While massage's health and wellness benefits are clear to professionals like you, many current and prospective clients still see it as a luxury service and an indulgence. And, with the number of massage therapists increasing by 4.6% over the last decade, the industry is highly competitive. This means focusing on promoting your massage practice and setting it apart from others is crucial.
To do so, you need a robust marketing strategy to maximize the number of potential clients who hear about your practice. Let’s discuss 15 effective massage marketing techniques you can employ:
- Identify your niche.
- Establish well-designed branding.
- Create a professional website.
- Incorporate search engine optimization.
- Advertise on online business directories.
- Leverage social media.
- Create email marketing campaigns.
- Use SMS marketing.
- Leverage paid marketing.
- Distribute massage therapy business cards.
- Send out direct mailers.
- Attend local events.
- Provide incentives to increase bookings.
- Request personal testimonials and reviews.
- Partner with other businesses.
Regardless of whether you’re just starting your massage business or if you’re one of the top massage therapists in your area, attracting new clients is an essential part of your success. With these strategies, you’ll be able to generate a higher level of awareness for your business and grow it into the thriving practice you’ve envisioned.
The Foundation of Massage Therapy Marketing
Before focusing on specific techniques your massage practice should implement to improve marketing, you must deliver excellent customer service. Providing great customer experiences that make visitors want to return for more is the foundation of your massage business. After all, if customers don’t enjoy their massage, no amount of marketing will persuade them to return.
As you perform massages, center your customer’s comfort and preferences as your absolute priority. After the massage, ask for feedback about where you can improve and take steps to deliver the best massage experience possible, ensuring customers will spread the word about your practice.
After strengthening your customer service approach, incorporate the following marketing tips into your practice to wow clients and improve retention.
1. Identify your niche.
Especially if you’re just starting out, identifying your business’s niche is essential to creating a thoughtful and successful massage marketing strategy. Plus, it will help you set yourself apart from your competitors, allowing you to secure more customers.
To identify your niche, perform the following tasks:
- Assess your skills and expertise. Assess both your strengths and what you enjoy doing. For example, you might be skilled in aromatherapy, but you might enjoy giving Swedish massages as well. Consider how you can incorporate both types of massage into your business and how it will change your massage marketing strategy.
- Identify your target market. Choose your target market based on your areas of expertise and interests. Develop prospective client personas that include demographics, needs, habits, preferences, and any other information that you find relevant.
- Survey your competition. Research your competitors to learn information such as their client base and main offerings. Brainstorm ways to set yourself apart from them. Additionally, evaluate their marketing for effective strategies and consider how you could apply those insights to your promotional efforts.
Completing these tasks will help you come up with your unique selling point and proposition. For example, let’s say that you specialize in prenatal massages and also really enjoy aromatherapy. Your competitors, on the other hand, mostly focus on deep-tissue massages or sports massages. Plus, you know that your massage practice is located near several OBGYN offices.
In this scenario, you could center your massage practice on creating a gentle, relaxing experience for pregnant individuals. Not only will this differentiate your practice from your competitors, but it will also guide your marketing efforts to help you capture the attention of your target audience.
2. Establish well-designed branding.
Cohesive and well-designed branding allows potential clients to connect with your massage practice before even setting foot in your facility. To create compelling branding, you’ll need to consider both visual and verbal branding elements.
Visual branding refers to elements that you can see. It includes:
- Logos
- Colors
- Typography
When choosing your visual branding style, make sure that it’s harmonious and easy to read. For example, neon colors and busy fonts may not be the best choices for your visual branding elements if you’re trying to promote a relaxing experience.
Verbal branding, on the other hand, refers to the written choices you make. This covers your:
- Mission statement
- Values
- Tone
Consider how you’d like to discuss your massage practice with potential clients. For example, if you’re focusing on medical massages, then you may want to refer to your practice as a “massage clinic” in your marketing materials and write with a more professional tone to ensure that clients see you as a serious care provider.
After you make your selection, brand all of your promotional materials consistently, from your website to your social media posts to your email newsletters. To make this easier on yourself, create a brand guide that you can refer to every time you create new marketing materials.
By making good branding choices, you’ll be more likely to connect with potential clients. They’ll feel a connection with you and be more at ease booking their first appointment.
3. Create a professional website.
The cornerstone of marketing massage therapy is your practice’s website. While potential clients might discover your practice through a variety of different channels, they’ll expect to access your website for key information, such as your offerings and location.
When building your website, ensure that it is:
- Well-designed. Not only do you want your website to be visually appealing, but you also want it to be well-designed from a functional standpoint. This means that the layout should be intuitive and that interactive elements should work as intended.
- Easy to navigate. Potential customers should be able to easily navigate to the pages they want to view, whether that’s through a navigation bar or a footer. Highlight key pages in these locations, such as your services page, about page, contact page, and bookings page.
