Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

The digital business age has not only transformed business around the world, it has also created increasingly difficult challenges and opportunities for businesses offering medical services.

Challenges Professional Health And Medical Services Providers Face Online

Today, more than ever, medical professionals must work harder to stand apart from their competition and find new clients. Not only do you have to become more involved in the community your business serves, you must also maintain a strong presence online. This includes having an effective web presence and learning how to better market your practice online.

As well as spending dollars marketing offline, businesses in the health-related industry are now finding that increasingly larger amounts of their budget will need to be directed towards the development and management of a website that can bring in prospects, engage visitors, outperform the competition in search engines and give their business wider exposure online.

This means that your site not only has to look great, your web pages have to be fast-loading, and be easy to navigate, but it’s also important to keep in mind that your site’s needs may change over time and many areas may need to be updated often. This requires a sound website and content management strategy.

Another challenge that health or medical businesses (and most professions) face with their websites, is that you have an average of 30 seconds or less to give users the information they are searching for or they will leave your 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 Health Providers

As well as facing significant challenges, there are also loads of online opportunities available to businesses in the medical or health-related sector that are willing to evolve to meet the demands of the online economy and can think progressively when it comes to improving their online marketing skills.

In this article, you will discover new opportunities to drive more traffic and build more online credibility for your health or medical-related business.

As well as providing useful website improvement tips, we also recommend that you consider using WordPress to power your health-related website or blog.

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

• How A Poorly Designed Web Site Can Cost You Money
• Using A WordPress Blog To Grow A Successful Business Online

How To Improve Your Medical Services And Health-Related Website

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

If you need help with website planning, read this guide: The Web Site Planning Process Explained: A Money-Saving Blueprint For Business Owners

How To Improve Your Website Pages

Professional websites require several essential pages. Let’s discuss the pages your  need to have and how to set up your health-related website for best results.

Description Of services And Products

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

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. pain management, orthopedics endocrinology, cancer, aged care, rheumatology, bariatric surgery, eye diseases palliative care, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. preventive dentistry, holistic dentistry, oral health, teeth whitening, dental braces, emergency dental, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. heart monitoring, coronary care
• Prenatal & Neonatal – e.g. obstetrics, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic services – mammography, lung screening, medical imaging, pap smears, magnetic resonance imaging, allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology – lab testing and analysis, emergency pathology testing, fine-needle aspiration, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, domestic abuse, wellness coaching, social development services
• Alternative therapies – Chinese medicine, homeopathy, functional medicine, massage therapy, chiropractic, hypnotherapy, etc.
• Other medical services – diet and nutrition, othopedics, lymphedema therapy, physiotherapy, inherited diseases, artificial limbs, hearing aids, home care, community health, medical equipment, etc.

Make sure to list all of the services you provide. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about the benefits of using your services and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us Page

This page should give a description of your business and explain to visitors what your business stands for, its unique approach, community projects, etc.

It should mention any awards, certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that you can use to promote your medical services and to set yourself above other competitors.

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

Core Team

If you are searching for quicker, easier and cost-effective ideas to sell more products online and increase user interaction on your site, then something you can do, is help your visitors get to know, like and trust you, your team and your business better.

You want your business to be relatable. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your team. This page should include a photo and a brief bio. Since most visitors are probably not that well-versed in medical terms it should tell who they are and what their specialties are. It should also explain what those specialized areas do. This page can include social buttons that will allow your prospective clients to follow individual staff members on their social networks.

On this page, make sure to outline your team member’s experience, how their skills contribute to the success of your team, and more importantly, how they will help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add a page that introduces your team members to prospective new clients. Image source: southperthchiro.com.au)

We have written a detailed tutorial about how to create and add an easy-to-maintain directory of staff or team members in your WordPress site with no coding skills required here: How To Add A Simple Employee List On Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills

Work With Us

List any career opportunities within your clinic. It should include training, benefits, opportunities for advancement, social activities sponsored or encouraged by your organization, etc. You can include case studies of recruits who have worked their way up in your business and information about career opportunities in the medical or health industry.

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

Case Studies

Reviews from clients and case studies are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase what type of services you offer. By adding a page with case studies and client reviews, you are also helping to establish social proof.

(Add a web page with testimonials from previous clients and case studies. Image source: arrowsmiledental.com)

We have written extensively about using testimonials and client reviews to improve your business results online here: Discover How To Turn More Visitors Into Prospects With Powerful User Testimonials

Contact Us

Having a contact page is absolutely vital.

It should include:

• Name Of Your Business
• Your physical address
• Telephone number
• Facsimile number
• Email address
• Map and directions
• Web URL
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Links to social media pages
• Live chat

If your business services multiple areas you will want to make that clear when displaying the address and contact info.

Consider also including a few links point to the most commonly asked questions page, frequently-visited pages, booking form, support page, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add A Medical-Related Blog Section

A blog can be a powerful business marketing tool. Blogs typically include a content management system that allows you to promote your business by publishing content such as the latest announcements, new releases, useful articles and tutorials, opinions and discussions, promotional videos, media presentations, etc.

