Helicopter Marketing & Why It's An Inconsistent Marketing Strategy

You're listening to podiatry marketing, conversations on building a successful podiatry practice with Tyson Franklin and Jim McAnnold. Welcome back to podiatry marketing. I'm your host, Jim McAnnold. Join us always, my trusty co host, Tyson Tyson Franklin. Tyson, how are you doing today?

I'm fantastic today, big Jim. And once again, so glad that I am trusty.

Well, we're over the 200 episode mark now. So, yeah, just the trustness continues.

I know. How good was last week's episode with Don Peltzer on? That was it was fun actually having a guest, and I think the other good part with Don too was you just go, Don, talk, and he does.

He's not afraid to talk for sure. He's got a lot of lot of knowledge and information to share in that in that head of his. Yeah. It was great to have him with us.

Yeah. And so if you're listening to if you went from 99, skip 200 for whatever reason and went to 201 because you were so eager to hear what I had to say, Go back one and listen to Don's because it was really good. It gives a lot of really cool information, but I love the point he kept stressing. Yeah. I'll tell you whatever you want because most people will hear it more and won't do it.

So I challenge everyone to prove Don wrong and follow the advice that he mentioned.

Sounds good.

Before I give the title of today's podcast, I'm gonna ask the listeners a question, and it is, do you only market your podiatry business when things are quiet, when patient numbers are down, or things feel slow? So now I'll pause for effect. Let that sink in. And if you do, you probably find that you're not alone. And falling into that stop start sort of marketing cycle, it's a common mistake.

A lot of podiatrists do it, and it's referred to as helicopter marketing. So that's what we're gonna discuss today. Today's topic is helicopter marketing and why is it an inconsistent marketing strategy.

I think it's a great topic because I think you like you're saying, people wanna turn the faucet on and off. Right? And when things are going really, really well, people are like, oh, I don't need the marketing anymore. I'm gonna save, you know, 2 to $3,000 a month and just kinda, like, coast here for a while. And then if things slow down, I'll just turn it back on and things will be totally okay.

So you're you're trying to tell us that that's not the way it should be done?

No. I remember my podiatry clinic. We used to we we would budget. It was probably it was it was all the I think it was 8% of whatever our gross turnover was for the month. We budgeted that that's what we were gonna spend on marketing the following month.

And that included adjustments to your website, like all your marketing involved. So we would budget. So we'd look at what we turned over for the year and go, okay, the next twelve months, this is what we're going to be budgeting every month for the next twelve months, regardless if we're busy or not. Even when we were absolutely flat out, we still had the same marketing going, which is why we never had a quiet month. And so the reason helicopter marketing is bad is because there is no consistency.

And without consistency, you cannot build momentum, which is what we did. We were always consistent, so the momentum was always going. And without momentum, your marketing, it costs more. It takes more energy to restart, and and it's actually it's more time consuming to keep trying to reignite it. I equate it very simply like going to the gym.

You you can go to the gym and you can smash yourself for a whole week. I went seven times this week and just did upper body because legs don't matter. And you could do that for a whole week, not go again for six months. That week was irrelevant. Whereas if you go consistently go, even if it's just twice a week, you do that every single week for six months, you will actually notice a difference.

I think that consistency is key is a is a huge component. I think, like you talked about, kinda comparing it to, you know, weightlifting or that's running. If you have a big week, after a point in time in six months, it's not gonna matter. Right? It's that what are you doing each day?

What are you doing every week on a consistent basis over months, quarters, years Mhmm. To kinda build that momentum to the point where you're having a full, you know, clinic calendar and agenda. So I, yeah, I think you break up a good point because I think, like you said, sometimes you would like just to jump in and do a little bit here and little bit there and then stop. And we take the your foot off the gas like that, that gives other people opportunities to jump in front of you, but also the different kind of channels you're you're you're kind of not being a consistent voice in anymore, and you're kinda almost re you kinda end up reintroducing yourself to the same people over and over again.

