Archive for the ‘Blogging’ Category

Four Common Veterinary Blogging Mistakes

Friday, May 3rd, 2013

Managing a successful blog can be one of the most important decisions that your practice will ever make. A well-established blog can position your clinic as an expert on pet health topics, which will help build bonds with existing clients and encourage potential clients to pick up the phone. Did you know that a blog can also help your website’s Search Engine Optimization performance? This means that a fresh, well-maintained blog will help drive traffic from Google searches to your website.

While there are several techniques you can employ with your blog to help make your web presence shine, there are four major pitfalls that every veterinary blogger should avoid.

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Introduction to YouTube for Small Business

Wednesday, February 13th, 2013

YouTube

YouTube: Yes, YouTube is a social media destination. It also is the second largest search engine on the Internet after Google. Plus Google, owns YouTube. YouTube needs to be integrated into a website’s content as well as developing a YouTube channel for the business. For an example please visit http://www.youtube.com/AnimalMedicalHosp to see a hospitals YouTube page in action.  Or click go here http://www.animalmedical.net/veterinary-services/acupuncture.html to view how an YouTube channel is embedded into a website. Some key facts about YouTube to know are:

Founded: February 2005

Numbers:

  • 3rd Most Viewed Website
  • Every day 4 billion videos are viewed
  • 800 million active users a month
  • 700 YouTube videos shared on Twitter per minute

Business Only Platform: Yes, there are branded YouTube Channels for business (more…)

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Marginal Cost and the Pricing of Services

Wednesday, December 19th, 2012

In today’s increasingly competitive environment, we veterinarians are not immune from our clients’ tightened purse strings.  Paying close attention to overhead and pricing decisions is always important, but during tough economic times it becomes literally a matter of life and death for industries that depend on disposable income.  Wal Mart grew to be the biggest company in the world primarily by focusing on providing low prices, and their motto is: “Always low prices.”  Everything they do, from their relationship with suppliers to their early and continuing devotion to information technology, is aimed at lowering their costs so they can pass these savings along to their customers.  I’m not saying that the Wal Mart model is a perfect fit for professional service providers, like veterinarians, but there are some lessons we can learn from them.

In particular, Wal Mart has mastered the concept of “marginal cost” with respect to the pricing of products.  Marginal cost can be defined as the cost associated with selling one more unit of something, whether that something is a bottle of shampoo or a dog spay.  Let’s take surgeries, for example, and assume your fixed costs (i.e. rent/mortgage—things that don’t change depending on how busy you are) are $1000 per month attributable to your surgery room.  Then add up the variable costs: surgeon time, suture, anesthesia, autoclave costs, cage space, and technician time attributable to surgery.  Let’s say this is $100 per procedure.  So your surgery costs are $1000 per month PLUS $100 per procedure.  If you charge $250 per procedure, you would have to do 7 per month to cover your fixed costs.  But on that 8th, or marginal, procedure your cost is only $100, netting you $150 profit for each procedure you do above 7 per month. (more…)

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Just Because You Say It – Do People Hear It?

Monday, November 26th, 2012

Communicating tends to be one of the hardest aspects of all relationships.  For the doctor/patient relationship, it’s easy to assume that because the doctor provides health information the pet owner hears it. But do they? Not really.  Why? Pet owners today tend to:

  • Have their face in their phone.
  • Are overwhelmed with the medical information the doctor is presenting.
  • Focus on other anxieties in their life and aren’t focusing on the present.
  • Are emotionally processing the first piece of information presented and miss the rest of the medical update.
  • Forget or modify the content of the information presented over time.  (Think of the game telephone). (more…)

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Veterinary Medicine in the 21st Century

Saturday, October 27th, 2012

It’s no secret that today’s veterinarians face a number of challenges that our predecessors didn’t. Oversupply of veterinarians, educational indebtedness and loss of pharmacy revenue to major retailers are but a few issues facing the profession. I’ll be writing about all of these in the coming weeks, but each of these “clouds” has a distinct silver lining if you know how to find it. As a practicing veterinarian and, more recently, an MBA student I have come to grips with one cold, hard fact: that’s business. While challenges certainly exist, we must remember that the wind is at our back in many important ways. The pet industry is one of very few TRULY recession resistant industries in the US. Americans spent over $50 billion on their pets last year, despite tough economic times, with veterinary medicine representing about $14 billion of that total. More and more people are considering pets to be members of the family, and this is a meta-­‐trend that I believe will continue for the foreseeable future. Will our profession be the same in 10 years as it is now? No, it won’t. Rather than grow frustrated about market realities that may be beyond our control, we all must redouble our efforts on those things we CAN do something about. For example, don’t get overwhelmed by how fast computer technology is changing or that you don’t understand “the cloud”. Focus on making small, easily reversible decisions that will grow your practice. Even if something doesn’t work, you want to “fall forward”. For example, do you have a website? Are you on Facebook? You may not be online, but I promise you that your clients are. Ignore this at your peril.

