COVID-19 Digital Action Plan for Independent Pharmacies

Join us as we walk through a digital action plan for your Independent Pharmacy during this COVID-19/Coronavirus pandemic situation that we are in.

We lay out step-by-step what actions you should take with your digital assets to become the go-to resource for information in your community for your customers.

If you need help implementing this, schedule a FREE Pharmacy Acceleration Session here: https://www.pharmacyignite.com/schedule

 

Transcript:

0:00
Welcome to the pharmacy marketing profits podcast, the show that reveals how to take your independent pharmacy to the next level, hear from professionals in the industry as they share their stories of success and inspire you. You’ll also discover how to attract more customers with effective digital marketing strategies. here’s your host, Shane Gebhards. Okay, all right, well, glad everyone could be here. So we’re going to go ahead and get started. This is the cobit 19 pharmacy digital action plan. So glad everyone could be here on set aside this time, so obviously, we’ve got a lot of crazy things happening right now in our world with this whole coronavirus, current of cobit 19 situation. So basically, the idea behind this, we wanted to put together a webinar for you guys to kind of give you that digital action plan. So that you knew you know, some steps you can take online to kind of handle the messaging and what you should be telling your your patients and customers because they’ll be tired

1:00
to you guys, you know, if they haven’t already, I’m sure they have four answers when it comes to your health and what should be done and, and how to handle this and so forth. So that’s the idea here. So we’re going to kind of go through some steps in the action plan some ideas for you that you guys can take away and start to implement. So you’ll have a step by step action plan to really, you know, get that messaging out there that you’re trying to get. So, um, a few housekeeping things.

1:31
You know, turn off silence your cell phones, turn off Facebook, you know, if you got any distractions going, you’re here, you know, you set aside this time. So to be president, you know, take the information in VOB here for the next 45 to 60 minutes to to ensure that you can get that messaging and information to your customers and your patients, you know, that they’re looking looking to get from you guys. So, just a few housekeeping things as always with these webinars.

1:55
So why are we here obviously the elephant in the room is pretty clear. cobit 19 the title

2:00
The webinars your Cova 19 action plan the coronavirus is front and center, it’s on everybody’s radar, you know, so we all need an action plan, we all need steps that we can take, you know, when it comes to

2:14
getting that information in front of the people who need it and how to handle certain things. You know, the main reason and the main point I really want to drive home with this though is, is we’re talking about marketing, and we’re talking about digital marketing, but we’re talking about it during a pandemic. And so that third bullet point is very, very important. I should have made it bold, but we’re not looking to profit or come across as if we’re profiting or more marketing off of the pandemic, but rather be a trusted resource for people when they need the information. Right. We don’t want to come across disingenuous or, or you know, appear that we’re trying to profit off of something like this. But it goes without saying that people are looking for information. So being the one to provide that information is going to be going to be pretty crucial. So that’s the angle that you want to take with this.

3:00
That’s gonna be the big takeaway I feel like from this, I’m going to give you, you know, action items and things you could do. But think about all this in terms of how you can craft your message to be very straightforward in terms of this is informational, we’re here to help, you know, don’t come across as, you know, come by this come by that we’re trying to make money while this is all going on or anything like that. That’s, that’s not what you want to do. So, you know, we don’t know how long this is going to last right? So we have to go into the marketing with that in mind is this could be you know, obviously now as this evolves day by day, we’re hearing that this could go on for a little while. We just don’t know. So we want to become that trusted resource. And I’m going to give you some action items here to to help with this. But you know, it’s gonna allow you to showcase the expert, you know, the expertise in that you guys expertise that you guys have, you know, in the market and stuff like that. So, so we’re not looking to profit we’re not looking to market you know, we

4:00
Have quotes off of this pandemic, but rather be the trusted resource for people when they need the information. So, just wanted to make that clear, but that’s kind of the overall, you know, train of thought here with this, so, real quick, who am I? Why should you listen to me? For those of you don’t know me. I’m the author of The Complete Guide to internet marketing for pharmacies, how to ignite your pharmacy growth online. I found I’m the founder and CEO of a company called pharmacy Ignite. We only do digital marketing for independent pharmacies across the country. You know, we that’s all we work with across the US so you know, that’s kind of our bread and butter our sweet spot. So just a little bit about me and, and and why I’m, you know, why I put these webinars on each month, you know, obviously, this month the topic is the cobit 19 Digital action plan, but we do these webinars every month on different topics around digital marketing for for pharmacies, so

4:51
this is what we do. Again, kind of just reiterating you know, you can go to our website and check out more and now you know, if you got time on your hands was, you know, being

5:00
Being the quarantine you can grab the book for free and and and check that out as well. It’ll be some good takeaways for you to implement in your pharmacy. So, but that’s what we do. So just a little bit about us and who we are so.