Yeah. And what we're saying, we're talking about the gym or we're talking about fitness. Everybody knows, if you get your fitness up to a certain level, you can take a week off, go on holidays, come back, and you're probably not really gonna notice too much change. But it's only because you you did it consistently. So the reason we use the well, I use the helicopter analogy and have for years is because a helicopter, to take off, it burns up a huge amount of fuel in comparison to once it's actually airborne and it's leveled out, it uses a lot less fuel to get from point a to point b.

But that initial part is a lot and then if it stops and has to land for whatever reason, it's gotta burn a huge amount of fuel again to basically get it up to get it back up into the air and airborne. And your podiatry marking is exactly the same, that stopping and restarting just cripples the momentum, and the amount of energy it takes to restart a campaign. Like I said, once again, it's like going to the gym. It's like running once every six months and wondering why you don't why am I not fit? I I ran twice this year.

That's a great point. Yeah. The the amount of effort to kind of to put in a campaign and to grow campaign and then just to turn it off and let it coast is is definitely yeah. That's some of the biggest frustrations I have when I work with the people that in in my in my line of work.

Well, I do the same even when it comes to business coaching. I will have I've had some people that I've worked with now for four or five years. Their clinics are turning over three, four times what they were when I met them, And their so the revenues way up, their profits way up, the amount of staff they got there have improved. The whole bit everything is fantastic because we slowly built up momentum over the years, and they're consistently just doing the work. I've had other people that have come to work with me for two or three months, feel they got what they needed, and I'll guarantee you, they've just gone back to doing the things the way that they were.

They may have had a little bit of growth, but not the type of growth they could have if they consistently just kept making these small improvements in the business. Now it's really important. A lot of people go, oh, so it's only new people that make this sort of mistake. Yeah. New business owners.

And that is true. New clinic owners, they have there's a lack of experience. They don't know any better. Or when they've set up the clinic, they've seen what a past employer has done because that's what they did. So they think that must be what you actually do because they don't yet understand the importance of consistency because they haven't basically done it.

Or they might have a bit of money concern. They've set up the business, oh, I've only got a certain amount of money. I've gotta be really careful where I spend it. So they spend a little bit and they stop. Spend a little bit and they stop.

And they don't realize that is not the way to basically do it.

That's a great point. I think those new clinic owners, you know, sometimes talk about, you know, more time than money. So not only is it just the amount, you know, eventually the budget spend, but it's also, are you going out visiting your your professional referrers, your nonprofessional referrers? You know, how are you being consistent with that? Or did you just did you just did it like a a one month a one week blitz of trying to see everybody, and then now you're just back in your your clinic for the next fifty one weeks.

Right? So it's not about this budget, but it's also sometimes your time getting out there and helping mark your practice when maybe you don't have the funds to sit back and do digital forms of marketing and other forms of marketing.

That's a great point. Yeah. It's not just about the money. It's it it is also the time. And I know some people, they'll put a podiatry sign up and they go, I now have a sign.

People are gonna come flocking in. But they don't realize if you don't have anyone in your clinic, then don't be in your clinic. You should be out and about meeting people and and and drumming up business. But like I said, it's not just the inexperienced business owners. Even people who have been around for years, they fall in exactly the same trap.

They they get complacent or because they've just got this, but this is the way we've always done it. And once again, it could be the last twenty years, they're just replicating what they've done, but this is what they were taught when they saw their original employer do this, or they have podiatry friends that are doing exactly the same thing. Or the other part they do, they only react to they react to the competition instead of following their own strategy. So instead of having a plan in place, they see the podiatrist down the road starts doing something, oh, I better do that. And that's just not the way to do it.

See, and you mentioned this before too. The common reactive patterns will be when business is quiet, they advertise. When it gets really busy, let's stop. We don't need any more work. And then they see a competitor advertise, so then they advertise.

The competitor stops. Well, now nobody's advertising. We'll stop as well. It's just this constant stop, start. It is a business killer.