In my next post I’ll take up the topic of pet insurance, and why you should be embracing it in your practice. And I don’t mean just putting brochures up front and hoping people ask about it. I mean you, your technicians, and front desk staff should ALL be discussing it with each and every one of your clients, ESPECIALLY during puppy visits.

About Mark D. Olcott, DVM: Originally from upstate New York, Dr. Olcott received his Bachelor’s degree in Biology from State University of New York at Geneseo.  He graduated from the New York State College of Veterinary Medicine at Cornell University in 1995 and moved south to get away from the 6-month long winters!  After an 18 month stint as an equine veterinarian, he has been a small animal practitioner since 1997.  Over the last several years he has been the co-owner of 5 DVM small practice, a mobile ultrasonographer, and an emergency clinician at The Life Centre in Leesburg, VA.  Dr. Olcott has particular interests in cardiology, pain management, and the use of ultrasound as a diagnostic modality in small animal practice.  He is a published author, and holds two patents for an intelligent, automated pet feeder he invented.

He lives in metro Washington, DC area with his wife and 3 children.  They have numerous pets including a dog, 3 cats, a rabbit and a saltwater tropical fish tank.  Dr. Olcott in enrolled in the executive MBA program at the University of Maryland, and in his limited free time is an avid outdoors-man.

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Choppy copy part 2

Wednesday, October 24th, 2012

This is the second part of the excerpt from one of our free Wednesday Webinars series. Presented by our Director of Project Management William Lindus.  In our previous blog post we talked about the difference about writing for print material versus for the web.  In this second part we go into more details about how to make your web copy work.

Let’s talk about how to make your web copy work.  The first, and probably most important piece of advice I can give is to avoid technical jargon.  This is particularly difficult for veterinarians, as you have built your education and your careers on highly technical terms, phrases, and acronyms.  For example, you should use phrases like ‘chronic kidney disease’ instead of ‘chronic renal failure.’  It can be okay in some cases to use more technical terms… but make sure you back these technical terms up with phrases anyone can understand. Example:  If you are writing a web page about your staff cardiologist, make sure your copy prominently discusses ‘heart health’ or similar phrases.  Your web copy should be written at the same level that US Today writes, which is at about an 9th grade reading level.  Be specific with the points that you make on your site.  Superlatives (phrases like ‘we are the best’ are often over-used in writing), but if you can back your superlative up with a specific, your statement is no longer just fluff.  Instead of saying, ‘we are the best,’ imagine how much more powerful it would sound if you said, ‘we have been voted the best veterinary practice in Anytown, USA.’

Also, remember that this copy is for your clients, and should be tailored to what they want.  Make it about them!  You don’t need to include your mission statement on your website.  I’m sure your mission statement is great, and I’m sure it reflects who you are as a practice, but think about this:  Every mission statement a veterinary practice has ever created says something about providing, ‘high quality veterinary care,’ and such phrases become meaningless to the consumer on the go. Instead, get to the point with what services you can provide your client.  This next point terrifies most veterinarians:  don’t be afraid to use your web copy to upsell.  Most of the time when I bring up the concept of upselling to veterinarians, I’m greeted with either looks of shock or looks of fear.  After all, marketing isn’t something that most veterinarians are used to.  However, your website is as much a web marketing tool as it is an information source.  Use this to your advantage!  For example, if one of your pages is about pet vaccinations, it is a great idea to discuss the benefits of purchasing pet medications from your clinic (or through an affiliate that you trust) as opposed to through other sources.  Not only are you driving revenue for your business, but you are also providing a service by keeping your clients from purchasing pet medications from risky sources.

There are a few guidelines that a good web copy writer will follow when writing for your site.  These can actually be quite nuanced, but here are a few to get your feet wet.  A website’s home page should have less than 100 words of content, and this content should contain the ‘value proposition’ for the site.  The value proposition is your brand promise, or what your customers can expect from you.  What is the end benefit that you are offering?  What service do you offer?  Who do you offer it to?  Why is this useful?  Your home page content should answer these questions in 100 words or less.

Internal pages on your website (anything that isn’t the home page, basically) have a bit more leeway.  You can comfortably fit between 250-500 words of copy on a web page, although much more than this and your client’s eyes will start to gloss over.  Bullet points are your friend here, as is a ‘choppy,’ easy to scan layout.  Internal pages should drive your customers to some sort of action.  This may be as general as turning the reader into a new client for your practice, or it may be more specific. Think back to the example from earlier about the pet medication link on a vaccination page.  Headlines should be short and efficient.  Stick to headlines that are less than 80 characters, and make sure your headline uses the key phrases that users may be scanning for.

