On April 24th, I decided to improve my own marketing. Here’s what I did:

I wrote over two month’s worth of articles, and queued them to be published on Tuesdays and Fridays like clockwork. I’ve since reduced this to just Tuesdays. Even what you’re reading now was written over a month ago - I’m actually on vacation in Colorado right now. We went to the Denver Children’s Museum today.

Also, I set up some automatic follow-up messages for people who bought my marketing manual, Never Market Again. My goal is to make sure people who bought it actually use it. By the time you read this, there will be at least 10 followup messages to help people implement the book. They’ll be sent out automatically, and I won’t have to think about it.

So what does this have to do with you?

Ideally you won’t have to think about your marketing. It should be automatic, or nearly so. That way:

1. You only have to be organized once in a while.
2. You only have to be smart once in awhile.
3. You only have to make an effort to follow through once in awhile.

The rest of the time, you don’t have to think about it. Focus on treating patients instead. What can you do to automate your marketing? Here’s a few ideas:

1. Put an automatic followup system on your website. You basically set this up once, but people who visit your site experience it as an ongoing education/personal email sequence just for them. This is covered in “The Faucet”, a bonus manual included with Never Market Again.
2. Buy cards, have a few pre-written templates, and have the envelopes stamped and ready to go. When the situation calls for it, just address and mail a card to a patient. (Or if you want something even more automatic, I explain my online card system here. You log in online and send a real greeting card, or even a sequence of followup cards. You never even need to go to the post office or put the mail out.)
3. Put together your “Welcome Package” and have it ready to go for new patients. This makes their relationship with you seem “real” before they ever set foot in your clinic. (Explained further in Never Market Again.)

That’s just three ideas, but you can come up with your own. Marketing is most effective when you don’t have to think about it. Seriously.

Plus, it’s works great even when you’re on vacation. Especially when you’re on vacation.