If you asked one of your providers to treat everything…would they be best at it? Would the same person who’s an expert at rotator cuff injuries be awesome at vestibular therapy? Women’s health? Neurological care? Knee surgeries?
Of course not! In the same way, you can’t expect one marketing employee to be the best at email marketing AND blogging AND social media marketing AND building relationships with doctors.
In this blog, we’ll teach you how to hire the right marketing staff for your medical practice, based on our 20+ years in medical marketing. Many of our staff members are former Marketing Directors at private practices – so we know what it takes to successfully hire marketing staff.
8 Steps to Hire the Right Marketing Staff for Your Medical Clinic
Step 1: Decide what you want this medical marketing hire to accomplish for your clinic.
Before you put up a job posting, you need to decide: what do you want this marketing employee to actually do?
- Build relationships with doctors?
- Get your name out in the community with local events?
- Boost your Google rank?
- Write blogs or social media?
- Create an overall marketing plan that will get you new patients?
We’ll walk you through all these areas in Step 1. But first, stop and think about your expectations. Too many times, we’ve seen a medical practice hire a fresh graduate with a degree in Communications – but then not give that new hire any guidance on what’s expected.
Your new patient results will suffer. And that marketing hire will probably quit. So decide right now what you want this marketing employee to achieve.
Step 2: Recognize the expertise you need to have covered to properly market your clinic.
At Practice Promotions, we’ve helped hundreds of medical practices across North America market their practices, attract new patients online, and fill their schedules. Based on our 20+ years of medical marketing experience, here are the following areas you need to cover in your marketing.
Remember: the goal of marketing is to attract new patients. All of the actions below are just different ways to attract new patients.
Digital Marketing Roles
- Website. Is your website outdated? Then you probably need to hire an agency to redesign your website. But even after that, you may need a marketing employee to make sure your website stays up-to-date with new clinic locations, notifications, etc. Someone also needs to be tracking your website traffic, website appointment requests, and overall website performance.
- Search Engine Optimization. Search Engine Optimization is what gets you found on Google. There are many components to ranking #1 on Google with SEO: building backlinks, on-page optimization, listings builders, keyword research…etc. SEO is a very technical skill, and it’s absolutely vital in order to attract new patients online.
- Paid Online Advertising. If you want to dominate Page 1 of Google, you’ll need to use Google Ads. But like SEO, running Google Ads is very technically complex. You’ll need to hire someone who is Google Ads Certified and has experienced running ads for a medical clinic.
- Online Reputation & Reviews. If you want people to trust you with their body, you can’t just say you’re the best or your method of treating is unique. You need to offer proof. A marketing employee or clinic director needs to ensure your staff are getting consistent 5-star Google, Yelp, and Facebook reviews. This involves a lot of internal coordination and leadership.
Content Marketing Roles
- Writing / Blogging. Creating a weekly or monthly patient blog is a great way to connect with current patients and boost your online discoverability. However, medical copywriting is a very specific skill. You have to be both technically accurate, empathetic, and a skilled writer.
- Email Marketing. Reaching out to past patients over email is one of the most effective ways to fill your schedules! As Colin Bostic, Business Director at a 3-location medical practice says, “Practice Promotions forced the issue on focusing on old patients and returning patients. It’s very smart…I don’t know why it took me so long to understand this, but as we grow, our net gets larger and larger. We’re up to over 11,000 unique emails. We can just go ‘click’ and get our message out to 11,000 people using Practice Promotions’ Engage Email System.” An in-clinic email marketer needs to have all the skills of a writer / blogger, PLUS needs to be able to manage and organize large lists of past and current patients in a HIPAA-compliant way.
- Social Media. Social media is a great way to connect with current patients – but not everyone enjoys it! A marketing employee who handles your social media will need to have an eye for visual detail, brand consistency, and social media trends.
- Design, Images, and Video Content. Do you want custom-branded flyers and handouts? Patient testimonial videos? Then you may need to hire a graphic designer or someone who is comfortable editing videos. Having a designer on staff is the key to your brand being consistent and looking amazing, both online and in person.
Print / In-Person Marketing Roles
- Direct Mail Marketing. Another great way to fill schedules is by sending direct mail newsletters to past newsletters. But if you want a marketing employee to do this, they’ll have to write content, design the newsletter / postcard, create and organize a list of patients to send to, work with a printer who will print and mail the newsletters, and work with the front desk to measure results.