5:15
So let’s dive in. Did you get the workbook first and foremost, I laid out a nice Google Doc for you that that should have gotten emailed to you. But here’s the link. It’s a bitly link, so you can jot that down real quick head over there. It’ll take you straight to the workbook, what you want to do is that version of it, you want to make copies. So click file, and then make a copy on the drop down on Google Docs. And then that way, you’ll have your own copy and then you can you can type on that and you can edit that but it won’t allow you to edit the one that that I’ve created. So you got to make a copy first. So I’ll leave this up here for just another couple couple seconds and allow you guys to get that link. So you can get that workbook because we’re going to go through that workbook as a part of this webinar. So

6:06
Extra here, I can pop it into. I’m gonna pop it into the chat too for everybody. So

6:13
three, six.

6:21
Okay, there we go. So that should be the direct link that popped in the chat there. So yeah, pop over grab that workbook. If you want to do it now. So you have it while we go through it on this webinar. That’s great. If you want to get it afterwards, that’s fine too. And there will be a replay of this webinar. I always get that question but just wanted to make sure that was clear. And I’ll, I’ll have that up. Most likely by tomorrow for you. So you can you can check that out. So, um, okay, so let’s dive in

6:49
to what we’re going to cover. Alright, so here’s the action plan in a nutshell. And this is something like I said, we work with pharmacies all over the country. This is something that we’re rolling out

7:00
With all of our clients, so you’re kind of getting a, an action plan that we do for our clients, you know, through this webinar, but you don’t, don’t feel like you have to do everything. But there are some on here that are that are pretty crucial that I highly recommend you do. But you know, some some of them, you might not have the, the software or some of the stuff in place to execute on so so don’t feel like you know, if you can’t execute on one that you’re missing the whole boat, but they all work hand in hand together. They all kind of go together cohesively. So again, we’re going to walk through this step by step but you can kind of get a general overview bird’s eye view here of what we’re going to cover on this. So that’s your step by step action plan and, and let’s dive into that. So

7:47
the first thing first and foremost, what you’re going to want to think about is your sample your statement, right? So this, obviously, we all got the emails from you know, corporations that we

8:00
Haven’t done business with but they still have our email address. You know, from years ago, we all got those emails of what each corporation is doing with, with with Cova 19. So it started to become amusing because I was getting emails, you know, from companies that hadn’t even remember that they had my email address, but they updated me on what they were doing, and I haven’t done business with them years, so, but you’re gonna want to craft your statement, right, you’re gonna want to craft your announcement, as far as what is changing how you’re handling things, most likely, most of you have already done this. So kudos to you for jumping on that quickly. But if you haven’t, this is a sample one that you could take and, and implement, you know, obviously cater it to what you need, and make it work for you. Um, you know, there’s there’s things on here about, you know, delivery and stuff like that. If you don’t offer delivery, you know, then then obviously remove that to avoid any confusion. But this is just a sample statement that you could use. It’s very straightforward, but you know, like I said, Make

9:00
Get yours cater. This is kind of the central idea of what what all this revolves around, right? You know, this is the statement as you’re telling people, what’s changing how you’re, how you’re handling things, what you’re aware of, you know, making sure you’re reassuring your customers, you know, that, that you guys are aware, and diligently working to minimize the effects of this, right? That’s what everybody’s worried about, you know, so take the statement, edit it, how you see fit, and, and make sure you get that, you know, get that out. So we’re going to show you how to get that out now. So the first thing that we’re doing, we’re popping the statement on people’s website as a pop up, right. You know, there’s people that that are, you know, pops up pop ups are the worst. Well, pop ups are very handy when it comes to something like this, because then you know, people are seeing it, because to continue using the website, they have to click the X to move out of it. So, so we’re putting that you know, front and center for them. So people are seeing it that way, you know, it’s they’re, they’re they’re taking it in, so that

10:01
Nothing is missed, right? Okay, so pretty straightforward, pop it on the website, pop it on, you know, social media, you know, across all your channels anywhere that, that you have communication with your customers or potential customers, right. So just make sure that, that you’re using that statement effectively and getting in the hands of people who need it. Okay. Um, the next thing we’re doing is we’re creating an update update center is what we’re calling it on our clients website. So you can do this on your own website. So there’s a lot of, you know, everybody’s looking for information right now, right? Everybody’s looking it’s very confusing in terms of what’s what’s good information versus bad information. What’s opinion what’s fact, you know, so having a section on your website says a lot and and your you can accomplish You know, a lot of

10:54
a lot of different things with this, right? Because ultimately you’re sending people to it gives you a reason to send people

11:00
to your website, okay, and that’s kind of the first step in the layers of what’s going on here but creating that update center you know and updating it daily will create a center for people to have as a trusted resource right? And only pull information from the CDC World Health Organization you know and stuff like that places like that that you know are credible don’t don’t put opinions don’t put you know, what Dr. Phil says or anything like that, you know, pull information from from these these organizations who are on the frontlines of what’s going on and and putting out the information that we all need. So try and you know, if you can do daily updates, we’re seeing you know, daily update if not every other day update, the weekend was kind of slow as far as updates go for some, you know, our clients and what we updated for them but um, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s going to evolve as we go and having having a sent a page on your website that you can use to send people to just make sure like that.

