Healthcare Marketing Beliefs Worth Challenging
Here’s a question I think more business owners should ask their marketing agencies:
“If I offered you another $2,000 a month, would you find something to spend it on?”
I suspect most agencies could come up with a proposal fairly quickly.
More Google Ads. Additional SEO. A content campaign. Perhaps a website redesign.
And some of those recommendations might be perfectly reasonable.
But what if your clinic doesn’t need any of them right now?
What if there are better ways to improve performance without increasing your marketing budget?
Sometimes the best advice a marketing agency can give is to tell a client not to spend more money.
That’s not an argument against investing in marketing. KEY27 provides marketing services, and we believe they can deliver significant value when they’re appropriate.
It’s an argument for something that should be obvious but isn’t always practiced: recommendations should be based on the client’s needs, not simply on the services an agency wants to sell.
Summary
Healthcare clinics frequently receive recommendations to invest more in SEO, Google Ads, website redesigns and content marketing. But additional spending isn’t always justified. Sometimes existing campaigns need improvement, a website needs a few targeted changes or the clinic lacks enough information to evaluate its current investment. This article examines situations where marketing agencies should challenge additional spending and explains what clinic owners should expect before approving another marketing expense.
In This Article
- Agencies Sell Marketing. That Creates an Interesting Problem.
- Would You Approve These Marketing Expenses?
- The Difference Between More Work and Better Results
- Your Agency Should Explain What You’re Buying
- A Website Redesign Isn’t a Business Objective
- When Spending More Is Absolutely the Right Decision
- What I Would Expect From a Good Marketing Partner
- Frequently Asked Questions
Agencies Sell Marketing. That Creates an Interesting Problem.
Every business needs revenue.
Marketing agencies are no exception.
We employ people, invest in technology, pay for expertise and need to generate enough income to operate sustainably.
There’s nothing wrong with that.
But there’s a potential conflict worth acknowledging.
The agency earns money by providing marketing services. The client earns a return only when those services contribute something worthwhile to the business.
Those two interests often align.
But not always.
Imagine a physiotherapy clinic paying for an ongoing SEO program.
The clinic already performs well for most of its important local searches. Organic traffic is healthy, and several service pages attract relevant visitors.
The owner wants more new patients.
Would you automatically recommend a larger SEO package?
I wouldn’t.
Not without understanding whether additional SEO is likely to address the clinic’s most important opportunity.
Perhaps the clinic has good traffic but confusing booking options.
Maybe it receives plenty of inquiries but has limited appointments available for its most popular service.
Or perhaps an important service page needs improvement, but the work doesn’t justify increasing the monthly retainer.
There may still be valuable SEO work to do. A high-ranking website doesn’t mean optimization should stop.
But the agency should be able to explain why additional spending deserves priority.
That’s the distinction.
The fact that an agency can provide a service doesn’t mean the clinic needs to buy it.
Would You Approve These Marketing Expenses?
Let’s consider four situations.
None has a universal answer. That’s what makes them useful.
$2,000 a month for SEO without meaningful inquiry tracking
A clinic pays $2,000 monthly for SEO.
Every month, it receives reports showing keyword improvements, impressions and organic traffic.
After a year, the owner asks how much new patient interest the work has generated.
The agency doesn’t know.
Now, it may be impossible to connect every appointment directly to SEO. Patients use different devices, return to websites and sometimes contact clinics offline.
But after a $24,000 annual investment, the agency should be able to discuss more than rankings.
Which important service pages improved?
Was more relevant local traffic generated?
What appointment-related actions can reasonably be measured?
What remains unknown?
I wouldn’t necessarily recommend cancelling the SEO program.
I would recommend reviewing the reporting and establishing clearer measures before automatically renewing or expanding the investment.
$5,000 for a website redesign without a conversion baseline
The clinic’s website looks dated.
A redesign is proposed for $5,000.
But nobody has checked which pages attract inquiries, where visitors encounter problems or whether the current design is actually limiting performance.
Maybe the website does need replacing.
Perhaps it has widespread usability problems or significant technical limitations.
But wouldn’t it make sense to establish what needs improving before rebuilding it?
Otherwise, how will the clinic know whether the new website performs better?
Google Ads sending everyone to the homepage
A clinic advertises sports physiotherapy, pelvic health physiotherapy and massage therapy.
All advertisements send visitors to the homepage.
The homepage introduces the clinic, lists some services and includes a general booking button.
It might work reasonably well.
But visitors searching for a specific service could have a better experience if the advertisement led directly to information about that service.
Before increasing the Google Ads budget, I would investigate whether more relevant landing pages could improve results.
Fifty AI-generated articles every month
A content provider offers to publish fifty SEO articles monthly at an attractive price.
That sounds productive.
But why does the clinic need fifty articles?
What questions will they answer?
Who will review healthcare information for accuracy?
How will those articles differ from content already available online?
And how does the publishing plan support the clinic’s actual services?
AI can assist with content development. But the ability to generate content quickly isn’t a reason to publish it.
I would rather see a clinic invest in a smaller number of genuinely useful resources than pay for large quantities of material with no clear purpose.
These four examples have something in common.
The problem isn’t necessarily the service or its price. It’s approving the expense without understanding its purpose.
The Difference Between More Work and Better Results
Marketing agencies are busy organizations.
Campaigns need managing. Websites need maintaining. Content needs updating. Analytics require attention.
There’s always something that could be done.
But more work doesn’t automatically create more value.
A clinic may be paying for four new blog posts every month while its most important service pages haven’t been updated in years.
