Zero to Success in 12 Months

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Digital marketing is important. That might sound like a water is wet type of statement, but it is important to recognize that the vast majority of medical aesthetic providers out there simply cannot find the level of success they aspire to without implementing a digital marketing program. 

There are many providers out there who feel as though they do put a substantial effort into digital marketing but aren’t really sure what is actually returning value to their practice. Which is why it is also important to recognize that knowing what you should be doing is just as important as actually doing.

Even when someone chooses to implement a digital marketing strategy intentionally, there is a doctorate level of information on how to execute it perfectly. When you are juggling the management of a medical practice and learning how to get your digital marketing rolling, something as small as knowing where to focus your efforts can seem like an insurmountable task. 

Going from Ground Zero to Digital Marketing Success

Unfortunately, knowing how to go from zero to success in the digital marketing realm isn’t just a luxury — it can often make the difference in whether your practice will even see year two or three. It is also not okay to simply abdicate your responsibility; throwing money at it won’t help because the chances you will be successful drop precipitously. Which is a shame when, like us, you want to see practices succeed.

To help improve the number of practices we get to see find success, we decided to create this complete guide to finding digital marketing success in one year.

How We Recommend Using This Guide

Inside this guide is a calendar list of benchmarks to achieve within a certain time frame. We do not recommend attempting to read this entire guide at once — instead, read the sections relevant to the task you should be undertaking at the appropriate time based on the calendar we provide. 

For example, if you are on the “Conduct Market Research Step,” skip to that section and read the education and guidance available to you. This approach will help prevent you from burning out while also giving you the information you need to successfully tackle the relevant step on your own. 

A Practical Calendar You Can Actually Use

When you are ready to get started, go ahead and download this checklist to make sure you stay on track.

Part 1: Strategy

A well-developed strategy is the foundation of your entire digital marketing program. If the foundation is weak, anything you build on top of it likely won’t be able to stand on their own as successful endeavors.

But what exactly is a strategy in the context of a medical aesthetic practice? Put simply, strategy is the thoughtful and intentional application of information, data, industry knowledge, and experience. 

Information, data, and industry knowledge can all be researched to varying degrees. This means obtaining these components of a strategy requires a time investment. However, experience can only be achieved through action over time… and time isn’t always on your side, especially when trying to keep a practice in the black. 

(This is why many providers in the space turn to marketing partners — they have experience managing hundreds of medical aesthetic practices over long periods of time, so the experience garnered is exponential.)

You should also be aware that your strategy should always be 100% unique based on your specific practice, circumstances, and business goals. If you grab a cookie-cutter strategy from somewhere and shoehorn your practice into it, you are setting yourself up for failure. 

How Do I Develop a Strategy?

Implementing an effective strategy for your practice happens in two distinct phases: development and execution. 

Development

Development relies on a different element: intelligence, which we will dive into in great detail later in this guide. But for now, just know that you will need to conduct copious amounts of market research: demographics, spending habits, lifestyle factors, competitive analysis, and more. All of this will be part of your intelligence gathering. 

Execution

Once you’ve done this, the remaining sections of this guide will walk you through the entire execution path. We will tell you exactly how you should use all the information you gathered to implement strong branding, websites, SEO, paid ads, social media, and other engagement factors. 

A Note on the Symbiosis Between Development and Execution

It might be easy to dismiss one half of the strategy equation, but there is a dependent relationship between the two phases. Poor research and development botches the execution phase, leading to poor marketing outcomes and wasted time investments. Poor execution of a strong strategy renders the development phase useless since you will not be capitalizing on your initial efforts.

Part 2: Intelligence

The intelligence phase is going to inform the entirety of your marketing program. So, while it might not seem like something infinitely valuable at first, a strong focus on intelligence early on in your efforts will enhance the entire year’s worth of work you will be embarking on.

Market Research & Psychoanalytics

For the purposes of this guide, we will define this concept as follows: 

Market research is the thoughtful retrieval of information about your targeted and achieved audience. 

You will need to gather information about basic demographics, spending habits, lifestyle factors, patient motivations, as well as patient obstacles and objections, as part of your foundational market research. 

Here are some reports you can use to determine some of this information at varying price points: 

1. American Society of Plastic Surgeons ($0)
2. Statista ($200/month)
3. 2024 Global Medical Aesthetics Market ($2,350/once)
4. Medical Aesthetic Market ($4,950/once)

While the American Society of Plastic Surgeons reports are the most limited, they can still give you a general idea of the data you need. Statista has thousands of articles you can reference about specific points at a much more affordable price point, but you will need to hunt for it all. The last two reports on this list are expensive, but they are also tailored specifically to the information you need. 

Basic Demographics

• Age
• Gender
• Sex
• Income
• Educational level
• Location
• Ethnicity

Spending Habits

• Are they one-time lump-sum spenders?
• Would they come back month after month and provide recurring revenue?
• Does your target audience have disposable income for regular maintenance?
• Will your target audience purchase auxiliary aesthetic products like creams or moisturizers?
• Are they going to be spending large sums of money on larger procedures or surgeries?
• How long does a recurring patient take to meet the lump-sum patient in total spending?
• What percentage of your business are people who spend $0 - $1,000? $1,001 - $3,000? $3,000 - $5,000? $5,000 - $10,000? $10,000+?

Until you build up your own books, you may need to do some hypothesizing about your patient’s likely spending habits. Just make sure you have a wide range of information on which to base those hypotheses. 

Lifestyle Factors

Here are questions to ask about your patients’ lifestyle:

• What are their interests, hobbies, and values?
• What do they spend their time advocating for?
• What are their current priorities in their life?
• Are they working, retired, or otherwise?
• How much time are they willing to spend on cosmetics and aesthetics?

Patient Motivations

• Improve self-confidence
• Feel happier overall
• Improve quality of life
• Treat or reward themselves
• Celebrate a milestone

Use this step as an opportunity to conduct primary research. Ask your current patients what their motivations are and keep a log of their responses. This is easy to implement during the consultation or in a follow-up appointment. (This step is paramount because it will define your overarching strategy and tell you exactly what kind of problems your marketing needs to solve.)

You should also conduct social listening — reading blogs, forums, and social media posts to get an idea of what conversations are happening about you, your industry, your treatments, and your patients. 

Obstacles and Objections

• What would cause them to drop out of the process?
• What risks are weighing the heaviest on them?
• How big of an obstacle is the cost?
• Why might they choose a competitor over you?
• Are they afraid of the treatment process?
• Do they feel comfortable with you, your staff, and your office?

Once you have an answer to these questions, you can put systems or policies in place to combat and reduce the number of leads lost. It can also help you create more informed campaigns when you look to tackle this part of your marketing funnel. 