No. It's a great point because it's like you said, sometimes when you're seeing what other people are doing, you're not kind of following your own strategy. I think having your own strategy and understanding why they're doing what they're doing when it comes to marketing is a huge part of what I try to provide when I'm working with folks to let them know why we're doing what we're doing. Right? Because I think sometimes, you know, they're bit owners are busy.

You know, they're seeing patients. They're taking care of their staff. You know, sometimes they can lose a little bit of the eye and the ball as far as what we're trying to accomplish. But if you have a a good written marketing strategy, you know, and it's something that's updated, you know, quarterly or every six months, then you're kinda on that same I'm on the same page with the people I work with. So they know what I'm doing and what I'm trying to accomplish for them.

And it makes much more sense because if you let, you know, three, six months, twelve months go by and there hasn't been at least some communication about what we're doing, the results, and how it's impacting the clinic. I think, you know, a lot of clinic owners just kinda just get busy. They're not they kinda forget what was what was happening, and they wanna be caught back up. And, you know, they see, you know, two to three or four thousand dollar marketing bill each month, and they kinda forget about what the goal of the plan was if they don't have a a written strategy and and kind of understand what the marketing fighter's doing for them.

Yeah. And part of it too is, like, some of the problems and why it happens is they blow their budget, so they just go they go too hard, too fast. All the money is basically gone. Therefore, they're actually forced to stop. They don't have a choice.

I've run out of money before they've run out a month. So they really don't have any choice. The other part, mistakes often happen because, like you said, there's just no planning. They didn't sit down there and just plan out what it was they were trying to trying to achieve. Or and this is a common one, seen this happen numerous times.

They're they're oversold by a really smooth talking sales rep who makes everything sound good. And I'm gonna talk a little bit more about sales reps in a sec. All they're spending their money on the wrong platforms and targeting the wrong patients. So they've got all this money, and they're putting it on a certain online platform because they've seen another podiatrist do it. They don't realize, hang on.

Your patients aren't there. Or they're they're advertising to a certain group of patients who don't want them. So it's it's really heavy. So the big lesson is just to pace yourself with your money, you know, that's why you need to have a plan and stick to your strategy. But first, you actually need to have a strategy.

Because if you don't have a strategy, it's hard to stick to something you don't have.

Well, it's like you talked about. I think that sometimes there can be a bit of that FOMO marketing, right? Not necessarily marketing something because you want those patients to come into your practice. They're your ideal patient. Like you talked about, maybe they're not the right patient for you or you're not the right doctor for them.

But you're just kind of seeing what other people are doing when you're just kind kinda of running around the chick like a chicken with its head cut off. As far as that person's doing that, so I'm gonna do that. Or I heard this new thing really works, so I'm gonna try that. You're gonna run into issues, like you said, with budget spend, not knowing what works and not being deliberate about type of patients you're going after.

Yeah. But I find I see exactly the same thing happens in the whole business coaching industry. And and I I I tell people upfront, I'm not like other business coaches. I I'm not gonna start shooting videos and holding something and go, hey. I've got this technique here where you send this email, and you'll get 48 new patients.

Yeah. Next month, here. Here's 15 people that I've worked before who would tell you why it works. And I'm like, that's BS. You you can't send an email to someone that is not already on your database.

It just doesn't work that way. Not in Australia anyway. And I'm sure it's probably the same overseas. So what they're not telling you, you're sending an email to existing patients. Yes.

You might get 48 of them come back. How many did you annoy to get 48? So that took so sending emails to existing patients is not a difficult thing to do, but I just I refuse to fall when I see them doing that, I go, I refuse to follow what they're doing. And and I think podiatrists gotta learn from that when you see other podiatrists doing something. Just because they feel comfortable doing it doesn't mean that you should.

It may not suit what it is that you're doing. So first, build a twelve month marketing calendar. I think we've discussed that on a previous episode. But I I talked about

We have.

Yeah. Yeah. In my workshops, you've gotta have a marketing plan for the twelve months. It's set in sand. You can move things around.

