If you are creating content to promote your naturopathic medical practice, you need to read this article.

Content creation is pointless unless it is part of a deliberate and strategic plan.

Content may be king, but if you don't have a plan, you are wasting your time. This article outlines the 5 things that every doctor needs before marketing a practice online.

1. Legal Protection

Legal documents, jargon, and especially attorney fees are enough to send any of us into a full panic attack. But here is the deal: if you are going to create content to grow your medical practice, you sure as hell better have some legal protections in place.

You need at least 3 documents for your website:

• Terms and Conditions
• Disclaimer
• Privacy policy

I am not a lawyer and I cannot offer legal advice (that’s my disclaimer), but I do occasionally hire lawyers. Most recently I paid an attorney $3000 to draft a contract for me. Yikes! Then I discovered the most amazing and affordable way to get all the documents I needed for online legal protection.

I downloaded a legal protection kit that had everything I needed. Options for legal templates can be found from attorneys like Bobby Klinck for a nominal cost.*

2. A Specific Niche

Do you know who you serve? Do you know what problem you solve for those people? Decide what types of patients you want to attract to your practice, and craft messaging that speaks directly to them.

3. A Clear Message

You would be amazed at what a difference clarity makes. When people understand what you do and how it helps them, they are drawn to you like a magnet. When a person discovers your website, they should be able to know within 2 seconds exactly who you are, what you offer, and what makes you unique.

4. A Solid Strategy

Every piece of content you create needs to have a specific purpose. If you want people to read your blog and then call to make an appointment, you need to guide them on a clear path to make that happen. A series of content items should lead a potential patient on a path from the point they discover you to the point they become a paying patient. This is where the magic of content marketing happens.

Earning a potential patient’s trust is kind of like getting kids to eat vegetables: they need to see you and get a tiny taste of you multiple times before all-in committing to the whole bowl. How do you do that? You show up repeatedly and strategically—on their screens—where people basically are hanging out 24 hours a day.

5. A Few Tech Tools

Once you have your niche, your message, and your strategy, it is time to do the work. Content marketing is not rocket science, but it does require time and a few tech tools. You might want to learn how to do content marketing campaigns yourself, you might want to designate a staff member to learn, or you might just want to hire somebody else to do it. But regardless of who is designated to do the work, you will need some basic tools to get started. Consider looking into the following:

• A website that you know how to edit and update
• A way to create gorgeous and branded materials for free downloads (like Canva)
• A way to create sales pages and website forms (like Kajabi)*
• An email service provider (like MailChimp or ConvertKit)*
• A business page on Facebook (if you want to run ads)

Put these foundational parts into place, and then start creating content!

*Please note that this article may contain some affiliate links.