Competition

Traditionally, competitive analysis is performed during the market research phase. But as a new practice in the early building stages, it is useful to separate the two to give yourself a more intentional understanding of the terrain. 

When determining what practices should be considered your competitors, ask the following:

• Are they located in the same geographic area?
• Do they generally provide the same or similar services and offerings as you?
• How established are they in the industry locally, nationally, and globally?
• Is this a practice I would like to emulate?
• Is this a practice I can aspire to?
• What do I want to do better than this practice?
• What do I want to replicate (not plagiarize) from this practice?
• What do I want to avoid that this practice does?

Pay attention to these aspects of your competitor's marketing:

• What their treatments, services, and products include
• What demographics they are catering to and serving
• The cost of their offerings and their implied value proposition*
• What their digital platform strategies are (social media, web, email)
• What their patient approval rating and reviews say about their practice
• What medical devices are they using? 
  • (Click here for more information about marketing medical devices.)

Value proposition: the unique set of benefits and values that a clinic, practitioner, or medical group promises to deliver to patients who choose to partner with them. 

Patient Personas

Patient personas are a semi-fictional representation of your ideal patient, synthesizing real data and insights about your ideal and current patients. Patient personas are sometimes known as “avatars” in the medical aesthetics industry. 

These detailed profiles encompass the wealth of information that you collected: fundamental demographics, spending habits, lifestyle factors, motivations, competitive analysis, and objections. 

You will market to each persona differently simply because Persona 1 will interact differently with your marketing than Persona 2, 3, or 4. 

(If you would like to learn more in-depth information about patient personas, read our guide or our article series.) 

How Many Personas Should I Have?

Two factors will determine your persona count:

1. How complex your practice’s marketing operations are, and
2. How extensive your range of treatment coverage is

Smaller practices with limited offerings can be successful with one persona split into a couple of variants. Whereas larger practices that have multiple offerings and serve multiple demographics could have as many as five or ten, with multiple variants in each of those as well. 

Bottom line: Aim for the maximum number of personas that can effectively represent the segments of your target audience without overwhelming your marketing bandwidth.

How to Develop Your Personas

1. Determine the number of personas needed for your particular business and marketing needs. (This is typically between one to three for new practices, and three to 10 for larger or more established practices.)
2. Assign key attributes based on your data analysis, including the demographics, purchase habits, lifestyle factors, and motivations that we’ve been focusing on.
3. Identify each persona's primary pain points, objections, needs, and desires, focusing on those that are most relevant to the aesthetic medical services you provide.
4. Outline the goals and objectives your persona hopes to achieve through aesthetic medical treatments. 
5. Based on your data analysis and qualitative insights, determine each persona's communication preferences, such as preferred channels (email, social media, phone, etc.), tone, and language.
6. Develop visual representations of your patient personas to make them more tangible and accessible to your team. This can include photographs, illustrations, or graphic designs.
7. Develop a brief backstory for each persona, incorporating qualitative data you have gathered directly from your patients. 

A quick note on backstories: we are encapsulating a fictional character, but that fictional character is not brushed with a broad stroke. The more defined and specific we can be with pain points and decision-making, the better the outcome we can create. 

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Good

• College-educated
• Government job
• Has a family

Better

• BS in Mathematics
• Manager in the City Planning Department
• Wife and three children

Best

• BS in Mathematics from his local hometown university
• Oversees the zoning and planning initiatives for the City of Springfield
• Has been married for 15 years with two teenage daughters and a pre-teen son 

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Backstory example:

“Maria, a 45-year-old elementary school teacher and mother of three boys, is considering cosmetic procedures like a tummy tuck and breast lift—maybe even a full Mommy Makeover—to regain her pre-pregnancy body and boost her self-confidence. With a budget of $25,000 to $35,000, she’s ready to invest in herself but is concerned about recovery time, scarring, and balancing the process with her family duties. She also wants to find a surgery and recovery timeline that could fit into her summer break. She seeks a communication approach that is gentle and aspirational, avoiding any sales pressure. Maria is motivated by a deep desire to feel confident and rejuvenated, aspiring to navigate her concerns and embrace a transformation that aligns with her goals.”

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Patient persona example:

Here is an example of a abbreviated patient persona for a start-up medical aesthetic spa that services a relatively younger demographic. This is a quick reference card, but the remainder of the story and details should be available whenever you strategize marketing efforts.

Part 3: Branding

There are two categories of concepts you need to be aware of when it comes to branding. The first are the two different components of an incredible brand: uniqueness and viscerality. Uniqueness will allow your practice to stand out in the crowd and earn attention. Viscerality ensures that you keep that attention by invoking powerful emotions in your audience. 

The second category of concepts is the different elements of an incredible brand. On your 12-month path to success, we recommend focusing on these five: naming, logo, visual styling, and messaging. 

Once you’ve done all four, it is time to put everything together in a brand book, which will essentially serve as a pseudo-bible for anyone who is creating content or assets for your practice. Let’s break it down:

A Quick Note on Branding for Your Personas

Remember your patient personas during the branding stage. If you know who your audience is, what they like, what they want, and what will resonate with them, you can build or revamp your branding to align with their personalities.

So, ultimately, you have two choices: branding for yourself (which is important because your practice is your baby and life’s work) or branding for your audience (which will likely yield better business results). 

Try to strike a balance between the two, but remember that the more strongly the brand resonates with your audience, the more likely you will find business success.

Naming

Choosing a brand name is one of your most important decisions. Even if you have a name you are using already, it might be worth considering a rebrand if your name falls short and you are still relatively early on in the process. In addition to the quality of the name itself, you need to make sure the practice name is unique and has a website URL and social handles that are also available. 

When it comes to brand names, you can choose one of three options: practical, creative, or catchy.

Which one you choose is entirely up to your preference, as long as you are comfortable with the advantages and disadvantages of your choice. 

Important Note on Brand Naming

When you decide on a name, you need to go through and ensure you can access that name as a website domain and on all of the social media accounts you plan to be present for. 

Messaging

Here is a straightforward definition of messaging:

The strategic communication and content that a practice uses to convey its value proposition, services, and brand identity to its target audience. This messaging aims to resonate and connect with potential clients while differentiating the brand from competitors.  

In addition to visual aspects like your logo, colors, and fonts, messaging also involves two critical components: what you are saying and how you are saying it. This is also known as subject matter and voice.

Subject Matter

Subject matter is the content you will be covering, and this will be decided directly by what services and treatments you have decided to offer your patients. If you are a plastic surgeon, your subject matter will be the surgeries that you can provide. If you are a medical spa, your subject matter will be the available treatments.

