Can Therapists find more clients through Facebook Marketing? And how do they go about the process of defining their target audiences? Hi, my name is Francisco, and I am the owner of Planet Marketing, a Digital marketing agency. My company specializes in Facebook Ads, Google Ads and remarketing. I have been doing this for over a decade. In that time, I have worked with many Therapists to bring their businesses to the digital realm. So, you can be sure that I know what I am talking about here. In this article, I am going to;
- Show you why therapists need to start advertising on Facebook
- Teach you how to create your own Facebook Ads for your therapist business
Why Therapists need to Start Advertising on Facebook
I have worked with a number of therapists who were looking to do marketing on Facebook, and almost always the first thing that they asked me was; is there a place on Facebook for therapists who wish to advertise their businesses? My answer to them is a big YES! There is a place on Facebook for almost any business that’s serious about reaching out to its customers. The following are some of the reasons why therapists need to start advertising on Facebook;
- Facebook is a huge platform. As of the time of writing this article, it had over 2.7 billion monthly active users. That’s a huge well of potential for businesses that wish to reach out to their clients. I have previously written an article on how indies and others can advertise their businesses on Facebook. So, from the smallest to the biggest of business; everyone stands to benefit from advertising on the platform.
- People tell Facebook a lot about their personal lives. For better or for worse, Facebook uses this information to help advertisers reach their target audiences. This is something that you, as a Therapist, can take advantage of to grow your business. Facebook knows about your potential client’s preferences, their interests and their behavior.
- With a little patience, you can learn how to create your own Facebook Ads. That’s actually what I want to teach you in this article. The only challenge is that you have so many options when creating Facebook Ads. It can, therefore, be difficult to choose the best for your business. But that’s what I am here for. And if you would rather have everything set up and ready to go without doing the hard work, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me today. Facebook Ads are what I do on a daily basis. I have come up with a Facebook Ads Set up Plan under which I will do all the hard work and get you 2 live ads. From there, going forward will be a breeze.
- Generally speaking, advertising on Facebook is better than on any of the other digital marketing platforms that are out there. Take Google Ads as an example. Many people want to know whether or not it’s better than Facebook ads, not only in terms of price, but also in terms of performance. The answer is; based on my experience, Facebook Ads is way better. It has a better CTR and it costs less. In fact, you can get started with Facebook Ads for as little as $10. And for that amount, you will be able to reach a lot of people, depending on your settings, of course.
Guide to creating Facebook Ads for Therapists
So, where you do even start when it comes to doing Facebook Ads marketing for Therapists? Well, the first thing to do is to ask yourself the questions that are given below. These questions are absolutely important. They have a bearing on how you are going to set up your Facebook Ads marketing campaign. They therefore have a bearing on whether or not you are going to be able to achieve your goals. So, what do you need to ask yourself?
| Question | Answer |
| What is it that I wish to achieve with my campaign? | I want to get more traffic to my site, I need to generate leads, I want people to reach me directly, I wish to create brand awareness |
| How am I going to achieve my goal? | Via Facebook Ads |
| How much am I willing to spend? | Your amount |
| How long do I wish have my ads run? | For a week, a month etc… |
| What’s the measure of success? | Leads, sales, traffic etc |
Facebook Ads are created in Ads Manager. This is where you will need to go to create Facebook Ads for Therapists. The process itself is composed of the following 3 steps;
- Choosing a Campaign Objective
- Defining your target audience
- Creating the Ad itself
1. Choosing a Campaign Objective
This is the first step when doing Facebook Ads Marketing for Therapists. To begin with, you need to choose a Campaign Objective. Facebook provides you with 11 Campaign Objectives, from which you can only choose 1 for each campaign. One of the things that you will notice is that these Campaign Objectives relate to the questions that we gave you in the above table. They are a definition of the goals that you have for your campaign. The following are the available Campaign Objectives when creating Facebook Ads;
- Brand awareness
- Traffic
- Reach
- App installs
- Video views
- Store traffic
- Catalog sales
- Messages
- Lead Generation
- Conversion
- Engagement
Which Campaign Objective should Therapists opt for?
Again, we go back to the table at the top. Knowing what you want to do and what you want to achieve makes it easy for you to choose a Campaign Objective for your Facebook Ads. As noted, you can only have one Campaign Objective for each Facebook Ad Campaign. However, you are not restricted as to what that should be. It’s all going to depend on your aims at that particular time.
In fact, you can run several ads on Facebook, each of which will have a different Campaign Objective. Let’s assume, as an example, that you are a Therapist who is just setting up shop in a new part of town. In that case, Brand Awareness would probably be the most appropriate Campaign Objective for you because you want to tell people about yourself.
If, on the other hand, you have created a landing page on which people can learn more about you, then Traffic would be the best Campaign Objective for you. Perhaps you have created a short video introducing yourself, in which case video views would be the best Facebook Ad Campaign Objective for your Therapist business.
It’s also possible for you to choose Messages as your Campaign Objective. This will allow people who wish to book appointments to get in touch with you directly. So, you can see that the choice will largely depend on you. For this example, we are going to go with Messages as our Facebook Ads Campaign Objective.
2. Setting up your Target Audience in the Ad Set
Now that you have stated what you wish to do with your campaign, it’s time to define a target audience. This is done in the Ad Set section, making it one of the most important sections when creating Facebook ads for Therapists. Being able to define the right kind of audience tends to be the difference between a successful Facebook ads campaign and a failed one.
