Instead of standard medical jargon, a relatable and personable communication style always works better to drive appointments and patient retention.

You may not be too familiar with such heavy-handed business language as a medical professional. But the fact is, medical practices and medical institutes also require good business skills to survive.

You might always look for new patients and ways to build a knowing, liking, and trusting relationship with them. Instagram video marketing allows you to reach potential patients with your medical services and offerings.

The fact that you are here, reading this article, means you are trying to figure out the best practices for winning the Instagram marketing game.

Yes, Instagram or any social media marketing is competitive because you have to face a large number of influencers with a massive number of followers. However, you can also be an influential marketer on Instagram if you have the right marketing plan. Here’s how to gain the attention of Instagram followers and potential patients.

Why Should You Choose Instagram Video Marketing?

When we talk about Instagram marketing through video content, you are probably wondering: Why choose video content for marketing? What does video marketing include? Let’s get the basics straight first.

In this digital age, content creation is a must for all brands and businesses. The days had gone by when marketers rushed to sell their products through various advertising efforts.

Nowadays, people prefer to make more informed choices. They would like to check out their needs directly on the web. And they mostly search randomly or based on the call-to-action of content they have read or watched recently.

To be available on their random searches, your medical practices must be available on Google’s local business listings, review sites, and local business listings. But what about being remembered by the customer?

Posting different types of Instagram videos would be a great start to reaching all Gen-Y and Gen-Z digital natives who are responsible for their parents, children, and family. So, if you can establish your credibility before them, no one can stop you from having good business.

If they started trusting your expertise, not only would they come to you again and again, but they would also recommend your services to others.

Referrals or sharing through ongoing conversations on social media platforms are the best fuel for marketing.

Now the questions are:

• How to make content engaging and end with a passionate call to action?
• And most importantly, what makes a person engage with a call-to-action (CTA)?

Instagram Video Marketing for Doctors: Best Practices to Ensure Good Business

Here are the best tips to make potential patients follow your posts, trust your expertise, fall in love with your offerings, and return to your medical practices again and again:

Hook your audience

Posting different types of videos on Instagram is important, but crafting a compelling hook is even more important. People read through their social media feeds in their spare time. So, there is a high chance the audience will keep scrolling to skip your content, even if it’s a masterpiece and exactly what they were looking for.

So, you can’t compromise on a convincing hook at the start of your video content. Grab and hold the viewer’s attention by:

• Adding eye-catching visuals and punchy transitions
• Adding a clear value statement articulating why the viewers should keep watching the video content till the end.
• Emphasize the issues, potential home remedies or treatment plans, and costs you will discuss.
• Ending up with a call-to-action to make sure the audience remembers you and your services.

Humanize the brand

So many reels, stories, and videos are there on the Instagram feed, fighting for the attention of your ideal patients. You can give your audience a clear reason to stick around after adding a hook, but why would Instagram users check out your videos in the future?

To do so, you must establish meaningful connections with your audience, similar to the relationships with our social media friends. By adding personalization to your content and marketing approach, you can stay in touch with your audience for future views and referrals.

Check out these helpful hints for humanizing your brand, creating your identity, and building loyalty:

• Opening up to the viewers about your services will help build a deeper connection with them. It allows them to see your values and the ins and outs of your offerings and services.
• Speak in the language of your audience. Maybe it’s a complicated medical issue or treatment plan. Try to present it in the video content in a simple way.
• Don’t post like a marketer. You should present yourself as someone who genuinely cares about your audience’s medical concerns.
• Make sure to make the video content simple, inviting to look at, fun to read, and memorable.

Prioritize relatability

Don’t rush to sell your services without knowing the patient’s needs. When the key message of your video speaks to the audience’s needs and pain points, you will position your videos, Instagram reels, or stories as their solution, compel them to keep watching the video, and follow your future posts.

You can encourage the audiences to open up about their issues and ask questions to push more conversations about the posted topic or beyond it to enhance engagement and get insights about the next topic, which people might be interested in.

Be sensitive

Word of mouth is all that matters for marketing success. When you listen to the patients with a lot of empathy, amazing things will happen. While interacting through the comment section below the posted video, show empathy.

You can advise the commenters at no cost for their issues, give them assurance about the best treatment plans within their budget and cure, or refer them to any other doctors or healthcare service providers if it’s not part of the services you offer.

Optimize videos

Your time and effort invested in video marketing could go in vain if you don’t make the video reach potential customers. Video optimization in the following ways will boost the online presence of your video content:

• Identify your target audience, their issues, and when they are generally most active on social media.
• To increase your reach and referrals, try to serve their interests.
• Do in-depth research about the topic and maintain the authenticity of each claim.
• Try to make the video as short as possible and put all the important information in the first few seconds.
• Ensure the quality of the videos.
• Optimize the video title and description.
• Add subtitles and custom thumbnails to your videos.
• Add captions and hashtags according to the most popular related search query for better reach.
• Also, add the video to a specific category so that Instagram users will find your videos easily in the future.

Keep these best practices in mind as you create content that is both informative and visually appealing, and be sure to measure the engagement data to improve your strategy over time. With thoughtful consideration for your brand identity and an authentic approach to sharing relevant information, you can achieve great things through Instagram video marketing, like accelerating your practice growth and building long-lasting patient relationships.

About Author

Sharanya Chandrasekhar

I write content that ranks for doctors.