12:00
A lot easier because then you’re not saying oh go to the CDC and you know or go to the World Health Organization, just say go to our website, you know, we’re, we’re, you know, front and center on this in our local community, head over to our website. Just make it something it doesn’t have to be you know.com like your website comm slash coronavirus or anything we just made it, you know, pretty open ended with update center because maybe we’re going to need to use this again in the future. So we just we set them up that way. But again, pretty straightforward concept. But just having that that update center on the site, you can then use link out send it out on social media, send out an email blast, you know, to your to your customer base and really have them realize they have somewhere that they can go to get the latest information. And it doesn’t have to just be information from CDC and World Health Organization either if you’ve got a local community stuff that needs to be put on there, think about that as well. If you’ve got you know stuff in the area that that would make sense to put in here so that people in your area know if you’re wanting to

13:00
One of the states that has the, you know,

13:04
stay at home order. Not every state has that yet, but you know, Illinois, San Francisco, places like that, you know, they’ve all jumped on to that. So that could be on there. So it’s gonna depend for you, you know, where yours is where you’re gonna have to think about what you’re going to put on that update center. So but create an update center on your website, give your your patients and customers somewhere to go to get the information they need. Okay?

13:31
And here’s some screenshots of just, you know, the information with the update center, you know, have the basic information. If you look, we we took what was on CDC website and put it right on their page. I mean, there’s no reason to try to change anything, alternative thing. I mean, it’s information that involves people’s health. So you’re not going to get hit with a copyright claim or any of this stuff like this information needs to be out there. So literally, like we took the pictures, the paragraphs, word for word, and we put them on there because it’s

14:00
How to Protect yourself the steps to protect yourself how to protect others. So it’s not, you’re not going to get hit with, you know, them coming and being like, Oh, you know, took all our content, you can’t do that they want this information out there. So take the information, put it on there. So you don’t have to, you know, go through and spend hours writing all this up, just take what you see on there, put it on your website and, and direct people to that, so that so that they can get that information. So So that’s just a few screenshots here of, of how we did a few things. And then some common frequently asked questions that they had listed on there. You know, that that people are kicking around social media that we see a lot. And then also we looked at Google, we you know, being in the digital marketing space, we can see what kind of questions are being asked and you know, where the trends are. And so these are some of the top questions that are being asked about the coronavirus or cobit 19. So we figured, you know, put these on the site. You know, this can provide you with stuff to post, you know, you could post a question every single day.

15:00
So that’s 10 days worth of posts right there. For your social media just to get this information out, you could, you know, if I go back one slide, I mean, you could take this section right here and just do an image of it like a screenshot image of it and post that out. So again, this this gives you content, it gives you stuff to post, so that you can be sharing this with people who follow you and getting that information out there. Because ultimately, like I said, at the beginning, that’s what we’re trying to do. We’re wanting to come across genuine, which I know you are, but we don’t want to come across disingenuous we don’t want to come across like we’re, we’re trying to market and profit off of this pandemic. We want to be that information resource, that information hub. So you can turn your website, your social media, your your email marketing, you know, all that can turn into informational resources, which is what we’re showing you here. So,

15:50
so FAQ. Again, there’s a quick idea there for you on that on that resource page. What I recommend and I’m gonna go back a couple slides. What I recommend is I took the screenshot I’m

16:00
Back on the 17th of last week when I was putting all this together, but have the latest updates at the top of the page, set it up, have your web developer or whoever does your website, set it up that way. That way, when people land on the page, they see most likely that today’s date or yesterday’s date, so like it would be March 23, right there. If you were looking at the site today,

16:21
that way you can see, you know, the latest that we’ve had on there, as opposed to having to scroll and figure out what’s what so. So just a quick tip for you there. I’m creating an announcement video. So this is something

16:35
that we’re telling everyone to do. But go through and find either have the owner of your pharmacy if you’re the owner on this webinar, or have one of your pharmacists, if you’re, you know, if you have a different pharmacist in there other than yourself, or even whoever’s good on camera, it doesn’t necessarily have to be the owner. Ideally, you’d want it to be the owner or one of the pharmacist, but have someone who’s decent on camera. Do a video

