Groundzero

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the owner and sole proprietor of a medical practice.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Groundzero?

The opportunity was to take the existing Internet-based portion of my practice and improve my outreach to patients, as well as the overall appearance of my website and advertising campaigns.

Since websites need to be redone every few years, mine definitely needed an upgrade, so in summary, the challenge was to really upgrade that portion of my practice.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

I had a lot of decent content already, but Groundzero brought my site up to date, improved the format and UX, created additional landing pages that addressed specific areas of my practice, and upgraded my website in general. It was a very focused and well-planned campaign.

They also created a marketing campaign that was consistent with my practice, which included upgrading my existing organic sites.

The first phase was to hire creatives to evaluate the site, which included professional writers and designers to look at the content, trends in medical websites, and convert my previous design into an upgraded version.

Also, the important thing with the website was to functionally look at SEO strategies. We had people on the backend building a lot of creative links because in today’s competitive SEO market, you have to link your website to other important sites to gain credibility and link you back to that information.

What is the team composition?

There was a creative writer, 2–3 design people, and probably 2–3 people on the link side of the business. All in all, there were 7–8 people on the team.

How did you come to work with Groundzero?

The leader of Groundzero is a very creative person with a lot of experience in digital marketing. He’s got a tremendous amount of energy, and he’s put together a very creative and energetic team. I’ve found it’s very easy to work with them.

How much have you invested with them?

My monthly retainer is $2,000, but it doesn’t really include a lot of the additional costs. Therefore, with all the monthly marketing costs and everything that goes in, the cost is probably between $50,000–$75,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together right after the pandemic started in April 2020, and our relationship is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

Like any business, my metrics or the endpoint I’m looking for is seeing new clients. In that sense, not only am I seeing more leads per month from the advertising and SEO campaigns, but I’m also seeing better quality clients thanks to the keywords that they’ve focused on.

How did Groundzero perform from a project management standpoint?

My practice isn’t a gigantic enterprise, so it hasn’t been that necessary for me. They have a project leader and their way to organize the project, as well as their own tools. On my end, it seems to go pretty smoothly. My team carries certain responsibilities to deliver content and review it, but it all comes together quite nicely.

Nonetheless, their team is pretty tight, and they work well together. We have a lot of back-and-forth. For me, the process has moved really quickly and efficiently; I haven’t felt that anybody has dropped the ball and left it standing. We’ve met our deadlines without a lot of delays, and we already got to the end point with the website.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’ve been in practice for almost 30 years, so I was around before the Internet became a factor in anybody’s business. I’ve watched the internet grow, and I’ve used a lot of SEO management and marketing teams in the past, but what impressed me the most about them was that they laid out a realistic pathway and pointed out their benchmarks and when they were going to hit them.

A lot of companies tell you they’ll make it happen, but then they give you a gray area and benchmarks that aren’t really clear. Thus, I was very impressed with Groundzero’s ability to deliver the product. I’d never had anybody from a marketing standpoint give me an accurate estimate and actually deliver on that promise, and they do that for a lot of clients.

Of course, marketing is a difficult area because you can have great or moderate success. However, Groundzero seems to really have tapped into the right formula. They’ve been able to show me the actual positions of my organic site since very early on, and we’ve moved up quite quickly in certain keywords. If you can actually see your website moving upwards on Google on a regular basis, that really shows that they’re making a difference — the proof is in the pudding right there.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I’ve never had any major issues. We had some months where we had to go back and refigure things out, but that’s part of the process. In my particular experience, we didn’t take significant steps back, so at least from my standpoint, I don’t have anything negative to report.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Definitely give them a chance to quote your marketing project and really dive into the area that you’re in. They have a lot of experience in different areas; mine's a medical practice, but they probably have clients in 20–30 different areas of business.

Also, it’s important to meet the team and understand what your goals are. Similarly, it’s important to understand that a marketing campaign is something that plays out over a year’s time. Once you meet the team, it’s a slow but steady course. You have to give it time, but you’ll be pretty happy with Groundzero in the end.