With over 500 million daily active users, Instagram is a great social media platform for marketing your Rheumatology practice.
It’s also relatively cheap; while you can pay to get your posts in front of more people, you can also expand your reach organically with a few clever tips and tricks.
If you’re not familiar with Instagram, it’s a social media platform that allows users to share photos and videos with their followers. Instagram has filters to help you edit your photos within the app and a “Stories” feature that lets you share small behind-the-scenes snippets from your practice. Research has shown that Instagram users are highly engaged, meaning they spend a lot of time browsing through, liking, and interacting with the accounts they follow.
Now that you know what Instagram is and why it’s such an addiction, here are a few tips for using this platform to promote your practice.
Share engaging photos.
Instagram is a visual platform, which means to stand out, you must share engaging photos. Now, “engaging” doesn’t necessarily mean “beautiful.” While we all like a stunning image, rheumatology practices might get more views when they share a before-and-after of a patient (with his or her permission, and without revealing any identifying information, of course! Be sure to give your staff a refresher course on HIPPA).
Other images with the power to engage that also stay on message include behind-the-scenes photos of your practice, healthy meal ideas, local events and attractions, and testimonials. The point is to show your followers and fans another more relatable side of your practice, inspiring loyalty and leading to more appointments.
Create captivating captions.
While the main event on Instagram is the image, the caption is still essential. This is where you can show off your creativity and personality, give your followers valuable information, tell your practice’s story, and promote your services.
You can also add your location, and if you use your city instead of your actual practice, you’ll reach a wider audience.
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Post consistently.
To keep your audiences engaged with your profile, you need to provide consistent content and lots of material. You have targeted potential patients; now it’s time to show them what makes you the best in the industry.
The more consistency you gain in likes, the more your Instagram posts will appear on their feed. If you are posting two or more times a day, you increase the possibility of gaining more likes and getting your audience to engage. However, posting on Instagram with high-quality posts multiple times a day requires time and effort. This is the challenge that most practices quickly learn when trying to grow their Instagram. While Instagram involves a lot of time and attention, but the return on investment is well worth the extra work.
Utilize purposeful hashtags.
Hashtags (a word preceded by the # symbol, like this: #rheumatology) allow you to categorize your photos and make them searchable. If you choose your hashtags wisely, you guarantee more people will see them. What’s more, you can lure people interested in your content, business, or services by “tagging” your photos with relevant words and phrases. For example, if you are posting about a new piece of medical equipment, you might use hashtags like #health, #healthcare, and #arthritis.
If you’re posting a feel-good photo at the beginning of the week to inspire your patients, hashtags like #MondayMotivation, #inspiration, and #smile would be more appropriate. If you want to highlight a patient’s story and the success of their treatment, the hashtag #TransformationTuesday will be crucial to your Insta-success!
Follow your target audience and engage with them.
If you consistently follow patients from your target demographic, be sure to utilize your main news feed to like, comment, and engage with them. Especially the people that interact with your posts.
While it can be a little time-intensive, you will see growth and reciprocated engagement you receive when you show a little Instagram love. Like their photos, and many will return the favor. This works to help get your posts out to more people because one of Instagram’s algorithm factors is the number of likes, so the more you receive, the more you will increase your overall impressions and brand exposure.
We hope these ideas help you launch a successful Instagram account for your rheumatology practice, reach new patients, and engage those you already have. Let us know how it goes!
Tags: Marketing, Marketing Dos and Donts, Marketing for Office Managers, marketing with instagram, medical office management, national organization of rheumatology managers, office management, office managers, social media marketing, tips for office managers Posted by
