Grow Your Integrative Medicine Business By Telling Bigger Stories

Grow Your Integrative
Medicine Business by
Telling Bigger Stories
by Glenn Sabin

2© 2013 FON Therapeutics, Inc. All Rights Reserved • www.fontherapeutics.com info@fontherapeutics.com • 301 384 2476•
Content is the fuel that launches thought leadership, the glue that binds social media and
the only path to meaningful, sustainable health consumer engagement.
While a well-balanced mix of traditional advertising, marketing, media relations, referrals, and reputation
management remains vitally important and necessary to increasing and retaining integrative medicine
patient volume, it is now imperative for your clinic or center to become a content creator.
Yes, that’s right, a publisher. Like Mayo Clinic, Johns Hopkins and Cleveland Clinic—all of whom are leading
trusted medical publishers. But how is this possible? How does this scale for a small boutique clinic, medium
size center, hospital system or academic integrative medicine center? How exactly does one go about creating a
content strategy?
Read on to learn more….
The Art of Storytelling

Contents
It Starts With Understanding Your Brand 4
More on Brand Identity 5
Content is King for Growing Patient Volume 9
Integrative Medicine is a Story, Not an Advertisement 12
Why Your Blog Strategy is Important 15
Creating a Sustainable Blog Strategy 17
Maximizing Readership of your Blog Content 21
Community Outreach: Using Experiential Content Marketing to Influence, Engage and Grow 23
Social Media: Inform. Engage. Listen. 26

It Starts With Understanding Your Brand
You may be wondering why I have opened this e-book about
content, engagement and storytelling with a discussion on
branding. Frankly, it’s because your center’s unique brand identity tells
health consumers who you are and what you do. Branding is the foundation
from which your specific content creation and thought leadership efforts
will emanate.
Over the past 25 years, practitioners integrating the best of Western and
Eastern medicine have endured a series of catch-all titles describing their
model of care. Until recently, all medicine not tacking closely to Western
conventional allopathic care was termed “alternative”.
The term complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) began to seep into
mainstream medical vernacular about 1998 when NIH’s National Center for
Cancer and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) became a full-fledged center.
Although most of the major hospitals and cancer centers did not introduce their
integrative centers until a few years later, NCCAM’s “CAM” acronym stuck,
influencing the names of new private clinics and centers across the country.
NCCAM supports research on complementary and alternative
therapies—products, agents and interventions—regardless of the current
level of evidence supporting its safety and efficacy. Therefore, the acronym
CAM adequately describes what NCCAM is all about. On the other hand,
practitioners incorporating evidence-based integrative services into their
conventional care are not practicing CAM. They’re e practicing evidence-
based integrative medicine, not “alternative medicine”.
Alternative medicine is used in lieu of proven conventional care. Alternative
medicine lacks an adequate evidence base and is not practiced within
academic clinical settings. Conversely, integrative medicine incorporates
safe and efficacious therapies into conventional medicine.
It’s true that not all stress reduction techniques, say, Reiki, boast a solid
evidence base. But many clinicians who offer services like Reiki do so
because they’ve observed it helping many of their patients to relax, thus
lessening their need for certain medications. They rationalize that since
the intervention is not potentially harmful and their patient is more relaxed
and reporting beneficial value, then what difference does it really make if
we don’t yet know exactly how it works?
So I posit that CAM is dead, while evidence-based, personalized integrative
medicine continues its ascent—made possible by a growing literature base
and clinical outcomes that support the safety, efficacy and primary tenets
of an integrative approach to health. If you want to grow your integrative
health business, this is the story that needs telling.

More on Brand Identity
(Note: You should still read this even if you have already developed your
brand identity—name and logo—and have been operating for years and
have no interest in changing it.)
Your brand name and logo are the first things a prospective
customer (patient) typically encounters when searching for
an integrative healthcare provider. Significant consumer confusion
already exists around the terms and descriptors surrounding integrative health-
care. Consequently, you must clearly distinguish your brand identity from your
local competitor’s, regardless if you are a small private clinic, hospital system
or academic center.
Position your center for success by communicating your brand’s value
proposition with concision and a high quality graphical aesthetic. Tell
your target audience who you are and why you matter by following these
guiding principles:
CHOOSE YOUR BRAND NAME CAREFULLY
Today, CAM is dead and the term “alternative medicine” is mostly associated
with marijuana dispensaries and certain interventions used in lieu of
effective, evidence-based or clinical outcomes informed, standard of care
therapies. Don’t believe me? Try a quick Google search. I’ll wait.
If nothing else, the words “alternative” and “medicine” sitting next to each
other are relics from the ‘70s—providing fodder to the skeptics still unable
to differentiate it from the inexorable march that is evidence-based integra-
tive healthcare.
ABSENCE OF EVIDENCE DOES NOT PROVE FAILURE OF EFFECTIVENESS
Credentialed and licensed naturopaths, chiropractors, massage therapists
and acupuncturists do not comprise “alternative medicine”. These modali-
ties and whole systems are often alternative options to pharmaceutical and
surgical approaches.
However, there is only one “medicine”—that which is safe and efficacious, even
if not fully proven under the gold standard and reductive, double-blind random-
ized controlled trial paradigm, which was largely designed to investigate phar-
maceuticals or one active agent in isolation. It’s also important to note that the
literature supporting several of these interventions continues to grow.
For the patient, it’s a whole person, “holistic” approach we’re aiming for.
But for your center’s name, let’s not harken back to 1960s vernacular. Dig?
Using “holistic” in your collateral, communications, and, if you must, your
tagline, is perfectly fine. But leave it out of your brand name.
“Integrative medicine” and “integrative health” are the contemporary,

