If you’ve been reading along with this month’s posts, you should have a very basic understanding on what blogging is, why your chiropractic business needs a blog and what role social media plays in growing your chiropractic presence online.

Now, let’s take a look at a simple way to get your feet wet within social media and how to use it to find a chiropractic audience that desires what your services provide BEFORE you even launch your blog.

The reason why I emphasized the word before is because you don’t have to have a blog before you get started in social media. Matter of fact, it is to your best interest to start using social media immediately so that you can develop a following of interested prospects and loyal patients as soon as possible.

One of the best social media platforms I’ve found to use before launching a blog is Twitter. One of the reasons is because it’s easily searchable for prospects using specific keywords. Remember, it’s not about you, it’s about them. So, if you’ve done your homework correctly, you can simply pull out your keyword search list and start plugging them into Twitter’s search query.

You can even narrow the search down to your geographical area. For example, you can use a free service like NearbyTweets to find prospects based off of your location and keywords.

Once you’ve located these individuals, you can follow them by clicking on the follow button associated with their Twitter username. Then, indirectly join in on the conversation by either tweeting about your services or how your business solves problems for your prospects.

As you monitor the timeline, make sure you pay attention to both the replies and direct message sections. If your tweets contain valuable content, you’ll notice that others will either comment on it, retweet it or want to directly communicate with you about it. When this occurs, make sure you honor the conversation by responding back.

Social media is about the conversation. You must join in on the conversation to build relationships. If you don’t and just start blasting your message into the timeline, you’ll not only be ignored but will also lose followers. You’ll then have a difficult time inviting people to visit your blog once it’s launched.

Another “must do” is to customize your Twitter profile page. Make sure you add an avatar or photo of yourself as well as a very specific bio on who you are and what you provide. A great deal of people want to know this before following you. If you don’t provide it, it’s a sure way of being ignored and looked over. So, take the time and fill it out.

Also, make sure you inform your patients that you are on Twitter. Since most of them won’t know what you’re talking about, you’ll need to introduce and educate them on its importance. One of the best ways to accomplish this is through a patient newsletter or email. In the newsletter, encourage them to sign up for their free account by providing Twitter’s URL. Also, be sure to encourage them to follow you so that they can be the first to know about exciting things happening in your practice.

In closing, the neat thing about social media is that the possibilities are endless. It simply comes down to your creativity and what you decide to accomplish. If you harness the power of Twitter, you’ll definitely build a healthy following before the launch of your chiropractic blog. It’s this following that can add to its ultimate success and inevitably to your practice’s bottom line.

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Tagged as: Social Media, Twitter