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Choppy copy

Thursday, October 18th, 2012

​This is an excerpt from one of our latest free Wednesday Webinar series.  Presented by our Director of Project Management William Lindus.

As a veterinarians, office manager and/or other veterinary professional you have quite a bit of experience with writing.  You probably have written for print media all of the time, from reports, to articles, to client handouts.  However, you can’t apply the same principles that you use for print writing to web copy writing because your audience is different.  With print materials, your audience is trained to read word-for-word, start to finish. With an article or a handout, you are expecting your reader to read the entire body of work as a complete entity. Otherwise, key points may be missed!

 

But why is this?  Well, for starters, the web is a user-driven medium.  Visitors to a website feel as though they have to click on things to ‘engage’ with a page.  Long copy makes users feel as though they are being inactive or that they ‘doing it wrong.’  Remember also that the web has millions of web pages, all competing for the attention of your visitor.  If a client can’t get the information they need at a glance, they are very likely to bounce to another site.  With the rise in popularity of smart phones, this becomes even important.  Currently, 10% of all Google searches are made using mobile devices, and studies show that by 2014, mobile users will actually exceed desktop users.  To keep up with this ‘on the go’ lifestyle, a website should have very mobile-friendly content.

We know how web copy is different from print copy… but how do we evaluate whether or not web copy is effective?  On a well-written website, the copy may appear ‘choppy’ or repetitive.  This is where you need to throw away everything you thought you knew about writing and look to web writing as its own entity.  Your website copy may appear ‘choppy’ with lots of bullet points, effective headlines, and short content, but this is useful for the 79% of web users that we discussed earlier.  Choppy can be good!

Keep in mind also that many users will never see the home page of your website; because of links from social media sites (such as Facebook, Twitter, Google +, Pinterest, etc) or through Google search returns, they may enter your website through one of your service pages.  This is why some information may be repeated throughout your website.  I said it before, but it bears repeating:  most users will not read your web page word for word, start to finish.

​To be continued…

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Positive Based Marketing – It’s Here!

Friday, August 10th, 2012
Positive Based Marketing Logo

Positive Based Marketing

Hello! This is Kelly, the CEO of Beyond Indigo. We have taken our focus on Positive Based Marketing a step further and putting our research and knowledge into a blog as well as a Facebook page. This week we are focusing a post from this new blog. We look forward to your liking our Facebook Page as well as following our new blog on Positive Based Marketing vs. Fear Based Marketing. 

The idea seems “cool” to be positive, but really what is Positive-Based Marketing vs. Fear-Based Marketing? When a business uses Positive Marketing, what they are doing is creating and empowering relationships between themselves and their current/future clients. This creates a whole and a oneness with all parties that are involved. Ideally, the business creating the marketing is trying to improve the value and quality of the life of the person using that business’ services. In return, the person using the services is enabling that company to stay in business through his or her engagement and interaction with the business. It is a win–win and creates a positive atmosphere. Plus, people are encouraged to think whether this particular product or service is a good fit for them. People tend to be happier and more fulfilled with Positive-Based Marketing.

Now, think of the negative marketing campaigns that you have seen. Fear is used in Fear-Based Marketing to sever relationships or isolate people from their relationships. It backs people into a corner and makes them panic thinking they will no longer be accepted by the group/society if they don’t use the product or service being marketed. Fear-Based Marketing also encourages people to react — and not to think. For example, if a female watches a cosmetic commercial, she is usually told that she will not be beautiful or accepted by society unless she wears that exact shade of red. She will be “kicked” out of the group, so to speak. To be included in the whole, she needs to wear that shade of red and, therefore, she must immediately go buy that shade of red. She is not empowered to think: This shade is great for me; therefore, I will purchase it. People tend to be more fearful and anxious with this type of marketing.

To read other posts on this blog please click here.

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Content – Treat It Like Royalty

Wednesday, June 27th, 2012

Yawn—content is so boring, right? Why should we care about content? Throw a few words up on the page, call it good, and move on. Hold on! Not so fast. Content is the star player in any online marketing program. Key functions of content are:

  1. Search Engine Optimization Placement: Content plays a major role in how/where your website is placed on Google. In February 2011, Google made a change to its algorithm, emphasizing high-quality content as a key search engine optimization requirement. This change was called Panda. Bottom line—template content is out and original content is now “in.” (For tips about search engine optimization and content, please visit www.beyondindigopets.com/blog/.
  2. Education: As consumers, we know about cars, food products, cleaning products, and beer because of the amount of advertising we have seen on these subjects. However, we know minuscule amounts of information about veterinary health care and why we should pay for it. We just know as pet owners that we “sorta need it.” The job of content is to educate people about what the service is, why their pet needs it, and, frankly, why people should pay to have that service conducted.
  3. Engagement: If the content on your Internet marketing platforms is stale, boring, flat, and so on, then why should the consumer read it? The content needs to be written correctly in the proper style for the platform (website, Facebook, blogs, Twitter, Pinterest, eNewsletter, YouTube, newsletters, and so on) where it is placed, and it needs to ENGAGE the reader. If the content is not compelling, why should the consumer read it and, more importantly, why should they come back?

