Why Word Of Mouth Matters
Digital ads and social media may be loud, but they rarely bring people through the door. For small clinics like ours, word of mouth is everything. When you share your experience, you help us survive—and you help others find care that really makes a difference.
When someone finds something that really works—whether it’s a great plumber, a dependable mechanic, or a clinic that actually helps them feel better—they often tell a few people about it. These small acts of sharing are how most of us discover the things we come to trust. But in today’s world, it’s easy to assume that businesses grow because of digital advertising, clever algorithms, or a strong social media presence. That might be true for products or viral trends, but it’s not how real, local, service-based care actually grows.
Two women talk over breakfast
We’re often asked why we don’t post more on social media, or why we don’t invest in digital ads to “get the word out.” And the answer is fairly simple: digital marketing is expensive, competitive, and poorly suited to the kind of work we do. We’re not selling a quick fix or a single-use item—we’re offering care that takes time, relationship, and trust. And those are not things that people usually buy because they saw a well-placed Instagram ad.
The truth is, even if we wanted to pour energy into online advertising, we’d be competing with large health systems, national supplement companies, and digital health brands with marketing budgets that could cover our entire operating costs many times over. The internet is noisy. Attention is fragmented. And the kind of depth that Chinese medicine offers doesn’t lend itself easily to short-form content or click-through campaigns. What we do is slow. It’s personal. It requires a willingness to sit with someone and really listen. That’s not something you can package into a sponsored post.
And even if you could, it still might not work. There’s an old rule of thumb in marketing that says it takes about seven times for someone to hear about something before they decide to act. That number isn’t precise, of course, but the underlying point holds true. People rarely make decisions the first time they hear about something new. They need reminders. They need to hear it from someone they trust. They need to feel like the choice is safe and the path is familiar. And in our experience, nothing moves that process along more effectively than word of mouth.
When someone you trust says, “You should check them out,” it means more than a dozen glowing reviews online. When a coworker tells you that acupuncture helped their headaches or that their digestion finally improved, it creates a kind of opening. You don’t have to understand how it works—you just start to wonder if maybe it could help you, too. That small opening is where the real momentum begins.
And for clinics like ours, that momentum is essential. We don’t have investors. We don’t have billboard campaigns or prime-time ad slots. We grow because people like you have good experiences, and then tell someone else. That’s it. That’s the whole engine.
So when you recommend us to a friend, or share a blog post that resonated, or casually mention in conversation that acupuncture helped you sleep through the night for the first time in weeks—you’re doing more than passing along information. You’re actively supporting our survival. You’re helping to keep a small, local business open. You’re helping a clinic stay available for the next person who needs care. And you’re helping grow a model of healthcare that still believes in time, attention, and personalized support.
It doesn’t have to be a grand gesture. You don’t need to post on social media or deliver a speech about Chinese medicine to your book club. Sometimes it’s enough to say, “I think my acupuncturist might be able to help with that,” or to hand someone a card, or to write a few honest sentences in a review. These small, direct, person-to-person exchanges do more for us than any algorithm ever could.
In a time when people are inundated with ads and recommendations from all directions, a real voice still carries weight. Your voice—genuine, human, and grounded in your own experience—is what makes people listen. And in a landscape where small businesses are often drowned out by louder, better-funded ones, that kind of word of mouth matters more than ever.
So if our work has helped you, if you’ve felt better in your body or more steady in your mind because of the care you’ve received, we hope you’ll consider sharing that with someone. Not because we’re trying to grow fast, but because we want to keep doing this for the long haul. We want to stay open, stay available, and keep offering care that is thoughtful, effective, and rooted in something more lasting than trends.
The future of small, relational, whole-person medicine depends on people talking to people. And that kind of support can’t be bought. It has to be offered freely, one conversation at a time.