17:00
about what’s going on about the announcement that you guys have about your, your policies, your procedures, you know, reassure people that you’re available, and you’ll be posting updates, you know, and add the video to the update page on the website, and then post with all your social media accounts, you know, use it everywhere, because the video is going to get consumed a lot more frequently and a lot more

17:23
than any kind of write up that you put out. And that’s just, you know, marketing stats, right video gets consumed exponentially more and people want to see people in this time, right, we’re all being removed with social distancing. So a video will feel kind of comforting for some, right? It’ll feel it’ll feel like they’re getting to see you when they haven’t been able to, you know, in the past couple weeks or however long, you know, the social distancing has been in effect now for your area. So, a video explaining, hey, you know, here’s what’s going on, here’s what we’re dealing with and you can literally just kind of read off of yourself.

18:00
statement if you’ve put together a good statement that covers all the bullet points, you could just read off of that and kind of generalize it and summarize it but

18:07
take that video send it out use it in different places, such as the website, your email, marketing, your social media, and get that in front of people you know, so that they, they can feel reassured that you guys are are doing your part and let them know you know, you’re here for them. So definitely like to see more people take advantage of that because video is, is just so easily consumed that it’ll it’ll outperform anything else. So, so definitely put that one on your list to take advantage of

18:38
this one. We’ve kicked around with some of our pharmacists, and our clients but one thing right now that could go a long way is an Ask me anything and ama Facebook slash Instagram Live. Obviously with people being quarantined and social distancing, you know, if they’re trying to figure something out, their only choices are to pick up the phone or

19:00
You know, researching online, but a different avenue a different medium to think about is is hosting an Ask me anything Facebook or Instagram Live and and I’ve had some people ask you know what if I don’t think anybody would engage or what if our following this kind of small that’s okay but what you want to do the way you want to set this up is is that now too ahead of time before you’re going to do it don’t just go live and expect people to be you know, asking questions you know you got to kind of kind of kind of build it up a little bit I guess is the way to say it. But if it you know, today’s Tuesday say you’re going to go live Thursday at 2pm we’re going to do a you know post this all over social media put it on your website and have some questions in mind already that you can answer while the wallets getting going. So that way you’re not just sitting there looking at your phone or looking at the camera waiting on people to ask questions and just totally relying on that input. I have some some questions that maybe people are constantly calling in to the pharmacy about maybe they’re at you know, asking through Facebook Messenger or email

20:00
You guys about that you think would benefit everybody, you know if they’re asking specific questions, but again, it goes back to the video thing and Facebook Live, you know, everybody’s stuck at home right now. You know, trying to get information trying to figure out the best way to go on with their lives. So if they have specific questions about their medication about things they need to be doing, you know, that are specific questions for you guys and your pharmacist. You know, this Facebook, Instagram lives are a perfect medium for that and a perfect platform for them to, to get that to get that, you know, information that they’re looking for. And it just protects you and your patients from any unneeded exposure, just like anything else, you know, it gives them a good, good path to to get in touch with you and engage with you without having to be face to face in the in the same place. So definitely consider doing one of those but like I said, don’t just go live and all of a sudden expect it to be full of, you know, dozens of people asking questions, it might, you know, you might have a big following that would jump on and do that.

21:00
Not saying that wouldn’t happen, but give it a little bit of a build up, give it a little bit give people time to to know Okay, they’re going live at this point you know, don’t just jump on there and say Here we go you know and catch people off guard So, so definitely something to consider doing there.

21:19
send out an announcement or announcement in an email blast to your customers. If you’re doing any kind of email marketing, you’ll already have your list you’ll already have you know, your your software set up. If you don’t have this in place or you’re not doing it through, maybe like through your management system, in your pharmacy or anything like that. A good free alternative you can do MailChimp up to 2000 people up to 2000 contacts. So MailChimp comm

21:45
export your email list out of whatever database you have it in, import it into there, set up an email blast to go out that includes your announcement. You know the statement like actually written out include the link to your update center on your website, and

22:00
Obviously include that video that you created you know telling people what you have going on and and the announcement video I guess we’re calling it so that that way you have a reason to email him and let him know you know if you’re going to do a Facebook Live obviously include that but but start using your different channels you know in this time because you’re going to you’re going to get people’s attention in different spots, right? Some people you’re going to catch them on Facebook, some people are going to catch their their name on Instagram, some people are going to catch them on their on your email, you know, so you’ve got different channels here.