- Mobile responsive. Almost 60% of web traffic comes from mobile devices, making it essential for your website to be optimized for mobile devices. That way, people can easily access your site on the go and learn more about your offerings, increasing your chances of obtaining new clients.
While marketing massage therapy is crucial, you need to secure the potential clients who visit your site. Pay special attention to key pages to ensure that they run smoothly and lead visitors to book an appointment. Your home page should be inviting to encourage visitors to remain on your website and your blog roll should be regularly updated with valuable content to help them learn more about your business.
Your bookings page is essential to your massage marketing efforts. It should allow clients to find open appointment slots and book their massages online. This makes it easier for you to convert interested web visitors into customers. Plus, the right booking tools will send appointment confirmations and reminders to clients, which can reduce no-shows, saving you time and money.
4. Incorporate search engine optimization.
Search engine optimization (SEO) is crucial for your website to be easily discoverable through search engines like Google. Research SEO best practices that you can incorporate into your web design to ensure that search engines rank your website highly on results pages for relevant search queries. For example, you might focus on keywords like “massages in Chicago,” “aromatherapy near me,” and “relaxing massages downtown.”
In particular, focus on local SEO best practices to generate qualified leads that boost bookings. Local SEO is a strategy that increases your business’s visibility in local search results in Google. For example, when you Google “restaurants near me” to browse eateries in your area, you see businesses that have optimized their websites for local SEO. Start by making sure your business name and address are consistent across the web and by updating your Google Business Profile. With the right strategy, you can generate a great deal of business just through this one aspect of SEO.
5. Advertise on online business directories.
Directories are a great way to boost your visibility and attract people looking for professional massage therapists and businesses. Plus, popular directories like Google and Yelp have high conversion rates since your customers are already looking for what you offer.
Aside from general business directories, research and add your practice to massage directories that are a good fit for your business and rank well in web searches to upgrade your massage marketing outreach.
6. Leverage social media.
Social media platforms allow you to market massage therapy to a wider audience due to their popularity. Create business accounts on platforms such as:
- Instagram. This image-focused social media platform allows users to post photos and images to their pages. You can also upload short-form videos as Reels to generate greater engagement with your page.
- Facebook. With over 3 billion active monthly users, Facebook is the most popular social media platform in the world. This platform accepts many types of content, including text posts, images, videos, and more.
- TikTok. On TikTok, you can post short-form video content similar to Instagram Reels. 60% of its users fall between ages 18 and 34, making it a great place to connect with younger customers.
Contrary to popular belief, you do not have to be on every social network to successfully market massage therapy. Instead, you should focus on the most impactful platforms for your practice. Consider your target audience’s demographics and which social media platforms they’d be most likely to use, and create engaging content there to catch their attention.
Did you know MassageBook can help you easily convert social media visitors into paying customers? Use our seamless integration to add online scheduling directly to your social media business pages. Check it out here.
7. Create email marketing campaigns.
Although email may not be the most effective way to reach new clients, it is extremely effective for connecting with past and current clients. Since customer retention is as important as customer acquisition, create a thorough email marketing strategy that re-engages your past clients.
We recommend creating e-newsletters that you send monthly or twice a month. In these newsletters, summarize any upcoming updates or changes, such as introducing new staff members, teasing your new shiatsu massage offering, or announcing a discount.
8. Use SMS marketing.
Text marketing is another great way to reconnect with past and current clients. Since there is a 160-character limit per message, write short and snappy messages that pique the reader’s attention. For example, promote your holiday discounts with a text that says: “Celebrate this Valentine’s Day with a couple’s massage! Book by February 5 for a 10% discount!”
9. Leverage paid marketing.
If you have the budget to allocate to it, paid advertising is an excellent option for increasing your business's visibility. Consider investing in pay-per-click search engine and social media ads to maximize the number of individuals who see your marketing materials and convert viewers into clients.
You’ll handle selecting keywords and designing your ads to inspire viewers to click. In your paid marketing, focus on the benefits viewers will reap from booking a massage at your business. Don’t stick with the generic benefits of massages. Ask yourself: What makes my massage business stand out from other businesses? What does my practice do better than my competitors? Use the answers to these questions to inform your paid advertising efforts.
10. Distribute massage therapy business cards.
A business card is an essential marketing card that keeps your massage practice top of mind for the recipient. When a potential customer receives a card, they’ll have your business’s essential information in one convenient place. Plus, when they see the card, they’ll be reminded to book an appointment or refer a friend.
Here are some of the elements that your business card should include:
- Logo
- Business name
- Website
- Address
- Business hours
- Phone number
- Social media handle
You can also incorporate a QR code that takes the viewer directly to your business’s appointment scheduling page. This will boost conversions by making it easier for interested individuals to book a massage as soon as needed.
11. Send out direct mailers.
Develop visually appealing and professional flyers or postcards to send via direct mail to generate interest in your massage practice. Nowadays, many businesses have moved all their marketing efforts online, making direct mailers a way to stand out from the crowd. Plus, it makes it more likely that recipients will read your materials.