- Networking & Doctor Relationships. You need someone to build relationships with doctors. But should it be your marketing employee? A fresh graduate who has never spoken to doctors & whose expertise is in blog writing may not succeed at getting doctor referrals. Door-to-door doctor marketing is really more a “sales” function than a marketing one.
- Local Events / Partnerships. You’ll need someone to build relationships with local sports teams, gym / fitness centers, a senior center, or local schools / athletes. This role requires interpersonal skills, creativity, event-planning skills, and attention to detail.
- Strategy. If you have absolutely no idea how to market your medical practice– or if you’re a multi-location clinic that wants to take things to the next level– you may be looking for an experienced medical marketer or director to give you a holistic marketing strategy.
Whew! That’s a lot of aspects to cover. So let’s get into the actual marketing employees you’ll need to cover all these actions.
Step 3: Avoid these hiring mistakes.
Do not make the mistake of thinking that one employee can do all the above! That would set up your marketing staff for failure. A few epic mistakes we’ve seen…
- Expecting a social media expert to be proficient at running Google Ads
- Taking a copywriter and telling them to knock on doctors’ doors
- Using someone who’s great at managing events and hoping they’ll design your website
In this next section, we’ll list the employee(s) you’ll need, as well as their salaries.
Step 4: Understand the employee(s) you need to cover all your marketing needs, plus their salaries and costs.
Here are the employees you’ll need to hire! And guess what? We wrote them in the order that you need to hire them!
Marketing Roles You Need to Hire Internally
Writer / Generalist
- The FIRST marketing person that you hire should be a writer / generalist. They should be able to handle email marketing, blogging, basic social media, and be able to make minor website changes. But don’t expect them to also be a graphic designer or videographer! This person can help you with a lot of initial marketing actions to get you off the ground. Make sure they have a handle on your new patient targets, so they know if you’re hitting your new patient goals. After all, marketing is all about attracting new patients!
- Job responsibilities: Email marketing, blogging, social media, possibly minor website maintenance. Basic understanding of marketing metrics.
- Salary: $48,000 – $70,000 / year, plus benefits
Marketing Director
- Up until now, your writer / generalist has likely played the role of “Marketing Director”, in terms of determining strategy and reporting on key new / returning patient metrics. But if you want to take it to the next level, consider hiring a Marketing Director who can focus on strategy / big-picture ideas. You can either promote your Writer / Generalist and hire a new one, OR hire an experienced marketing director from outside. This person will report directly to the CEO / Owner on new patients, cost per new patient lead, Google ranking, and other marketing metrics.
- Job responsibilities: Manage marketing staff. Create, enact, and report on marketing strategy to attract new patients.
- Salary: $80,000 – $105,000 / year, plus benefits
Doctor Networking / Sales Representative.
- If you can, hire someone who has experience selling to doctors – or even someone who already has relationships with doctors in your area! Someone with a sales / medical background is best suited to build doctor partnerships by going door-to-door.
- Job responsibilities: Build relationships with local doctors and increase patient referrals.
- Salary: $63,000 – $72,000 / year, plus benefits
Local Partnerships / Events Manager
- If you’re running a lot of local events, you may need an events manager or someone solely focused on building local partnerships. Otherwise, your writer / generalist may get overwhelmed. This job title will likely be “Marketing / Event Coordinator” or something similar.
- Job responsibilities: Build local relationships, manage vendors / partnerships, coordinate community events.
- Salary: $48,000 – $70,000 / year, plus benefits
Medical Marketing Roles You Can Outsource
Graphic Designer
- This person will make sure your online and in-person branding are consistent. They can also pitch in for social media, designing items for local partnerships, and overall making sure your logo and brand are consistent. Ideally, they could also make sure your website looks updated. This person could be part-time or full time.
- Job responsibilities: Making your brand look amazing.
- Salary: $48,000 – $60,000 / year, plus benefits
- Pro tip: If you work with a marketing agency for your website & collateral marketing, you may not need to hire a graphic designer. At Practice Promotions, our team of graphic designers handles website design, print marketing, the creation of flyers / brochures, logo consistency, and branding for our clients.
