Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

The digital economy has not only transformed business worldwide, it has also created an increasing number of challenges and great opportunities for businesses in the health or medical-related industry.

Challenges Medical And Health Services Face Online

Now, more than ever, businesses in the health industry must work harder than ever to remain competitive. Not only do you have to become actively involved in the community your business serves, you must also develop and maintain a strong presence online. This includes having a website and learning smarter ways to promote your medical services online.

In addition to spending dollars in offline marketing, businesses in the health-related industry are now also finding that increasingly larger amounts of their budget will need to be delegated towards developing and maintaining a website that brings in prospective clients, engages users, outranks the competition in search engines and social media, and increases their marketing reach online.

This means that your site not only has to look professional, your web pages have to be fast-loading, and your website has to be easy to navigate, but it’s also important to keep in mind that the needs of your website will change over time and sections will need to be updated frequently. This requires implementing sound website and content management strategy.

Another problem that health businesses face online (as other businesses do for that matter), is that you have around thirty seconds to help visitors find the information they are looking for or they will go elsewhere.

“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 Businesses In The Digital Economy

As well as facing a number of significant business and technology changes, there are also loads of online opportunities available to medical-related businesses that can adapt to meet the demands of the online economy and can think outside the box about improving their online business marketing skills.

This guide will help you uncover opportunities to attract new visitors and see noticeable improvements in your business results online.

As well as providing useful website improvement tips, we also emphasize the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system (CMS) to power your health business website or blog.

To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress Content Management System (CMS), see these articles:

• Discover Why A Poorly Built Website Can Lose You Money
• How To Grow Your Small Business With WordPress

How To Improve Your Medical Center Website

Let’s start by reviewing the basic information you need. In this section, we’ll look at how to improve your health or medical website and get better results online. We show you what pages your site needs, what type of content works best for health or medical-related websites, your navigation structure, etc.

If you need assistance or help planning your website, see this guide: How To Plan Your Small Business Web Site: A Basic Primer For Business Owners

Improve Your Web Pages

Professional business websites require a number of essential pages. Let’s review the pages your  need and how to set up your website for best results.

Services Page

You need a page that explains your products or services. Depending on which area of health or medical services you specialize in, your page can list services such as:

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. ear, nose & throat, orthopedics haematology, cancer, continence management, rheumatology, endoscopy, ophtalmology day surgery, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. preventive dentistry, holistic dentistry, gum disease, teeth whitening, dentofacial orthopedics, emergency dental, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. heart surgery, chronic heart conditions
• Prenatal/Postnatal – e.g. obstetrics, maternity services, etc.
• Child Health – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic – breast screening, lung screening, x-ray, gynaecology, magnetic resonance imaging, allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology services – lab testing and analysis, routine pathology testing, occupational and environmental testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling services – mental health services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, marriage counselling, diet and nutrition counselling, social work services
• Alternative treatments – Chinese medicine, reflexology, reiki, massage therapy, chiropractic services, hypnosis, etc.
• Other medical services – diet and nutrition, sports medicine, reproductive services, physiotherapy, medical genetics, artificial limbs, mobility, home and community care, community health, medical transport, etc.

List all of the services you provide, not just the ones you specialize in. Educate your visitors about the benefits of using these services and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us Page

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

This page should also mention any professional awards, accreditations, certifications, recognitions, associations, publications, etc., that could be used to promote your business and set yourself above your competitors.

(List all of your business awards accreditations, certifications, recognitions, associations, publications, etc. in your About page. Image sourced from: squaremedical.com.au)

Your Team

Are you searching for cost-effective ideas to sell more products or services online? Then help your prospective clients get to know you, your team and your business better.

You want prospects to relate to your business. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your staff or team members. It should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors won’t be familiar with health terms it should tell who they are and what they specialize in. It should also explain what those specialties mean. It can also include social buttons so your site visitors can follow your staff members on their social networks.

On this page, make sure to highlight each staff member’s expertise and qualifications, how they add value to 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)

If you need help how to easily add an easy-to-manage list directory of staff members in your website, go here: Step-By-Step Tutorial: How To Add An Employee List Directory To Your Site

Job Opportunities Page

List any career opportunities available within your company. It should include training offered, employee benefits, advancement opportunities, social aspects of working for your business, etc. You should also include information such as the job outlook and upcoming career opportunities in the medical and health industry.

Include also a positions available section in your page. If there are no positions currently available, consider inviting people to return periodically to the page, subscribe to your newsletter, follow your social pages, etc.

Testimonials & Case Studies

Customer reviews and case studies are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase the services you offer. Adding a web page with testimonials from previous clients and case studies also helps to provide visitors social proof online.

(Add a page to your site with case studies and client reviews. Screenshot image sourced from: arrowsmiledental.com)

We have created a comprehensive article about using testimonials, case studies and reviews to grow your business online here: All You Need To Know To Get Better Results Online With Effective Testimonials

Contact Us

A clean contact page is absolutely necessary.

It should include the following:

• Business Name
• Your physical address
• Telephone
• Facsimile number
• Contact email address
• Map
• Website URL
• Contact form
• Contact name
• Links to social media pages
• Online chat

If you have several areas you will want to make this clear when displaying your address and contact info.

Consider also including links to an FAQ section, frequently-visited pages, booking request, support area, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add A Health Or Medical-Related Blog

A blog can be a very powerful marketing tool. Many blogging platforms are built around a content management system that allows you to promote your business using content like announcements, updates, useful articles and tutorials, opinions and discussions, promotional videos, webinars, etc.