22:32
As always, you know, with digital marketing there’s there’s a lot of channels, but don’t just put up a Facebook post and call it a day, right? Don’t just don’t just put it up in one spot and think, okay, everybody’s gonna see it. Right, put it, you know, put it everywhere, you know, make it all work together in unison. So that’s a that’s a big thing that we preach on on all of our digital marketing efforts. Normally, you know, aside from this coronavirus thing was is use all your channels to your advantage. Okay, so definitely send out an email now.

23:00
And you can do this, you know, frequently to in terms of every time there’s an announcement or an update, you know, you can, you can send out an email. Anytime there’s, you know, news that’s newsworthy and worth sharing, if the CDC or the World Health Organization, put something out, you know, shoot out an email, you know, stay in front of people, you know, they’re, they’ll appreciate that in this time. They’re not going to get annoyed or anything like that, if you’re, if you’re concerned about that, because you’re sending out information that is valuable. And you’re, again, you’re, you’re positioning yourself online as that valuable resource of information that they need, like we talked about at the beginning. So

23:35
utilize SMS messaging to your database with the announcement as well.

23:39
Again, there’s software out there that can help with this. If you don’t already have it baked into your, your pharmacy management system or anything like that. I know some have it built in. But again, you know, send out an SMS with the same information. That’s, that’s definitely a surefire way. You know, the percentages show that we all look at our text messages, right. I

24:00
I don’t have the exact percent off the top of my head. But I know it’s up in the 80 90% of people that when you send a text, they see it, you know, as opposed to email, Facebook, you know, your website, all these other ones they don’t, the numbers aren’t as high, but we all see text messages. So this is, this is an ideal time, then if you’ve ever considered setting it up, now’s a good time to set it up. Because now you could say, Hey, you know, people won’t be upset if you send them a message with information about what’s going on, that helps them you know, they’re not going to be as mad as you know, if you send them about, you know, a text message saying, hey, we’ve got a promo promotion going on, you know, at any other time other than what we have going on right now. You know, that annoys some people right now you send out a message, they’re gonna be like, okay, I appreciate my pharmacy for sending that out that that’s awesome. That shows me that they care and that they’re, they’re being proactive. So a perfect time to set this up and kind of warm people up to the idea that you’re going to be doing this.

24:57
You know, if you have it in the plans to do it.

25:00
Going forward, so, so definitely consider that, you know, the idea here is to ensure customers get the information, like I said, so this is a pretty sure fire way to make sure they’re seeing it. So, um, so that’s all kind of the announcement type stuff in a way, but that we know like email, SMS post on your social media, but where people are, are kind of shifting away from our ads. And what I’m gonna kind of explain to you here is that that’s not necessarily the right move for various reasons. So if you’re currently running Facebook ads, Instagram ads, you know, Instagram is owned by Facebook. So it’s the same platform. If you’re currently running them, stay on, don’t back off, right? Because and that’s for a few reasons. But one is, everybody’s exposure is going to go up right now on on the ad platforms, because people are at home, they’re on their phones or on their computers, tablets, they’re taking in information, they’re scrolling social media, so you’re gonna have a much better percentage.

26:00
have, you know the ads being seen and being clicked on right now than you ever have. So that’s number one. Number two, the dollar is going farther. And what I mean by that is people other industries are pulling back and that that affects. So you want to look at Facebook ad platform, we’ll use that as an example because that’s the picture I have on here. But

26:22
all Facebook ads affect each other. And what I mean by that is if cost per click goes up in one area, it’s going to go up in another area. And when people pull back, and when people stop doing ads, everybody’s cost per click comes down. And what we’re seeing and Facebook’s releasing some numbers and source and other, you know digital marketing,

26:40
news sites, I guess, if you will, or big players in the industry that kind of study the trends they’re releasing so far, they your dollar is going to go 30% farther. So if you and I’ll just use round numbers, but if you’re using $100, and that’s getting you 300 clicks, you know, you’re gonna get 30% more out of that same 100

27:00
dollars then, you know, then you were previously because people are dropping off the platform, right? So the dollar is going to go farther. So the idea here is to continue doing ads, but change the messaging, right? Don’t Don’t keep promoting specific sales and offers because we all know what’s happening with the economy, right? Change your your ads up and start doing ads that one is about your statement

27:26
and use your video that you made because

27:31
if you’re not aware of this the way Facebook ads works in terms of so first off, let me back up the way Facebook works. 567 years ago, if you had 1000 people that followed your page, and you put up a post, you could bet that 60 to 70% of those people six or 700 of those people would see your posts right that’s the way Facebook works. It was it was free people built up huge huge followings and likes on their pages and got that out in front of people for free. Right? Um well Facebook over the years figured out