Website / SEO Specialist
- Do you want to rank #1 on Google in your area? Then you need a website / Search Engine Optimization Specialist. As stated above, this is an extremely technical job. That’s why most of Practice Promotions’ clients don’t have an SEO Specialist on staff. Instead, they hire us to improve their SEO / website ranking every month. Check out our SEO services here.
- Job responsibilities: Improve your company’s Google ranks for key search terms. Increase website conversions and traffic. Build backlinks. Improve on-page website optimization. Research new keywords.
- Salary: $65,000 – $80,000 / year, plus benefits
- Pro tip: Seriously consider hiring a medical marketing agency that specializes in boosting your Google rank.
Google Ads Specialist
- To dominate Google in multiple places, you need Google Ads. But like an SEO Specialist, this is a very technical job. Plus, since Google Ads are paid advertising, you can very easily lose thousands of dollars if you don’t know what you’re doing. Once again, most of Practice Promotions’ clients don’t actually have a Google Ads Specialist on staff. Instead, they hire us to run their HIPAA-compliant Google Ads for them, and get monthly reports on their ad spend and performance. Check out our Google Ads services here.
- Job responsibilities: Run Google Ads PPC campaigns. Report on results.
- Salary: $65,000 – $80,000 / year, plus benefits
- Pro tip: Seriously consider hiring a medical marketing agency that specializes in running medical and condition-specific Google Ads.
Video Marketer
- Finally, consider hiring a video marketer! Patient testimonials, captured over video, can be very powerful! You could also combine this role with that of your graphic designer or social media specialists.
- Job responsibilities: Build your brand with video.
- Salary: $48,000 – $60,000 / year, plus benefits
Step 6: Consider hiring a medical marketing agency to save costs.
If you were to hire all eight employees above, that would cost $537,000 in annual salary – and that doesn’t even include their benefits, employee development costs, etc.
That’s why a lot of multi-location clinics hire a medical marketing agency like Practice Promotions to add expertise while offsetting costs. Here are three common employee lineups we see for clinics:
1-2 Clinic Locations
- Marketing Director: $105,000 / year (on staff)
- Writer/ Generalist: $60,000 / year (on staff)
- Hire a Marketing Agency For the Cost of 1 Employee: Instead of hiring a Graphic Designer, Website / SEO Specialist, Google Ads Specialist, and another Generalist to help with blogs, social media, and print marketing, they work with Practice Promotions for the cost of ONE extra employee.
- Savings: Instead of spending $290,000 on 4 extra employees, they spend $2000 / month or $50,000 a year, for our Ultimate Marketing Plan, which includes website design, print marketing, SEO Specialists, Google Ads specialists, and monthly reports. That saves them $240,000 in annual salaries ALONE! Basically, you get 4 extra employees for the cost of one. (Plus, now you have four fewer employees to manage.)
- Total Marketing Salary + Agency Cost: $165,000 in salaries + $50,000 for marketing agency= $205,000
3 – 10 Clinic Locations
- Marketing Director: $105,000 / year
- Writer/ Generalist: $60,000 / year
- Doctor Networking / Sales Representative (s): $80,000 / year
- Hire a Marketing Agency: $60,000 / year
- Total Marketing Salary + Agency Cost: $245,000 in salaries + $60,000* for marketing agency = $305,000
*The more locations you have, the more time and effort it will take to market each location, and the higher the cost of hiring a marketing agency. However, the increase will still be less than hiring an additional employee.
11+ Clinic Locations
- Vice President of Marketing: $160,000 – $185,000 / year
- Email Marketer: $60,000 / year
- Social Media Manager: $60,000 / year
- Marketing Events Coordinator: $75,000 / year
- Graphic Designer / Video Marketer: $60,000 / year
- 2-3 Doctor Networking / Sales Representatives: $160,000 / year
- Hire a Marketing Agency For the Cost of 2 Employees: $120,000 for marketing agency
- Total Marketing Salary + Agency Cost: $720,000 – $1 million / year
The bottom line: Whether you have one clinic location or 100, hiring a marketing agency can bring massive savings. For the cost of 1 employee, you get the expertise and work of 4-6 employees!
In all the examples above, hiring Practice Promotions saved the $240,000 in salaries, at LEAST!
Step 7: Budget for the tools your medical marketing employee(s) need to succeed.
Now you have your marketing staff lineup, remember that they will need tools to succeed, and these tools cost money!
