As a small business owner, it would be a mistake to assume that the goal of your digital marketing campaign should be to “go big.” Yes, it’s true that social media sites like Facebook, Twitter/X, Instagram, and others connect us together in ways that would have been unthinkable in decades past.
But if you’re running a decidedly niche business like a physical therapy practice, it’s not the biggest possible audience you should be targeting. It’s the right audience – meaning the people who live and work right in your own backyard.
According to one recent study, about 46% of all Google searches have some type of local intent. People aren’t searching for a physical therapist in the general sense. They’re searching for “physical therapist near me” or “physical therapist open now.” That’s part of the reason why localization matters such a great deal.
Plus, in the fast-paced digital world that we’re currently living in, localization can be a great way to get noticed at a crucial part of the customer journey. Another study indicated that about 81% of people say they actively want to shop locally. Localizing your online presence is one way to lean directly into that. Leveraging social media in particular to do so is always a good idea for a number of key reasons, all of which are worth a closer look.
How Does Using Social Media Platforms Help to Localize Your Online Presence?
Recently, it was revealed that about 97% of people say they learn more about local companies online than anywhere else. If someone is going to find your physical therapy practice for the first time, it’s likely going to be online. Because the physical therapy industry is inherently competitive, sometimes that local angle is all you really have to stand out.
Sure, once you get someone in the door, the quality of your services will keep them coming back for more. But to attract their attention in the first place and to get to that point, you need to pull out all the stops when it comes to localization.
Localizing your online presence helps build trust in potential customers who just want to be certain that you are capable of what you say you can and that you’re going to be able to solve whatever problem they are focused on. It’s also an opportunity to build connections within your local community, which people have shown they are in favor of.
Social media in particular is important because it checks a number of key boxes, all at the same time. It’s like a virtual “town square,” so to speak, in that people use it to both share their opinions about businesses they like and dislike, and they go searching for information about new businesses they may be unaware of. It’s also where people do a tremendous amount of research before spending money.
Choosing the Right Social Media Platforms For Your Business
Naturally, one must acknowledge that not all social media platforms are created equally. They all have their own unique strengths. Facebook is great for long-form content, where Instagram plays more to visual elements like pictures and videos. The same is true of Pinterest. TikTok is great for short bursts of content, and it also skews towards a younger audience. LinkedIn is a great way to reach a more professional audience.
When putting together your local social media tactics for physical therapists, you need to identify the platforms that are most relevant to your business, your industry, and your target audience. That can absolutely be multiple social media sites if the situation calls for it. Just remember to make sure you have a consistent brand presence across all social media platforms you use to avoid confusion moving forward.
How to Set Up Your Social Media Profiles for Greater Local Search Visibility
Regardless of the social media site you’re talking about, always set up your profile by first creating a compelling and locally-focused bio. Let people know who you are, why you do what you do, and how you can help them. Incorporate as many local keywords and hashtags as possible to give people an idea of exactly where you serve.
You should also utilize location-based features that are available to you. Some social media sites encourage you to add your business’ physical address, for example.
How to Infuse Your Content Strategy With Location Signals
Moving forward, you need to work to create the type of content that resonates with your local community. There will always be certain “evergreen” topics you should cover, but you should also dive directly into topics that may only matter to your precise local audience. The more relevant and specific that content is, the more it will resonate.
Never overlook an opportunity to showcase your physical therapy practice’s community involvement and support. If you participate in a local event, don’t be afraid to write a blog post about it or record a quick video for TikTok.
Likewise, always highlight local testimonials and success stories. Show prospective customers the joy and satisfaction that existing local customers are getting out of their relationship with you.
Use Social Media as a Way to Engage Your Local Community
Sites like Facebook have many local groups and community forums for you to participate in. Not only can you find physical therapist groups, but you may even be able to find groups that are specific to the city you’re actually operating in. Participate in these groups whenever you can because you never know what connections you might make.
When people leave you reviews and feedback on social media, always respond publicly. Address any criticism or concerns in the most fair, thorough way possible to show people what it is like to deal with you.