It doesn't mean it's set in concrete. I always say the only thing set in concrete is Jimmy Hoffa. That's my ongoing joke there, Jim. If anyone's been to one of my marketing workshops, they would have heard that joke. So you gotta factor in things like seasonal sports, football codes, athletics, school holidays impacting children's foot health.

That's really important. Other things to factor in, local events. Are there shows in your area? Are there fun runs? Which we talked about running clubs on episode one ninety nine.

Go back and listen to that one if you missed it. And but being part of fun are there fun runs in your area? Are there health expos in your area that you can actually tap into? But what's just as important in tapping into all that is preparing your assets in advance. And what I mean by assets is having brochures, having business cards.

You might have some free books that you can hand it. You might have you might need banners for different events, some form of signage for for your different promotions. The benefit of having all that in place before you need it is when all of a sudden opportunity just pops up, bang. You know, you're not scrambling around going, oh, hang on. We what do we normally take for this talk again?

You have this all it's part of your plan. You have a document. When we do a talk, this is what we take. Here's that box. We actually have it all in.

Pick the box up. Take box with you. Open box. Display box. It's it is actually sometimes it sounds really it sounds too simple, but that's all you really need to do.

I think that I think you make a good point there, and it's kinda like we talked about previously tonight. If you don't have a plan, you're just gonna be kinda going everywhere. Right? Like, you just you're gonna get caught up in the FOMO. You're gonna get caught up caught up in the hype as sort of marketing channel.

So you really need to sit back, understand who you are, type of patients you want. Obviously, maybe what's worked in the past, what are those kind of high ROI opportunities that you can either really kind of execute on. Because like you said, if you don't have a plan to execute it, you're just gonna you're gonna fail before you even get started.

Yeah. And it's important to just learn the consistency over just these bursts of advertising that some people do. Repetition builds recognition, basically. The more you're doing it, the more people see you, the more they recognize who your business is. One ad consistently over a twelve month period is gonna beat one week of you just totally smashing your your marketing and then doing nothing else.

And marketing should feel like a like a drip campaign, like drip irrigation, not like a fire hose. It's not something where you're bursting it out there. And patients will trust the business that they see on a regular basis. There was a I don't if I ever mentioned on here before. Golden Drop Winery was a company still is a company up here in Cairns.

Mentioned to anybody, you heard of Golden Drop Winery, everybody says yes. They only used to advertise after 10PM at night because it was really cheap on television. And and this is a bit before the Internet was as big as what it is now. People still watch TV. But what was interesting is they were always on between 10PM and midnight, every night of the week.

It was dirt cheap. Just dirt cheap for them to be advertised. It's it's the only place they ever advertised. Nearly everybody at some stage would come home after 10PM, would punk themselves on the lounge, flick on the TV, and you would see one of the ads at some stage. It was just it was always it.

They were so consistent. And when it I could be asked anybody in Cannes who had a Golden Drop winery, everyone goes, yeah. Have you ever seen their ads? No. I probably haven't seen one of their ads for five years because I don't watch normal TV anymore.

But people still remember it just because of that consistency. And the other analogy I like to use with this, just about being consistent, is a farming analogy. And this was in my book. I said if a farmer had a 100 trees and he had enough fertilizer to just fertilize them once for the year, but he only fertilizes them once for the year, they won't bear any fruit. They must be fertilized twice.

So the farmer has a choice. Do I fertilize all the the trees once and get no fruit, or do I fertilize half the trees twice and get fruit and actually have something to take to the market? And that's what and that is the the thing between being consistent but also being frequent with what you're doing. Not just blurting out there once and then hoping something's gonna happen. And sales reps, sometimes they will talk about reach.

How many people that you can actually reach with marketing? Sometimes it's frequency and consistency is a little bit better.

No. You're that awareness piece. Right? So you're kind of top of mind. Yeah.

If you just blast people one time, you're it's you're easy to ignore. But if you have something valuable that they are that at least they see as valuable and you're there on a consistent basis, the name recognition of those things will be much more evident.