These tools may include:
- Computers / Microsoft Office Suite
- Email marketing software like Mailchimp or Practice Promotions ENGAGE Email System
- A Customer Relationship Management software
- Website analysis tools, like CrazyEgg
- Online appointment scheduling software
- Budget to spend on Google Ads
- SEO Analysis tools, like Moz or Semrush
- Graphic design tools, like Adobe Suite or Canva
- Budget to spend on printing & mailing patient newsletters
- Events budget
- Social media scheduling software, like buffer
- Copywriting tools like Grammarly
Once again, hiring a marketing agency for some of these functions (SEO, Google Ads, blog writing, social media) can eliminate the need to spend money on some of these software / tools. For example, all Practice Promotions clients get access to our ENGAGE Email System & Social Marketing Tool as part of their monthly marketing subscription.
Step 8: Know your marketing responsibilities after hiring.
Even after you hire a marketing employee(s) and / or a marketing agency, you still have responsibilities!
Remember, marketing is all about attracting new patients and filling your schedules! So if you plan to grow your clinic, you have to keep a close handle on marketing. As an owner, your continuing responsibilities include:
- Create the overall strategy / direction for the marketing team
- Setting new patient goals / targets for marketing to hit
- Setting revenue per patients / gross collections for marketing to hit
- Reading monthly reports on your website, SEO, Google Ads, Direct Mail, and Social Media performance
- Understanding where new and reactivated patients are coming from
The Bottom Line: You May Need to Hire Marketing Staff And A Medical Marketing Agency
If you’re wondering: “should I hire a marketing employee or a marketing agency”, the answer may be…both!
At Practice Promotions, we work with hundreds of medical practices across North America. The ones that succeed the most are ones that have a Marketing Director or Marketing Specialists who works with us to market their clinic. It’s not an either / or.
Hiring a medical marketing agency, in addition to having marketing staff, can…
- Save costs by not having to hire a Digital Marketer, a Copywriter, an SEO Specialist, a Graphic Designer, a Google Ads Specialist, and a Print Marketer!
- Free up your marketing staff’s time to work on in-clinic promotions
- Get expert help for less than the cost of 1 employee
So if you haven’t yet made that first hire…think of what you want your marketing employee to DO!
At Practice Promotions, we provide powerful marketing services to help medical practices attract more new patients. Schedule a demo of our Ultimate Practice Marketing System today!
Frequently Asked Questions
Does hiring internally replace having a medical marketing agency?
No. Unless you’re willing to hire a team of 10+ people, pay, and manage them, you will not be able to replicate the digital medical marketing expertise of a marketing agency. Even then, you will likely not have a website designer on hand to update your website every two years. Nor will you be able to benefit from the expertise and experience that at medical marketing agency like Practice Promotions as accrued over the years.
What’s the first medical marketing hire you should make?
The FIRST marketing person that you hire should be a writer / generalist. They should be able to handle email marketing, blogging, basic social media, and be able to make minor website changes. But don’t expect them to also be a graphic designer or videographer! This person can help you with a lot of initial marketing actions to get you off the ground. Make sure they have a handle on your new patient targets, so they know if you’re hitting your new patient goals. After all, marketing is all about attracting new patients!
When is the right time to hire?
If you want to grow, you need to invest more in marketing! The US Small Business Administration recommends you spend 7-10% of annual revenue on marketing. So if you realize that you’re only spending 1-2% on marketing…you’re probably choking your own growth.
You have room to hire a marketing generalist or director.
What should still be outsourced?
We highly recommend outsourcing…
- Graphic designer
- Print / direct mail marketer
- Website Designer
- SEO Specialist
- Google Ads Specialist
You can get all of these specialists for the cost of 1 employee with Practice Promotions’ Ultimate Marketing Plan!
What medical marketing functions should I NOT outsource?
Any “boots on the ground,” in-clinic roles will be difficult to outsource. For that reason, we recommend NOT outsourcing…
- Marketing Director
- Marketing Events Coordinator (Local events / partnerships)
- Doctor Networking / Sales Representative
Most other tasks can be outsourced successful.
Why would I hire outside medical marketing experts?
We’ll give you three reasons!
- Save costs by not having to hire a Digital Marketer, a Copywriter, an SEO Specialist, a Graphic Designer, a Google Ads Specialist, and a Print Marketer!
- Free up your marketing staff’s time to work on in-clinic promotions
- Get expert help for less than the cost of 1 employee