It gets a little more complex than that — you’ll eventually want to tackle topics like potential patient objections or frequently asked questions — but for the first stage, stick to what you are offering as the subject matter.

Voice

Voice is less concerned about what you say and more concerned about how you say it. Do you want your patients to feel comforted by your words? Or do you want them to feel confident that you are a professional on the bleeding edge of the industry? Maybe something in between?

Here are some examples of the different types of voices that your practice can use:

Authoritative - Establishes the brand as an expert or leader in its field. Confident, knowledgeable, sometimes commanding.

Friendly - Warm, approachable, conversational tone that makes the brand seem like a trusted friend.

Professional - Formal and polished voice that conveys reliability and trustworthiness. Often used in healthcare and aesthetics.

Humorous - Uses wit and humor to engage the audience and make the brand more relatable and memorable.

Inspirational - Motivating and encouraging. Aims to inspire and uplift the audience. 

Casual - Informal and relaxed, conversational. Often uses slang or colloquial language for a younger or laid-back audience.

Quirky - Unique, unconventional, sometimes whimsical. Helps a brand stand out and appeal to a niche audience.

Emotional - Aims to evoke strong feelings and connect on a deep emotional level. Often used in storytelling campaigns or personable brands.

Formal - Highly structured and proper, suitable for brands needing to maintain high decorum and professionalism.

Direct - Straightforward and to the point. Delivers clear and concise messages.

Optimistic - Positive, upbeat, hopeful. Focuses on the bright side of things and spreads positivity.

Educational - Informative and instructive. Aims to teach or provide valuable knowledge to the audience.

Serious - Grave and earnest. Suitable for brands or industries requiring high seriousness and sensitivity.

Empathetic - Understanding and compassionate. Resonates with the audience's feelings and shows genuine care.

Playful - Light-hearted and fun. Often used by brands targeting light-hearted audiences or creating a joyful, relaxing experience.

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Here is an example of each of those voice styles conveying the following information in different ways: 

• Plastic surgery is a big decision. 
• Plastic surgery can help you feel better about your appearance. 
• Plastic surgery requires some downtime and recovery.

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Authoritative

"Plastic surgery is a significant decision that can enhance your appearance and self-confidence. It requires careful consideration of downtime and recovery."

Friendly

"Thinking about plastic surgery? It can really help you feel great about how you look! Just remember, you'll need some downtime to recover."

Professional

"Plastic surgery represents a major decision and can improve your appearance. It is essential to plan for the necessary downtime and recovery period."

Humorous

"Ready to look even more fabulous? Plastic surgery might be the answer! Just be prepared to Netflix and chill for a bit during recovery, but mostly just Netflix."

Inspirational

"Plastic surgery can be a transformative journey to feeling better about your appearance. Embrace the process, including the downtime, as part of your path to confidence."

Casual

"Plastic surgery is a big step, but it can totally boost your confidence! Just keep in mind, you'll need some time to rest up afterward."

Quirky

"Thinking of a little nip and tuck? It’s a big deal, but it can really boost your mood! Just be ready to take a recovery break."

Emotional

"Plastic surgery can help you feel more comfortable in your own skin. It's a significant decision that comes with necessary recovery time, but the results can be worth it."

Formal

"Undergoing plastic surgery is a substantial decision. It has the potential to improve one's appearance. Adequate downtime and recovery are imperative."

Direct

"Plastic surgery is a big decision. It can improve your appearance, but it requires downtime and recovery."

Optimistic

"Plastic surgery can make a big difference in how you feel about your appearance! Remember, a little recovery time is a small step towards a new you."

Educational

"Plastic surgery is a significant decision. It can enhance your appearance and self-esteem, but it’s important to understand the necessary downtime and recovery involved."

Serious

"Plastic surgery is a major decision with profound implications for your appearance. It requires careful consideration of the downtime and recovery period."

Empathetic

"Plastic surgery is a big step, and it can help you feel better about your appearance. We understand the journey and are here to support you through the downtime and recovery."

Playful

"Ready for a change? Plastic surgery could boost your look! Just plan on some chill time while you recover."

Each of these examples conveys the same information, but it feels like it is coming from completely different people. This is the goal — decide who your brand is and how it would speak. Once you’ve done that, you’ve nailed down your brand’s messaging.

Visual Styling

Creating your practice’s brand style involves selecting the fonts, patterns, colors, and other visual elements that collectively define your brand's appearance. These choices should reflect your practice's values and, you guessed it, resonate with your target patients. 

As for fonts and colors, consider what message you want to send. Traditional medical colors like blue and white suggest cleanliness and trust, but they are extremely boring and might not set you apart from the rest of the industry. 

Using bold colors or unique fonts can help your brand stand out, but it's important to balance distinctiveness with ensuring that potential patients feel comfortable and confident in choosing your services.

Here is a quick cheat sheet on color meanings, but if you want to learn more about applying color theory to your branding, check out this article that dives in much deeper.

The key is to balance memorability with accessibility. Your brand should be distinctive enough to be memorable but not so outlandish that it fails to connect with your intended audience. It’s not just about looking different for the sake of it; it’s about creating a visual identity that genuinely reflects your practice and appeals to your potential patients.

Logo

If your brand name is the most important factor, your brand logo is a very close second. Technically, there are about nine different types of logos you can choose from, but for medical aesthetics and the current online ecosystem, we generally recommend going with a “combination” logo form since they can effectively represent you on any platform you choose to engage on. 

Combination means the logo has both a symbol and a wordmark element. To put it simply, the logo should have your practice name and some kind of icon to represent it. 

Think about something like Lamese:

Check out these examples of scalable logos for different platforms:

How to Make a Logo

The truth about graphic design or brand creation is that unless you do it every single day, it will be difficult to nail on your own. It isn’t impossible, but don’t feel discouraged if you have to spend a substantial amount of time building something you like.

For absolute beginners, Canva is a great resource when you have zero acumen for branding or stylization. You can pull from thousands of templates and visual elements to start your design process and get your creativity flowing. 

Here are some examples of their assets that are available to Pro users: 

Remember to be cognizant of your messaging and visual styling here. Use the styling you decided achieved your practice’s goals, and make sure that the iconography you use aligns with your messaging. Also: do your best to customize these templates as much as you possibly can. 

Brand Book — Putting It All Together

Your brand book is critical; it will survive and outlast years of business changes, practice managers, marketing agencies, and other variables involved in your marketing and practice image. 

At the same time, the brand book is more like the brand bible — all creative direction must align with its tenets.

