Every year from October 12–20, healthcare providers across the U.S honor Bone and Joint Action Week.
They honor it by hosting and participating in activities designed to bring more awareness to disorders related to these two bodily structures, according to the Bone and Joint Initiative USA.
Additionally, five of these seven days are dedicated solely to specific musculoskeletal topics, with those days being:
- World Arthritis Day (October 12)
- World Spine Day (October 16)
- World Trauma Day (October 17)
- World Pediatric and Joint Day (October 19)
- World Osteoporosis Day (October 20)
Because the main goal of chiropractic care is to achieve maximum health in all of these areas, that makes this entire week a perfect marketing opportunity for DCs. What can you do to maximize both your time and marketing dollars?
Maximize your social media exposure
Research conducted by the Pew Research Center reveals that a majority of Americans regularly use social media to stay in touch with friends, family and businesses, with the four most utilized platforms in 2018 being YouTube (73 percent), Facebook (68 percent), Instagram (35 percent) and Pinterest (29 percent). That makes these social channels great places to post information that can help your audience achieve higher levels of bone and joint health, while also increasing their engagement with your practice.
One way to do this is to post statistics on joint and bone information designed to get them to stop and think about their own bodies and how they need to look after them. The Bone and Joint Initiative shares a few examples, such as the fact that musculoskeletal conditions afflict more than one-half of all Americans and one in three people eventually need medical care for these types of issues.
You could also post pictures showing what a healthy spine looks like or share a video-based infographic with stretches people can do to help ease pain associated with arthritis, joints or osteoporosis. Alternatively, write blogs about these issues and share pointers about at-home remedies patients can use to feel better in between chiropractic visits.
Take advantage of hashtags
Along the same lines, when posting on social media, maximize your potential exposure by adding hashtags to the content you share. This helps potential clients find you easier if they’re doing a search for the topics or ideas that you’re posting about. For instance, if on World Spine Day you share a post about how to improve spine health, you could add #healthyback, #healthyspine, or #painfreespine to your post.
According to the fitness experts at Precor, there are also quite a few health-based hashtags that can potentially help you get found more easily by individuals interested in improving their overall health and wellness. They include #GetHealthy, #HealthyLife, and #HealthTalk.
But if you’re posting about something specific, add hashtags specific to that topic. For example, if you’re sharing nutrition tips for healthier bones and joints, you may want to add hashtags such as #EatClean, #FitFood, or #HealthyEating. Exercise hashtags to consider include #FitLife, #Fitness, and #GetStrong.
Hand out promotional materials
To get the most out of your offline marketing efforts, one option is to hand out promotional materials honoring Bone and Joint National Action Week. Create flyers with helpful bone and joint health tips so your patients can take them home to read after their appointments. Hand out rubber wristbands with a creative phrase or motivational saying about bones or joints on them, serving as a constant reminder to patients to look after their musculoskeletal health.
Be sure to include your practice name and contact information on whatever materials you hand out so patients and prospective patients know both where it came from and how to get in touch with you. This gives you the opportunity to increase brand awareness, helping those in your community see you and your practice as a health care provider and organization dedicated to helping patients achieve total health and wellness, and that you’re willing to go the extra mile to achieve that goal.
Involve your pediatric patients
If you’ve ever heard a child chastising his or her parent for smoking after learning about the negative effects of cigarettes at school, then you’ve already witnessed the power of involving kids in a health-related marketing campaign. Not only does this help you better reach the adults in the child’s life, but it also provides the child or youth the information necessary to make positive health choices for themselves.
To do this with Bone and Joint National Action Week, share with the little ones and youngsters why it’s so important to look after their bones and joints and do it in a way they’ll understand based on their age.
Many will appreciate the time that you took to talk to them one-on-one. Doing this also reinforces you as the health care professional, someone they’ll look to as they grow. You’ll become someone they’ll remind the adults in their lives of when it comes to their bone and joint health.
Bone and Joint National Action Week is a time to remind patients about the whys and hows of proper musculoskeletal care. At the same time, it reminds them that you’re there to help with these types of issues—and more.
