CHRISTINE YEE

Content Marketing. Writing. Social Media. SEO. Digital PR

The field of cosmetic procedures is extremely competitive. High bids are placed for keywords associated with anti aging treatments like Fraxel laser and Botox. 

At Fabric, a smaller project that I managed was to create, update, optimize and test Google Adword ads for three Los Angeles physicians who specialized in cosmetic skin procedures.

Mary Lee Amerian MD

Mary Lee Amerian is a leading dermatologist in Los Angeles who provides custom skin treatments for her patients. She has been voted as one of the "Best Doctors in America" since 1996. Additionally, she has also been featured on the show Ten Years Younger.

www.maryleeamerian.com

Michael Persky MD

Dr. Persky is an expert in Fraxel laser. He also specializes in rhinoplasty and regards his practice as both an art and a science.

Dr. Persky has made regular appearances in the media, including a role as a life change expert on the television show, Extra. www.drpersky.com

David Rahimi MD

Dr. Rahimi specializes in a wide range of leading cosmetic procedures to help his patients look younger. Many of these treatments help to regenerate collagen beneath the skin surface. In addition he also developed a mini face lift procedure called the Tuliplift which gives more natural looking results. www.foreveryoung.net

Client Challenges

Our doctors want to utilize online marketing to reach new patients.

Although their sites are SEO optimized, their keywords are used by all their competitors. Other strategies were needed to supplement SEO. However the budget to develop their online presence on an organic level was limited to content development.

In this particular context, traffic and conversions are separate challenges. Volumes of unique site visitors per month does not necessarily translate into new patients.

With these constraints, a more PR based approach was developed to reach new groups of potential patients. Online marketing through regular PPC tactics ran in parallel to this primary strategy.

Content and PR Recommendations

The content on all three of the doctors' sites were characterized by being very technical. Content recommendations were made in the following areas. The ideal objective was to emulate the look and feel of mainstream women's magazines and provide a more engaging experience for site visitors

• Diet and nutrition for the skin
• Recommended makeup tips
• Celebrities who share a common age or ethnic group as the target audience members
• Fashion
• Hair
• Beauty philosophy
• Self Esteem

Gathering and developing this information required structured collaboration with the doctors which proved to be a very time efficient way of addressing the need for quality content.

Additionally, the use of photography on a more frequent scale was also recommended to improve the overall aesthetic of the sites. Although content is commonly thought of as written posts, visuals also contribute to the overall site experience for the end user.

Google Adwords

High traffic keywords associated with cosmetic procedures is instrumental in reaching large numbers of internet users who are performing searches based on them.

However, when clients are paying per click, these keywords can cost them a lot of money if users are not serious about opting for these procedures.

Solution

Instead of targeting high volume keywords, effort was spent in researching key word phrases that users would type in to find solutions to specific skin issues. This provides a direct bridges between what targeted users need and what our clients offer.

Results

Previously, the average click through rate (across campaigns) was less than one percent. For example, in July, the average click through rate was 0.71%

The keyword phrase strategy, described above, produced a much higher average CTR (2.0%) for the month of November 2009

Reaching Specific Ethnic Markets

Dr. Rahimi specializes in cosmetic procedures for different ethnic groups.

• Asians
• Hispanics
• African Americans

Most people are not aware of the different skin needs that ethnic women have. They are more prone to scarring and discoloration from conventional cosmetic procedures and require an anti aging specialist who can design custom treatments for their skin types.

Communicating with each ethnic group required the following areas to be addressed through the site content.

• skin characteristics and structure
• aging patterns
• recommended care regimens
• makeup color tips
• celebrities of the same ethnicity

Reaching women in these groups required PR outreach with niche magazines such as Audrey, Latina, and Ebony.

PR Outreach: Time Broadcasting

Many lucrative opportunities to reach new patients exist outside the internet realm. For example, modeling agencies have their online sites. However networking efforts rely more heavily on personal contacts and attending events at local venues, as opposed to social media strategies.

Physicians realize the importance of networking with models and professionals in the entertainment industry. However these opportunities (in the form of functions and events) are offered to them at a high cost, with very little return.

Time Broadcasting

An independent television network called Time Broadcasting targets the Iranian community in Los Angeles.

