If you have no idea what a Facebook tracking pixel is, you’re not alone. But, your practice marketing department should at least be aware, and your healthcare marketing agency should definitely be using this powerful tool on your behalf.

Facebook Tracking Pixel

What is a Facebook Tracking Pixel?

A Facebook tracking pixel is a snippet of code placed on your website that tracks visitor behavior.  Using the collected data, it allows you to run more efficient ads and track your return on investment.

How could I use a Facebook Tracking Pixel for a medical practice?

Hyper-Targeting – If you were going to run a Vasectomy promotion (e.g. March Vasness), the tracking pixel would allow you to target the specific visitors to your Vasectomy page over the last 6 months.  Targeting 1,000 people who were already looking for information on your site will produce a much higher ROI than targeting 25,000 random people through local sports radio.

Conversion Tracking – If your goal is for someone to make an appointment or call, you can track which advertisement converts best.  The tracking pixel follows them through your site and then records when they hit a page like the “thank you for requesting an appointment” page or “contact” page.  Then, you can fine-tune future spending by spending more on ads that are more likely to produce the action you want.  For medical practices, that’s typically an appointment.

Demographic Insights – Once your list is built and reaches around 500 names collected (btw, it’s anonymous, you cannot see the names or info on your collected lists), you view the insights of that group.  It can include what they are interested in, income, gender, etc.  Even if you continue to spend on traditional media, this can be helpful information that you wouldn’t otherwise have.

Lookalike Audiences – If your list is relatively small, say 1500 people, but you want to advertise to a similar group, Facebook can help.  By creating a lookalike audience, Facebook takes the information of your specific audience, looks for trends, then identifies other people that are similar.  This allows practices to expand their marketing to a wider audience with similar characteristics of your patients.

Having this type of tool at your disposal 10 years ago would have cost six figures and require a contract with a big data firm.  Facebook offers this tool free and thus increased the value of their paid ads dramatically – which are still remarkably cheap.

Need help implementing a Facebook Tracking Pixel?  Watch for future articles or contact us for help.