28:00
We’re going to limit the reach. And we’re going to make people shift towards the ad platform because we want to make more money, right? It’s their platform, they can do what they want. And we’re all kind of just along for the ride. But to play ball, you got to be in the ad space now with them, because they took that same 1000 people that your page had as followers. And when you made a post, now you’re lucky if 150 of them see the post, right? We all saw our engagement numbers go down, we all saw all the numbers decrease, because they wanted to shift all of us over to the ad platform so that they could make more money, right? They’re in business, just like all of us. So you can’t fault them for that. And it’s their platform. So we have to play ball. So knowing all that, you can use the Facebook and Instagram ad platforms to your advantage when it comes to getting information out because now you have those thousand people that follow you, and you’re in a town of 10,000 Well, that’s 9000 people that don’t follow you, right? So the ads are the way to figure out okay, I can get in front of these, these other 9000 people, um, you know, to to get my message out there. So the

29:00
This is a perfect opportunity to, you know, start campaigns using your statement video, start a separate campaign using your announcement, start a third campaign using your,

29:11
your update center on your website, you know, letting people know that you guys have all this going on and that, that you’re, you’re going to win people over to your website because you have information that they’re looking for. So by using that and sharing that message in your ad campaigns, it’s not not about you know, hey, come buy this or we have you know, this for sale or anything like that. We’re playing a longer term game here and winning them over because if they’re going to CVS, you know, or Walgreens or Rite Aid or any of those other places, they’re not getting that, right, they’re not getting an ad showing, you know, hey, come to our website for all the latest information but you know, their community pharmacy is right. So, take this take advantage of this opportunity to where you can kind of maximize some of your your spend and get more reach out of it. And then also, your ads are going to show more frequent

30:00
It’s called frequency due to the fact that other people are dropping off the ad platform so you’re gonna get more eyes ultimately, any way you look at it on your, on your ads based on kind of what’s happening with the marketplace and don’t stop there you know, there’s there’s other ad platforms to consider. And I should have put them in here. But YouTube is a big one. People are the numbers are are becoming pretty staggering you know, as far as with people being you know, in quarantine and how much video they’re consuming on YouTube. So consider putting, putting together a little video using your statement video

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on YouTube ads, and you can be one of the ads that plays right before the video. So So that’s another one to consider as well. We’re looking at doing a lot of that as well for our clients. So

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again, just to kind of recap, you know, these will reach people who may or may not be customers and who aren’t, aren’t already following you and and your dollar goes a lot farther there. So, so definitely something to look at doing.

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The next one I want to kind of touch on is geo fencing. So, geo fencing became really popular a year or two ago, we do quite a bit of it. It works very well for our clients, but I’m going to kind of explain the strategy here and how it’s shifted. So typically, with geo fencing, you know, we would target

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you know, CVS, Walgreens, Rite Aid are really popular areas, you know, like there’s a, an area in town that a lot of people frequently go like, specific restaurants, or downtown or malls or stuff like that. But now if there’s ever been a time that it’s extremely easy to figure out where people are, it’s right now, because people are at home, right. So now, what you can do is set up some geofencing campaigns and target the neighborhoods and target the grocery stores because you know, people are going to those locations and that’s pretty much it in certain areas if they’re in one of the lockdown areas. So have a geo fence set up, target that neighborhood and again,

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Use the same messages, use your announcement, use the information use your update center, use your video, you know use the same stuff we’ve been talking about to get in front of people while they’re sitting there on their devices with nothing else to do and consuming content, get in front of them with their with your ads and start sending them over to your website. Right start sending them to your platforms and your pages to stay in front of them. And then there’s like I said, I was going to explain there’s multiple layers to this and I should have made a slide for it. So I apologize, but once you get someone to your website, if you are doing any kind of retargeting. If you have any pixel a facebook pixel in place or or any remarketing or retargeting pixel, it’s got a couple different terms to it. Once they land on your website, you can then set up campaigns where you have ads that follow them around, right. So if you’re going to do a geofence campaign or a Facebook and Instagram ad campaign was your was your announcement video, someone goes to your update page, you have to pick

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On that page, you can then set up another campaign called the retargeting campaign, and make an ad that has, you know, a picture of the update page on your website, the update center, and that can follow them around to remind them, Hey, keep coming back to our page, keep coming back and checking, checking out the latest updates, right? Because now you’ve built up your pixel audience, and that’s going to serve you well, you know, months years down the road, beyond all this cobit 19 stuff, because you’re going to have a base of people who have been to your website and who know who know about you. So even when all this is done, you’re gonna still you’re still going to be able to use that, that pixel audience, right, you’re still going to be able to

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market to them down the road, when things calm down and get back to normal. Whatever our new normal is, you’re going to be able to then talk about you know, the other stuff that you have going on to other campaigns, you know, if you’re running any promotions and stuff like that, after all this after all the dust settles right but this

