Marketing your practice to civil workers: Is there a difference?

Public safety personnel tend to hold a special place in most people’s hearts.

Whether it’s the firefighters who spent hours trying to save your family’s home, the police officer who helped ease the nerves of a loved one at an accident scene or the emergency response personnel who provided necessary medical attention in your time of need, these brave men and women definitely do a lot of good for their communities.

So, what can you do to let them know that you’re there to help them?

Research their most common physical problems

Veronica Romney, co-founder of LoSoMo, a new startup digital marketing agency which provides location-based marketing, says that “the best way to market to a set group of people is all about research. For a chiropractor, it is best to market to a group’s specific body problems.”

For instance, the International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) shares that “firefighters are at increased risk of back injury compared to other professions,” adding that this particular line-of-duty injury is responsible for half of this profession’s injuries annually.

Worse yet, it’s also the cause of one-half of injury-related retirements each and every year. This makes getting and keeping a healthy back critical to firefighters being able to do something they’re extremely passionate about: fighting fire.

The National Interagency Fire Center adds that other common injuries sustained by firefighters include shin splints, tennis elbow, knee and foot problems, and ankle sprains and strains. Knowing this enables you to create blogs and social media posts that target these types of injuries, says Romney, as they’re “directly related to the client [you] are trying to attract.”

Learn what they’re not likely to do

When conducting your research, it also helps to learn more about the public safety personnel you want to help so you know which prevention and injury treatment options they’re not likely to go for. This helps you keep your marketing relevant, and hopefully more appealing to this demographic.

For example, though yoga and Pilates have been found to help people who struggle with chronic pain conditions, a 2014 PoliceOne survey of more than 9,000 of their followers, most of whom are likely in some type of law enforcement position, revealed that only 0.4 percent preferred these types of exercises.

Instead, they’d rather spend their time weightlifting (26.4 percent) or performing some type of cardio such as running, jogging or cycling (16.5 percent).

When you know this type of information up front, then you know that your marketing efforts would be better applied to the latter two exercise forms as a way to prevent or treat injuries, staying away from the options that they’re not likely to try, no matter how good they may be.

Offer even more solutions

Though your number one goal is to get people working in these types of professions to come to your chiropractic practice for services, that doesn’t mean that you should limit your marketing to just these solutions. In fact, the more you can show people in these positions that you care about their health and wellness as a whole, the more likely it is they’ll want to do business with you.

As an example, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that “EMTs and paramedics have one of the highest rates of injuries and illnesses of all occupations.” Furthermore, one of the causes of these injuries is the physical movements required by the worker when practicing patient care or transferring the patient to a medical care facility.

This makes focusing on proper form for movements related to lifting and turning a great way to help these medical responders stay healthy while performing their jobs. This can be accomplished by posting videos or articles about how to properly lift a patient without injuring yourself, or even holding workshops at their base or home office to show them the best techniques in person.

By establishing yourself as a health care expert and not just a chiropractic provider, they’ll start to turn to you with more with their physical questions and needs.

Marketing to police officers, firefighters, EMTs, and other public safety personnel shows that you care about the people who are committed to keeping you, your family and your community safer. That’s a commitment worth honoring, and these are just a few fairly effective ways to do it.