It is also important to note that there are technically different levels of brand books that you can create. A more established practice might have an excess of strategic insight in addition to things like logo design, colors, fonts, messaging and other core elements, but a newer or less established brand might only need the basics like a style guide for content. 

Here are some examples of brand books we have created for clients that we believe serve as strong examples of what a brand book should look like, keeping in mind that your personal scope might change for your needs:

Part 4: Website

We will assume, at the very least, that you know what a website is. You know what a website is… right? Hello? Anyone? Alright, well, in any case, moving on.

So, instead, let’s ask a different question that we unfortunately hear all the time: Are websites really that important?

Your website is the most important part of your entire marketing program. FULL STOP.  

It is the only asset on the internet that you have full control over in terms of messaging and user experience. Social media, email marketing, and advertisements are all subject to the whims of other companies and shifting regulations and laws. 

But on your website, you can control what is said, what image you project, how you speak about elements of the medical aesthetic industry, and how your potential and current patients will view you as a provider or practice.

Design

The design of the website is the most forward-facing element and often the one your potential patients will immediately judge you on, making it critical that your site makes a good first impression. A website’s first impression has two critical components: the User Experience and the User Interface.

Let's break them down:

User Experience

UX, or user experience, dictates the ease with which your patients can navigate your site. It’s about creating a seamless journey from point A to B, ensuring that every click brings them closer to their goal without confusion or frustration. 

One thing to keep in mind as you develop your sitemap is the notorious “Three Click Rule.” It is the idea is that everything you want accessible to your patients should be available in as few clicks or actions as possible. Why? The more actions required by the patient, the more leads you lose.

User Interface

UI, or user interface, complements this by focusing on the site's visual and interactive elements. The color scheme, typography, and button styles make the experience not just navigable but enjoyable. Medical aesthetics is about creating a vibe for your patients.

Creating Your Website Content

Developing your website content can be difficult without a proper understanding of what each page should include. So, we’ve broken down the big four: homepages, about pages, treatment pages, and contact pages so that you can get started as quickly as possible. (If you are struggling with Calls to Action in your content, try reading this article on the topic.)

Homepage

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Your homepage is your first opportunity to convey your brand and demonstrate who you are as a medical aesthetic provider. Consider the most important questions your patients are asking themselves: 

1. How can you help me?
2. Why should I choose you? 

Make sure they are answered, to some degree, on the homepage. If they aren’t fully answered, give them a teaser early on that clearly leads them to the answer. Here are some great ways to communicate those answers: 

• Before-and-afters
• Testimonials
• Popular treatments
• Mission statements
• Staff quotes 

Check out AesthetiCare for a strong example of how an optimized homepage should look.

‍About Pages

About pages are biographies that demonstrate your personality and build a relationship with your audience. You can create them for yourself, your staff, or your practice — anyone you would like to feature as a selling point. 

People often fall into the résumé trap here as well. So here is some advice: paint a picture of yourself as a person first so that your patients feel connected to you on a deeper, human level. 

Here are some ideas you can use to help you start filling out that profile content. Keep in mind that your profile isn’t the only one that matters. Make sure to create pages for other key staff members at your practice and highlight them as well. 

Professional

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• Your full name
• Current professional title
• Brief history of your career
• Key positions held and responsibilities
• Major accomplishments and milestones
• Core competencies
• Specialized skills
• Industry knowledge
• Degrees and certifications
• Relevant courses or training
• Professional affiliations
• Description of your current job or business
• Your role and responsibilities
• Projects or initiatives you are currently working on
• Professional goals
• Long-term career plans
• Aspirations within your industry

Personal

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• Where you are from
• Brief personal history
• Information about your spouse and children (if you’re comfortable sharing)
• Hobbies and interests
• Personal achievements
• Core personal values
• Beliefs that guide your life and work
• Volunteer work
• Participation in local organizations or causes
• Philanthropic activities
• Unique or quirky personal details
• Favorite activities or pastimes
• Travel experiences or favorite destinations

Check out Dr. Chahal for a great example of a well-developed About Page.

‍Treatment Pages

As a general rule of thumb, treatment pages should answer as many frequently asked questions as possible while providing a clear narrative about the procedure to the potential patient. Here is a list of the most common questions found throughout all medical aesthetic procedures:

1. What Is the Treatment?
2. Why Do I Need the Treatment?
3. What Does This Treatment Provide?
4. Am I a Candidate for This Treatment?
5. How Should I Prepare for this Treatment?
6. What Should I Expect from the Procedure?
7. What Should I Expect During the Recovery?
8. What Kind of Results Can the Treatment Provide?
9. Can I Combine My Treatment with Other Treatments?
10. How Much Does the Treatment Cost?

If you cover these 10 ideas in every treatment page you produce, you will likely answer the vast majority of search queries that arise for those topics. Check out this page from About Skin for an idea of how to tackle some of these questions.

‍Contact Page

If you've ever moved to a page that had a contact form to fill out or an email or phone number to reach out to, then you’ve already experienced a contact page. Don’t add too many bells and whistles to this page; keeping it simple is really the best approach. 

Why? If they are on the contact page, they’ve already made a decision to reach out to you. Any additional fluff will only give them an opportunity to second-guess that decision. 

Vein & Cosmetic Center of Tampa has a great contact page you can reference.

Responsiveness

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A sluggish or difficult-to-navigate website can be a significant setback. This is why optimizing all media on your site — images, audio, and video — is essential to ensure quick load times. 

Here is a quick list of optimal file types and sizes:

Clean, efficient coding and backend development are equally crucial to prevent a clunky user experience.

(If you are using a premade template from Squarespace or Wix for your site, make sure that the site is loading optimally and that you can move from page to page without too much delay.)

Also, when designing the site, make sure that you are considering mobile first since this is where the majority of your patients will be coming from.

Making Your Own Website

When it comes to creating a website, you have two options: professional help or DIY. Naturally, we always recommend getting professional help since you want to see a return on your investment, but even if you commit to hiring a professional, you still have to decide which route you will go with: 

• Freelancer
• Marketing agency
• Healthcare marketing agency
• Ad agency 

If you go with the DIY option, you have some options to choose from:

1. Squarespace
2. WIX
3. WordPress 

While user-friendly and fast, they still require backend technical work to really make it shine. Are you prepared to spend hours researching, Googling, and YouTubing those guides? If so, DIY is the way. 

(Pro-tip: Just don’t use GoDaddy — they are the worst option.)

But even if you choose to manage every other aspect of your marketing on your own, your website might be a place where you want to invest in professional help because of the technical nature of some of the elements — like SEO.

Part 5: SEO

Search engine optimization is all about enhancing your website's visibility in the organic search results of search engines like Google. By employing a range of strategies, techniques, and practices — from optimizing your website's content and structure to improving its relevance and authority for specific keywords — you aim to position your website higher in the search results for terms that your target audience is searching for. 