appropriate terms for most integrative-directed providers. However, there
are certainly exceptions to this general rule, and the breadth and scope of
integrative clinic brand names abound.
If you don’t like the word “integrative” attached to your brand, and insist
on using words like “prevention” or “wellness” or “lifestyle”, or a number
of other similar treatments, I encourage you to look closely at the current
meanings of these words. See if this accurately describes what your clinic
offers. Feel free to run them by me and I’ll share my, um, unbiased opinion!
Take Ownership
The use of a generic name for your entity is not helpful. A nonspecific entity
name fails to distinguish your brand (center) from your competitor’s. More-
over, it’s difficult to trademark generic names to keep others from using.
This happens in the business world and can lead to consumer confusion
and potential legal problems. Nevertheless, if you look at FON’s national di-
rectory of integrative healthcare centers, here, you will see an abundance
of generic names.
It’s always better to use a noun rather than an adjective in your organiza-
tion’s name. “Quality Integrative Medicine” is neither easily trademarked
nor protected. However, “Apple Integrative Medicine” is. That is, unless
someone else has secured it since I wrote this!
My original thought was to grab a bunch of these existing names, i.e. “Center
for Integrative Medicine” or “Holistic Healing Wellness”, capture them along
with a dozen or so logos (brand marks) and critique them in this e-book. But
instead of calling folks out here, I am happy to have a conversation if you are
launching a new program or simply want to update your name or brand identity.
When creating your name and tagline (optional) for your enterprise, keep it
short and concise. Remember, less says more.
Plan Ahead
If you are developing a private clinic and your exit plan—how you will
eventually exit your practice—is to launch the center; build it up over five
years and then move to Tahiti to perfect your golf game, do not put your
own name on the door. This can understandably be tempting for some folks,
but you need to consider what your eventual exit may look like even when
launching your business! Simply put, the name of your center, as well as
the name of your corporate entity, can impact your eventual exit plan. It’s
your good name; would you want it attached to a new operator’s less than
stellar reputation?
Choose Taglines Carefully
A tagline can help but is not always required. Leave it out if your brand
name can be adequately communicated in just a few words. But if you do
More on Brand Identity cont’d

include a tagline, make sure it works. It needs to reinforce who you are and
speak to your unique delivery of integrative healthcare.
AVOID POOR LOGO DESIGN
Maybe you feel that now is the chance to express your long suppressed
creativity and burning desire to craft the ideal logo (aka brand mark) that
will stand the test of time. Everyone seems to have a second cousin whose
kid is a terrific graphic designer. Trust me when I tell you—it’s best to leave
this important process to an actual brand identity professional!
Never pinch pennies when it comes to designing your logo. Don’t be tempted
by the myriad websites offering unlimited logo design for $49. Even using
name-your-price auction sites like 99 Designs can be a frustrating process,
especially if you don’t offer a respectable sum with which to motivate the
better designers to participate on spec. There’s no guarantee even then you’ll
come away with a quality brand mark. If your standards are high, I categori-
cally recommend that you stay away from creative auctions.
Avoid Design by Committee
Don’t ask your entire staff, your kids, or their friends, for opinions regard-
ing your brand mark. Keep your circle of advisers small, or you may end up
going in big circles!
Don’t Be Penny-Wise, Pound-Foolish
Time is money. And your time is probably better spent in clinic or engaged
in business aspects other than managing your own brand identity project
with cut-rate and generally less effective service providers.
The Creative Brief
A quality brand identity firm will provide what’s called a creative brief.
Therein, a lot of important questions will be asked about the nature of your
clinic, the message you want to convey to the public, your preference for
color, shape, typography and more. Take the time to carefully answer these
questions to help inform the design process and ensure the best possible
result. This iterative process requires your participation and ongoing feed-
back.
Measure Twice, Cut Once
The actual logo development itself is one of the least expensive compo-
nents of brand identity creation. Once in place, you will create signage,
myriad collateral and even products proudly displaying your logo—your
new brand identity. Moreover, the logo design —shape, color, look and
feel—informs the general design (or redesign) of your website and all
other designed components, electronic and physical, connected to your
integrative brand. The cost of all this other stuff tends to very quickly dwarf
the logo investment itself. Before making this consequential commitment

and incurring all this expense, make sure you have the most effective logo
(brand mark) that will withstand the test of time.
A Serious Contender—By Design
Though the average health consumer may not be able to articulate what
makes for good design, most folks know it and can feel it when they see
it. They can differentiate an amateur versus clean, professional aesthetic.
You may not (yet) be as large as the well-established integrative medicine
center a few miles away, but your professionally designed new logo should
create an identity that’s perceived to be as strong as, or better than, your
largest competitor’s. In effect, announcing that you have arrived!
APPLY YOUR BRAND IDENTITY CONSISTENTLY
I visit a lot of integrative medicine facilities both large and small, across
types and disciplines. I see lots of logos, brochures, signage and websites.
Yet I always find it amazing when an entity uses multiple iterations of their
brand mark across applications. Often, there’s variation in typography and
color palette usage; or logos skewed to fit a particular space. It’s often
messy and confusing, especially to prospective clients. With respect to
clearly branding your company, this matters greatly.
For various applications it’s usually best to have both a vertical and horizontal
iteration of your logo in both black and white and color. Your logo needs to be
scalable—easily readable and sharp in both small and large sizes.
After approving but BEFORE using your new, well-designed logo, it is wise
to invest in a style guide. An example of a logo style guide can be found
here. Will your logo be featured on a partner website, t-shirt for the local
5K marathon charity or at a sponsored event? A logo style guide helps
ensure that anyone who touches your logo—your core brand identity—
follows your established rules for its application. If you would like to see
FON’s logo style guide, contact me and I’ll email it to you.
Your brand identity is a smart investment that should endure for years.
Working with a brand identity expert, and carefully following these core
guiding principles, will result in the creation of a strong identity that your
center will proudly display and leverage for many years to come.