Placement for Engagement

Multiple times I have been asked: “Can I write the content once and copy and paste it across all my platforms?” No. Resist this urge to write material once, check the box, and just plaster it out there willy-nilly. You will lose your audience. Each platform has its own style and guidelines for the way content should be displayed, the length, and the tone of how it is delivered. Sure, the message across all the platforms can and should be the same, but the exact content in each place needs to be avoided. General guidelines are as follows:

  1. Online Review Areas: Everywhere people can leave you reviews online must be managed and monitored. The content on these pages needs to be accurate and updated on a regular basis. Once a review is left, then a thank you note needs to be given for positive reviews and an educational note placed for a crabby review. Each thank you/educational note needs to be unique to the post and should not be a standard reply.
  2. Website: Most veterinarian websites I see fall down on the job when explaining the services they offer and why people should use them. Website content needs to be 400 to 500 words per page, needs to educate the pet owner on what the hospital does and why they provide those services, and it needs to be optimized (coded) to be found in Google. The content style needs to be informative and educational in nature. Because protocols do not change every week in the hospital, do not expect to change content about what services you provide on a constant basis. Instead, a blog should be used for weekly educational updates. 
  3. Blog: Confusion reigns over what in the heck a blog is. Think of it as an online magazine that is educational in nature. Resist putting cute updates about the office pet on a blog (those type of updates go on Facebook/social media). Focus on short paragraphs, bullet points, and easy to understand educational topics that are timely. For example, in the spring a good topic would be flea, tick, and heartworm prevention.
  4. Social Media Platforms: A good framework for the tone and style of social media is a coffee shop. Conversations on social media areas are fun, chit chatty, ongoing conversations with a hint of education thrown in for flavor. Numerous times I have heard doctors say they wrote a beautiful article that is educational in nature and are disappointment nobody thought it was useful on Facebook. However, the picture of the office cat doing something cute went viral. The educational piece is great but needs to be placed on a blog. Correct placement is everything with content. (For tips on content for Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Google+, check our blog each week during the month of May at www.beyondindigopets.com/blog/).

Monitor Its Success

Marketing needs to be monitored to make sure it is generating the results that are desired. Are people engaging with the content? Are they reading it? Is the post/page/tweet being passed to other people? To find out, monitor the statistics. Each platform mentioned above has its own statistics program that is included or can be added to determine the success of the created content. Monitoring, adjusting, and changing the content based on results is an ongoing process—but a necessary one.

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What Should I Write About? Tips for Your Veterinary Blog

Friday, October 28th, 2011

If you’re thinking about starting a blog for your veterinary practice, you may be wondering, “What should I write about?” Well, your high school English teacher was right. Write what you know.

Almost anything that affects your practice can be turned into a blog post. Unlike an article or pamphlet, blogs are intended to be immediate and casual. Strive for an informal, newsy tone.

For starters, try these:

Information about pet health. How to brush a dog’s teeth, how to give a cat a pill. Any general pet health information you routinely give clients can make a great blog post.

Current events or issues affecting pets in your area. Has a pet food recall affected your area? A local tick infestation? A heat wave that could pose a danger to unprotected pets? Blogging timely issues like these help get information to your clients (and potential clients) quickly. Over time, they’ll think of your site as a place to look for answers to timely issues.

Questions from clients or readers. “Mailbag” blog posts are always popular. You probably get asked dozens of questions each day about common pet health issues. Select a few of general interest and answer them in a blog post. Better still, ask readers to submit their questions by email or give them to your receptionist. Of course, you’ll only answer those where you’re comfortable giving general information.

Changes in your practice – Get a new dental laser machine? Show it off. Just finished remodeling your boarding area? Pictures please. We all like to hear what’s new. It’s fine to be excited to let everyone know what’s happening at your practice. The key is to keep the tone light rather than like a press release.

Local events you’re sponsoring or participating in. Will you have a table at Homecoming Days? Helping with a food drive for a local shelter? Let people know about the event in your blog so they can participate. Don’t forget to do a follow-up post with photos of the event.

Write about what others are writing. One of the great things about blogs is that you aren’t limited to your own content, but can comment on news, articles, videos and other blog posts. Give your take on a local news story affecting pets, share a useful (or funny) pet video, bring an article you read to your client’s attention or even comment on another blog post. Just be sure to give credit and a link to the original work.

 

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