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gives you an opportunity to bring those people to your website so that you can get them into your, your marketing your pixel. Audience, right. So now you have them, because they went to the website to check out your information, your update center. And that goes the same for, you know, the SMS and the email stuff, be sending that out on social media saying, hey, pop your email in here so you can be alerted. You know, when we send out emails, we can get our emails about the updates, or pop your cell phone and message or message us your cell phone number. So we can put you on the list so that when we send something out that CDC says, you get that information right away, people are not going to argue about that. They’re going to give you their information, they’re going to give you their email and their phone number, even if they’re not a current customer or having you fill their prescriptions, they’re going to give you that information. So I’m so considering, you know, putting that out there having that,

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you know, having that, uh, that portal for them and you can take it a step farther like there’s so many ways you can spin off at

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You can take it a step farther. And if you’re doing delivery, you can set up a QR code that you can pop in people’s

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deliveries that says scan this code to get added to our email list or scan this code to get added to our SMS list and make it you know, the easier you can make this on people to get, get their information, get their, you know, their email, their phone number, get their, their attention on social media, the more you know, the more you’re going to grow your audience and your following, you know, based on on kind of what we’re dealing with and and, and ultimately again, though, you’re still just giving them the information they’re looking for. So So that’s how you can use geo fencing to to get that information out as well and get people into your to your pixel. So

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again, continue creating content relative to the situation so

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don’t stop if you’re currently if you have someone doing your digital marketing. Let’s say you have someone in house or using another company. Don’t pull back the reins in turn.

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of what you’re having them do. Because again, there’s no if they’re working on your SEO, your search engine optimization, and they’re trying to get you ranked for, you know, pharmacy in whatever town it is, or drugstore, you know, let’s say you’re not showing up to those terms, calling them and saying, hey, I want to back off of this is not going to do you any good. Because

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SEO is such a long term game. And creating content is such a long term game that you want to think about it, you know, you’re gonna want to win as soon as this gets done, and keep winning people and SEO is a month over month game where you’re trying to increase your rankings across the board. So again, continue creating content relative to the situation. So what you can do is map out content for your website blog or your social media that people will find useful during this time. So for I got an example on here, you know, what’s the difference between the coronavirus and the flu? You know, there was a lot of misconception about that early on when this when this first hit that people were like, Oh, it’s just another version of the flu or people you know

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We all saw that the different stuff that people were saying so, um, so just sit down, take 30 minutes to an hour with your team. It’s always good to have people, you know, do this with you, because you’ll have different perspective different different thoughts, you know, you just roundtable it and different ideas will come about. But ask them, you know, what should we be creating some content on? What should we be

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talking about, you know, what do people need to know, aside from what CDC is putting out, you know, and World Health Organization like, what, what are people asking about constantly, and just post weekly blogs that, you know, provide that value to people and gives them the information they need? You can also do a cool thing where if you go to Google, and you type in a topic and you scroll down the page, maybe like, halfway down. Once you get past a few articles, you’ll see a section called feedback. This is Google telling you what people are asking about that topic. So these are like the top questions. So like, if you did it right now and you go over and you ask me to

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Type in flu, you scroll down, there’s like some, they call them accordions, if you click the arrow, it expands. That’s like an accordion. That’s a web design term, but it’s an accordion and the information expands and you can see where they’re getting that information from but what they’re doing Google is telling you these are some of the top questions that people are asking about the topic you just put it in there. So that that can give you some ideas you know, so there’s there’s different ways you can you can do this but the key here is to create keep creating content keep pushing forward in terms of you know, your digital marketing efforts to really

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just keep driving you know, the train keep moving forward. You don’t want to

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I don’t want to say you don’t want to pull back the reins, but you don’t want to just completely shut everything off. You can pull back the reins a little bit, but don’t just shut everything off. Don’t don’t just stop your your efforts all together. If anything, double down and keep going because it’s times like these that are you know

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People are going to search to the front because of what’s going on. So, so definitely have you know, have a strategy in place and map that content out so that people can again, it’s all about, like I keep repeating, but it’s all about getting people back to, to your site for the information that they’re looking for. And if you’re the one providing that information, you’ve shifted the mindset. Because if someone’s not your customer, maybe they’ll reconsider being your customer because of your proactiveness and what you’re doing here and, and the level of expertise that you’re portraying, because you’re, you’re showing, hey, this is what you need to focus on. This is what you need to do. Here’s what you need to accomplish, you know, in your house as far as staying safe and how to protect yourself and here’s how it relates to the flu. And, you know, there’s there’s so many layers to this, but if you’re, if you’re working on all of them, you’re gonna you’re gonna win in the long run. So, so definitely something to keep in mind there is map out your content and continue posting continue on, you know, pushing forward. Okay.

