Post busters

One social media post receives a deluge of comments and many reshares, while another post receives the digital equivalent of tumbleweed rolling through an abandoned town.

The challenge lies in working out the common ingredients that set the first post apart from the second.

Why do some practices have social spaces that replicate the hum of a crowded café, while others are as silent as a sushi restaurant with a dubious food hygiene rating?

OTspeaks with socially savvy practice team members about their tips for building effective engagement that reflects the ethos of a practice and forms connections with the local community.

A two-way conversation

Yvette Brown is a marketing and business development executive at the Hakim Group independent practice, Urquhart Opticians.

Brown shared that consistent messaging and having a strong call to action is a focus for the practice on social media.

“At Urquharts, we use social media as a tool for engaging with our local communities, increasing brand awareness and sharing knowledge, tying to our key business values,” she said.

Urquhart Opticians uses a content calendar and splits content into three different categories: team/community, clinical, and brands/frames.

“This way we ensure we have varied content and plan our content for the month beforehand,” she said.

In terms of her tips for practices that are new to social media, Brown recommends that practice team members consider who they are talking to with their platforms and ensure that their key messages tie into their target market.

Keeping this in mind, practices should make use of platforms that have high levels of engagement with their target market – whether that is Facebook, Instagram or TikTok.

“Social media is a great way to share updates about your practice and team but also to have atwo-wayconversation with your patients and community,” she said.

She added that social media can both be a way of getting to know the community and enabling the community to get to know the practice and staff.

The social content that receives the most engagement on Urquhart Opticians platforms often relates to team members, patient stories and good news stories.

“For social media success for a practice, it’s important to plan your content in advance and to not post for the sake of it, but when you have something important, interesting, and authentic to share,” Brown shared.

Tailored content

Bhavin Shah, optometrist and director of Central Vision Opticians, also emphasised the importance of identifying and understanding a practice’s ideal customers.

He shared that this helps practice team members to plan what type of content will resonate with customers.

An understanding of the practice’s target demographic also helps to decide which platform to focus efforts on.

“Each platform has its own personality and style of content,” Shah said.

Like Brown, Shah highlighted the value of consistency in creating and publishing social media posts.

“It may be easier to create the content for a week on one day and then use social media distribution apps to schedule and deliver the content automatically at the right time,” he shared.

In terms of the ingredients of a successful social media post, Shah encourages practice staff to make content that is relevant to the viewer.

“Try to understand what questions your customers are asking and then try to find the answers,” he said.

Shah said that he avoids sharing overly clinical posts on social media.

“As professionals, we often end up being too technical when we should try to deliver information in a human and empathetic way that is easy to understand. We try to use analogies and relate to things that are outside of optometry but that help to explain information,” he said.

Shah is in favour of using practice testimonials from patients on social media – particularly short videos.

He emphasised that this creates a “compelling and human story.”

“This helps to explain the kinds of difficulties that patients who visit us may be experiencing and how we helped them,” Shah shared.

Always authentic

Optometrist Deepak Oberai, who is the owner of Albert Road Opticians in Wilmslow and Station Road Opticians, in Cheadle Hulme highlighted how a practice’s social media can act as an extension of the personality of the business.

“We specialise in niche eyewear that makes our clients look and feel good, so we post client pictures that people can relate to,” Oberai said.

He has a preference for using authentic images of clients taken in store rather than relying on stock images.

Reflecting on his guidance for practices that are new to using social media, Oberai advised practices not to overcomplicate things.

“Regular posting helps and so does trying different things,” he said.

“It is helpful to identify a team member who is naturally good at using social media and playing to their strengths with guidance from the business owner,” Oberai shared.