In this instalment of our regular feature highlighting small-business marketing experts who have created successful campaigns in challenging circumstances, we find out how Vanessa Geraghty of Vivacity Marketing in Perth helped a mobile physio who had been working for someone else launch his own venture. The client had no experience running a business and was setting up in a new territory where he had no established network – but the move was a success.
Tim Pass approached Vanessa as he was just about to leave his employer. For he’d been working as a mobile physiotherapist but now intended to start his own business in the southwest of WA. Although Tim’s plan was to start an enterprise in the same field, he had no experience as a business owner.
He realised that he needed a website, some branded items, and a full marketing strategy so he could launch strongly and fulfill his dream of being a business owner while doing what he loved. But he had no marketing experience.
“Tim knew he needed a marketing consultant and an agency that could help him with all of the marketing services that he needed to launch his business and then offer ongoing support as a sounding board for advice during those first crucial months,” Vanessa explains. “He was willing to invest in his business, and in marketing it, as he understood that marketing could make or break his business.”
Tim didn’t have an established network in the south-west of the state – indeed he had very few contacts there at all. He needed Vanessa to create an effective, fast-results marketing plan so he could build his client base quickly in new territory.
“Tim is a great physio but he didn’t know anything about marketing,” Vanessa says. “We needed to create a marketing strategy and plan that he could follow and implement himself so that his business would be a success.” Vanessa set about drawing up a clear roadmap of all the marketing activities Tim would need to do, pre-launch and post-launch.
“He’s about six months ahead, each time, of achieving the goals he has set.”
At their first face-to-face meeting, Vanessa ascertained what Tim was trying to achieve, what his business would ideally look like, who his competitors were, how many clients a week he would need to see, and what he really needed from his marketing plan to help him succeed.
“Tim’s niche is being an in-home physio for the elderly,” Vanessa explains. “Being able to travel to elderly clients’ homes would make it easier for their families to get care for their loved ones. Tim had chosen to work with me on his marketing, as I had worked with other physiotherapy clients in the past, and also some chiropractors, so he knew that I understood the space.
“I had also worked with a client who provided in-home care to the elderly so he knew I understood how the funding model worked and the services that he could make available in-home.”
Build trust and relationships
Without any kind of business footprint in south-west WA, the strategy had to empower Tim to build trust within the community and foster relationships with potential referral partners, such as hospitals, doctors and in-home care providers. Making them advocates for his service would allow him to build a significant client base.
Vanessa got Tim to research local healthcare providers and he conducted an online search for consultants who could help him, recording their contact details so he could start to build relationships with them and gain referrals. “Ultimately, this list proved to be a huge part of Tim’s success in getting the business up and running,” Vanessa avers.
Build a website, success will come
This approach meant that Tim would need a website that incorporated a doctor referral section for easy intake of referral patients, alongside branded collateral and information packs to leave with his referral partners.
“Over the next couple of months, we built his website, designed all his collateral and completed his marketing strategy,” Vanessa says.
Within six months of launching his Abode In-Home Physio website, Tim had not only reached but exceeded his revenue targets. He has already hired another mobile physio to be a part of his team, as he reached capacity in terms of the number of clients he can look after himself. He has also hired an admin person.
‘Leave it to the professionals‘
“Tim is well established in the south-west of WA as the go-to mobile physio for the elderly at home,” Vanessa enthuses. “He’s about six months ahead, each time, of achieving the goals he has set, which is fantastic. It’s so wonderful to see clients succeed, and to succeed because they have followed the marketing plan and implemented all the recommendations made in the plan.”
The experience has confirmed Vanessa’s belief that the number one thing you need to do when you are launching a new business is to get a marketing professional to create a marketing strategy and plan that is tailored to your unique business and niche.
“You also need to ensure you have set aside enough of a marketing budget to see you through the first six months, and not try and get away with launching on a shoestring budget or building a website yourself,” she says. “Leave it to the professionals, so that from the get-go you have a really professional-looking business that you have invested in.”
This article first appeared in issue 37 of the Inside Small Business quarterly magazine
