Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Health professionals today face growing challenges.

Challenges Health And Medical Services Practitioners Face Online

Now, more than ever, health services professionals must find smarter ways to remain competitive and generate new clients. Not only do you have to become more involved in the community your business serves, you must also develop and maintain a strong web presence. This includes having a dynamic website and searching for smarter ways to market your business online.

As well as spending money advertising offline, businesses in the health industry are also finding that they need to allocate a bigger portion of their marketing budget towards developing and maintaining a website that drives clients, engages visitors, outperforms the competition in search engines and social media, and helps give their business wider marketing reach online.

This means that your website not only has to look great, your web pages have to be fast-loading, and be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, your site’s needs may change in time and sections may need to be frequently updated. This requires a well-developed website and content management strategy.

Another challenge that medical and health services practitioners (and other professions) face online, is that your site has an average of 30 seconds to help users find what they are searching for or they will look 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 The Medical And Health Profession In The Digital Economy

As well as facing a number of business and technology changes, there are also loads of online opportunities available for health or medical-related businesses that are willing to adapt to meet the demands of the digital economy and can think progressively in terms of marketing themselves better online.

The article below will help you uncover a number of ways to source new business and build more online credibility for your health-related business.

As well as providing practical tips and information on cost-effective ways to improve your business online, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress content management system (CMS) to power your health or medical-related business website or blog.

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

• Discover Why A Poorly Designed Website Can Lose You Money And What To Do About It
• WordPress For Business – The Complete Guide To Building A Successful Small Business Using A WordPress Site

Useful Tips To Improve Your Website

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

If you need assistance or help planning your website, visit this page: A Money-Saving Guide To Web Site Planning For Non-Technical Business Owners

Your Web Pages

All business websites need some basic web pages. Let’s take a look at the pages your  should have and how to set up your medical-related website for best results.

Description Of Services

You need to include a page that explains your services and any products that you offer. Depending on which area of health or medical services you specialize in, your page can include services like:

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. anaesthetics, pulmonology blood disorders, cosmetic surgery, hyperbaric oxygen therapy, rheumatology, weight loss surgery, optometry emergency surgery, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. cosmetic dentistry, children’s dentistry, oral health, restorations, implants, emergency dental services, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. heart surgery, chronic heart conditions
• Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. birth suites, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic – breast screening, lung screening, audiology, gynaecology, magnetic resonance imaging, food allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology services – lab testing and analysis, emergency pathology testing, food and water testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling – mental health services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, domestic abuse, wellbeing, social development services
• Alternative therapies – acupuncture, reflexology, hydrotherapy, tai chi, chiropractic, hypnotherapy, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – diet and nutrition, chiropody, fertility services, speech language therapy, inherited diseases, prosthetics, sleep therapy, home and community care, community health, medical transport, etc.

List all of the services you provide, not just the ones you specialize in. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about the benefits of using these services and direct them to your contact or appointment booking page.

About Us Page

The ‘About Us’ page needs to describe your business and what your business stands for, its unique approach, supported community projects, etc.

Remember to mention any business awards, recognitions, certifications, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that could be used to promote your practice and set yourself above other competitors.

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

Meet Our Team

If you are looking for ways to sell more products or services online and get people to engage more with your site, then make it easier for your prospects to get to know, like and trust you 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 employees or team members. This page should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors are probably not well-versed in health or medical terms it should tell who they are and what their specialties are. You may also want to explain what those specialized areas do. This page can also include social buttons so your site visitors can follow some of your staff members on their social pages.

In this page, make sure to highlight each person’s qualifications, why they are an invaluable asset to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

(Make sure to add a page that introduces your staff members to prospective new clients. Screenshot image source: southperthchiro.com.au)

If you need help how to add a simple staff directory in WordPress using free plugins, see this step-by-step tutorial: How To Add A Simple Employee List To Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills Required

Career Opportunities

List any job or career opportunities available within your practice. This page can include training offered, benefits, opportunities for advancement, social activities sponsored or encouraged by your business, etc. It should include information such as the job outlook and additional career opportunities in the health industry.

Maintain 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 & Testimonials

Case studies and reviews from clients are a great way to attract potential clients and showcase your services. Adding a page with client reviews and case studies also helps your medical business to establish social proof online.

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

To learn more about using client testimonials and client reviews, refer to this article: Learn How To Improve Your Conversions With Compelling User Testimonials

Contact Page

A contact page is vitally important.

Your contact page should include:

• Name
• Your physical location
• Telephone
• Fax
• Email address
• Google Map
• Website address
• Contact form
• Request for more information – contact details
• Links to social media networks
• Chat/Skype (optional)

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

You can also include links to an FAQ section, frequently-visited pages, booking request, support area, newsletter opt-in form, blog, etc.

