If you haven’t already done it, now is the time to create a marketing strategy for your mental health practice for the new year. The beginning of January is a great time to set goals for your practice, including financial goals. And what better way to reach your financial goals than to ramp up your marketing?
If you’re thinking “how am I going to make any money if I spend it on marketing?” my response is: have you ever heard the phrase “it takes money to make money?” Marketing is an investment. There’s no doubt about that. But if you don’t market your practice you probably won’t meet your financial goals.
So before we get too deep into this, I have some questions for you. What do you want to accomplish this year with your business? What do you hope to get out of your marketing?
As you know by now, I’m a copywriter. I help therapists like you market themselves through writing. As a mental health professional, you don’t have time to spend on marketing. That’s why you hire someone like me, an expert mental health copywriter.
So let’s go back to my earlier questions about what you want to accomplish and what you hope to get out of your marketing. How can copywriting help you get there?
Copywriting Strategy is an Important Part of Your Marketing Plan
I recommend breaking the year up into quarters. From there you can come up with your financial goals and your client goals. Ask yourself:
- What’s the ideal number of hours you want to work?
- How many clients do you want to see a week?
- How much money do you want to make?
Once you’ve figured that part out, it’s time to find the right mental health copywriter. They’ll work with you to create your mental health marketing plan and copywriting strategy. Some things you might come up with are schedules for blogs and social media posts, new email sequences to welcome people to your email list, and your newsletters.
Each of you is going to need something different, but I always like to start in the same place. I find out what your goals are, who your ideal client is, and what your budget is. From there we create a copywriting marketing plan. This includes deciding how many blogs you’ll post a month, how often you’ll send out your newsletter, and how many emails you want in your automated sequence.
Have a Marketing Strategy Plan That Includes Hiring a Mental Health Copywriter
If you’re a therapist in private practice, you may not think you need to market yourself. You’d be wrong. How are you going to get new clients if you’re not putting yourself out there?
Your blogs should include search engine optimization (SEO) that helps boost your ranking in a Google search. Your mental health copywriter knows how to optimize your blogs for this purpose.
Maybe you need to revamp your website as part of your marketing strategy for the new year. Your mental health copywriter will be able to SEO-optimize the copy on your website to help rank you higher in Google searches.
You don’t need to spend all your money on a marketing firm. Hire a copywriter who can do the work for you. Copywriters take the time off your hands that you don’t have to spend on writing and marketing. They save you money when it comes to hiring a person to do your marketing because you’re not paying an employee.
When you have a copywriter that you know and trust, the rest is easy. Once you work with a copywriter for a few months you start to get to know each other. Your copywriter knows your voice. They know where you like your commas and the types of phrases you like to use. They also know how you like to work.
When I say the rest is easy, I don’t mean the work. Marketing and copywriting are hard work. But the relationship between you and your copywriter makes it feel easy.
Another bonus to working with a mental health copywriter is that they help you clarify your thoughts and marketing plan. I get feedback all the time from my clients saying that I’ve helped them have a better idea of what they’re trying to say. Working with a mental health copywriter on your marketing strategy can be a clarifying experience for you. It might even help you better understand what types of clients you want to work with. It’ll also help you understand your process better. You’ll begin to realize how you want to come across to the world.
Types of Mental Health Marketing Strategy Plans
I already touched upon some of these, but there are lots of ways you can work with a mental health copywriter. Copywriters write lots of different types of copy that will help market you. A few types are:
- Email marketing campaigns
- Social media ads
- Social media posts
- SEO-optimized blogs
- SEO-optimized website copy
- Strong Psychology Today profiles
Let’s start with email marketing campaigns. You’ll want to start or grow your email list with a strong opt-in that includes some kind of “freebie” that your audience gets once they sign up for your email list. Every time someone signs up for your email list they’ll get an automated email sequence, usually a total of 3-5 emails that they receive over the course of 5-7 days.
These automated email sequences are great for establishing a relationship with your audience. Once you’ve got that list, you’ll need to send out regular newsletters. Newsletters are a great way to continue to build and strengthen your relationship with your audience. Some of my clients prefer monthly newsletters while others prefer weekly or bi-weekly. It all depends on your marketing goals and what you and your copywriter came up with for your marketing strategy.
As a therapist, you might not want to use social media ads as part of your mental health marketing plan, and that’s ok. They’re not completely necessary for what you do. But social media posts are. Social media is another way to build a relationship with your audience. You need to post regularly and consistently.
Outsourcing your social media posting to your mental health copywriter is a great way to stick to the marketing plan without taking up too much of your time.
Blogs should be another part of your mental health marketing plan. These also need to be updated regularly. Your mental health copywriter will optimize your blogs for SEO purposes. They’ll work with you to bring your ideas to life.
Speaking of SEO, I mentioned SEO-optimized website copy. Kudos to you for writing your website yourself. But I’ll bet it’s not optimized for SEO because you didn’t know how to do that. Hence the reason it’s important to hire a mental health copywriter who knows their stuff when it comes to SEO. SEO is a huge part of a strong marketing plan.
I also mentioned Psychology Today profiles. This is a big part of your mental health marketing plan because Psychology Today is where a lot of people find you. When I’m searching for therapists on Psychology Today, if the profile isn’t well-written, I peace out and move on. It doesn’t matter how good of a therapist you are, if your profile isn’t well-written people are less likely to choose you. That’s just the way it is.
Getting Started in the New Year With a Strong Marketing Plan
If you’re ready to start creating a marketing plan for the new year with a mental health copywriter, send me a message, and let’s see how we can work together. Contact me today to get started. Happy marketing!