Today's Veterinary Practice

JUL-AUG 2012

Today's Veterinary Practice provides comprehensive information to keep every small animal practitioner up to date on companion animal medicine and surgery as well as practice building and management.

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PRACTICE STEP BY STEP | provide email addresses in order to receive news- letters/practice updates and offer free resources, which are the currency of the Internet, in exchange. For example, create and offer a downloadable PDF on Making the Most of Your Pet's Veterinary Visit as an incentive to "sign up." 4. Ask for permission to text your clients. While you may not start immediately, getting clients' permis- sion will allow you to be ready when you implement texting as part of your social media marketing plan. 5. Commit to quality content. Users want practical, up-to-date information they can use and that com- pels them to return for more. Position yourself as the expert in your field by sharing links to online sources or your own information, such as brief articles, vid- eos, or podcasts. 6. Advertise your online sites in the reception area and examination rooms. Have a computer in your reception area where clients can review your sites while they wait. Include site links on your invoices, emails, and other client communication. 7. Put information about visits/follow-up care on your website, which allows clients to review it prior to their visit or afterward. New client/pet forms can also be added to help expedite the first visit and familiarize new clients with your website. 8. Pay close attention to key word searches—opti- mum search engine ranking can come down to key words. Check out how to get the most out of searches by using the Google keyword tool (tinyurl. com/GoogleAdWords-Keywords). Table 2. How to Improve Website Traffic Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of ensuring your website has what it takes to make its way to the top of searches. Check out this starter guide: tinyurl.com/ GoogleSEOStarterGuidePDF. Post a video about pets or animals and watch it attract attention. Have inbound and outbound (other sites') links. This improves your position in searches. Make sure you are listed in business and professional directories and sites. Ask for recommendations to your site. Remind clients, business colleagues, employees, and others that love your practice that you need their recommendations. Talk about local issues to garner community interest in your opinions and practice. Hand out business cards and make sure they have your website address on them. Set up a QR code (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_ code) and post it in your reception area and examination rooms. 4 SOCIAL MEDIA OPTIONS How Practices Can Thrive in an Online Envi- ronment reviewed the different types of social media available. In order to integrate the social media you've chosen into your practice, develop a schedule to make sure it is updated on a regular basis. Do it your- self or delegate it to a trusted team member. r 4UBSU XJUI VQHSBEJOH ZPVS DVSSFOU XFCTJUFT r 5IFO MBVODI ZPVS 'BDFCPPL QBHF BOE 5XJUUFS account. r 3PVOE PVU UIF TDIFEVMF CZ MBVODIJOH ZPVS CMPH Feel free to set your goals according to what you want to achieve. You'll also have to decide how to handle issues that will arise. r *G B DMJFOU DPNQMBJOT PO ZPVS 'BDFCPPL QBHF IPX will you respond? r )PX XJMM ZPV TIBSF UIJT JOGPSNBUJPO XJUI ZPVS UFBN r %P ZPV XBOU ZPVS UFBN JOUFSBDUJOH XJUI DMJFOUT PO your social media sites? These are just a few examples, but they underscore the fact that you need to set up a social media policy with team members. Different policy examples can be found at davefleet.com/2010/07/57-social-media- policy-examples-resources. 5 MEASURE IT All goals must have a clear objective and an instru- ment of measurement. In social media this can be as simple as tracking the number of new clients who saw your Facebook page or tracking the number of email ad- dresses obtained. However, here are five tools that pro- vide better measurement results. Practices may use any combination or all of them. 1. Alerts identify if your business or name is mentioned online. Google Alerts (alerts.google.com) is a use- ful tool; Collecta (collecta.com) and Social Mention (socialmention.com) monitor social media sites for keywords, businesses, or individuals. July/August 2012 Today's Veterinary Practice 65 9. Implement social media sharing tools. These tools provide the option to Tweet, Facebook, or blog about something you have just read. Tools to set this up are plentiful; one of them is sharethis.com. 10. Claim everything—your name is your brand. Make sure to claim domain (website), Facebook, and other online names that you would like to use for your practice. Leveraging Social Media Communication

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