Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

The information economy has not only revolutionized business worldwide, it has also created an increasing number of challenges and opportunities for businesses offering health or medical services.

Online Challenges For Health Businesses

Now, more than ever, health services professionals must work harder to remain competitive and generate new clientele. Not only do you have to become actively involved in the community you serve, you must also develop and maintain a strong web presence. This includes having an effective website and learning how to better market your business 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 more significant part of their budget to develop and maintain a website that can attract prospects, engage visitors, outperform the competition in search engines and social media, and help to give their business a wider degree of reach online.

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

One other challenge that medical or health-related organizations face (as most businesses do for that matter), is that your site has only around 30 seconds or less to provide visitors with what 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 Health & Medical Businesses In The Online Economy

As well as facing many new challenges, there are also many online opportunities available to businesses in the health industry that are willing to evolve to meet online economy challenges and think outside the box when it comes to marketing themselves better online.

This guide will help you uncover opportunities to generate more web traffic and establish online credibility for your business.

As well as providing general website improvement tips, we also place special emphasis on the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress CMS platform to power your health-related business website or blog.

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

• Why A Poorly Constructed Website Can Cost You Customers And What To Do About It
• The Beginner’s Guide To Growing Your Successful Business Using WordPress

Practical Tips For Improving Your Medical Site

Let’s start by reviewing some basics. In this section, we’ll look at ways to improve your medical-related website and get better results. We will look at what pages you need, what content you need, useful tips for improving your navigation structure, etc.

If you need assistance or help planning your website, read this detailed step-by-step guide: Planning Your Business Website: A Practical Guide For Business Owners

Essential Web Pages

Professional websites require some basic web pages. Let’s discuss these.

Services Description Page

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

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. anaesthetics, neurosurgery blood disorders, oncology, aged care, rheumatology, weight loss surgery, ophtalmology palliative care, etc.
• Dentistry – e.g. cosmetic dentistry, children’s dentistry, gum disease, veneers, crowns and bridges, dental implants, emergency dentistry services, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. heart monitoring, coronary care
• Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. obstetrics, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic services – mammography, lung screening, radiology, women’s health, magnetic resonance imaging, food allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology services – lab testing and analysis, emergency pathology testing, fine-needle aspiration, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling services – mental health services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, couples, wellness coaching, social development services
• Alternative treatments – acupuncture, homeopathy, colloidal silver therapy, yoga, chiropractic, hypnosis, etc.
• Other medical services – diet and nutrition, othopedics, fertility services, speech therapy, inherited diseases, prosthetics, mobility, home and community care, clinical information, medical equipment, 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 the benefits of using your services and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us Page

The ‘About Us’ page needs to describe your business and what it stands for, its unique approach, philanthropic activities, etc.

It’s important to mention any awards, recognitions, accreditations, certifications, associations, publications, etc., that could be used to promote your medical services and to set yourself above your competitors.

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

Your Staff

Are you searching for cost-effective ways to sell more products or services online and get people to stay longer on your site? Then help your prospects get to know, like and trust you, your team and your organization better.

Prospective clients need to relate to your business. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your team members. This page should include a photo and a mini biography. Since most visitors will not tend to be very well-versed in health terms it should tell who they are and what they specialize in. You may also want to explain what those specialized areas mean. This page can also include social buttons so your prospective clients can follow some of your team members on their social networks.

In this page, don’t be afraid to humanize your people with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to highlight each employee’s expertise, how their skills add value or contribute to the success of your team, and more importantly, how they will help add value to your clients’ business.

(Make sure to add a staff description page. Screenshot image sourced from: southperthchiro.com.au)

To learn more about how to easily add a simple and easy-to-maintain directory of staff or team members in WordPress without coding skills, go here: Tutorial: Adding An Employee Directory To WordPress

We’re Hiring

This is a listing of job or career opportunities available within the company. It can include training provided, employee benefits, professional development, etc. You can also include information such as the job outlook and additional career opportunities in the health or 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 the page, subscribe to your announcements list, follow your social pages, etc.

Case Studies

Case studies and reviews from clients are a great way to attract potential clients and showcase the services you offer. By adding a page with case studies and reviews from clients, you are also helping to will also be providing visitors social proof online for your business.

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

We have written extensively about using testimonials, case studies and user reviews to improve your business results online. Go here to learn more about this: Improve Your Sales Using Compelling Testimonials

Contact Us Page

Having a clean contact page is absolutely necessary.