The higher your pages rank, the more likely they are to attract attention and lure prospective patients to your site, without the need for paid advertising. The ultimate aim is to draw more organic traffic to your site, which is vital for increasing awareness, engagement, and ultimately, conversions for your bottom line.

Why Is SEO the Best? SEO provides the highest quality leads, the highest conversion percentages, and best long-term ROI figures.

In your first 12 months, your focus should be on four primary SEO components: keywords, localization, structure, and schema. 

Keywords

To actively create a keyword list, you should always use a professional tool like SEMRush or SERanking to find high-volume keywords and phrases. This will help you understand what conversations and queries are happening around your industry, services, and products. 

Then, categorize your keywords into four main types: branded, procedure, condition, and inquisition (question-based).

1. Branded Keywords: These are terms that include your brand or product names or variations of them.
2. Procedure Keywords: These refer to specific services or processes related to your industry.
3. Condition Keywords: These are related to issues or problems that your products or services address.
4. Inquisition Keywords: These are question-based terms that potential customers might search for.

Next, define SEO success for your business. In the vast majority of practices, SEO success will ultimately come down to the number of conversions — new patients brought into the practice — that come in from your website and content. 

There are two routes to approaching keyword content production: you can use either the machine gun or a sniper approach.

When to Use the Machine Gun Approach:

• Broad Reach: If your goal is to attract a wide audience and increase overall traffic, using a broad array of keywords can help capture a larger segment of potential visitors.
• Early Stages: When starting out, it may be beneficial to experiment with a wide range of keywords to see which ones perform best.
• Brand Awareness: If you aim to increase brand awareness, casting a wider net can help get your name in front of more people.

When to Use the Sniper Approach:

• Targeted Conversions: If you have specific conversion goals, such as sign-ups, sales, or inquiries, focusing on high-value, targeted keywords can attract more qualified leads.
• Competitive Markets: In highly competitive markets, targeting niche, less competitive keywords might be more effective where you can rank higher.
• Limited Resources: If you have limited resources, focusing on a smaller set of high-impact keywords can be more efficient and effective.

Localization

Localizing your SEO efforts will go a long way in starting your digital marketing on a strong foundation. Consider these three localization tasks your priority for the first year:

• Onpage Updates
• Google Business Profile
• Beginning Backlinks

Onpage Updates

This step is concerned with making sure all of your content is contextualized to your specific geographic location. Here is a list of optimizations to make. 

• ‍Title Tags and Meta Descriptions - Include the city or region in title tags and write compelling meta descriptions with local keywords.‍
• Header Tags (H1, H2, H3) - Use local keywords in header tags and structure content with clear headers.‍
• NAP - Ensure NAP (Name, Address, Phone Number) is consistent across all pages; add NAP details in the header or footer.‍
• Local Keywords - Incorporate local keywords naturally throughout the content; use variations of primary keywords.‍
• Localized Content - Create content specific to the local area, such as local news, events, and community involvement.‍
• Google Business Profile Embeds - Embed a Google Map with the business location and add a link to the GPB listing.‍
• Image Optimization - Use local keywords in image file names and alt text; geotag images with location data.
• Reviews and Testimonials - Display customer reviews and testimonials, especially those mentioning the location.‍
• Social Media Integration - Link to social media profiles from the website and ensure profiles are optimized for local search.

Google Business Profile

GBP is the small window on the right side of a Google search (or the middle on a mobile search) that shows your business’s information like the address, phone number, hours of operation, and other key components of your business. 

Getting your GBP set up is an important step in the SEO process since it will be where many potential patients reference your business on a search engine. The process is fairly straightforward; Google has done a great job guiding you through the step-by-step process. All you have to do is visit this page while signed into your business email to get started.

Beginning Backlinks

Backlinks, or inbound links that go from one website to another, play a critical role in SEO. They act as votes of confidence, signaling to search engines like Google that a website is authoritative and trustworthy. This can lead to higher rankings in search engine results pages, increasing visibility and organic traffic.

Local directories are the best backlinks you can earn when you first start out. This process involves listing your business information—such as your website, address, phone number, and other contact details—on various online directories. 

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of directories available, but we recommend starting with the big hitters from this site. Most of these directories won't result in referral traffic, but we are after the backlink, so the traffic is not a consideration. 

Structure

Your SEO structure has two critical components: your sitemap and your robots.txt file. Before you can create anything, though, you need to decide what the structure of your site will look like. In most cases, we represent it as a simple numbered bullet list:

1. Home
2. About
   1. Dr. Larry
   2. Dr. Moe
   3. Dr. Curly
3.  Procedures
   1. Face
      1. Facelift
      2. Necklift
      3. Hair Restoration
   2. Body
      1. Abdominoplasty (Tummy Tuck)
      2. Liposuction
      3. Arm Lift
      4. Body Lift
      5. Butt Lift
   3. Breast
      1. Breast Augmentation
      2. Breast Lift
      3. Breast Reduction
4. Contact

Once you have this, you can create your actual sitemap file for the site, which is imperative for helping Google and other search engines figure out what they should and should not be looking for on your site.

Developing Your Sitemap

For beginning DIYers, we recommend using an online sitemap generator. XML Sitemaps is our top recommendation. All you need to do is plug your site’s address into a bar and submit while the site does all the formatting work for you. Of course, this method only works once your website is developed. Once you have the file, the next step is to index it.

Indexing Your Sitemap

Your sitemap should live in the root directory of your website, which would look something like this:

https://www.drpeek.com/sitemap.xml

Google automatically checks this page on all sites for a sitemap. As long as your site has the sitemap file living at this address, it will be indexed.

Developing and Submitting Your Robots.txt File

Your robots.txt file is a little different than the sitemap. While the sitemap shows the structure of your site to Google, your robots.txt file communicates directly with the search engine “crawler” to find out exactly what pages you want indexed on the web.

Click here for a thorough explanation of how to create your robot.txt file.

Submitting Your Robots.txt File

Submitting a robots.txt file to Google doesn't involve directly sending the file to them. Instead, you should place the robots.txt file in your website's root directory, just like we did for the sitemap.

Protip: Use a robots.txt tester tool to ensure there are no errors in your file. Google Search Console offers such a tool to help you verify that your directives are correctly set up and that Google can crawl and index your desired pages.

Schema

Implementing schema markup, or structured data, on your website involves adding specific code in a format that search engines like Google can understand. This code helps search engines index and display your site more accurately in search results, potentially leading to enhanced visibility and click-through rates. Below, we'll revisit some common schema tags and also cover common structured data tags, which serve similar purposes in helping clarify your content to search engines.