Or it may be investing in social media activity while its Google Business Profile contains outdated information.
Perhaps an agency is working hard to increase website traffic, but the clinic’s booking links aren’t functioning properly.
In each situation, there’s a reasonable case for changing priorities.
That doesn’t mean the agency should work for free.
Fixing an existing problem still requires expertise, time and often a professional fee.
But the work should be chosen because it makes sense for the business, not because it fits neatly into a predefined package.
A focused website conversion audit may, for example, identify a few improvements worth implementing before committing to a much larger redesign.
The agency earns revenue by solving the right problem.
The clinic benefits from investing in something with a clear purpose.
That’s a healthier relationship than simply expanding the monthly list of deliverables.
Your Agency Should Explain What You’re Buying
When an agency recommends additional spending, I would expect three things.
First, a clear explanation of the opportunity.
Not simply “We can improve your SEO.”
Which services or locations need stronger visibility? What’s the evidence that this is an important limitation?
Second, a reasonable explanation of the expected benefit.
That doesn’t mean guaranteeing a particular number of new patients.
Marketing outcomes are influenced by competition, patient decisions, appointment availability and other factors the agency doesn’t fully control.
But the recommendation should have a logical connection to a business objective.
Third, an explanation of how the investment will be evaluated.
If a clinic is paying for advertising, what will it monitor besides clicks?
If it’s investing in SEO, which relevant searches and pages should improve?
If it’s redesigning the website, which usability or conversion problems should the project address?
In healthcare, measurement also has limitations. Patient privacy must be respected, and not every online interaction can be connected reliably to an attended appointment.
Those limitations should be acknowledged rather than hidden behind complicated dashboards.
A reasonable recommendation doesn’t need a fifty-page proposal.
It needs enough information for the clinic owner to make an informed decision.
A Website Redesign Isn’t a Business Objective
I want to return briefly to website redesigns because they illustrate the problem particularly well.
A clinic owner says, “Our website is five years old. We should probably replace it.”
Why?
Maybe the design no longer represents the clinic accurately.
Perhaps the website is difficult to maintain, performs poorly on mobile devices or cannot support important functionality.
Those are legitimate concerns.
But sometimes the real reason is simply that the website looks older than a competitor’s.
Appearance matters. A healthcare website should look professional and inspire confidence.
However, a more attractive website isn’t automatically a more effective one.
If an agency proposes a redesign, I would want to know what the existing website fails to do and how the new version will address those problems.
Sometimes the answer is a complete rebuild.
Sometimes it’s improving service pages, navigation, mobile usability and the booking journey.
And sometimes a redesign can wait.
The sensible choice depends on the condition of the website and the clinic’s priorities, not an arbitrary rule that every website should be replaced after a certain number of years.
When Spending More Is Absolutely the Right Decision
There are situations where I would be quite comfortable recommending an increased marketing investment.
A clinic may have strong appointment availability, good service pages and a reliable booking process but little visibility in its local market.
More SEO or targeted advertising could make sense.
Another clinic might be opening a new location and need to introduce its services to a different community.
Or an existing advertising campaign may be generating relevant inquiries at an acceptable cost, with evidence suggesting that expansion is worth testing.
In those situations, spending more may be justified.
The point isn’t to spend as little as possible.
A clinic that continually underinvests can miss legitimate growth opportunities.
The objective is to allocate money where it has a reasonable chance of contributing to the results the clinic wants.
That’s why a healthcare marketing strategy should be informed by business objectives and performance evidence, rather than a standard collection of services.
What I Would Expect From a Good Marketing Partner
If I were running a physiotherapy clinic, I’d want a marketing partner who was comfortable having an occasionally uncomfortable conversation.
Someone willing to tell me that my proposed website redesign wasn’t necessary yet.
Or that my advertising budget shouldn’t increase until we understood why the existing campaigns were underperforming.
I’d also want that same partner to tell me when I was underinvesting in an opportunity that deserved attention.
That’s important.
Saying no to every expense isn’t good advice either.
The value is in exercising judgment.
A good marketing partner should understand the difference between an opportunity worth pursuing, a problem worth fixing and an activity that can wait.
At KEY27, that’s the approach we aim to bring to our client relationships.
We don’t consider more marketing activity an achievement by itself.
The work needs to contribute to the client’s objectives.
And occasionally, the most useful recommendation may be that the clinic doesn’t need another service right now.
Your marketing agency should want your business to grow. Not just your marketing budget.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I know if my clinic is spending too much on marketing?
Review whether your spending is connected to clear objectives and meaningful results. Consider inquiry quality, appointment outcomes, available clinic capacity and the sustainability of acquisition costs. A large marketing budget isn’t necessarily excessive if it supports profitable, sustainable growth.
Should I cancel SEO if I can’t measure new patients directly?
Not automatically. SEO can contribute to visibility, patient education and inquiries that aren’t perfectly attributable. However, your agency should explain what can be measured, where the limitations exist and whether the work is improving relevant search performance.
When should a physiotherapy clinic increase its advertising budget?
Additional spending may be justified when campaigns reach appropriate prospective patients, performance is reasonably well understood and the clinic has capacity to accommodate more appointments. A controlled increase is often easier to evaluate than a large, immediate expansion.
What should I ask before approving a website redesign?
Ask which problems the redesign will solve, whether smaller improvements could address them, how existing SEO performance will be protected and how the new website’s effectiveness will be evaluated.
Considering another marketing investment for your clinic?
Before committing to additional services, it may help to have an independent conversation about which activities deserve priority.