Does your center have a content creation and distribution
strategy? Start planning now! Consumers interested in a patient-
centered approach to their healthcare spend a lot of time learning about
preventive medicine and general wellness. When they or a family member
face a health challenge, they are quick to consult the web for their health
information needs. So when it comes to evidence-based integrative medicine,
your center or clinic has a valuable opportunity to become that trusted source
of information.
Here are five reasons why:
1. Original Web content creation drives significant search engine
optimization.
If your Website features static pages created long ago and you have no
blog program, news features or other fresh content, search engines such
as Google will not place your site high on their search pages, thus organic
traffic driven by SEO (search engine optimization) will be miniscule at best.
Search engine algorithms recognize new, original content and track how
many sites are linked to yours.
2. Providing live “experiential content” in the community shows leadership.
Offering hands-on experiential “sample” services in the form of community
education outreach in the areas of prevention, wellness and evidence-based
integrative health, is a great way to inform current and prospective custom-
ers (consumers) while positioning your center and its providers as thought
leaders. There are myriad topics around which to create quality programming.
This is an excellent way to build relationships, develop trust and drive word-of-
mouth patronage.
If your center is hospital-based and relies on referrals, make sure to offer
relevant and, hopefully, compelling content, that appeals to both the practi-
tioners and administrators within your organization. This will surely increase
your internal referrals. The Marino Center for Integrative Health offers a num-
ber of paid group educational/experiential classes, including their Women’s
Health Series. Duke Integrative Medicine at Durham offers complimentary
classes on mindfulness-based stress reduction, nutrition and more.
Get the community—consumers and medical professionals alike— involved
with experiential acupuncture, mind-body exercises, yoga and Pilates
sessions. Each one provides a fantastic opportunity to explain the research
base, demonstrate the various interventions and to build trust and patient
volume for your integrative services. Consider starting with no-fee
programming leading up to paid group classes in the future!
3. Content is the foundation and glue for all meaningful, sustainable social
media strategy.
Has your center worked through the HIPAA privacy issues and nuances
Content is King for Growing Patient Volume

related to social media? If so, perhaps you now have a presence on several
networks and have smartly tasked one person as the social media man-
ager—someone who is checking in a couple times a day, posting tweets,
making status updates and interacting with folks. But if your center is not
creating original content surrounding the bevy of integrative services you
provide, you are missing the benefits of social media.
Creating online promotions and discounts are important. So is posting relevant
news items pertaining to your center as well as retweeting and reposting inter-
esting content and information created by sources outside of your business.
An effective and original content strategy creates true engagement and
engenders trust around your brand. Over time, the consistent growth of your
social media program will greatly contribute to your center’s overall success.
4. A newsletter chock-full of relevant, informative content, delivered with
consistency, reminds both current and prospective customers that your
organization cares.
Topic examples include: New advances in personalized allopathic medicine;
The discovery of another vegetable showing anticancer properties; An update
on the dangers of diet soda; A botanical study at Mayo reducing white blood
cells in leukemia patients; A phase II study on acupuncture showing positive
outcomes for lower back pain; News around the center; Recent TV or radio
interviews with your dietician. Remember, if your center doesn’t write about
this stuff, another center will. That’s a fact. Why not take ownership of this
space by creating the content and driving the conversation?
Create a newsletter subscription sign-up form and place it prominently on
your site. Start collecting interesting news and information—some of which
can be repurposed from content you’ve already created for your site or other
efforts detailed above. Get folks to sign up for your newsletter when signing
in for clinic appointments. Consider delivering a print version in addition to
an e-version.
5. Create and deliver great content to build trust around your center’s brand.
Your center has a unique ethos made possible by interesting, accomplished
practitioners and a dedicated support team. What makes your clinic
different? What’s your organization’s story?! What are your patients’
stories? Perhaps they can discuss their experiences working with your
center—or, newfound health outcomes made possible by your center’s
lifestyle modification recommendations.
From textual and video testimonials to QA features to “before and after”
stories and more, patient-driven content is a terrific way to humanize your
organization. The same approach to content creation and storytelling can be
applied to highlighting/showcasing your various practitioners and staff.
Content is King for Growing Patient Volume cont’d

You will be surprised by how engaging carefully crafted, meaningful content
can be. Imagine short QAs attached to your practitioner’s bios. Or even
a two-minute video with the practitioner explaining her integrative health
philosophy and passion. This approach is more dynamic than the important
however dry traditional emphasis placed on a practitioner’s education and
CV. By all means highlight their resume and link to their CV, just spice it up
with more creative engagement.
The consistent creation and delivery of informative content not only drives
recognition of your organization and builds traffic—both physically and
virtually—it also engenders trust around your brand. Consumers will come
to know and expect that when they receive your emails, reference your site
or review your newsletter, you have interesting, relevant and often compel-
ling information to share—you aren’t simply pitching your center’s products
or services. This is the power of compelling content!
Content is King for Growing Patient Volume cont’d