Another part of your local social media tactics for physical therapists can involve running local promotions on social media. If you offer promos that people can’t get elsewhere, this will train them to follow you and pay attention to what you post.
Always make sure that you’re engaging with as many local businesses in the community as possible. If you play your cards right, you might be able to break a little piece of their audience off and make it your own.
Enhance Your Local Visibility With Social Media Advertising
It’s important to make every last marketing dollar count, and always target local audiences through platforms like Facebook and Instagram advertising. These tools let you leverage geotargeting features for specific local promotions. It’s the type of precision you’d be hard-pressed to match on your own.
Collaborate With Your Customers to Create Local, Authentic Content (User-Generated Content)
Whenever someone leaves your physical therapy practice satisfied, encourage them to share their experience by leaving you a review on Facebook and your Google Business Profile. You can’t promise them anything for free in exchange for a positive review – doing so would violate some platform’s regulations. But if they’re already happy, and they want to help, leaving reviews is the perfect chance to do that.
Another way to collaborate with your customers involves running local contests and campaigns that involve your audience to boost engagement. You could repost or reshape user-generated content across your various social media platforms, for example. This can cut down on your content creation expenses and can help better engage with your audience as well.
Analyze Engagement and Reach to Determine the Best Course of Action
Finally, always set up analytical tools to track local engagement and visibility when it comes to your local social media tactics for physical therapists. You cannot improve that which you are not measuring – end of story. You wouldn’t want to be making choices based on gut instinct or intuition. You want to do so based on cold, hard facts that support your intuition.
Analyze different metrics to understand the effectiveness of your current localization strategies. Look at how your organic reach, engagement, leads generated, revenue, and other KPIs improve over time. When you make changes to what you’re doing, return to these metrics to see what real, tangible impact they had.
Always make data-driven adjustments. Don’t make the mistake of ignoring the true story that the numbers are trying to tell you.
Surefire Local: Your Partner in Social Media Success
But above all else, one of the most important things to understand about local social media tactics for physical therapists is that none of this is something that you “do once and forget about.” Thanks to the rate at which social media platforms in particular evolve, localizing your online presence is always an ongoing affair. It’s just that the various social media platforms tend to provide an easy way to maintain that online presence without taking too much time out of your day.
Especially if you look at the last decade, social media has only become more important. It’s how we communicate with one another. It’s how we get our breaking news. It’s an essential part of the digital-first customer journey, which is why it also needs to be the centerpiece of your localization efforts for your physical therapy practice.
When executed properly, there is always the possibility of increased visibility in specific zip codes. This leads to better customer engagement, which in turn gives way to an era of newer and more organic business growth. All this is accomplished by optimizing your social media profiles with local and relevant information – things that Surefire Local was built to accomplish.
The Surefire Local platform, as the name implies, is designed to help small businesses like your physical therapy practice with all your localized online marketing needs. Our platform helps you create local signals across various platforms and profiles, all of which make it easier for new customers to find you.
One of the major draws to that end comes by way of website/local SEO optimizations. By creating geotagged content that is published to your social media profiles, your website, your blog, and more, you’re able to significantly boost visibility in local search rankings. There is a number of other innovative features our platform includes but are not limited to ones like:
- Online review management. Surefire Local offers the tools needed to send review requests, write responses to reviews, analyze your brand sentiment, and more – all to learn exactly what your customers think about your business.
- Content marketing. It’s never been easier to create locally targeted and relevant content for your blog, Google Business Profile, social media profiles, and the various business directories that are out there.
- Social media management. Surefire Local can act as your “one-stop shop” for scheduling posts, tracking engagement metrics, and even responding to comments that people are leaving.
- Analytics and reporting. Not only will you have total visibility into the return that every marketing dollar is generating for you, but our AI-generated recommendations can also highlight specific areas to improve, too.
Note that there are also educational resources like webinars and blogs available that are intended to help small businesses like yours tap directly into all things local online marketing. So if you’re ready to make social media a core component of your customer’s digital-first journey, or if you’d just like to learn more about local social media tactics for physical therapists in general, please don’t delay – click here to attend a Surefire Local demo or contact us today for more.