Common Schema Markup Tags:

• Article: Enhances articles, blog posts, and news stories with information like the author, publication date, and summary.
• LocalBusiness: Provides details on businesses, including location, hours, and contact information.
• Event: Marks up events with dates, locations, and ticketing information.
• Product: Details products with names, prices, availability, and ratings.
• Recipe: For recipes, including ingredients, cooking times, and nutritional info.
• Review: Showcases reviews with ratings, authors, and product information.
• Person: Information about individuals, including job title and affiliation.
• Organization: Details about organizations, such as location, contact info, and logo.
• Video: Marks up video content with titles, descriptions, and thumbnails.
• FAQ: Structures frequently asked questions and their answers.
• JobPosting: Details about job listings, including requirements, salary, and application links.
• Course: Information on educational courses, including providers and duration.
• Book: Details about books, including authors, publication dates, and ISBN numbers.

Medical Specific Scheme Markup Tags:

• MedicalOrganization: Represents healthcare organizations like hospitals and clinics, including their names, locations, contact details, and services they provide.
• Physician: Provides information about medical doctors, detailing their names, areas of specialization, contact info, and professional affiliations.
• MedicalClinic: Covers details about medical clinics, such as their name, address, services offered, and how to contact them.
• MedicalCondition: Describes various medical conditions, including the name, symptoms, causes, and possible treatments.
• MedicalProcedure: Outlines medical procedures, providing names, descriptions, purposes, and the steps involved.
• MedicalTest: Details medical tests, including their names, what they are for, how they are conducted, and what patients can expect.
• MedicalTherapy: Information on medical therapies, describing the type of treatment, its purpose, and benefits.
• Drug: Lists details about pharmaceutical drugs, such as their names, descriptions, active ingredients, and usage instructions.
• MedicalSymptom: Describes medical symptoms, including what they are, possible conditions they indicate, and treatments.

Common Structured Data Tags:

While the above are specific instances of schema markup, structured data as a whole can include these and many other tags designed to clarify the content of a webpage for search engines. Some additional structured data tags, often used in conjunction with or as part of schema markup, include:

• BreadcrumbList: Indicates the page's position within the site hierarchy.
• AggregateRating: Shows average ratings based on multiple reviews.
• Offer: Details offers for products, including price and availability.
• PostalAddress: Provides postal addresses in a structured format.
• ContactPoint: Specifies contact information, such as customer service numbers.

Implementing the Markups

You can use JSON-LD (recommended by Google), Microdata, or RDFa formats to implement structured data on your website. Here’s a simplified step-by-step process:

• Choose the content to markup: Decide which pages or content types you want to enhance with structured data.
• Select the appropriate schema: Based on the content, choose the relevant schema.org types and properties.
• Generate the structured data code: Use a structured data generator, an AI tool like ChatGPT, or manually write the JSON-LD, Microdata, or RDFa code.
• Add the code to your webpage: Place the structured data code in the HTML of your webpage. For JSON-LD, it typically goes inside a <script> tag in the <head> or <body> of the page.
• Test your implementation: Use Google's Rich Results Test or the Schema Markup Validator to ensure your structured data is correctly implemented and can be interpreted by search engines.

Part 6: Social Media

When you are just getting started, we recommend focusing on the Meta social media platforms (Facebook and Instagram) since they will be the places where you will have the easiest time reaching your target audience and converting them.

For your business, you’ll need to go one step further than just creating an account. You will also need to create a business page in order to run ads and grab leads down the road. Here is a complete walkthrough of that process: 

Creating Your Account

• Navigate to facebook.com‍
• Select “Create New Account”

• Fill in the sign up window (use an email address that is accessible by everyone who will be working on your social marketing)

• Verify your email by retrieving the code that was sent to the email you signed up with

• Navigate to “Pages” on the left side of Facebook (you may need to select the “See More” option)

• Click the “Create New Page” button

• Fill out the windows with your practice’s information (“plastic surgeon” and “medical spa” are common categories you can choose)

• Click “Create Page” at the bottom left of the screen (this will take a moment to process)
• Fill in the appropriate contact information
• Upload your logo as your profile picture and a picture of your office as your cover photo (cover photo should be 16:9 aspect ratio)
• Skip the “WhatsApp” connection by clicking “Skip”

• • If you are someone who works with international clientele, consider actually fulfilling this step if their preferred method of communication is WhatsApp
  • Skip the “Build Your Page Audience” option by clicking “Next”
• Choose your preferred notification settings and click “Done”
• Confirm your Facebook page is live
• Navigate to instagram.com‍
• Select “Sign Up”

• Choose the “Log In with Facebook” option
• Select “Yes, Finish Adding” option
• Navigate to your profile and select “Edit Profile”

• Fill in the website, bio, and photo options
• Navigate to “Account Type and Tools”

• Select “Switch to Professional Account”
• Select “Business” and “Next” on the following screen
• Select appropriate categories, likely “Health/beauty” and check the “Show Category on Profile”
• Check the “Show Contact Info on Profile” option and fill out the information
• Hit “Next” and then “Done”
• Navigate back to profile to ensure the profile is properly set up
• Navigate to https://business.facebook.com/‍
• Select the “Connect an Instagram profile” option

• Choose the “Log into Instagram” option
• Toggle “Allow access to Instagram Messages in Inbox” option to “On” and press continue
• Continue through the log in process, selecting “continue” and “allow” as needed
• Select “Done” when a connection has been verified

Creating Social Media Content

Creating social media content should be much more strategic than just posting selfies or photos on your page. Each post should serve a purpose and work toward your practice goals. To achieve this, you first need to understand what content pillars are and then know the step-by-step process you should be taking during content creation. 

Understanding Content Pillars

Content pillars are “categories” of content that serve your business purposes. When you are just starting out, there are three pillars that you should be creating content for regularly: entertainment, education, and promotion.

1. Entertainment: Something fun and interesting that you or your staff is doing that people on social media will find interesting or engaging.
2. Education: Informative posts educating your audience on a topic of their interest.
3. Promotion: A deal, sale, discount, or special offer that you are providing for a limited time used to generate buzz and conversions. 

Cycle through these pillars evenly during the first twelve months to ensure you are keeping your content fresh and engaging. 

