ChiroTalk - Marketing 101: Promoting your practice as a professional

This episode focused on how chiropractic practices should promote themselves professionally right now.  Dr. Larry discusses three marketing paths, entertain, sell, or educate and why teach/clarify/earn trust is the durable approach. From “roadmapping” how to navigate the healthcare system to using outcome-based storytelling (not philosophy-first messaging), the content focused on building trust through transparency and real patient value.


📌“The basics are what wins the profession.”  The best-performing marketing isn’t spectacle, it’s education with clarity that reduces fear and helps people understand what to expect and what outcomes they can reasonably pursue.


Key Points Discussed

🟢Why marketing and messaging matter right now: Dr. Larry explained that the profession hasn’t done a strong job getting its name and true value across to the public, and that public perception has not improved despite many changes in the broader media landscape.

🟢The three chiropractic marketing paths: 

    1. Entertain with spectacle (e.g., viral “snap/crackle/pop,” clickbait),
    2. Sell with bigger claims (gimmicks and overselling),
    3. Educate with claims (clear, outcome-focused education).

The discussion emphasized that education should become the dominant reputation-builder.

🟢“Shock-and-awe” backfires on trust: Viral videos may attract attention, but they can also confirm patients’ fears about safety and forcefulness, causing many people to never return after their first impression.

🟢Gimmicks have short lifespans and create long-term damage: They discussed how gimmicks can bring short-term interest (e.g., weight loss offers), but can define a practice in a way that makes later clinical trust harder to rebuild.

🟢Trust is earned via “clear diagnosis, plan, measuring, and mapping”: Instead of slogans or philosophy-first messaging, they stressed a patient-first approach: explain what’s going on, what will happen next, and how progress will be understood.

🟢Education is not anti-marketing: They argued that teaching outcomes, side effects (from the analogy), and next steps lowers fear, increases familiarity, and makes patients more willing to seek care and follow through.

🟢Using technology/systems without gimmicks: Dr. Larry highlighted that tools like ChiroSpring can support automated, relevant patient education campaigns (tag-based content) while the clinician remains the decision-maker.