Add A Health Blog Section

A blog is a powerful business marketing tool. Blogs typically include a content management system that allows you to promote your business using content such as news, new releases, educational information, informative posts, educational videos, infographics, etc.

If you already have an existing website, then consider adding a WordPress-powered blog to promote your medical services.

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

You are probably not aware of this, but WordPress can turn your web presence into an automated traffic-generation system that will attract web traffic to your business, simply by publishing new content on a consistent basis to your website.

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

Go here to learn more about this:

• Web Traffic Blueprint – How To Turn Your WordPress Web Site Into A Traffic Machine

Legal Information

Having a compliant website is very important. This is not only important for establishing trust and credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that you are not breaking any laws or regulations in whatever area or location you provide services.

Depending on what services and products you provide, adding the following legal pages to your health-related site will help keep you out of legal hot water with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential sources of threats and legal inconveniences:

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

We have written a detailed article about adding legal pages to your website. Go here to learn more: Why You Need To Add Legal Pages To Your Site

Improve Your Web Content

In today’s globally competitive economy, being generous with information has become one of the key differentiators for businesses.

By committing to providing useful content with great information, tips and advice, you will get your visitors sharing your web pages with others and coming back for more. Publishing content is a great way to inform and teach your visitors and prospects about your business and services.

For example, if your business provides weight management services, then some of the areas you could cover as content on your site:

• What is BMI (what it stands for, what it does, how to calculate yours)
• How to develop portion control habits (smaller plate, don’t put food on the table, more vegetables)
• Is using a measuring tape better than a scale when it comes to weight loss progress?
• Could a personal chef help you lose weight (what they do, is it affordable)
• Etc.

You can also create a series of informative articles that will help your your prospective clients understand your medical services, by explaining benefits, procedures, terminology, etc.

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

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

Tips For Improving Visitor Experience

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

Add RSS Feeds

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve your visitor engagement and user experience in several ways.

If you provide useful content, other sites 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 updates are in one place
• your content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Your feed can be shared online
• Allows users to subscribe
• An RSS feed provides links back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories
• There are various ways readers can 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 a number of benefits to providing information on your site 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 visit sites of relevant government departments and industry bodies.

Below we have listed examples of useful RSS feeds you could consider adding to a medical site:

• 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 specific feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Breastfeeding, Healthy aging, Heart health and stroke, Mental health, Screening tests and vaccines, etc.) here: http://womenshealth.gov/news/rss/rss-feeds.html
• US National Libraries Of Medicine – For a list of feeds from well-known medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. AHA Journals (American Heart Association Journals), PsychiatryOnline Journals, BMJ Medical Humanities, Occupational Medicine, American Institute of Biological Sciences, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health - Get many health-related news feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• US Food And Drug Administration (FDA) – Get RSS feeds on fda-related news like enforcement reports, food allergies, product recalls, animal and veterinary news, 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. Victoria – http://www.health.vic.gov.au/rss/newsfeed.xml
• Centers For Disease Control And Prevention (www.cdc.gov) - Find many health-related feeds and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
• Medical News Feeds: You can search medical news feeds by going to publications like the NYTimes RSS feeds section (e.g. Research: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Research.xml)
• MedicineNet.com – MedTerms Medical Word of the Day: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyword.xml. You can also select specific feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Lung Conditions, Cancer, Chronic Pain, Pregnancy, Sexual Health, HIV, 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, Multiple Sclerosis, Lymphology/Lymphedema, Swine Flu, Food Intolerance, Biology/Biochemistry, Ear, Nose and Throat, 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. “stress rss feeds”, “cold rss feeds”, “psychology rss feeds”, etc.

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

Checklists And Forms

Adding checklists and charts to your site is a great way to help increase visitor engagement and add value to your audience. Checklists and charts can give them useful step-by-step instructions and resources to perform necessary tasks. Forms and checklists can also be great client educational tools.

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

• Checklists and forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for post-surgery recovery
• Health checklists for specific systems
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral hygiene program, general dentistry, etc.
• Fitness and nutrition program checklists
• General charts & infographics (e.g. caloric level of different foods, the importance of sleep at different ages, etc.)

Provide Online Tools

Providing unique tools, gadgets and applications on your website is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add significant value to your users. Health-related calculators, for example, are some of the most popular tools for your website. Others could include things like nutritional tools, and even recipes.

In part 2, we take a look at a number of WordPress plugins and themes you can use in your health or medical website that can help to improve your seo, improve user engagement and generate more visitors to your business.

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This is the end of section one of this guide on ways to build your medical or health business web presence.

To view the rest of this guide, click here:

• Grow Your Health Website – How To Improve Search Engine Optimization, Improve User Engagement And Increase Web Traffic Generation Using Plugins

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