My longtime professional background in media and market-
ing started during the still-heady days of television, radio and
magazines. Cable was just making its way into the world. There was no
Internet— at least not a public one—nor digital social networks. Profession-
als created content while producers, program directors and editors were the
arbiters of what the public saw and consumed.
Integrative healthcare was not as widely available back in those days.
While “alternative” health interventions were usually disparaged by the
conventional medicine community, “promotion” of its beneficial value grew
through a single effective channel: word-of-mouth. In other words: through
very personal stories.
ADVERTISEMENTS INTERRUPT
When I was running my media company, if you wanted to reach customers
consuming information from these channels, you had two choices: editorial
or what’s called “earned media” coverage based on merit (specifically, on
what editorial gatekeepers deemed worthy or interesting to their audience)
or “rent” time: air or space in the form of an advertisement. Television, radio
and magazine ads are “interruptive.” Companies and organizations buy ads
to sell their products, their services and to influence their markets. Traditional
ads interrupt and disrupt. Their objective is to essentially say, “Stop, look at
me, look at me!” Notably, these ads are surrounded by content—content that
is largely conceived, developed, owned and controlled by media companies.
NOW WE ARE ALL THE MEDIA
The Internet and plethora of television channels and social media have all
combined to create a sea change in how people consume and share media.
More profoundly, blogging, micro-blogging (think Twitter) and other aspects of
digital information sharing have transformed consumers into content creators,
tastemakers and influencers. Large numbers of celebrities and non-celeb-
rities alike have significant followers, fans and subscribers of their social
media-expressed brands. Many individuals now directly control their own
media relations activities, announcements and general public messaging.
During the decision-making process, consumers are starting to rely more
and more on peer reviews and feedback via social media than on ads and
other sources of traditional, “professional” media.
STORYTELLING ENGAGES
In contrast to interruptive forms of advertising, content development allows
integrative healthcare providers the opportunity to create thoughtfully
crafted stories. Targeted and done correctly, storytelling engages. It has the
profound power to connect on an emotional level. Regardless of the media
channel, including experiential, nothing quite connects like a good story. And
your clinic or center can control the storytelling process. Wondering what
stories I am talking about? Well, the topics are endless, and, when presented
Integrative Medicine is a Story, Not an Advertisement

in an appealing fashion, incredibly valuable to health consumers. Topics
can address wellness, prevention, diet, supplementation, contraindications,
exercise, the impact of integrative modalities on various conditions, the latest
science across the spectrum of integrative healthcare delivery and so much
more.
THE DECLINING IMPACT OF TRADITIONAL MEDIA
Traditional advertising and marketing have proven marginally beneficial, at
best, to growing integrative medicine services. Targeted local print media
and radio have helped practitioners connect with the growing but still small
number of people interested in holistic and alternative therapeutic approach-
es. Unfortunately, the full value of integrative healthcare is simply too difficult
to promote through conventional media alone. Advertising campaigns are ex-
pensive and often hard to track in terms of overall effectiveness. An advertis-
ing “campaign”, by nature, is just that, a campaign that includes both a start
and end date. Simply put, using traditional media alone is not an economi-
cally sustainable marketing approach to building meaningful growth.
THOSE DELIVERING INTEGRATIVE HEALTHCARE NEED TO BECOME THE
“STORY-TELLING” MEDIA
There’s no getting around the fact that businesses of all types and shapes
have become publishers. Companies are developing useful, relevant content
and delivering it with continuity directly to consumers. They are effectively
surrounding their “brand” with trusted information.
Regardless of the size or type of your integrative medicine enterprise,
storytelling via content creation has never been more important for build-
ing patient volume. Unfortunately, the healthcare delivery industry has fallen
way behind here, and it has negatively impacted the growth of integrative
medicine programs, especially those operating within academic centers and
large hospital systems.
Surprisingly, the larger centers and health systems rarely publish anything on
their sites other than the occasional news item, community program update
or press release. Over time you’ll see more and more health systems and
private centers become “content marketers”.
Health institutions pioneering the area of content creation currently include:
Mayo Clinic, Johns Hopkins, Cleveland Clinic and Kaiser Permanente. All of
whom are bona fide publishers directly and consistently engaging patients
and prospects across media and communications channels.
DIGITAL MARKETING IS TRANSFORMATIONAL, BUT OLD MEDIA STILL HAS
ITS PLACE
If you are using specific print, broadcast, radio, or cable media outlets in your
market to get your message out, and consistently, cost-effectively driving
Integrative Medicine is a Story, Not an Advertisement cont’d

new patient volume, by all means continue.
Are you creating promotional print collateral material for direct mail campaigns,
your waiting room patients, your community education program attendees,
or local practitioners from whom you would like patient referrals? If so, that’s
wonderful! Traditional media and marketing approaches can still be very
effective. These viable core staples can help round out your comprehensive
marketing mix.
The point is that you must enter and test the digital waters. Start by creating
original content to achieve to augment and greatly strengthen your
marketing prowess.
Integrative Medicine is a Story, Not an Advertisement cont’d

A blog provides your center with a platform to outwardly communicate with consum-
ers, giving you the ability to establish trust and thought leadership with current and
prospective patient clients.
No Longer Static
All websites contain a portion of core static content that rarely changes. This messaging is vitally important
and must be very SEO (search engine optimization) friendly. You may have added your Twitter or Facebook
feed, but these features and your core static content alone do not drive SEO or raise organic page rankings
on search engines like Google or Yahoo! Once you commit to a properly implemented blog program, creating
fresh content, you begin to distinguish your brand (center) from others in your competitive set.
Marketer or Publisher?
You may think of yourself as a marketer, but effective marketing today must include content creation and
delivery. You are now a publisher. Remember, the consistent delivery of informative blog content builds a
valuable editorial archive that over time, drives more and more organic traffic to your site through SEO.
A Content-Driven World
The well-informed health consumer absorbs tons of media when they or a loved one is diagnosed with a condi-
tion or illness. Depending on specific needs and interests, these consumers will look for information and help
through web searches. Content is king—and your center needs to own its media. This is how you will be found.
A Smart Content Strategy Starts with Your Blog
A quality blog program is fundamental to good overall content strategy. Much of the content used in
Why Your Blog Strategy is Important

