Last week, I posted on my Facebook page, asking if you found marketing to be icky or fun.

The resounding response was icky.

It got me thinking…

Why do we as Natural Medicine Practitioners have so many barriers around marketing?

What do you love the most about working with your clients?

Is it playing the detective in uncovering their health story?

Perhaps it’s playing the teacher as you educate them in their new lifestyle?

Maybe you love creating meal plans and helping them to discover a new world of food?

For me, it’s always been a combination of all of those things, and the joy of watching them return to health.

It’s like watching the Naturopathic principles play out with each person.

Vis medicatrix naturae – The Healing Power of Nature is evident as they change the foods they eat.

I love the challenge of Tolle causum (identify and treat the cause).

But my favourite would have to be Docere – Doctor as Teacher. Helping to educate my clients to understand the power of food, and how to harness it to optimise their health is incredibly rewarding.

There are so many different ways we can offer this knowledge to our clients.

It’s imperative to incorporate the different learning styles into our practice. You can do this by offering information in a multitude of formats and media.

Traditionally, I think most of us rely heavily on verbal explanations within the clinical setting.

Unfortunately, it’s so easy for clients to feel overwhelmed with all of the information. They forget most of it by the time they do up their seat-belt in the car on their way out.

Some try to get around this by taking notes during the consult. But this can be distracting for you as it breaks your train of thought when you have to keep stopping and repeating yourself.

So today, I’m going to share a few ideas of other ways you can help to educate your clients so that they undergo their health transformations with ease and clarity.

Clinic Handouts

are probably the most common educational aid that Practitioners use.

They have many benefits.

• You only have to create them once, and then you can print them out or email them as often as needed.
• You can make them look professional using software such as Microsoft Publisher or Canva.
• You can brand them with your logo and business colours.

Make sure to use easy to understand language. Remember, you’re not writing an academic article. Try to keep it to about a year 7 literacy level as clients come from many different educational backgrounds. Pictures and diagrams can be fantastic additions to help explain concepts too.

If you specialise in a particular area

such as fertility, women’s hormones, ADHD or thyroid health for example, you can take it one step further and create an ebook.

They can be anything from a couple of pages right through to a full length book depending on how much you have to say on the topic!

One of the things I love about ebooks, is that they are easy to share (like this) and they are a great way to build your authority and your business. You can sell them through your website or in your clinic. If they are longer, Amazon is a fantastic platform to gain exposure to a much wider audience. You can see how I have mine available as both Kindle and paperback here.

You can also include clickable links which is a fantastic way to drive people to your website.

I always recommend to my Practitioner clients that they include a promotion on the last page to a program that they are currently promoting. It is free advertising space for you! You can easily set it up so people can click straight through from the ebook to your sales page on your website.

Speaking of websites…

your blog is THE premier way to educate your clients.

One post a week gives you 52 opportunities each year to help your clients with their challenges.

You can offer them healthy recipes, tips to manage their stress, explain common blood tests, or go more into depth regarding the physiology of their condition so they have a deeper understanding of what is going on inside of their body.

It gives you a central repository of information to send your clients to. However it also showcases your knowledge and experience to potential clients who are actively looking for someone to help them on their journey to health.

Once you have written a blog post, it’s then easy to split it up into a few bite sized chunks to share on social media. This helps to educate even more people.

We all know how much misinformation is circulating online these days, so why not combat it with some good quality, reputable information that can actually help people!

If you’re feeling really adventurous…

then why not have a play with video? All you need is a smart phone these days to produce your own videos.

If nerves aren’t a problem, Facebook Lives are an easy place to start. You can write a short, bullet-point list of topics you’d like to cover and tape it to the wall behind your camera to keep you on track.

If you are a little nervous, then you can always pre-record and edit out any slip-ups. Pre-recorded video can be uploaded to both Facebook and YouTube. If you do Facebook lives, you can download them later and upload them to YouTube and your website to help even more people!

If you prefer chatting to writing…

podcasts are another fantastic platform to share your knowledge. Again, they are easy to set up, and if you’re not comfortable talking to yourself for 15-20 minutes, you can always invite other practitioners to come for a chat and share their experience with your patients.

I’ve actually been a bit tricky here.

Have you noticed what I’ve done?

Back to my Facebook post from last week.

What if instead of “marketing yourself”, “advertising your business” and “promoting your products”, you focused instead on educating your clients and spreading your message?

What if you put the focus on helping other people with the knowledge they need to improve their health and well-being, rather than on trying to get people to book in for an appointment?

Guess what?

That’s what marketing really is!

It’s about educating others with your knowledge, so that when they are ready to seek help, they know who to go to (You) and where to find them (Your Practice)!

If you still feel like it’s too hard…

you don’t have time, or it’s just not your thing, then I’d love to help.

Natural Medicine and writing are my two interwoven passions.

So if you need help with your website pages, blog articles, email newsletters or even client handouts, let’s have a chat about how I can support you so that you can support your clients.

Click the button below and book your free Exploration Call where we can talk about your individual needs, because I know every practice is as unique as every patient.