After 15 years in the aesthetic industry, we have seen a tremendous amount of growth and have experienced changes in almost every aspect of the patient experience and marketing strategies. At MD Internet Marketing, we are dedicated to helping aesthetic surgeons optimize their online presence and overall digital marketing strategy. In pursuit of this goal, our team works tirelessly to remain up-to-date with the latest industry trends and best practices that are impacting online marketing and consumer changes. From innovative digital asset management to impactful strategic planning and (SEM) strategies, MD Internet Marketing strives to remain a trusted resource for helping you make the most of your online marketing efforts. As we celebrate the arrival of 2023, let’s take a look at our top marketing predictions for 2023.
Google Analytics 4 Implementation
GA 4 is a completely new way of collecting and presenting your website’s data, and there are a ton of new features—and a new interface. What happens if you don’t upgrade? Google says, “standard Universal Analytics properties will stop processing new hits”. In other words: you HAVE to move to GA4. Setting up the new Google Analytics 4 on your site involves adding the new tracking code snippet, configuring all your conversions, and testing, testing, testing so that everything works as expected. Studies show that digital activity is exponentially at an all-time high, with 90% of the world’s overall data being created only two years back!
In good economic times or challenging ones, analyzing and understanding your data and business metrics is the SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT thing you can do in your practice to make strategic, data-driven decisions. Data gives you the truth, not opinions. Without data to back things up, you are relying on an opinion to make critical business decisions. Data gives you an honest picture and tells you what is working and what is not. At this time you should be running both standard Universal Analytics and GA4 on your website with the anticipation of removing standard Universal Analytics in Q3 of 2023.
Lean hard on short-form content creation
Short-form content is exploding, and it’s making content creation (and, ultimately, consumption) way easier. There is nothing new about content that is less than a minute long, also known as short-form content. Plastic surgeons are now creating short-form video content to help people understand the procedure they are interested in. Many patients have told us that they prefer to watch a video over reading text about the procedure. This could be because many individuals have little to no attention span. We believe that by creating informative videos using captions, you can make more people feel comfortable with plastic surgery and ultimately increase patient satisfaction! Many people, especially younger generations, are watching videos that are less than one minute long. Major social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram and YouTube Shorts are now offering opportunities to create short content with little to no equipment. This can make video content more accessible for viewers and content creators. Short-form content may not be new, but we think its popularity will continue to rise as platforms want to cater to this unique content consumption experience. This could result in further investments that will benefit both plastic surgeons and patients.
AI Marketing and ChatGPT
We have been hearing about AI for some time now but in 2023 with the creation of new products like ChatGPT there are opportunities for novel ways to leverage these tools in the near future. For example, it can be used to generate personalized automated responses to customer inquiries, create high-quality content for email or social media marketing campaigns, and assist customers through their purchasing process. Many blogs written by SEO companies are actually already being created using AI. Here is another: ChatGPT can help marketers in keyword research by identifying synonyms for root keywords. For example, suppose the root keyword is ‘breast augmentation’. ChatGPT will provide alternate synonyms like custom Breast implants, best breast surgeon, or top breast surgeon to help marketers include these in landing pages/blog posts/Pay Per Click (PPC) campaigns and strengthen their on-page optimization strategy. We recently created a post on Instagram using ChatGPT to provide the history of plastic surgery – check it out here.
Increase in Emotional Marketing
When emotions are a major factor like they are in the surgery decision-making process, you can’t afford to ignore them in your marketing content. You need to use emotional marketing to build deeper connections with your potential patients and encourage them to act.
Emotional marketing inspires action. Consumers are much more likely to take action when they see an emotional marketing campaign. When two products have similar styles, features and prices, customers will often choose the one that builds the best emotional connection. The best part? When you learn how to leverage that emotion in your content, you will see increases in engagement, social action and conversions within your funnel.
Emotional marketing is an effective way to connect with your potential customers because it evokes an emotional response. When done correctly, this increases the chances that you will steer them to a desired outcome – which is usually to eventually visit your practice.
Creating great emotional marketing campaigns starts with understanding your audience, and determining their emotional state. From there, make the decision about whether you need to influence and exploit emotions that are already present, or if you want to create or give rise to emotions the audience wasn’t initially expecting or experiencing.
Final thoughts for 2023 & beyond
If you really want to grow in any economic climate and build a long-term sustainable and profitable practice, you must hire a solid team, invest in their training, and hold them accountable. MD Internet Marketing works with several top plastic surgeons to help deliver results and maximize both their time and resources. We can help you lead your team and adopt a mindset that everyone in your practice is impacting the conversation rates. We encourage you to build a culture of possibilities, fun and growth opportunities. Spend time with your team, guide them and let them grow with you. Find out what is important to them so you can help them build their dreams. Respect them, teach them, trust them, and empower them to make choices. MD Internet Marketing can take a lot of the guesswork out of your digital marketing strategy. If you’re ready to see your online efforts flower into real results, don’t hesitate to contact the digital marketing experts for personalized solutions to your marketing needs.
Here’s to a profitable 2023!