Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Medical services practitioners face many challenges in the digital economy, especially when it comes to growing their presence online.

Online Challenges For Medical Businesses

Now, more than ever, health and medical services professionals must work hard and find smarter ways to remain competitive and obtain new clientele. Not only do you have to actively participate in the community you serve, you must also maintain a strong web presence. This includes having an effective web presence and learning how to better promote your services online.

In addition to investing dollars in offline marketing, businesses in the health or medical-related industry are now finding that they need to invest a greater part of their marketing budget to developing and managing a website that attracts prospective clients, engages users, outperforms the competition in search engines and helps increase their marketing exposure online.

This means that your site not only has to look great, load fast, and your site has to be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website will change in time and sections will need to be updated often. This requires a well-developed web and content management strategy in place.

Another challenge that health businesses face with their websites (as other businesses do for that matter), is that your site has only around 30 seconds or less to help users find the information they need or they will leave the site.

“Websites have evolved into central information hubs where service information is still present but enhanced with web portals, hyperlinks to state and federal sites, and a variety of free tools.”

Michael Alter, http://www.accountingweb.com/technology/accounting-software/tips-for-improving-your-website

Opportunities For Medical And Health Services Providers

As well as facing a number of challenges, there are also plenty of online opportunities available for businesses in the medical-related sector that can evolve to meet the challenges of the digital economy and who can think outside the box when it comes to improving their online marketing skills.

This comprehensive article will help you uncover new ways to attract and engage more visitors and establish online credibility for your business.

As well as providing useful website improvement tips, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress content management system (CMS) to power your health or medical-related website or blog.

To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress CMS platform, go here:

• Discover How A Poorly Designed Web Site Can Lose You Money
• Using WordPress To Grow Your Small Business Online

Ways To Improve Your Health Clinic Services Website

In this section we will show you ways to improve your website and get better results online. We show you what pages your site needs, what content works best for medical or health sites, your layout and navigation, etc.

If you need website planning assistance, read this guide: The Web Site Planning Process Explained: A Basic Blueprint For Business Owners

How To Improve Your Website Pages

Professional websites need several basic pages. Let’s take a look at these.

Services And Products

You need a page that describes your services and any products that you offer. Depending on which area of health or medical services you specialize in, this page could list services like:

• Medical And Surgical – e.g. pain management, nephrology diabetes, oncology, rehabilitation medicine, rheumatology, endoscopy, optometry surgical outpatients, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. general dentistry, holistic dentistry, oral health, restorations, dentofacial orthopedics, emergency dental, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac patient rehabilitation, coronary care
• Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. birthing, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic services – mammography, skin cancer, x-ray, pap smears, magnetic resonance imaging, allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology – lab testing and analysis, emergency pathology testing, fine-needle aspiration cytology, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling – mental health services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, trauma counselling, diet and nutrition counselling, social development services
• Alternative therapies – Chinese medicine, reflexology, colloidal silver therapy, tai chi, chiropractic, hypnosis, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – diet and nutrition, chiropody, reproductive endocrinology, speech language therapy, inherited diseases, prosthetics, hearing aids, home care, community health, medical supplies, etc.

Make sure to list all of the services you provide, not just the ones you specialize in. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about what these services do and why they should choose you.

About Us

The ‘About Us’ page should give a description of your business and explain to visitors what your business stands for, its unique approach, causes supported, etc.

Remember to also include any business awards, accreditations, recognitions, certifications, associations, publications, etc., that could be used to promote your business and to position yourself above similar service providers.

(List all of your industry awards certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc. in the About Us page. Screenshot image source: squaremedical.com.au)

Your Staff

Are you searching for ways to sell more products or services online and get prospective clients to interact more with your site? Then make it easier for your prospects to get to know you and your organization better.

Your business needs to be relatable. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your people. It should include a photo and a brief bio. Since most visitors are probably not familiar with health or medical-related terms it should tell who they are and what their specialties are. It should also explain what those specialized areas do. It can include social buttons so your site visitors can follow your staff members on their social pages.

