When you are connecting up your Cliniko with your Keap Max Classic account and going down this whole path of communicating with your customer, I want you to think about more than just that one thing of sending a regular newsletter out to your database and think that’s going to be enough.

Because just sending a regular newsletter out isn’t going to be enough to engage your database, number one.

But also on the flip side of that, it’s kind of like catch 22. Just sending the newsletter out also isn’t going to give you the domain health and the domain reputation to be able to get into the inbox for everyone to just read the newsletter.

So there’s some key things that I want you to start thinking about so that you can keep your domain reputation up here.

In the following content-rich video I share what your domain health is and what you need to do to protect yours.

See what happens is this: when you send an email to your database and altruistically, all we want to do is give them some content, give them some help and show them some things that we’re doing, of course, don’t we?

But if that’s all you’re doing and just sending those emails and those emails only what happens is this: when you’re sending those emails, every time it goes to the inbox or goes to an email provider – say Gmail, for example – every time it goes there and gets opened and you get a tick against your name. Every time it doesn’t get opened you get a cross against your name and it goes against your reputation.

Now the average email open rate is about 19 to 20%.  And so if we’re sending and only 19 to 20% of our database is opening our emails, then what happens is every time we send an only 20% opens, then all of the Gmails and the Hotmails and the Yahoos and every email provider of the world put us into the, “Oh, these people are only sending to 20% of their list or only 20% are opening from their list” category.

You’re going to go and get a black mark against your name.

Now, if you get your open rates up higher and your engagement up higher, then your domain reputation goes up as does your reputation with all those email providers. And instead of going inside into the promotions tab, you go into the inbox then, and it gives your domain health the boost that it needs.

So there are a lot of things we need to think about when we go into this engagement process, other than just sending a newsletter every month and thinking that will be enough.

But why would you want to?

Because if you follow this process, you can actually get more bookings. We usually see about 10 to 20% more bookings on average, after about a six week process of starting to follow this.

Some simple things you can do to get your engagement up and then get more re-bookings as a result of that as well.

Five of them to do today – there are more strategies, but we’ll just go through five today.

1. So the first one, the engagement has to start from the first time someone books in for an appointment with your clinic.

Every single new customer to your clinic should go through an indoctrination series. And that indoctrination series should welcome them. They should be able to start developing a relationship with your clinic and start to get to know what it’s going to be like when they get there. What they can expect? Some people booking in for the first time may never have been to your clinic before and so making them feel at ease is going to help them attend. It’s also going to help the engagement by getting that trust building component.

And also, if I know some entry points that are difficult to find, then walking them up the stairs or taking them down the path, so to speak, literally, and showing them where to come in and what to do and that sort of thing, then what’s going to happen when they get there – it’s going to help. So that’s your indoctrination series.

2. Then we have to keep the engagement going with those regular broadcasts – fortnightly or monthly.

We want to get good quality content out to our database so that they engage with us. Don’t just sell, sell, sell this offer, that offer, this offer, that offer, because that’s going to decrease our engagement with the database and then decrease our domain reputation.

3. Another good time to communicate and engage with someone is when they’ve got a problem.

“Oh, I’ve got a sore neck or a sore lower back or a sore knee.” When that happens and they come in and they have that problem you can start a series of exercises. And I know you give the exercises when they’re in the clinic and you’ve prescribed these exercises, but how many of your customers do you think take it all in or still have that piece of paper, or remember the exercises that you’ve told them? I know, not many.

And so you can actually give them an engagement series about their sore neck – “What are the exercises I should be doing?” – and have that follow up with them and help them through the process.

4. When someone engages in a particular part of your newsletter, send them more of it.

Say your newsletter has got some tips on running or some tips on swimming or cycling tips or something like that.

I’m just focusing on sports here at the moment. It doesn’t have to be sports though, but if someone clicks on the running info, you can segment them and then just send all the running stuff to the people that have clicked through on the running info and send them more of what they want and less of what they don’t want.

Automatically segment the database and people are more likely to engage in the things that they’ve engaged in already.

5. And then the last one, when someone buys a product, send them an engagement series on how to use it.

So perhaps it’s a foam roller or a spiky or anything that’s going to help them.

You’re going to tell them about how to use it in the clinic and probably half of that is going to be forgotten. Only half of that is going to be remembered.

But you can have an engagement series about the times when it should be used and how it should be used and how you can use it to the best advantage and follow up with them. Follow up by email, follow up by SMS, even follow up by Bonjoro – which is a great app to do so – you can help your customers get the most out of that product. And then they’ll be coming back to you for more of that as well.

So five key things to think about:

  1. Engagement from when someone first books with your clinic.
  2. Regular broadcast – every fortnight or every month.
  3. When someone has a pain point – neck, back, knee, whatever it might be – follow up with some exercises for them. Make sure it’s all good value stuff that’s really important to them.
  4. When somebody engages in a part of your newsletter, follow up with them more about that specific topic. For example, running – give them a running series; swimmers – give them swimming information; so forth and so on.
  5. And then the fun one, the fifth one is when someone buys a product, follow up and engage with them to make sure they get the most out of that product.

So there are five key points now to get started with. There are many, many more, but these five are good ones to get started on.