blog posts can conveniently be re-purposed for other uses, i.e., monthly e-
newsletters, print newsletters, videos, mini-magazines, social media efforts
and more.
Ease of Use
Blogs are easy to author, edit and upload (images, sound and video). If I
can do it, anyone can. Built-in content management systems (CMS) like
WordPress make it simple. Your center should be able to upload blog posts
and make simple edits in other areas of your site at will. If you are still
relying on an outside vendor to make web updates, it’s time to re-think your
internal process. Your site is your most important communication vehicle,
thus you need to be in full control of the content and authoring process.
Snapshot of the Integrative Medicine Blog Landscape
Here are several integrative medicine centers that do a pretty good job with
their blogs:
• Dr. Frank Lipman
• The UltraWellness Center
• Block Center for Integrative Cancer Treatment
• Integrative Health Institute
• Flatiron Functional Medicine
These centers are consistently delivering useful, relevant content around
their brand, engendering trust and building their own media. Pay attention
to the frequency of posts by Dr. Lipman, and Dr. Hyman at The UltraWellness
Center. Consistency is crucial. Assuming proper keywords are used and
simple optimization techniques followed, over time, the branding investment
these centers are making will steadily pay dividends, by building organic
SEO, raising page rankings on the major search sites and pulling in new
prospective customers.
Why Your Blog Strategy is Important cont’d

Surprisingly, the majority of integrative centers today do not
maintain a blog. And those who do rarely have a proper, long term plan to
maintain and develop a body of useful, privately “owned” content. Or they
once had a blog—the idea sounded good at the time, posts were written and
published, but then after fits and starts it just kind of fizzled. The most recent
post for many centers date back months—even years! Does any of this
sound familiar? Under which category do you fall? It’s time to either remove
your blog altogether or re-engineer your approach. I’m pushing for the latter.
“Maintaining a Blog Seemed Easy and Exciting at the Time, But…”
The process of consistently creating quality, informative content around your
brand (center or clinic) is not easy. However, maintaining a quality long-term
program doesn’t need to be difficult if you follow these basic guidelines:
One Manager Only
You need to assign one person to take lead of your blog program. This
person will ultimately be responsible for assignments, deadlines, internal
communications, editing, image collection and post uploads. If you have
more than one leader heading the initiative, it will quickly become unwieldy
and unsustainable.
Getting Buy-In From Your Team
Whether you previously had a blog that has since been abandoned, are
maintaining a spotty, lackluster effort today—or just now getting around to
launching your new blog—you need buy-in from your team. Get your group
of practitioners together and clearly explain the importance and benefits
of establishing an effective blog presence. Emphasize the importance of
establishing thought leadership to positively influence current and prospective
customers.
Identify Your Team’s Individual Strengths
Review the list of integrative modalities offered by your center and the mix
of practitioners fulfilling these services. Ask each team member to commit
to writing two consumer-oriented posts per month, approximately 350-600
words in length, on topics around their area(s) of interest and expertise.
Blog Topics
The topics for your posts are virtually endless. Do you provide integrative
services around, say, primary care, oncology, pain management, naturopathy
or women’s health—and offer dietician/nutritionist consults, supplementation,
massage, acupuncture, mindfulness-based stress reduction techniques? Have
each contributor (practitioner) start their own list of topics. Flesh out each list
as a group and offer feedback to help shape the most viable ideas.
Create an Editorial/Production Schedule
This task is crucial and fundamentally helpful. Create a simple spreadsheet
Creating a Sustainable Blog Strategy

that captures your contributing authors’ names, assignments, word counts,
text deadlines, image deadlines, publication dates and any special notes.
Make the spreadsheet available on the company server, DropBox, Google
Docs or otherwise for all authors to view in real time. Give editing permis-
sions to your team if you want them to provide direct input. Or, ask for ideas
to be sent directly to the blog manager who’ll subsequently approve and en-
ter. There is no right or wrong way; do whatever works best to keep everyone
in your organization on the same page.
Frequency Matters
If you have ample blog contributors on your team, you might easily be able
to publish 3-5 quality posts per week, ideally several across a few different
subject matters.
KISS—Keep it Simple Stupid Silly
The following proven rules will streamline the writing process and increase
reader engagement:
1. When writing, turn off email client and all social media windows
… so you can actually focus on writing! Use strong titles— it’s the
doorway to readership. Keep your titles under 75 characters. If your
title stinks, the post will not be read! Numbers are good, i.e., “5 Ways
to Improve Your Conditioning;” “10 Must-Have Super foods”, “8 Ways
to Lower Your Inflammation Load.” Integrative health topics can be
endless so choose blog subjects reflecting your specialty areas. This
tactic has been used successfully for decades to increase newsstand
magazines sales. Write the title first; then deliver on its promise. Create
SEO-friendly titles by including strong keywords.
2. Keep posts under 650 words—brevity rules! Use short paragraphs,
short sentences and simple words.
3. Always use at least one powerful visual image—stay away from bor-
ing and predictable images and kitsch! Invest a few dollars for each
post and use quality images. I use istockphotos.com.
4. Post 1-2x week (consistency and frequency make a big difference for
SEO; post as often as you can).
5. Maintain list of blog concepts/ideas—use a content calendar/produc-
tion schedule.
Creating a Sustainable Blog Strategy cont’d

6. Create an outline (based on writing frame; see #14!).
7. Write (right brain). Do not simultaneously edit (left brain)!
8. Complete the draft.
9. Next edit and format—shorten everywhere you can.
10. Add hyperlinks (to outside sources and to pages on your own site) and meta-
data (description, keywords, tags, category(ies).
11. Read through silently twice; then read aloud once.
12. Proofreader(s) review if available!
13. Search engine optimization—if you use WordPress, publish a draft with
a timed release, use WP admin panel, run through the Scribe plugin to
analyze the content. Then incorporate provided suggestions for optimizing
content, making the post more SEO friendly; Scribe target score: 100 (If you
don’t use WordPress and are just starting to create fluid content like a blog,
then use SEO tools available based on your website program and content
management system.)
14. Ready to begin? Use a writing frame:
Strong title—write your titles, headlines, sub-headers and copy
with search engine optimization in mind. Make sure to tag ap-
propriate keywords.
Lead paragraph (short premise) Personal experience (personal
storytelling rules, but must always function as a doorway to
serving readers’ needs)
Main body—numbered points, bullets or both; bold interesting
points or sentences.
Break up with subheads to keep reader attention and move
them through your content.
Conclude with a question to encourage engagement and com-
ments (as long as you have the time to monitor the responses
and respond accordingly, I recommend turning on the com-
ments field). Even if you are not a prolific scribe, don’t worry.
Following these rules will help keep your blog post writing
focused. Posts of this size, say 350—650 words, can be re-
searched, written, edited and formatted in less than 75 minutes.
It will take some time to get there. You just need to get started.
15. Use a writing frame, like this one from Chris Brogan.