How to Create Content

Define Your Objective

• Determine what pillar the post should support and what your goals are (e.g., brand awareness, engagement, website traffic, lead generation)
• Define which patient persona you are trying to reach

Content Creation

• Brainstorm content ideas that align with your pillars and personas
• Create or source images, videos, or graphics that capture attention and convey your message. Tools like Canva or Adobe Express can be useful

• Write engaging and concise captions. Ensure the tone and voice match your brand identity
• Research and include relevant hashtags and tag any relevant users or brands

Design and Format

‍

• Tailor your content to fit the specifications of each social media platform (Facebook and Instagram allow a range of aspect ratios

• • Square Images: 1:1
  • Portrait Images: 4:5
  • Landscape Images: 1.91:1
  • Ensure the post aligns with your brand’s visual and messaging guidelines

Scheduling and Posting

• Research and choose the optimal times to post for maximum reach and engagement. It’s generally recommended to post between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m., but you can actually check when your followers are most active and post then.

• • On Instagram: Menu > Insights > Total Followers > Scroll down to “Most Active Times"
  • On Facebook: Business Suite > Content > Create Post > Toggle “set date and time” under Scheduling > Click “Active Times” button
  • Use Meta Business Suite to plan, schedule, and post your content from a single platform. “Create Post” can be found in the “Content” tab

Engagement and Interaction

• Keep an eye on your post’s performance and engagement
• Interact with your audience by responding to comments, messages, and shares

Part 7: Paid Ads

Paid ads are often one of the most effective tools for new practices or practices looking to revamp their digital marketing program. This is because, for a fee, you can prioritize your content over organic content on a social feed or search engine results page to an audience already looking for a procedure you offer.

This means you get to bypass all of the work that goes into earning an organic ranking on Google or growing a following on a social media platform. If you just aren’t in the race yet, a well-executed paid ad program can almost feel like a cheat code… if you are willing to invest. 

Pro-Tip: Small budgets don’t tend to perform well because the ad platforms you are using need time to learn how best to utilize and deliver your ads.

Choosing Your Ad Type

When you are just starting out, the most advantageous ads to leverage are pay-per-click, paid social ads, and retargeting ads.

Advanced Ads: Interruptive Advertising vs. Permissive Advertising

Interruptive advertising involves placing ads that disrupt the consumer's experience, such as TV commercials, radio ads, and online pop-ups, aiming to capture attention by interrupting current activities. In contrast, permissive advertising relies on consumer consent, focusing on delivering targeted and relevant content that the audience has opted to receive, such as email newsletters and social media followings, thus fostering a more engaging and welcomed interaction.

Pay-Per-Click

Pay-per-click ads are a model of internet marketing in which advertisers pay a fee each time one of their ads is clicked. Essentially, they're a way of buying visits to your site rather than attempting to “earn” those visits organically. Search engine advertising, like Google AdWords, is one of the most popular forms of PPC, allowing advertisers to bid for ad placement in a search engine's sponsored links.

To get started on PPC advertising, you’ll need to set up your ads profile here. 

PPC ads are extremely valuable to your business — unfortunately, they are one of the only aspects of your marketing we strongly advise against running yourself. Ad creation, set up, and tracking is an extremely technical process that requires finesse, time, and expertise to extract high ROIs. We recommend strongly that you find an experienced partner for your PPC ad program. 

The content of these ads is limited, so you need to be creative about what you say and how you say it to stand out from the other organic and paid results. After all, you will still be competing with other PPC practices and nothing is promised from ads — rolling them out just gets you in the game.

Luckily, paying per click means you are only paying for clicks that have at least a small chance at converting, but remember there is a specific formula you will need to follow for Google PPC ads — here is a template and guide you can follow:

Google PPC Ad Template

Headline 1: [Primary Keyword] | [Business Name]

• Up to 30 characters
• Focus on the main keyword you’re targeting and your business or brand name.

Headline 2: [Unique Selling Proposition]

• Up to 30 characters
• Highlight what makes your offering unique or why customers should choose you.

Headline 3: [Call to Action]

• Up to 30 characters
• Encourage users to take action, such as “Book Now,” “Get a Free Quote,” or “Shop Today.”

Display URL:

• [YourWebsite.com]/[RelevantPage]
• Show users where they’ll land after clicking. The path can be customized to reflect the content of the landing page.

Path 1: [Service/Product Category URL]

Path 2: [Specific Service/Product URL]

Description 1:

• Up to 90 characters
• Elaborate on your offering, mentioning key benefits or features. Answer the “What’s in it for me?” for your potential customers.

Description 2:

• Up to 90 characters
• Add additional details about your product/service, include another call to action, or highlight a special offer.

Paid Social Ads

Social advertising involves placing ads on social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter. These ads can be tailored to target specific demographics, interests, behaviors, and more, making them highly customizable. Social ads leverage user data to serve highly relevant advertisements based on interactions within a specific platform.

‍

To get started on social media ads on Meta, you’ll need to set up your ads manager account.

Launching Your Ads

Once you have created the content for your ads, you need to go through the process of launching them on whatever platforms you are using. 

‍‍Here is a step-by-step checklist to follow along with:

• Navigate to your Facebook page.

• Click on the menu option.

• From the professional dashboard, select "Ad Center."

• Click on "Advertise on Meta."

• Select "Boosted Instagram Post."

• Choose a piece of published content to boost.
• some text
  • Decide the action you want people to take:
  • Learn More (directs to website/blog)
  • Shop Now (links to product page)
  • Instagram Profile (gain followers)
  • Send Message (encourage direct engagement)
  • Optionally, set up an automated response for DMs.

• Choose your audience:
• some text
  • People Through Targeting (edit age, gender, interests)
  • People Who Like Your Page or Similar

• Select specific interests relevant to your audience.

• Save and name the audience for future use.

• Decide the ad duration.

• Determine your daily budget and overall spending.

• Click "Publish" to start running the ad.

Part 8: Email Marketing

Email marketing is an important part of your digital strategy, which is why we recommend focusing on developing your email marketing program as early as possible and as correctly as possible from the beginning.

Putting in a little effort here will pay huge dividends down the road when your list is populated and creating conversions comes much more easily.

Starting an Email List

• Navigate to MailChimp

• Select “Start Free Trial”

• Fill out “Business Email,” “Username,” and “Password” areas

• Select “Open Gmail” and add your Google Email Account

• Find the email from MailChimp and push the “Activate Account” button

• You can either input credit card information or select “Cancel” to skip that step

• Fill out the required entry questions, skip any optional questions you do not want to fill

• Navigate to Audience>All Contacts

• You can add your current contacts individually or import them on a list
• some text

• • Review this guide from MailChimp for the current structure to follow

Segmenting Your Email List

Here are the steps to doing this process on Mailchimp:

‍

Step 1: Navigate to the “Segments” tab under the “Audience” category.

‍

Step 2: Choose “Advanced” or “Regular” segments based on your level of comfort and then select “Create advanced/regular segment.” 