They expressed interest in a reality show concept featuring our clients, Dr. Persky and Dr. Mary Lee Amerian.

A basic proposal, depicting a simple show concept was drafted and approved by the CEO. The premise of the show would be to discover effective, minimally invasive procedures that yield real results. It would also interest audience members to learn how modern science offers ways to manipulate skin structure to reverse aging signs. Most people are only familiar with household terms like Botox and facelifts.

Benefits

The Iranian community is an affluent market segment. Beauty is an important aspect of their culture. Science is also highly valued as well. Parents often encourage their children to pursue degrees in science and careers in medicine. Because of this, the partnership with Time Broadcasting served as an ideal solution for Dr. Persky and Dr. Mary Lee Amerian.

Fabric Interactive was selected as one of the vendors to assist with the marketing for IKEA's Easy to Assemble web series. 

Our developers and designers worked on creating a page for the official website of the show and building a voting box feature.

Within the storyline, the characters, Illeana Douglas and Justine Bateman engage in a competition with one another, vying for the coveted title, Coworker of the Year. And with the voting box feature, fans would be able to vote for either Illeana or Justine and thus influence how the rest of the story unfolds.

Additionally, a small division of Fabric's internal team focused on using PPC strategies to drive traffic to the official website for the show.

My role was to balance these efforts by developing initiatives by encouraging organic traffic to the site. We were given a rather limited time frame. Therefore, it made the most sense to leverage other sites with a large base of active users to cultivate organic interest in the webisode.

Strategies Employed

(1) Identified and contacted pockets of IKEA fans/ groups, requesting the site's voting box page to be shared with fellow members. Also encouraged these individuals to write blog posts, expressing their opinion of the show, the characters etc. 

(2) Assigned the task of writing unique, highly personalized blog posts (using Blogger.com to Fabric's interns (e.g. what they liked about the show, favorite IKEA styles and products, opinions about the characters, Illeana Douglas and Justine Bateman, favorite scenes and lines and why these were chosen as favorites.) This content was shared with IKEA fans/groups to help encourage the process of writing their own blog posts. The blog post written by the interns were also posted on social sharing news sites. 

(3) Posted video links, website pages and uniquely written blog posts to popular social sharing sites. These included: Yahoo Buzz, Propeller, Stumble Upon, Reddit and Digg

I initiated and developed Fabric's first internship program to help provide the necessary support for a growing set of  objectives needed for our marketingn projects. I relied on sites like Craigslist as well as referrals from our own internal team to establish a team of six interns. Additionally, I developed a work flow process which not only required the interns to perform required tasks, but also to record their daily activities and progress. I worked to design an overall experience that would allow the interns to gain valuable reall world experiene in online marketing for the purpose of helping take their resumes to the next level.

The growth of Fabric's marketing projects required additional support. Dogasaur's community of registered members was growing rapidly, largely due to our very successful Facebook ad. Dog lovers were very receptive to participating in a community of like minded pet lovers. However,  once registered, it was important for the brand to take a proactive approach in engaging new members, making them feel at home, introducing them to the site's offerings, encouraging them to make friends and even create their own content. These types of activities were essential for optimizing page views and the performance of the site's existing content.

One of our interns wrote a post about Ellen Degeneres and her dog food brand, HALO. This content was picked up by Ellen's company who linked to the blog from their site, citing Dogasaur as one of their media sources. 

The interns were also able to gain hands on experience in community enagement and management, learning about the human to human dynamics of online communities which extend far beyond the point  of signing up and registering.

Additionally, Fabric had signed on to contribute to the marketing and awareness for the new webisode series, Easy to Assemble, starring Ileanna Douglas and Justine Bateman. Our agency was in charge of building a voting box, allowing fans to vote for Ileanna's character or Justine's character, ultimately deciding on how the storyline would develop. Furthermore, we also assisted with the show's pay per click ad campaign to increase viewership and also to enhance the organic reach, awareness, enthusiasm and engagement for the show. The interns contributed to these initiatives by creating original blog posts and submitting them to social sharing sites such as: Stumble Upon, Digg, Reddit, Propeller and Yahoo Buzz.