Monday, December 17, 2012

How to use bad online reviews to build your business

By Maritn Avery


I pointed out during the last blog a technique that's widely used to get rid of unfavorable online reviews is to construct mini-sites, optimizing them where they start to rank highly on the search engines and therefore, knocking down the negative review website in order that they drop further and further in Google's ranking so nobody will see them. Even though this is an useful technique, the issue lies in the fact that Google gives such authority to these sites and ranks them so high that it's very difficult to drop their ranking. As a result, normally it takes a very VERY long time to see results.

In truth, once you're able to bury internet websites, it usually is too late and you'll have been forced to close down your clinic. So action has to be swift and effective because the most of your potential patients are sure to see these reviews before coming to see you, you have turn these internet websites in your favor. More vital than being swift and effective, is that every step of your efforts really need to be performed correctly from the start.

As mentioned in my last blog, having your patients respond to these negative comments with positive comments is a very powerful way. However, since writing the last blog, I had a number of docs emailing me stating that instead of having their patients write a positive review, they did it themselves. That is to say, the docs wrote fake reviews.

The result they were called on it! Meaning, people posted within the thread that the doc wrote comments themselves and that they were totally fictional, therefore further doing damage to their credibility. And overcoming this is exceptionally hard. Unfortunately, even genuine comments could be detrimental to you because they too can be mistakenly called out as phony.

However, there is a better way and like I just mentioned, it's by transforming these detrimental review site(s) into practice building and reputation building engines!

How do you do that? Before I answer that, let me state this in order to have skeptical people listen to you, you've got talk to them where they are most at ease, most comfortable and more importantly, where they are most receptive and open to your message. And where is that? At their home! Now you're probably saying "Why would anyone let me into their house to allow me to explain myself?"

Well, I'm not suggesting that you do this, but should you do this and they did let you in, you'd know for sure that they're interested in hearing whatever you had to say, that they'd offer you a chance to explain and that they'd probably be more ready to visit your office as a new patients once they heard your side of the story. Right? Right.

Well, thankfully with the technology these days, it is possible to reach these individuals inside their homes without even stepping inside. And it comes in the way of "WEBINARS". That is, live online seminars that you can perform while in front of your webcam that people can watch on their computers from the comfort of their house.

So going back to my last point, if people were to let you in their homes (by watching you live on their computer) aren't they giving you a chance to explain yourself? Wouldn't they be more receptive to your message? And wouldn't they be more likely to give you a chance and book a consultation with you? Answer Ya, they would be!

So here's the easy and very successful strategy to turn these damaging online review sites in your favor and build your practice just as before.

Simply write a post on the site, needless to say within the thread where all bad comments are, and say something to the effect

"Hello All, This is Dr. X and I was told of these comments from a patient of mine who saw them. Needless to say, I am shocked and saddened by these comments as we at clinic name have always made it our mission to provide the best care possible to our patients in a warm and loving environment. Although, it's impossible to help everyone, we do everything we can for all of our patients. But there are some patients that have not been satisfied and have decided to post on this site. We would like to set the record straight and we invite everyone to watch and talk to us live online, from the comfort of your home, in an open Q&A format where I will answer all you questions and show you what our clinic is really like.Please give us a chance to explain and join us on every Date & Time by going to webinar domain and just for taking the time to listen to us, we would also like to give you a special gift.. Yours, Dr. X"

Before I get more into webinars, i want to address this invitation.

Again, these review sites are going to be ranked high on Google for a long, long time and you have to handle these comments straight away and show the readers that you've absolutely nothing to hide and you want to re-establish your good name. Write in an informal and humble manner so that you will appear like real down to earth person instead of some stuck up doctor. Having positive comments is one thing, but allowing people to actually watch you, relate to you and be able to have their concerns answered, is priceless and far more powerful in re-establishing yourself.

Now, there are going to essentially be two types of people that are going to make a point of watching you. People who are wanting to hear you out and give you a chance to explain yourself and people that are curious to see the doc that everyone is bashing. Either way, these are all potential new patients. NOT ONLY THAT, but when these people get to know the real you and realize how caring you are and how you have been misrepresented, not only will they come in as potential patients, but they will spread the word about you AND may even write a positive post on the review site. So over time, not only will you save your clinic from shutting down, but you'll gain new patients and more importantly, the negative comments on the review site will be disregarded by visitors.

To be maximally effective, I suggest that you hold a live webinar each week for around 30 mins so that you can reach as many people as possible.

Side Note: Once you see how highly effective webinars are, you are going to most likely carry on doing them for all your Health Care Talks, Lunch & Learns, Health Care Booths etc. because you'll not only will you have the ability to reach the people right in front of you, but you'll be able to always reach the 100's if not 1000's of people online. Imagine the amount of new patients you can now potentially get!!

Where can you go to find a webinar service? Well, there are several that you can find online. One of the best is Gotomeeting, but for the most part, they are all quite good. But there are a few drawbacks with these services.

1. Cost: Since you have to be charged any time you use their service, pay for the duration of your webinar, the number of attendees and up-sell features (e.g. webinar host/co-ordinator) it can get very costly.

2. Different Access Code - every time you hold a webinar, you'll be given a different access code to give to your attendees. So as opposed to posting only one time for all of your upcoming webinars, you'll must make several posts. Problem with this is the fact review sites probably will block your posts because they will be deemed similar. Consequently, your future webinars won't have attendees.

3. Webinar is not linked to your website - webinar services are not attachable or embeddable into your website. This is a major downfall because viewer of your webinar may want to get more information about your clinic so having the webinar embedded into your website makes your information easily accessible to your visitors and increases the likelihood of them booking an appointment. People are fundamentally lazy and the more steps it takes to get something, the less likely people will take action. So without having your webinar embedded, you will lose potential patients.

4. No downloadable options - skeptical people generally won't make quick decisions nor making financial commitments. So during your webinar, viewers must have the option of downloading a Gift Certificate with some kind of promotional offer (e.g. FREE examination and Initial treatment)

There is however a better way. An even better webinar option and it successfully addresses all of the above issues and enables you to maximize your viewer-to-new patient conversion. Furthermore, now you can hold as many webinars as you would like and at any length of time as you want. And the best part the cost is pennies! Promodocs chiropractic website developers has created built-in website webinar feature (exclusive to Promodocs chiropractic websites) that enables you to direct viewers to your website to watch your live webinars without making use of access codes and continuous posts. Thus making your posts far more effective in being able to reach a more substantial audience.

In addition, Promodocs chiropractic website designs have also incorporated into their websites Event Calendars where you can post upcoming webinars and events (e.g. Health Care Talks, Lunch & Learns, Trade show Booths etc.) that your online visitors can make note of and attend. Lastly and more importantly, after performing your compelling webinar, your online viewers can take immediate action by utilizing your Promodocs Fillable Online Intake form and Online Patient Scheduler so that they can quickly and easily schedule an appointment with your office.

Therefore having an all encompassing website webinar feature is so very important in obtaining new patients simply because you need to make everything readily available for your online website visitors to book a consult once you have them pumped up about you and your clinic. Needless to say the decision is up to you. So whether you utilize a Promodocs site or a webinar service, it is vital that you take action immediately, allow visitors of the negative review sites to get to understand the real you and to build back up your clinic.




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