patients a month, but my little experiment with pay per click taught me that it takes a lot of time and a huge amount of money to find success through this medium. Thank goodness I had some money to burn to learn the valuable lessons that I learned, but if you dont have that kind of money, then I suggest staying away from pay per click and learn from my mistakes.

So, what can you do if you’re trying to get the most bang for your buck in this economic crisis that we are facing? Well, I strongly feel that harnessing free mediums of chiropractic marketing and advertising first is where you should begin. One of the main reasons is because there is no financial risk, period! Another reason is because websites like YouTube, Facebook, and MySpace are in the top 8 most popular and visited websites in the world.

When you take your chiropractic message and personal story out to thousands of highly targeted people on these social media sites, youre meeting people from your local community as a person, and then sharing your chiropractic abilities. Your chiropractic message, with the click of a button, will travel to countless numbers of people in your community that can use your services.

Video marketing is also going to stomp the search engines like Google and Yahoo in 2009 so be prepared. Over 50% of all online content at this moment is video and it will continue to dominate the organic search results for years to come. People get a chance to see and know you before ever walking into your chiropractic office. This is great PR and and has been shown to be the best virtual medium for acquiring new chiropractic patients on the planet!

Listen, no one can stop you from using pay per click, but keep track of how much youre spending per day and put a limit on it. If you specify that you only want to spend $20 a day, then Google will adjust how its putting your videos out. I was trapped paying $130 a day when I was using pay per click, and thats because I didnt think to set a cut-off.

PPC is by no means worthless, but there is an appropriate time and a place to use it. Whether you can get 40 new patients a month out like some chiropractors claim is up in the air. Make sure you are willing to pay $1-5 dollars per click, too. Depending on your area, this may very well be more or sometimes less costly. It is also best to put a specific condition in the headline like “back pain.” Many times I see chiropractors use their personal or practice name which is a bad idea. Put your ego aside and focus on the patient and what condition they are seeking relief from. This will assure you a higher return on your investment and better response.