If you already have an existing health site, then consider adding a WordPress-powered blog to market your company.

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

Something few businesses know about, is that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic-generation system that can deliver web traffic to your website, simply by adding content on a regular basis to your website.

(WordPress can automate your traffic generation)

Go here to learn more:

• Web Site Traffic Blueprint – Discover How To Drive More Website Visitors For Your Business

Legal Information

Having a compliant website is essential. This is not only important for building trust with prospective clients, but also to ensure that you are not breaking any local, regional and federal laws or regulations wherever you practice.

Adding the legal pages below to your health site will help you stay out of legal hot water with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers (e.g. Google), and other potential legal threats and inconveniences:

• Contact Us
• Privacy Statement
• Terms And Conditions
• Website Disclaimer
• Affiliate Agreement
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• DMCA Notice
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Links Policy
• Health Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• etc.

We have written a detailed article about adding legal pages to your site. To learn more about this go here: How To Add Legal Pages To Your WordPress Site

Improve Your Content

In today’s highly competitive digital economy, being generous with information has become one of the key differentiators for businesses that sell similar products or provide similar services.

By committing to providing useful content with advice, information and tips, you will get your readers to share your web pages and come back for more content. Publishing content is the most effective way to inform and educate your visitors and prospective clients about your business and services.

For example, if you provide services that help people manage their weight, then some of the topics you could cover in your content include:

• Nutrients your body needs on a daily basis (carbs, proteins, fats, minerals, vitamins)
• How to set realistic, but challenging weight loss goals
• Diet sodas (common ones, side effects, long term results, do they work?)
• Useful apps for tracking calories and exercise
• Etc.

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

Include keywords and terminology in your articles that readers will be searching to find you online.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive a comprehensive series of training emails with actionable information and practical tips that will show exactly how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating useful content that will add value to your site visitors and grow your presence online using content. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also 100% FREE!

Ways Of Improving Visitor Engagement And User Experience

Improving your website’s user experience (known as UX) helps keep visitors coming back and engaging with your site. This section will show you ways you can improve your visitor engagement and UX.

RSS Feeds – Content Syndication

RSS feeds provide lots of benefits for your business.

If you provide useful information, other businesses may want to syndicate your content.

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

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

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

To find useful RSS feeds just visit sites of medical or health-related government departments or key industry bodies.

Here are some feeds you could consider adding to a health-related website:

• US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Blog posts feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SelectedHhsBlogPosts, etc. You can also select individual feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Breastfeeding, Healthy aging, Heart health and stroke, Menopause, Smoking and how to quit, etc.) here: http://womenshealth.gov/news/rss/rss-feeds.html
• US National Libraries Of Medicine – For a list of feeds from various medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. PhysiologicalReviews, ADA ClinicalDiabetes, Obesity, BMJ Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 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 news feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• FDA – Get feeds on fda-related news and topics like enforcement reports, food safety, product recalls, vaccines, blood and biologics, etc. and podcasts here: http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/ContactFDA/StayInformed/RSSFeeds
• Department of Health UK (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 (www.cdc.gov) - Get various health-related news feeds 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 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 select specific feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Medications, Mental Health, Migraine Headaches, Diet & Weight Management, Digestion, Travel Health, etc.)
• Medical News Today – MNT Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• Medical News Today – You can also choose specific feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Bipolar, Pulmonary System, Melanoma/Skin Cancer, Cholesterol, Diabetes, Epilepsy, Medical Practice Management, etc.)

You can also search online for general RSS feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific subjects, e.g. “surgery rss feeds”, “respiratory rss feeds”, “personal monitoring rss feeds”, etc.

(Use RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds to improve your medical or health-related website’s user experience.)

Checklists & Forms

Adding checklists and charts to your site is a fantastic way to increase visitor engagement and add value to your readers. Checklists and charts can provide visitors with step-by-step instructions and resources to get necessary steps completed. They are also great client educational tools.

You can provide online or downloadable checklists and forms (or links to these) covering a range of subjects such as:

• Booking appointments
• Checklists for post-surgery recovery
• Health checklists and charts for specific systems
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, caries prevention program, cosmetic dentistry, etc.
• Weight loss and nutrition program checklists
• General charts & infographics (e.g. sugar content in different foods, sleep requirements at different stages of development, etc.)

Unique Tools

Providing unique online tools, gadgets and applications on your site can help increase visitor engagement and add value to your visitors. Calculators are useful tools you can add to your website. Others can include things like nutritional tools, or even recipes.

In part 2 of this guide, we discuss a several WordPress-based tools you can use in your medical or health website that can also help to improve search engine optimization, improve user engagement and drive more web traffic to your business.

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

Click on this link to continue:

• A Step-By-Step Guide To Building And Growing A Health-Related Web Presence – Part 2

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