In this page, make sure to highlight each employee’s qualifications, how they add value or contribute to the success of your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add an employee description page. Screenshot source: southperthchiro.com.au)

We have created a detailed tutorial about how to easily add a simple team members directory in your website without coding skills here: How To Easily Add A Simple Employee List To Your WordPress Site

Job Opportunities Page

This is a listing of job opportunities within the clinic. This page should include training, benefits, advancement opportunities, etc. You can also include information such as the job outlook and upcoming career opportunities in the medical-related industry.

Include also a positions available section in this page. If there are no positions currently available, consider inviting people to return periodically to this page, subscribe to your contact list, follow you on social media, etc.

Case Studies

Testimonials and case studies are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase your services. By adding a page with reviews from clients and case studies, you are also helping to establish social proof.

(Add a page with client reviews and case studies. Screenshot image source: arrowsmiledental.com)

To learn more about using testimonials, case studies and user reviews, see this article: How To Improve Your Conversions With Standout Testimonials

Contact Us

A contact page is absolutely vital.

Your contact page should provide some or all of the following information:

• Company Name
• Location
• Telephone
• Facsimile
• Contact email address
• Google Map and directions
• Web URL
• Contact form
• Contact name
• Links to social media pages
• Interactive chat

If your business operates out of different areas you should make that clear when showing your address and contact info.

Consider also including links to an FAQ section, useful pages, booking request, helpdesk, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add A Medical Or Health Blog

A blog can be a powerful marketing tool. Most blogging platforms are built around a content management system that is easy to use and allows you to easily promote your business using content like news and events, product releases, useful articles, informative posts, promotional videos, infographics, etc.

If you already have an established medical site, then consider adding a WordPress-powered blog to create more exposure for your clinic.

If you don’t have a website yet, or if your existing medical site is very hard to add new content to or not giving you the results you want, then WordPress can be used both as your business website and business blog.

Something few people know about, is that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic system that can begin delivering a stream of targeted visitors to your website, simply by publishing content to your website on a regular basis.

(WordPress can automate your traffic generation)

For more details:

• Web Site Traffic Blueprint – A Complete Guide To Getting More Web Traffic Automatically With WordPress

Legal Information

Having a compliant website is important. This is not only important for establishing credibility with visitors, but also to ensure that no laws or regulations are being contravened in whichever region you do business.

Adding some or all of the following legal pages to your health website will help keep you out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential sources of threats and legal inconveniences:

• Contact Us
• Privacy Policy
• Terms Of Use
• Website Disclaimer
• Affiliate Agreement
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• DMCA Notice
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Linking Policy
• Health and Financial Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• etc.

We have written a comprehensive article on adding legal pages to your website. To learn more, go here: How To Add Legal Pages To Your Site

Tips On How To Improve Your Content

In today’s highly competitive global business economy, being generous with content that educates and informs visitors has become one of the key differentiators for businesses that sell similar products or provide similar services.

You will want to provide great content with useful information, tips or advice that will get your readers to share your web pages with others online and come back for more content. Publishing content is the most effective way to inform and teach your visitors and prospective clients about your business and services.

For example, if you provide weight management services, then some of the topics you can cover in your web content include:

• What’s the difference between being overweight and obese?
• What are calories and how they play a role in weight loss
• How to incorporate exercise into your busy schedule
• What salad dressings can derail your weight loss goals (and healthier choices)
• Etc.

You can also create a series of educational articles that will help your readers understand your medical or health services, by explaining benefits, procedures, terminology, etc.

Use keywords in your articles that your prospective clients would search for.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive a comprehensive series of training emails with easy-to-digest information and practical tips that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your web site, save money creating high-quality content for your visitors and grow your presence online using content marketing. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!

Ways Of Improving Visitor Experience

Improving your website’s user experience (generally referred to as UX) will help to keep visitors coming back and using your site. This section will show you ways you can improve your visitor engagement and user experience.