It should provide:

• Name
• Your physical address
• Phone
• Facsimile
• Email
• Google Map and directions
• Web URL
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media web addresses
• Interactive chat (optional feature)

If your business services multiple locations you will want to make this clear when displaying the address and contact information.

You should also include a few links point to commonly-asked questions page, useful pages, booking form, support area, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add A Health Blog

A blog can be a very powerful marketing tool for your business. Blogs typically include a content management system that is easy to use and allows you to promote your business by publishing timely content such as events, updates, educational articles, opinions on current topics, promotional videos, media presentations, etc.

If you already have an established health or medical website, then consider adding a WordPress-driven blog to create more exposure for your medical organization.

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 be used both as your website and blog.

Not many people know this, but an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic-generation machine that will help begin to attract targeted traffic to your website, simply by publishing regular content to your site.

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

For more details:

• Website Traffic Blueprint – Learn How To Turn Your WordPress Web Site Into An Automated Traffic Machine

Legal Information Pages

Having a website that complies will all legal requirements online is important. This is not only important for establishing credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no local, regional or federal laws or regulations are being contravened wherever you practice.

Adding some or all of the legal pages below to your site will help you stay 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 Policy
• Terms And Conditions Of Use
• Website Disclaimer
• Affiliate Agreement
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• DMCA Notice
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Linking Policy
• Health Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• and others

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

Ways To Improve The Content On Your Website

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

By providing great content with information, tips and advice, you will get your visitors sharing it with others and coming back for more content. Content marketing is a great way to inform and educate your visitors and prospective clients about your services.

For example, if you provide weight management services, then some of the topics you could write content about include:

• Emotional causes for weight issues (possible causes, how to identify yours)
• How to set realistic, but challenging weight loss goals
• Is using a measuring tape better than a scale when it comes to weight loss progress?
• How a personal chef can help you lose weight (what they do, is it affordable)
• Etc.

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

Remember to include keywords and terms in your articles that your prospective clients would search for online.

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

Ways To Improve Visitor Experience

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

Add RSS Feeds

An RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed provides plenty of benefits for your health or medical-related business.

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

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

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

There are also a number of benefits when it comes to adding syndicated content to 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 search online for relevant government departments and industry bodies.

Here are some feeds you could add 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 also choose specific feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Body image, Environmental health, Heart health and stroke, 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. Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science, Journal of Biological Chemistry, Neurology India, Indian Journal of Psychiatry, The New England Journal of Medicine, 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 feeds on fda-related news and topics like criminal investigations press releases, food allergy reports, pet health, radiological health, 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 (www.cdc.gov) - Find various health-related feeds and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
• Medical News: You can search medical news RSS feeds by going to publications like the NYTimes feeds section (e.g. Medical research: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Research.xml)
• MedicineNet – Daily Health and Medical News: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyhealth.xml. You can also select specific RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Alzheimer’s Disease, Asthma, Cholesterol, Depression, Eyesight, Travel Health, etc.)
• Medical News Today – Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• Medical News Today – You can also choose specific RSS feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Cardiovascular/Cardiology, Acid Reflux/GERD, Depression, Flu/Cold/SARS, CJD/vCJD/Mad Cow Disease, Medical Innovation, Genetics, etc.)

You can also search online for general feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific areas, e.g. “ADD rss feeds”, “asthma rss feeds”, “restless legs syndrome rss feeds”, etc.

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

Add Downloadable Checklists

Checklists and medical forms are a fantastic way to help increase user engagement, add value to your readers and set yourself apart from the competition. Charts and checklists can give them useful step-by-step instructions and resources to perform a necessary task. They are also great instructional tools.

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

• Checklists/forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for pre or post treatment
• Health checklists for specific medical conditions
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, caries prevention program, general dentistry, etc.
• Fitness and nutrition program checklists
• General charts & infographics (e.g. caloric level of different foods, sleep requirements at different ages, etc.)

Adding Online Tools

Providing unique online tools, gadgets and applications on your site can help increase visitor engagement and add value to your potential clients. Health-related calculators, for example, are useful tools you can add to your website. Other applications can include things like diagnostic tools, or even recipes.

In part 2 of this detailed article, we look at a number of WordPress plugins and themes you can use in your site that can help to improve search engine optimization, improve user engagement and generate more visitors to your business.

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

To view Part 2, click here:

• The Ultimate Guide On How To Build And Grow A Health Clinic Services Website – Part Two

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