When you’re first starting out, you can also create door hangers and go door to door within your massage practice’s neighborhood. This practice is very time-consuming, but it's a great way to generate leads for a business that’s just getting off the ground.
12. Attend local events.
Improve your business’s visibility in your community by attending local events. For example, you might serve as a vendor at a local farmer’s market and give shorter, 15-minute massages at a discounted price. You could also attend trade shows to connect with other professionals and form valuable relationships. Bring business cards and pamphlets so your new connections know where to find you.
Volunteering is another option for massage therapists. Aside from increasing your business’s visibility, it also improves your reputation, making it more likely for community members to patronize your business. After all, 77% of consumers are motivated to purchase from companies committed to making the world a better place. As a massage therapist, you can volunteer by offering pampering massages to residents at a local retirement home. Or, give massages at a healthcare facility to alleviate pain in individuals suffering from arthritis.
13. Provide incentives to increase bookings.
You work hard and deserve compensation for your efforts. However, discounts can be an excellent marketing investment if used correctly. You can implement discounts through the following incentive programs:
- Rewards. In a rewards program, you’ll provide clients with a discount or a freebie after a certain amount of bookings. For example, you could offer a free hand massage after five massage sessions, or a 15% discount on a client’s tenth massage booking. This allows you to build stronger relationships with clients and encourage their repeat bookings.
- Referrals. Referral programs work very similarly to rewards programs, except instead of rewarding clients after a certain amount of massages, you reward them for referring their friends to your practice. For example, you could give referred clients a 10% discount on their first massage, and the referring client a 10% discount for every new referral. This strategy not only helps you gain new customers but also encourages the retention of existing clients.
- Memberships. With a membership program, clients pay you monthly for a set amount of services that they receive. This allows you to grow the number of regulars you see and creates a more predictable revenue stream to ensure the success of your business.
Some massage therapists have found success going to local events such as 5K races and offering free 10-minute massages. This small incentive allows you to connect with many new potential clients, helping your practice fill the empty slots in your schedule.
14. Request personal testimonials and reviews.
To build trust in your practice within your community, leverage the power of personal testimonials and reviews. After building your list of loyal customers, ask them to provide feedback and their reviews of your services on Google, Yelp, and other business directories. Having a public base of positive reviews improves the reputation of your business and will help you acquire new clients.
To boost the number of online reviews you receive, consider investing in an automated solution to gather reviews from satisfied customers. The right solution will automatically collect these reviews and post them on your website and Google, without any additional effort from you!
In addition to asking clients to leave online testimonials and reviews, encourage them to spread awareness of your massage practice through word-of-mouth. After all, people tend to trust the recommendations of their friends and family over all else. You can even incentivize your clients to make such recommendations with referral programs!
15. Partner with other businesses.
An often overlooked technique for marketing massage therapy is to partner with other businesses. These companies should be more established than your business and have a clientele that would be interested in your massage offerings. That way, you’ll be able to reach out to their well-cultivated audience.
Businesses you should consider partnering with include:
- Health and wellness centers. These include chiropractic clinics, yoga studios, physical therapy clinics, and gyms and fitness centers. Since their offerings are adjacent to massages, it’s likely that their clients would be interested in your offerings as well.
- Spas and salons. Spas and salons have a focus on relaxation and rejuvenation. While some offer massages in-house, many do not. Ask them if they would be willing to refer their clients to your practice for more pampering treatments.
- Corporate wellness programs. Companies with a focus on their employees’ well-being may offer wellness programs to encourage them to stay healthy. These programs often include a stipend for gym memberships or discounted subscriptions for fitness apps. Contact local companies to see if they’d offer a stipend for massage memberships or offer their employees a discount on your services.
When marketing massage therapy to corporations, research companies near your practice to drive the most conversions. Be prepared with a pitch explaining how a partnership with your practice would benefit their stakeholders and be worthwhile.
Additional resources
As the massage industry grows increasingly competitive, developing a thorough massage marketing strategy that sets your practice apart from others is essential. With the help of these strategies, you’ll be well on your way to attracting the clients your practice needs to succeed. Additionally, consider investing in massage software that streamlines your marketing efforts and makes it easier than ever to acquire new clients.
If you’d like to learn more about improving your massage business, check out these resources:
- 13 Best Massage Therapy Software Solutions — Massage therapy software can do more for your practice than simply streamlining your marketing efforts. Learn more about the top solutions here.
- A Guide to Massage Billing: Insurance Codes for Therapists — Accepting medical insurance at your massage practice has benefits and drawbacks. If you’ve considered accepting insurance, this guide covers the basics you need to know!
- How to Write SOAP Notes for Massage: A Guide + Free Template — Taking SOAP notes can vastly improve the quality of your services and care. This guide will give you tips on how to take effective notes and even includes a free template!