A Couple More Important Tidbits
Stay On Topic
Three of the most common mistakes with blog posts are that they’re too
long, dense, and stray off topic. You may be able to follow your own writing
perfectly well, but, if your transitions are not smooth, you will lose the
reader’s interest. Writing two separate posts are usually better than
conflating two themes into one. Follow? If so, I’ve kept your attention
thus far by employing the same tactics and avoiding the pitfalls I’ve
written about in this section of the e-Book!
Do Not Edit Your Own Writing
If you wrote it, you should not edit it. You are too close to the trees. If
possible, get another set of eyes across your copy. Depending on your
organization’s size or capacity, perhaps there are internal marketing and
communications resources. Or maybe the blog manager herself or an
outside resource is the best match for your editing needs.

Once your new blog strategy is up and running, you are on
your way to creating interesting, relevant content around
your center’s (brand’s) integrative medicine mission. Creating
great content is an important start, but now you’re ready for your content
to be read more widely.
Essential Reading
Brody Dorland wrote an excellent post for the Content Marketing Insti-
tute called 12 Things to Do After You’ve Written a New Blog Post. The
advice Dorland shares largely works across business sectors and certainly
applies to integrative medicine centers of all types and sizes. I’m always
saying that content is king, but, to get your work out there, distribution is
still really important. As you will read in Dorland’s post, there are many
effective ways to go about this. Follow the majority of his suggestions and
you’ll be well on your way to maximizing your blog readership.
RSS Feeds
There is one thing that Dorland and I don’t agree on: the use of RSS feeds
to populate one’s various social media accounts. Having your social media
accounts automatically populate does not allow for message control,
which is essential to success engagement and storytelling.
If you have, say, less than a half-dozen accounts including Facebook,
Twitter and Google+, it’s more effective to manually craft different messages
based on the specific social platform, audience and space limitation. If your
blog team is managing to create say, 3-5 posts per week, it will not take long
to manually post these to a half-dozen social media accounts. Be careful to
leave at least a dozen character spaces on your tweets to allow others to
retweet your messages.
Blog Content is Not Channel Dependent
You’re creating blog content, but it doesn’t have to just stay there. Your
blog initiative is your core content hub. It doesn’t need to stay digital. Not
all existing or prospective customers get their media from RSS feeds,
social media or e-newsletters. Believe it or not, some folks across the
age spectrum still prefer print—or they read a combination of digital and
print. The point is you need to reach your customers where ever they
actually consume their media, not simply where you would like them to
be. A good deal of your blog content is perfect for populating your e-
newsletter. And, it can easily be re-purposed for your additional
communication efforts.
Extending the Reach
It’s neither hard nor expensive to have a decent designer come up with
a print newsletter template informed by your brand identity (logo, fonts,
color palette, etc.). You can essentially reuse the same template for
Maximizing Readership of Your Blog Content

years. Consider delivering your newsletter to your patient database and
distributing bulk quantities to strategically-targeted places where they’re
most likely to be read, including your own reception area.
Reaping the Rewards
Growing influence and reach by cultivating a dedicated readership
takes time. But done correctly, and consistently (imperative!), your blog
program will pay long-term dividends: building trust around your brand
(center) and increasing patient volume through education—the delivery
of informative, quality content.
Maximizing Readership of Your Blog Content cont’d

Simply put, live presentation is and will always be the most
powerful communication medium.
Nothing engages people like a live experience. Whether sports, music or …
yes, medical information—a live setting experience provides more engage-
ment than a book, CD, television or website.
Some of the most successful integrative medicine practices, clinics and
centers share at least one common theme: consistent community outreach
and education. Centers with varying fiscal and human resource capability
are realizing the value of providing patients with relevant, beneficial
information. In effect educating and consistently motivating new patients to
use their various integrative services.
Communicate to Educate
Evidence-based integrative medicine is still quite new for most of the general
population, and, for many conventionally-trained clinicians, administrators
and medical students, too. After word-of-mouth referral, community outreach
and education is often cited as a primary builder of clinic utilization; it helps
drive self- and physician referrals.
Following are some community outreach content ideas. Create a weekly series of
60-90 minute lectures, targeted to a single intervention or specialty area, such as:
• Acupuncture
• Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction
• Guided Imagery, Visualization Techniques
• Deep Breathing Exercises
• Yoga Pilates
• Nutrition
• Exercise
• Biofeedback
• Nutraceuticals (dietary supplements)
• Pain Management
Centers specialize in different conditions and provide varying sets of
integrative intervention. Choose your top five or six areas of interest and
expertise and get started.
Introduce your center and discussants
Start each lecture (seminar, discussion—whatever you choose to call it)
with a short introduction to you, your center, your staff, your colleagues—
and anyone else addressing the audience. And of course, thank folks for
making time to attend.
Community Outreach: Using Experiential Content Marketing to Influence, Engage and Grow

Let your audience know what will be covered during the 60-90 minute
lecture, such as:

• The evidence
• How specific interventions are administered in clinic
• Service models: insurance vs. pay-for-service
• Hands-on demonstrations
• QA session
• An opportunity to meet the speaker(s) and clinic staff after the
lecture
Don’t forget the collateral
Always make sure your center’s brochure is readily available by placing one
on each seat or passing them out to all attendees as they enter. Also, having
a lecture one-sheet is smart and makes a good companion to your brochure.
Endless options
Depending on your audience size, you may opt for small or large group dem-
onstrations. For instance, for larger groups you could provide the audience
with mats and towels and introduce yoga or Pilates. Or forgo the mats and
towels and do a mini Tai Chi class. Or turn the lights down and do a deep re-
laxation breathing demonstration. For smaller groups, acupuncture or cook-
ing demonstrations can be wonderful. When it comes to developing quality
program ideas for your lectures, the topics are nearly endless.
Quality educational content can be shaped to appeal to general or targeted
audiences. Existing patients? Check. Prospective patients? Check. Community
physicians? Check. Other practitioners and influencers? Check.
Samples of speaking events
• Simms/Mann UCLA Center for Integrative Oncology —Insights Into
Cancer Public Lecture Series
• Blum Center for Health—Classes and Lectures
• Northwestern Integrative Medicine—Workshops and Lectures
• MD Anderson Integrative Medicine Program—Lecture Series
• Torrance Memorial Integrative Medicine—Lecture Series
Potential Speaking Venues

• Your center or clinic
• Affiliated hospital (not offering IM services)
• Local grocery store like Whole Foods or indie health food store
• Local gym • Library • YMCA
• Community center/senior center
• Church, Synagogue, Mosque or other places of worship
Community Outreach cont’d

Marketing your lecture series
There are numerous ways to promote your integrative medicine lecture
series. Here are just a few:

• Your website (and partner websites)
• Media tie-ins: Look for an appropriate local media partner spon-
sor (radio, print, web) to cross-promote your series
• Attractive fliers or post cards distributed at local health food
stores, spas, gyms, etc.
• Your e-newsletter
• Facebook, Twitter and other social media
• Venue Partner: if you tie into a community center, library or other
public or private venue, make sure you’re included in their event
calendar and heavily cross-promote
You don’t have to be a major center or spend a lot of money to create a qual-
ity oriented and well-attended experiential educational series. You just need
to follow these steps and do the work! There’s never been a better time to go
“live” and touch someone!
Community Outreach cont’d

Social Media: Inform. Engage. Listen.
More integrative medicine professionals than ever are using
social media sites like LinkedIn for globe-spanning peer-to-peer
connection allowing for productive, creative idea sharing. The
use of crowdsourcing by medical specialists discussing challenging patient
cases is growing. Facebook has over 1 billion monthly users. Twitter transmits
over 400 million tweets every day.
According to The Pew Research Center’s Internet American Life Project,
nearly 80 percent of Internet users go online for answers to health questions.
Social media now plays a significant role in consumer health education.
PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Health Research Institute (HRI) reports that “one-
third of consumers now use social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter,
YouTube and online forums for health-related matters, including seeking
medical information, tracking and sharing symptoms, and broadcasting how
they feel about doctors, drugs, treatments, medical devices and health plans.”
It’s hard to ignore this explosive growth, but astonishingly, most integrative
medicine centers have not yet jumped on the social media train to engage
current and prospective patients (customers).
Thefollowingoffersgeneralguidancetointegrativehealthprovidersinterestedin
creatingafoundational,legallysound,socialmedia(akasocialbusiness)strategy:
Social media includes myriad platforms and channels. Here is the basic mix:

• Website + Blogging/Micro Blogging (Twitter)
• Social Networks (Facebook, Google+, 100’s of others)
• Social Bookmarking (Digg, Delicious)
• e-Newsletters/e-Blasts
• Photo Sharing (Flickr, Pinterest, Instagram)
• Video Sharing: (YouTube, Vimeo)
• Public Comments on Websites
Legal Exposure and HIPAA Concerns
Let’s get these important issues out of the way first. To properly and responsibly
utilize social media to engage current and prospective customers you need to
closely adhere to a few basic precepts:

• Include a medical disclaimer
• Do not offer specific, individualized medical advice
• Never include actual full patient names, even in response to input
or questions
• Monitor your social platforms regularly for offensive behavior and
remove inappropriate comments

(Important: If your organization has established social media guidelines,
review them carefully in the context of this section.)
It’s remarkable how many integrative health websites fail to include a basic
medical disclaimer. This vital SOP should be followed in every applicable
social media outpost. Here’s a very basic disclaimer used on FON’s site:
“All information contained on this website is intended for informational and
educational purposes only, and is neither intended nor suited to be a replace-
ment or substitute for professional medical treatment nor for professional
medical advice relative to a specific medical question or condition”.
Looking for something more comprehensive? Go to any major medical Web-
site and find theirs at the footer (very bottom). It’s either presented textually
or linked to its own page. Add this today! And while you’re at it, make sure
you have a solid privacy notice and clear terms of use language that is typi-
cally accessible from the same footer area.
Never use social media to provide specific medical advice to patients. Com-
municate about specific conditions in general terms. Patients and prospects
wanting specific medical advice should be encouraged to make a clinic ap-
pointment. This is a responsible, appropriate way to convert local prospects
to patients.
Patient privacy must be maintained in all communications. Do not disclose
information that may be used to reveal patient identity or their specific health
concerns. Remember that even by changing a name, the patient, family,
friend, colleague or employer may still be able to identify the specific person.
The HITECH Act that promised economic incentives to providers for
implementing EHRs, simultaneously increased civil monetary penalties
for unauthorized release of protected health information. A major focus
for this funding was aimed squarely at security breaches through social
media, further proof of its exponential growth. Providers who ignore
HIPAA laws when engaging in social media strategy do so at their own
peril. Simply follow these rules and you are golden.
Social Business is Good Business for Integrative Medicine
Implemented responsibly and effectively, social media focuses on three
important areas:

• Informing: Via the consistent delivery of useful information.
• Engaging: Via regular interaction with consumers and organizations
sharing an affinity and interest for advancing integrative healthcare.
• Listening: By discovering what your current and prospective pa-
tients are saying about your center—and acting on this information
to ensure quick and exceptional customer service.
Social Media cont’d

These are the primary pillars of social business. Social media allows organi-
zations to engage directly with current and prospective patients, effectively
cutting out the middle man (traditional media). By sharing and discussing
relevant, useful information about your area(s) of expertise, you establish
thought leadership in your community, while gaining greater rapport and
trust. Meaningful engagement drives business.
By listening to what others are saying—both good and bad—about your
center on social media pages and via searches, you will learn how to im-
prove your business by elevating the quality of your customer service.
Start by setting up a Google Alerts “listening post”. Simply enter up to 10
search terms and how often you would like an alert delivered to your inbox.
Start with the name of your center and an individual practitioner’s name.
Then, focus on more general keyword terms related to your local area and
core services provided, such as “chelation therapy Nashville”, “integra-
tive medicine Nashville”. Then, set Alerts for your main competitors. Google
will capture search results across the web. Knowledge is power, especially
when acted upon.
Can you really grow patient volume with a smart social media strategy?
Absolutely. But it takes time and commitment to earn big dividends. First
and foremost, social media is about the engagement process through
sharing relevant and useful information. This helps establish trust around
your brand. You need to “give” (provide something useful) at least 10-15
times for every “ask” (i.e., pitching a sale, special offer or other deal). If
your current social media presence primarily consists of “selling” inte-
grative services and heavily promoting your center, then you are going
about it all wrong. Save that for interruptive print ads and radio spots.
Social media is for educating, engaging and storytelling … all forms of
discreet, tactful selling.
Setting Goals
You need to set realistic goals. You aren’t going to get 100,000 Facebook
“likes” or 200,000 Twitter “followers” overnight. That is, unless Justin
Beiber is blogging as part of your IM social media posse. Regardless, the
sheer volume of likes and followers should not be the end-all metric by
which success is measured. Qualitative engagement beats quantitative
connections every time.
Focus on Your Hub
Your hub is comprised of your website, blog and newsletter. You own and
control these. They cannot be taken away from you; the rules cannot be
easily changed. However, this is not the case regarding the myriad social
networks and media outposts where you have the “option” of maintaining
a presence.

Remember, unless your last name is Zuckerberg, you are simply renting—
usually at no charge—space on a given social network platform. Although
you can do some level of transactional business from social channels, your
primary goal should be getting prospects to your website to take a deeper
look at your brand (center) and to take action, like signing up for your blog,
RSS feeds and newsletter.
Choose Your Outposts Wisely
You don’t have to be everywhere! Choose carefully. Identify and target
where your patients and prospects spend most of their time online. Typically,
three good places to start are Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. And remem-
ber, a portion of your customers and prospects still prefer to consume their
content the old fashion way: print—ink on paper.
Assign Ownership
Designate one person within your organization as manager of your social
media program. A modest upstart program, once implemented, can be
managed in as little as 60 minutes per day—30 minutes in the morning
and evening.
This daily 60 minute investment can include the basic social media activi-
ties—following, liking and linking new people and organizations; sharing new
content; answering questions and starting new conversations; and, impor-
tantly, monitoring your social platform for inappropriate activity.
For smaller clinics, the assigned social media manager, might grow into the
role of main content assigner, organizer and tracker even while handling their
other office duties.
No Content, No Social Media
I’ve stated many times in this e-Book “content is king for growing integrative
medicine services”. The strategic creation and consistent dissemination of
useful, relevant content creates engagement and builds trust around your
brand. It starts with your hub—website, blog and e-newsletter—and from
there populates your social media platforms. Over time, your hub and its
growing base of original content allows for the creation of longer form writ-
ings (i.e., e-books, guides), short-form videos and experiential educational
programming—all aimed at growing clinic utilization.
One Step at a Time
There are plenty of sophisticated social media measuring tools and endless apps
and widgets to consider. The sky’s the limit for building out a leading-edge social
platform presence. This e-Book touches on the very basics. Creating original
content and a smart dissemination strategy is not simple. It takes time to master.
Thankfully, in a field as rich and vibrant as integrative medicine, there are plenty
of interesting topics to fill even a twenty-year editorial calendar!

Don’t let the tools and platforms bog things down and get in the way of the
work that needs doing. There will be time to revisit new social media op-
portunities, apps and platforms when you’re ready.
Creating a smart social media strategy is imperative. Understanding your
unique center’s goals is essential. Develop your social media program
in easily executable phases. But do start! Over the long term, if done
correctly, social media will be become a vital part of your business’s
sustainable marketing mix—allowing you to tell bigger stories and build
trust around your brand.

Glenn Sabin is a veteran marketing and
business development executive who for
over two decades led an award-winning
media and content marketing firm in the
Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. Click
here to learn about Glenn’s passion for
evidenced-based integrative medicine
and his forthcoming book N-of-1: How One
Man’s Triumph Over Terminal Cancer is
Changing the Medical Establishment.
About FON Therapeutics
FON delivers customized business and
clinic solutions to integrative medicine and
oncology centers and private practices.
FON focuses on growing clinic utiliza-
tion—driven by innovative marketing, messaging and brand positioning—all
rooted in fiscally sustainable business models that work. Contact FON today
to schedule a complimentary 30-minute consultation to discuss your busi-
ness development needs.
About the Author

Grow Your Integrative Medicine Business By Telling Bigger Stories

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