Always check. Does it fit in your budget? Whatever it is you're going to do, just make sure does it fit within your budget because you don't wanna blow it. Will it attract your ideal patient? So really think about who do you want more of in your clinic?

Do you want more people that have no money, who complain about your fees, win you complain constantly, chew up all your time? If you don't want those people, stop marketing to them. Think about who is your ideal patient and only marketing to them. You've mentioned this before, what's your return on investment? What can you expect?

And then is it the best use of your money compared to other options? So if you're looking at, should I put my money here or put my money somewhere else? Where do you normally get the biggest bang for your buck? That's where you should be putting your money. And and if you have that that thinking in place, when all of a sudden some it helps avoid shiny object syndrome where, oh, here's a great idea.

I'm gonna go and do that. And and especially when a rep comes up and they do one of their amazing sales pitches, and they can make things sound a lot better than what they are. What I used to is that if you take nothing else away from this episode, you might wanna replay this part I'm about to talk about now, is if a sales rep comes to you and they've got an idea, something that they wanna sell to you, ask them these three questions. First question, can you tell me what a podiatrist does? Most will get that wrong.

Second question, do you think or who do you think is my ideal patient? Once again, they will get that wrong. And the third thing is and this one, I just absolutely love. I always ask them. So what did you like most about my website?

And most will never look. The smart sales reps will check out your website. They will actually base on your website, have an idea who your ideal patient is and be able to tell you, and they will also tell you what a podiatrist does with confidence. If they can't do that, walk away. Go and find somebody else that that actually does.

No. I like I like those three questions, I also like that section before that. You know, like sometimes, depending on where you're at in your marketing, you know, you have to build a stable foundation, especially when you're doing digital things. Right? If you have, you know, you've heard great things about some ad platform or you have you think you heard that Google Ads work the best.

But if the Google Ads are sending people to your website and you have a terrible website from 1995

Yeah.

So things have to be done in a stepwise fashion and you need to understand kind of the kind of the normal way that it's gonna be the best way to kind of for you to build that foundation. So yeah. Like but the the three questions are great because they need to know, you know, who you are, what you do, who you want to be your patient, and then kind of get a general sense of take that time to know who you are by looking at your website. So I love those those three questions as well.

Yeah. Because I do. I recall a member of sales rep walking in one day and said, oh, we've got this this idea for you. We think it's gonna be absolutely fantastic for your for your podiatrist. I said, oh, great.

I said, yeah. So what's podiatrist do? This is how I figured out these questions. Went, oh, yeah. Like you guys, you cut toenails and and all that.

I went, oh, right. Okay. I said, and who's my ideal patient? Who would tell you? Oh, this thing is perfect for, like, old people that can't reach their feet and, you know, they'll this is where we're gonna be doing all the marking.

And I went, oh, okay. And then I eventually told them, well, actually, we do orthotics and sports, and now I deal patient and explain to us, oh, yeah. This this marketing campaign will be perfect for them. I'm like, really? So that's when I finish up.

What do like most about my website? Oh, have you got a website? Oh, Jesus. So yeah.

Sorry, bro.

So anyway, just the last thing I just wanna finish on is just remember, marketing should be consistent, planned, and it should be sustainable. Once your momentum builds, it is cheaper and it's easier to maintain. If you need any help with this, reach out to Jim, reach out to myself, and just repeat I've mentioned before, but this is a quote that was written down. It just said repeating a message daily for a year beats shouting at 365 times in one day. So that's what I'm gonna finish on.

That's great, Tessa. No. I definitely agree. It's a it's a an important topic because that consistency piece is something that we get busy. I know that even in my own, health, running, I sometimes will take off a period of time.

But just being consistent in your marketing and in your life can really create fantastic results. So it's a great topic tonight.

I'm glad you enjoyed it, Jim. And I look forward to talking to you next week.

Sounds great, Tyson. Okay. See you later. Bye now. Thanks for listening to Podiatry Marketing with Tyson Franklin and Jim McDonnell.

Subscribe and learn more at Podiatry Marketing. That's the website address, podiatry.marketing.