‍

Step 3: Name your segment and then click “Add filter.” For our purposes, we will go with the name “Skin Resurfacing Candidates.”

‍

Step 4: Select your metrics. Remember, we are looking to target people between the ages of 35 and 49 as closely as possible. For this specific example, we have to go outside of our target range just a bit by using two different age ranges.

Step 5: Select “Review segment” at the top right.

‍

Step 6: Make sure the segment is populated, and then click “Save segment.” Congratulations, you’ve now created an email segment. The process will be very similar to this, regardless of the platform you use.

‍

Creating an Email

You’ll want to start by navigating to Create>Design Email. One you get there, MailChimp will offer you plenty of guidance on preparing an email to sent out.

Write Your Subject Line

As a general rule, there are three goals of a subject line: making an announcement, solving a problem, and creating urgency. Not all three of these need to exist on every subject line; in fact, it is possible to craft a good subject line that focuses entirely on one of these concepts:

Subject

“Now Accepting New Dawn Health Insurance | Eligibility Requirements”

The point is that finding a way to focus on these strategically and intentionally can drastically improve your open rates.

An announcement or change in your practice that is substantial enough — say, a new way for patients to pay for treatment — might merit and succeed without any need for an intentional focus on problem-solving or urgency. In fact, problem-solving and urgency might just end up being a natural byproduct of a good announcement. 

Here’s an example we can use:

New Injectable Filler | Say Bye to Wrinkles 👋 | Limited Product Available

In this particular subject line, we have three sections covering the three subject line goals:

‍

Goal

1. Making an Announcement 

2. Solving a Problem

3. Creating Urgency

Content

1. “New Injectable Filler”

2. “Say Bye to Wrinkles”

3. “Limited Product Available”

‍

Write Your Preheader Text

If your subject line doesn’t get your audience to open, the next plan of attack you have is your preheader text. (Often referred to as “preview text” as well.) This is the bit of writing that usually lives right under the subject line. It gives you a chance to elaborate more on what you are writing about. 

Photo courtesy of MailChimp

Here are some examples:

Preheader Text 1

Erase even deeper fine lines in as little as 30 minutes.

Preheader Text 2

Don’t miss a beat — This new treatment will have you back to work before lunch.

Preheader Text 3

Amplify fillers in 30 mins. No harsh side effects — just a youthful complexion.

Write Your Body Content

Before you sit down to fill out the content of your email, do the following tasks:

Reconsider your objective. Go back to your notes when you figured out what the goal is for this email and then find a logical structure to achieve it. Are you trying to promote a new product? Then your email needs to be tailored to move your audience through the sales funnel. Are you making a simple announcement? Keep it short and sweet, and ditch most of the bells and whistles.

Reconsider your audience. How you say something is just as important as what you are saying. If you are looking to send an email to a younger demographic about a new treatment that improves skin glow, that content should sound different than what you would send an older demographic. 

Reconsider the problem you are solving. We did all that mental work earlier in your strategy to figure out exactly what your personas would be targeting and what problems you can be solving for your audience. So, target them. Make them the big headers or bullet points. 

Consider this as well: your email design is part of the email’s content, and it is fairly common for many people to care more about visuals than they do about words. Not to mention, visual information is processed by the human brain around 60,000 times faster than text content. 

MailChimp and most platforms (even Google) have templates you can use to figure out a structure for your content. 

Choose whichever one fits your aesthetic/practice the most and it can be as easy as plugging and playing.

Develop Your Calls to Action

You should put a CTA button whenever you want to prompt your audience into action. The earlier you give the option, the better — the last thing you want to do is lose any potential leads simply because you didn’t give them the opportunity to contact you or sign up for a service early enough.

Take a look at the following example that is about as simple as it comes from Codeacademy:

They hit all the important elements: announcement, problem solving, and urgency. But because of the design, it fits snugly into one screen and has a bright yellow button just begging to be pushing.

As far as the naming of the specific buttons or links, always use some kind of action: call now, learn more, contact us, reach out, send a message, talk to our team. These are all powerful prompting phrases that will help drive your conversions to the finish line.

Tracking Your Emails

In order to see your email marketing metrics, you will need to navigate to Analytics>Marketing Dashboard on MailChimp (or whichever email hosting platform you choose to use).

There are a couple metrics you should pay attention to when figuring out how well your emails are performing:

1. Opens: Emails are limited in their reach by the number of people on the list they are sent to. You can still measure their awareness success by monitoring opens, or the amount of people who clicked into the email. This will give you a coin of how many people saw the content of your email.
2. Open Rate: Open rate is the raw percentage of people who opened your email versus the number of people it was delivered to. This is a direct indicator of how well your subject matter, subject line, and any previews were received. Track which subject lines, sales, promotions, and emails are generating the highest open rates and use that information to optimize in the future.
3. Forwards: This measures how many times your content was shared from one email recipient to someone else. This is important for engagement because it is one of the few ways you can track dialogue within an email ecosystem. Forwards can happen for a lot of reasons, but generally, they show that the information contained in the email was interesting or relevant enough for someone to start a conversation around it. 
4. Unsubscribes: These are the people who decided to remove themselves from email communications with your brand using the unsubscribe button from that particular email. This is important to track because high unsubscribe numbers could indicate that the content is not relevant or low quality. It could also be an indicator that communications were happening too frequently, leading people to feel like they were being spammed.
5. Click Through Rate: The number of times that your audience members click a link on your email to receive more information on a webpage or other destination. Because email is limited by nature, there is no way to optimize email marketing for additional outcomes in the vast majority of cases. Generally, though, those clicks are considered high quality, meaning they often lead to more direct conversions. 

Paying attention to these metrics can help inform how you should shape your future email marketing efforts.

Part 9: How Can You Achieve This Timeline?

Here is a list of potential partners and methods by which you can choose to achieve all the tasks included in this timeline:

12 Months Isn’t As Long As It Seems

If you feel discouraged by the amount of time it will take to get your digital marketing firing on all cylinders, you shouldn’t. Believe us — 12 months is going to fly by faster than you would have ever imagined. And if you are feeling overwhelmed by the sheer volume of tasks, trust us when we say that following the calendar we provided will help break everything down into easy, actionable tasks. 

We also know it can still feel overwhelming, but don’t worry, you got this. If you ever need clarification or some extra help getting pushed in the right direction, don’t hesitate to reach out. We are happy to help you—remember, we love seeing practices succeed. Preamble: If you are a new practice that is just starting out; a practice that has been around for a couple of years that found initial success by luck, chance, or happenstance; or a more established practice that is looking to reset or rebound from an unfortunate turn of events, then this guide is for you.