The COVID-19 pandemic hurt many businesses, and not knowing when circumstances would improve made it worse. As a result, many businesses stopped marketing during the pandemic.
That was a mistake.
At Efferent Media, when the coronavirus pandemic hit, we adjusted strategies for our clients to adapt to the circumstances, but we advised our clients to continue their marketing. In each case we analyzed both the particular business and its industry to address the owner’s budget and campaign goals for their ongoing success.
For our clients in the healthcare industry (and especially hair restoration), maintaining their marketing – including PPC and social media ads – turned out to be a vital step in their 2020 financial success. In fact, one hair restoration practice did better in 2020 than they did in 2019 despite the pandemic… and the cost per lead was lower than usual. Let’s look at the numbers.
Comparing social media ads from the period of March 1, 2020 – Feb 28, 2021 with the period of March 2, 2019 – Feb 29, 2020 shows the following improvement for our hair restoration client:
- 13.9% increase in impressions
- 18.5% increase in clicks
- 10.3% increase in engagements
- Cost per engagement decreased by 17.3%
- Cost per conversions decreased by 92%
Additionally, of 312,987 engagements:
- 54.9% share increase
- 67.7% comments increase
- Link clicks increased by 6%
- Other engagements increased by 10.7%
During the same period the conversion rate increased by 18.08% and cost per lead decreased by 23% to $48.79.
Why Continue Running Social Ads During a Pandemic?
- More people are at home browsing on their devices
- Being at home spurred interest in plans and purchases for when the pandemic improved
- You don’t have nearly as much competition – costs will be lower and have better reach to deliver ads and even posts to your target audience
- The Facebook Learning process doesn’t stop, and you won’t lose progress. That helps ads deliver to those most likely to convert.
- With more metrics increasing during this time, this means more opportunities to build up your remarketing list based on social actions, website actions, form fills, etc.
Additionally, our hair restoration client found that people who had been thinking about getting the procedure did research during lockdown. Most big purchases require research time for a person to move through the buyer’s journey. Lockdown was the perfect time for that.
Our client facilitated that decision-making process by offering consultations over Zoom to evaluate whether the prospect would be a good candidate for the hair restoration procedure and answer any additional questions they had. Then when restrictions eased as 2020 progressed those people booked procedures because they knew they’d have recovery time until large gatherings and normal public social events were once again allowed.
In regard to point #3 above, digital ads, whether on social media or PPC, involve a bidding process, not a flat rate. The cost of an ad depends upon competition for the terms and audience being targeted. The more competition, the higher the cost. The lower competition during the pandemic from so many businesses stopping their marketing out of fear meant that the budget for Efferent Media’s clients went further than usual – creating another win.
Looking at Google Analytics data for the same client is also informative. These numbers reflect the positive results attained by Efferent Media’s clients during the pandemic.
Using the same period of March 1, 2020 – Feb 28, 2021 compared with the period of March 2, 2019 – Feb 29, 2020 shows these gains for our hair restoration client:
- 4.57% increase in social referrals to the website
- 22.82% increase in goal completions
- 16.82% improvement in its goal completion rate
As mentioned before, consumers rarely see a product or brand and buy immediately. They often do research before purchasing, and marketing studies have shown that consumers need an average of seven “touches”, meaning having seen or interacted with your brand, before buying. As such, “assisted conversions” is another metric to watch, meaning social interaction and website visits that contributed to a conversion. Those also improved due to marketing during the pandemic.
The same time period showed:
- 331.25% increase in Facebook mobile referrals to the website
- 11% increase in link referrals via Facebook
- 250% increase in referrals to the website from Instagram
While we’re highlighting this hair restoration practice for clarity and simplicity, Efferent Media saw similar improvements for a wide range of clients. Efferent Media was able to create to uniform improvements when comparing the pandemic time period with the prior year – especially for our medical and healthcare clients.
Medical practices were able to continue to serve their patients during even the strictest parts of the pandemic lockdown, but people had concerns. Efferent Media highlighted all of the COVID safety steps our medical clients were taking and create marketing strategies that generated business despite the pandemic.
Wondering what Efferent Media can do you for your business? Give us a call.
Efferent Media Are the Medical Marketing Experts
If you have a medical, healthcare or wellness business, Efferent Media has the experience you need to grow your business and fill your appointment list. Whether it’s a HIPAA-compliant website design, social media marketing, ads, and lead generation campaign specifically designed for the needs of a healthcare professional, or a full marketing plan, our team at Efferent Media will tailor each of our services for you and your business. Contact us today and have the website your business deserves.