Content Syndication – RSS Feeds

Adding RSS feeds can help to improve your visitor engagement and user experience in a number of different ways.

If you provide useful information, other businesses will want to syndicate your content to their visitors.

Some of the benefits of syndicating your content to other websites using RSS feeds, include:

• All of your content updates are kept in one place
• your content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Can be shared and picked up by other sites online
• Allows for subscribing
• It provides a way for external links to point back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• RSS provides various ways for readers to receive your content (e.g. subscribers can read the content on their mobile device using a feed reader)
• It’s built into WordPress

There are also benefits when it comes to providing great information on your website from other websites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.

You can find RSS feeds with loads of useful content for your website by searching online for relevant government departments or respected industry bodies.

Here are some examples of RSS feeds containing useful information that you could add to a health or medical website:

• US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Blog RSS feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SelectedHhsBlogPosts, etc. You can also choose individual feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Emergency preparedness, Environmental health, HIV/AIDS, Minority women’s health, Violence against women, etc.) here: http://womenshealth.gov/news/rss/rss-feeds.html
• US National Libraries Of Medicine – For a list of RSS feeds from various medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. BMJ Journal of Medical Ethics, BMJ, BMJ Emergency Medicine Journal, American Chemical Society, BMJ Evidence-Based Mental Health, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health (www.nih.gov) - Find various RSS feeds on health-related news here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• FDA – Find RSS feeds on fda-related topics like consumer health information, food allergies, tainted products, tobacco news, etc. and podcasts here: http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/ContactFDA/StayInformed/RSSFeeds
• UK Department Of Health (www.gov.uk) – Latest news: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-of-health.atom
• The Department Of Health (Australian Government): http://www.health.gov.au/internet/main/publishing.nsf/xml/rssLatestNews.xml
• Department Of Public Health (Australia – State Level): e.g. Western Australia – http://www.public.health.wa.gov.au/feed/?types=news
• Centers For Disease Control And Prevention - Find many health-related feeds and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
• Medical News: You can search medical news feeds by going to publications like the NYTimes RSS feeds section (e.g. Health news: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Health.xml)
• MedicineNet.com – Weekly Health and Medical News Digest: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/weeklyhealth.xml. You can also choose individual RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Lung Conditions, Menopause, Cold & Flu, Diet & Weight Management, Exercise & Fitness, High Blood Pressure, etc.)
• Medical News Today – MNT Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• Medical News Today – You can also choose individual RSS feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Ovarian Cancer, Caregivers/Homecare, Pregnancy/Obstetrics, Dermatology, Medical Devices/Diagnostics, Tropical Diseases, Restless Legs Syndrome, etc.)

You can also just search online for general RSS feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific subjects, e.g. “medical training rss feeds”, “autism rss feeds”, “cancer rss feeds”, etc.

(Add RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds to provide your visitors with a better user experience.)

Checklists And Charts

Checklists and educational charts are a great way to help increase visitor engagement and add value to your visitors. They can provide visitors with useful step-by-step information and resources to complete steps. They are great instructional tools.

You can provide online or downloadable checklists, charts and forms covering a range of topics such as:

• Booking appointments
• Checklists for post-surgery recovery
• Health checklists for specific conditions
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, active maintenance program, general dentistry, etc.
• Fitness and exercise program checklists and charts
• General charts & infographics (e.g. sugar content in different foods, sleep requirements at different stages of development, etc.)

Provide Other Tools

Providing unique online tools, gadgets and applications on your website can help increase visitor engagement and add significant value to potential clients. Calculators are popular tools for your website. Other tools would include things like diagnostic tools, or even recipes.

In the next section of this guide, we will look at a several WordPress plugins and themes you can add to your health or medical site that improve seo, improve user engagement and drive more traffic to your business.

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This is the end of part 1 of this comprehensive article on ways to grow your medical-related web presence.

Click here to access Part 2:

• Online Business Tips For Medical Professionals – Improving Search Engine Optimization, Improve User Engagement And Generate More Visitors To Your Site With Plugins

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