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Consider an online store. And I think this is kind of something that everybody should start thinking about anyway. But if there’s ever been a time to consider it, now’s the time, if you’ve been toying with the idea, if you’ve been thinking, you know, maybe we should do some kind of an online store, you know, for over the counter products that that people can buy, you can ship them to them or deliver to them if they’re close enough to you. But, again, start thinking about that. In times like these, obviously, it’s, it’s a big deal. But again, it just, it goes back to the level of convenience. Once we get past this, and then,

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you know, kind of taking it to the next level as far as your offering and what you guys are capable of doing. And, and despite some of the stuff maybe you’ve heard setting up an online store is not difficult anymore. There’s a lot of resources out there that make it very easy. It’s not, you know, 678 years ago, you know, setting up an online store was a task. I mean, it was expensive. It had multiple layers.

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people needed a developer for I mean, now, there’s so many software’s out there that can help you do this pretty easily, we can do this as well, if you need help, you know, talking about this, I can give you more resources. So feel free to shoot me a message after this, I’ll give you give you all the resources, you want to kind of guide you through this, I’m more than happy to do that. But consider doing it you know, it’s it is going to be a little bit of an undertaking. So I don’t want you to think, you know, this is something that it’s just like, on a whim, you can decide, okay, let’s set up an online store. And tomorrow, it’ll be ready and you’re good to go. Like there’s some steps you got to go through. And you got to think about the products and what you want to put on there and map it out. Again, you don’t just go into it, you know, with no direction have an idea of you know, what you want to put on there.

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I always tell people People always ask, Well, what products should I put on there? I would say start with what you sell the most of right, just start with it, start with their that and then work your way off of that. So um, whatever whatever you sell the most over a few years.

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You might already have people have people asking, you know, can I buy this online, can I get this from you through your website, you know, that that might be something that’s already been asked

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by someone that, that you have as a customer, but, um, you know, start thinking about this, like I said, if this is something you want to do, now’s a better time than ever to consider doing it. And again, it’s not just something that you would set up for, for what’s going on. Now, obviously, this is something you would carry on doing, you know, well past this cobit 19 pandemic that we’re experiencing, you know, because, again, it’s, it’s, we all see the success that Amazon has, and these other, you know, online retail stores, you know, so if you can offer that as well, that’s just one more thing that you can, you know, add to your arsenal and help you make more money, right. So, so set up an online store, consider doing that, start offering products that are that that you can ship or that you could deliver, there’s different angles you can take to this so but definitely something to think

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There. So, um, so, again, if you need help implementing some of this, let’s talk. That was that was kind of the last bullet point that I wanted to hit on with, with the action plan, but you know, feel free to give us a call, or you know, I’ll put my email out there for you. It’s just Shane at pharmacy, ignite calm, feel free to reach out, send me an email. If you have any questions. If you have any questions now that you want me to address while we’re still on here, feel free to pop them in the chat. And I can definitely cover those for you while we’re still sitting here. I’ll hang around for a few minutes, but you know, definitely made it pop up that on there. If you want to schedule a pharmacy acceleration session, that’s a one on one session where we take a look at everything you have going on. Obviously, the idea behind this has shifted a little bit with cobit 19 or more so looking at this action plan what you have in place, but outside of this action plan, we take a look at you know kind of where the state of your digital marketing stands.

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What you need to work on what you need to focus on and kind of give you a blueprint that’s built just for your, your pharmacy, so that you can, can run with that. So,

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again, hope I provided some some good value for you. I appreciate you guys being here. I know everyone’s super hectic super busy right now. But again, if you need the workbook, grab that, but start implementing this stuff. So you can get this information out to your people. And then you know, we’ll be constantly putting out updates as well. So I’m be looking, you know, there’s, this is going to change day by day. So I’m going to be emailing out, you know, updates to this action plan as we go. As far as if there’s something else we think you should add or something that we’ve tested that we see is is become crucial. We’ll will email that out for you guys as well. So, so I’m not seeing any questions pop into into the chat. So if that is a is um, kind of everything that you guys were wanting to know then I

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Appreciate you being here. And we’ll go ahead and wrap it up with that. And like I said, if you if you want to chat, feel free to email me if you have any questions and we’ll be posting a replay of this as well and I’ll be sending it out. So you’ll have that as well. But appreciate you guys being here and, and we’ll talk soon. So thanks, guys. If you’re looking for more information on how to attract more customers to your pharmacy, go to pharmacy ignite calm and schedule your FREE pharmacy acceleration session with marketing expert and founder Shane Gebhards. You can also join our free pharmacy marketing mastermind Facebook group to learn from other pharmacy owners and managers. If you enjoyed the podcast Be sure to subscribe and leave us a five star review