Message Destination
Because we have chosen Messages as our Campaign Objective, we will need to take some time to set up this section. The great thing is that you have a number of options when it comes to where you wish to have your messages delivered. You can choose to have your messages delivered to Facebook Messenger. Or you can choose WhatsApp Business as the destination for your messages. You can also choose Instagram Direct for your messages.
The option that you choose here will have a direct bearing on how Facebook delivers your ads. If you choose WhatsApp business, your ads will be delivered to people who are most likely to be using WhatsApp. And when a person clicks on your Ad on Facebook, a thread with your business will popup on their WhatsApp.
Budget and Schedule
After hearing that Facebook Ads Marketing works very well for therapists, the next thing that people usually ask me is whether or not advertising on Facebook is affordable. This is something that I have already noted above. Facebook tends to be cheaper when it comes to running ads.
One of the settings that you will need to work on in the Ad Set setting is the Budget and Schedule section. This is actually a very important section. The amount that you are willing to spend on your Facebook Ads has a bearing on your results.
One thing that I need to say is that you should set a budget limit for your Ads. Otherwise Facebook will keep on running your ad and they will keep on deducting money from your credit card. You can set a limit in terms of what you spend by and end date for your campaign. You should also set a daily budget limit. In the above screenshot, we have put that at $25.
Audience
In the Ad Set, one of the sections on which you should do serious work is the Audience section. Here, you have the following settings that you can use to define your target audience;
- Location
- Age
- Gender
- Detailed targeting
- Connections
- Languages
Location
The location setting is where you wish to have your ads delivered. For Therapists, this will probably be so many miles around the physical location of your business. It depends on how far you get your clients. Thing is, nobody is going to drive across the country just to see you, no matter how good a Therapist you may be. Of course, if you do online therapy, then your reach could very well be across the world. So, no two businesses are going to be the same in this regard.
For this example, we are going to assume that you live in the city of Cambridge, Massachusetts. We will set delivery of our ads to a radius of 25 miles around you, as you can see in the screenshot above. We have also chosen to have ads delivered to people living in this area. Here, you can opt to also include people who have been through the area.
Age
You can also set your Facebook Ads to be delivered to people within a particular age range. For this example, we are going to go with people who are 25 years and above. You can play around with your target age range depending on the nature of the audience that you are looking for.
Gender
It’s also possible to define your Facebook Ads based on Gender. That would be great if you are into Gender specific products.
Languages
Do you wish to have your ads delivered only to people who speak a particular language? If yes, then you can use this setting. One thing that you will notice with Age, Gender and Languages is that they enable you to have your ads targeted at a particular niche audience.
Detailed Targeting
The detailed targeting section is another crucial setting that you can use to define your target audience. In fact, here you will be zooming in on the people to whom you wish to have your ads delivered. But how does it work? The detailed targeting section uses demographics, interests and behavior to zoom in on your target audience. It’s a departure from the previous setting where we were just generalizing. For this example, we are going target people who have expressed an interest in Pages related to;
- Therapy
- No Depression
- Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance
- Defeat Depression
- Anxiety and Depression Association of America
Connections
The Connections setting is another that you can use when creating Facebook Ads for your Therapist business. Assuming that you already have a Facebook Page, you can target people who have interacted with that page in one way or the other. Perhaps you wish to have your ads delivered to people who liked your Facebook Page.
You can also target people who have previously interacted with an event that you hosted. Connections are useful in that these people have already shown an interest in your business. So, they are much more likely to respond positively to what you have to say than complete strangers.
3. Creating your Ad
This is the final step when doing Facebook Ads Marketing for Therapists. It’s also the one of the most important steps. That’s because the ad is what people see in their Facebook and Instagram feeds. So, it needs to be good. Working against you is the fact that people only have a limited amount of time in which to view your ads.
It’s social media, after all. People have far better things to do, such as messaging friends and family and watching the latest funny videos. So, your ad is competing against all that. You need to make it the best that it can be to be able to capture the attention of your target audience. And you only have a few seconds in which to do it.
Identity: Facebook Page
You need to choose a Facebook Page and/or an Instagram Account that will represent your business in Facebook ads. So, you need to have a Facebook Page for your Therapist business. This is actually important because Facebook Pages are free. So, there is no reason for you not to have one to serve as the point of interaction with your customers.
Add Media
You will need to add media when creating your ads. This could be in the form of a video a single image or carousel. Again, remember that your ad needs to be the best that it can be. That way, you will be able to catch the attention of the people that you are targeting with your ad. You can upload your own media or you can create your ad using stock images and videos.
Primary Text
Use the Primary Text section to convince people to take the desired action. You can see what I am talking about here in the above screenshot. The great thing about Facebook Ads is that you can do a lot of A/B testing. What this means is that you can do a lot of playing around with your ad to get to the best options.
Headline
You should use the headline section to drive people towards the desired action. As you can see in the above screenshot, we have used ours to get people to initiate a chat in Messenger.
Call to Action
In the Call to Action, you are essentially telling people what you want to have them do. Do you wish to have them call you? Or maybe you are looking to have them send you a message. You have many options in the Call to Action, so use them.
Facebook Pixel
You may also wish to set up Facebook Pixel when creating Facebook Ads for Therapists. This is useful in increasing your conversions. If you have a website, pixel tracks people’s interests from that website to Facebook. On Facebook, they are then shown ads relating to their interest on your site. It’s more or less the same as happens with Google.
Summary
Hope this article has shown you the basics of creating Facebook Ads for your Therapist business. There are a lot more steps involved, some of which depend on your choices at the beginning. What I have tried to do is to lay the foundation for you. Anyway, if you need help, don’t hesitate to get in touch with me via the details given below.