If you already have an established medical or health-related website, then consider adding a WordPress-driven blog to promote your medical practice.

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

Something not many people know about, is that WordPress can turn your web presence into an automated traffic machine that will drive new visitors to your site, simply by adding regular content to your website.

(An expertly configured WordPress site can generate new traffic automatically to your website)

If you would like to know more here:

• WordPress Web Site Traffic Blueprint – How To Grow Your Website Visitors For Your Business

Legal Pages

It’s very important for professional organizations to have a website that complies will all legal requirements online. This is not only important for building trust and credibility with visitors, but also to ensure that you are not breaching any laws or regulations wherever you practice.

Depending on the services and products you provide, adding the legal pages below to your medical site will help you stay out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers (e.g. Facebook), and other potential sources of threats and legal inconveniences:

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

We have written a comprehensive article on adding legal pages to your site. For more details, go here: How To Add Legal Pages To Your Website

Tips On How To Improve Your Web Content

In today’s highly competitive online economy, content marketing has become one of the key differentiators for businesses selling similar products or services.

You want to provide great content with information, advice or tips that will get your readers sharing your information and coming back for more. Using content is a great way to inform and educate site visitors and prospective clients about your business and services.

For example, if your business provides products or services that help people lose weight, then some of the areas you could publish content about include the following:

• Common medical conditions that can cause weight gain
• How to identify the bad habits you need to correct to ensure lifetime weight loss
• How to develop an exercise routine you can enjoy and will stick with
• What processed foods can derail your weight loss program (and healthier choices)
• And endless other content topics

You can also create a series of educational articles that will help your your readers gain a better understanding of your medical-related services, by explaining benefits, procedures, terminology, etc.

Include the keywords and terms in your content that your prospective clients will be searching for.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with easy-to-digest information that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating high-quality content for your site visitors and grow your presence online using content marketing. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also 100% FREE!

Tips For Improving Visitor Engagement And User Experience

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

RSS Feeds

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds provide many benefits for your business.

If you provide content that adds value to others, other businesses will want to syndicate your content.

Some of the benefits of having other businesses syndicate your content, include:

• All of your updates are in one place
• Doesn’t rely on email
• Can be shared and picked up by other sites online
• Feeds allow users to subscribe
• It provides a way for links to point back to your site
• Your feeds can be submitted to RSS directories
• RSS provides various ways for your readers to receive your content (e.g. view your content on their mobile device using a feed reader)
• RSS is built into WordPress

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

To find RSS feeds with loads of useful content just search online for relevant government departments or key industry bodies.

Here are some examples of RSS feeds you could consider adding to your website:

• US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Latest news feed: http://www.hhs.gov/rss/news/hhsnews.xml, etc. You can search by departments and choose individual feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Emergency preparedness, Healthy aging, Illnesses and disabilities, Mental health, Screening tests and vaccines, etc.) here: http://womenshealth.gov/news/rss/rss-feeds.html
• US National Libraries Of Medicine – For a directory of feeds from leading medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. AHA Journals (American Heart Association Journals), The Journal of General Physiology (JGP), BMJ Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases, BMJ Journal of Clinical Pathology, Transplantation – Most Popular Articles, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health (www.nih.gov) - Find various health-related RSS feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• US Food And Drug Administration (FDA) – Find FDA-related news feeds (e.g. FDA drug safety, food allergies, tainted products marked as dietary supplements, animal and veterinary news, etc.) and podcasts here: http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/ContactFDA/StayInformed/RSSFeeds
• UK Department Of Health (https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-of-health) – 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. NSW – http://www.health.nsw.gov.au/pages/rss.aspx
• Centers For Disease Control And Prevention - Get many RSS feeds on health-related news and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
• Medical News: You can search medical news feeds in major news publications like the NYTimes feeds section (e.g. Research: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Research.xml)
• MedicineNet – Weekly Health and Medical News Digest: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/weeklyhealth.xml. You can also choose individual feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Alzheimer’s Disease, Menopause, Cholesterol, Depression, Digestion, Women’s Health, etc.)
• MedicalNewsToday.com – Medical News Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• MedicalNewsToday.com – You can also choose individual RSS feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Public Health, Pain/Anesthetics, Blood/Hematology, Body Aches, Men’s Health, Sports Medicine/Fitness, Liver Disease/Hepatitis, etc.)

You can also just search online for general RSS feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific areas, e.g. “lung cancer rss feeds”, “cleft palate rss feeds”, “psychology rss feeds”, etc.

(RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve your website’s user experience.)

Adding Online Forms And Checklists

Adding checklists and medical forms to your site is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add value to your audience. Checklists and charts can provide useful instructions and resources to perform steps. Checklists and forms are also great educational tools.

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

• Checklists and forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for post-surgery recovery
• Health checklists for specific conditions
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral hygiene program, general dentistry, etc.
• Weight loss and nutrition program checklists and charts
• General charts & infographics (e.g. sugar content in different foods, the importance of sleep at different stages of development, etc.)

Provide Unique Tools

Providing useful tools and applications on your site is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add significant value to your potential clients. Calculators, for example are popular tools for your website. Others would include things like nutritional tools, or even recipes.

In the next section, we will look at a number of online tools you can add to your site using WordPress plugins that can improve your search engine optimization, increase user engagement and drive more traffic to your business.

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This is the end of section one.

Click here to keep reading:

• How To Grow Your Medical Practice Website Successfully With WordPress – Part 2

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