How To Create The Perfect Chiropractic Content
With any online presence, great content is essential. You not only have to attract patients to your site, but you must find ways to hold them there – to help answer their questions, find out more about what you offer, and build trust in your brand. You also want your site to perform well in search. This is where great content becomes vital for success online.
In this guide, we aim to help you break down the content creation process to help your business stand out online and be discovered by more people. Here are the questions you need to answer for the content creation process, to figure out where your strengths lie, as well as where you may need external help.
What are your priorities and goals?
First thing’s first: what do you want to tell people about your work? Your practice? About chiropractic care, or the profession more generally?
Before you start making things, it’s important that your goals are your first port of call. If you’re going to create meaningful content, you must know why you are creating it. This means understanding the values you hold, the aims you have for your business, as well as how you’re going to judge the success of your new content. Are you hoping to get traffic to your site, or clicks, likes, or shares? Are you hoping more people will sign up to your newsletter? All of these are possible metrics of success, but content must respond to the goal at hand, synthesising your aims for your business online with your vision of success.
Who are your audience?
Who do you hope to speak to with your content? Is it a certain age category, gender, or other demographic? It’s important to place yourself in your audiences shoes. Ask yourself a few questions as though you are them – if you were in pain and looking for answers, what might you search for? If you didn’t know what Chiropractic care could offer, what information would you need?
Start with empathy. Think about your audience and where they might ‘hang out’ online. What other sites they might use, or information they might need. This means also taking into account any social media they might use, or other platforms they might engage with. Ensure your content covers you across these places, so you can be found by the right people at the right time.
What ideas do you have? What types of content will you create?
You might have thoughts and feelings about what Chiropractic can do for patients already. You might research a lot about diet tips, for instance, or have lots to say about exercising. That’s great! Go with what you think you can uniquely offer your patients. Take your observations from practice and engage with other sources to come up with the ideas that can help drive your content direction - from books, the news, your colleagues and anywhere else you regularly participate in discussions. Start observing and think up ideas that you think could genuinely benefit your potential patients.
A few types of content that you might consider creating:
- Engagement-driven: Content designed to start a conversation and draw in readers, by displaying your opinion on a topic or your practice’s response to a concern or question.
- Evergreen: Content that ‘lasts forever’ – a guide, an answer to a common query, or anything else that an individual might be able to continually refer back to. Tends to be based around your practice’s key search terms (and we’ll talk more about search in future!).
- Event-based: Content that refers to a particular event, or news-worthy industry item.
Chances are, you’ll have a combination of these, or lean more on two out of three. Some of these could take the form of videos, which can be a powerful way to connect with your patients and put a face to your business.
What skills do you have? Do you know how to get started?
Starting a blog, email newsletter, or social media account can be tricky. There is a particular combination of technical and creative skills required to make a website, blog, video, or email list come to life. And, not everyone is a born writer or communicator – the online world is also very different to what you might read in a pamphlet, a book, or another medium. You only have seconds to capture the interest of readers online. With so much competition for attention, your content has to shine. However, you also want to avoid ‘click-bait’ – it’s a tricky balance between quality and quantity.
Assess your existing knowledge and your existing skills: do you have the ability to produce blogs, for instance? Or social posts? Consider the time commitment as well, as it does take time to produce quality content across platforms. Do you have the time and skills to execute everything your website or online presence will require? Here is where we can help you, if there’s something missing – or you’d rather focus your time on your practice!
What has worked/not worked in the past?
Perhaps you have included some basic copy on a website in the past, or even had a blog or social media presence. What has already worked or not worked for you? Were your goals clear at the time? Does the content suit you current branding and the vision you have for your practice? It’s a good idea to start creating some ‘pillars’ under which all your content falls. This means setting out the key areas you think your practice should have – the medium, format, and topics you’ll cover.
In Chiropractic, the pillars of your content might well be:
- Wellness blogs, with hints and tips on healthier living;
- Interviews or highlighting a particular practitioner;
- Industry news and what it means for you and your practice;
- Basics or guides for good spinal health.
These are just ideas. But your pillars could cover anything at all that you think will help your audience discover your practice, and the value chiropractic could bring to their lives.
How will you present and promote your content?
With a professionally designed website, you can ensure that your content appears attractive and engaging. It also has to be easy to navigate in order to quickly gain attention and interest. Include images or embedded video/audio content if you can, as it will help keep attention on the page. Then, think about promotion – will your content go into a newsletter? Will there be a teaser on social media? Use these platforms to help gain traffic and engagement to the content you create and meet your goals. We’ll have more advice on different avenues of promotion soon.
In all, content is a great way to ensure your website and practice are interesting and helpful to prospective patients. Make a positive impression online through content creation, and ensure that your work is understood, valued and discovered by more individuals.