Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Medical professionals today face significant challenges.

Challenges Professional Medical Providers Face Online

Now, more than ever, businesses in the medical sector must work harder than ever to remain competitive. Not only do you have to participate in the community your business serves, you must also develop and maintain an active web presence. This includes having an effective website and learning how to better promote your health or medical services services online.

As well as spending dollars in offline marketing activities such as advertising on newspapers, ads in industry publications and magazines, radio and tv, etc., businesses in the medical or health industry are now also finding that increasingly larger amounts of their marketing budget need to be delegated towards the development and management of a website that will drive new clients, engage users, outperform the competition in search engines and increase their marketing reach online.

This means that your website not only has to look great, your pages have to be fast-loading, and be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website will change in time and some aspects may need to be updated frequently. This requires having a sound website and content management strategy in place.

Another difficult challenge that health and medical services professionals (and most businesses) face with their websites, is that your site has only about 30 seconds to provide users 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

Online Opportunities For Health & Medical Services

As well as facing a number of significant business and technology changes, there are also loads of online opportunities available to health or medical businesses that are willing to adapt to meet the challenges of the online economy and think progressively about marketing their business services better online.

In this article, you will discover opportunities to drive more traffic and establish online credibility for your business.

As well as providing tips and information on cost-effective ways to improve your business online, we also focus on the benefits and advantages of using WordPress to power your medical-related business website or blog.

For more information about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system (CMS), see the articles below:

• Learn How A Poorly Constructed Website Can Lose You Business
• A Beginner’s Guide To Growing Your Business Using A WordPress Site

How To Improve Your Health Center Site

This section explains how to improve your medical or health website and get better results. We will look at what pages you need, what type of content works best for medical or health-related sites, layout and navigation, etc.

If you need assistance or help planning your website, read this article we have written: How To Plan Your Small Business Website: A Cost-Saving Blueprint For Business Owners

Your Website Pages

All business websites require a number of basic pages. Let’s take a look at these.

Services And Products Description Page

It’s essential to include a page that explains your services or products. Depending on which area of health or medical services you specialize in, your page could list services such as:

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. anaesthetics, neurosurgery hematology, oncology, neurology, renal, bariatric surgery, eye diseases day surgery, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. cosmetic dentistry, children’s dentistry, oral health, veneers, crowns and bridges, dentofacial orthopedics, emergency dental services, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac surgery, coronary care
• Prenatal & Neonatal – e.g. birthing, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic services – mammography, lung screening, x-ray, pap smears, psychosis, food allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology services – laboratory testing and analysis, emergency pathology testing, occupational and environmental testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, couples, diet and nutrition counselling, social work services
• Alternative therapies – acupuncture, aromatherapy, functional medicine, tai chi, osteopathy, hypnotherapy, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – diet and nutrition, chiropody, fertility services, speech language therapy, medical genetics, artificial limbs, mobility, home care, sexual health, 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 what these services do and direct them to your contact or appointment booking page.

About Us Page

The ‘About Us’ page should give a description of your business and what it stands for, its unique approach, causes that you support, etc.

It’s important to list any awards, recognitions, certifications, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that you can use to promote your medical services and to position yourself above other competitors.

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

Team Profile

Are you searching for ways to sell more products online and get prospects to stay longer on your site? Then one of the things you can do, is make it easier for prospects to get to know, like and trust you and your organization better.

You want your business to be relatable. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your employees. It should include a photo and a mini bio. Since most visitors won’t be well-versed in medical or health terms it should tell who they are and what they specialize in. It should also explain what those specialized areas mean. It can also include social buttons that will allow your prospective clients to follow some of your staff members on their social pages.

On this page, make sure to outline your person’s expertise and qualifications, why they are an asset to your team, and more importantly, how they will help add value to your clients’ business.

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

If you need help how to add a simple and easy-to-manage simple staff directory in your web site with no coding skills required, see this step-by-step tutorial: Tutorial: Adding An Employee List Directory To WordPress

Recruitment

This is a listing of job opportunities within the company. This page should include training, employee benefits, advancement opportunities, social activities promoted or encouraged by your business, etc. It should include information such as the job outlook and additional career opportunities in the medical industry.

Also include a positions available section in your 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.

Testimonials And Case Studies

Customer reviews and case studies are a great way to attract potential clients and showcase your services. Adding a page with client reviews and case studies also establishes social proof.

(Add a page to your site with case studies and testimonials. Image source: arrowsmiledental.com)

We have written extensively on using testimonials and reviews improve your business online here: Discover How To Convert More Visitors Into Qualified Prospects Using Compelling User Testimonials

Contact Us Page

Having a contact page is absolutely necessary.

It should provide:

• Company Name
• Your physical location
• Telephone
• Fax number
• Email address
• Google Map
• Website URL
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Links to social media profiles
• Live chat feature (optional)

If your business services different locations you should make this clear when showing the address and contact information.

You should also include links pointing to the most commonly asked questions page, main pages, booking request, support page, newsletter opt-in form, blog, etc.

Add A Health-Related Blog Section

A blog is a very powerful marketing tool for your business. Blogs are built around a content management system that allows you to promote your business using content such as events, updates, useful articles and tutorials, opinions on current topics, promotional videos, webinars, etc.

If you already have an existing site, then consider adding a WordPress-driven blog to create more exposure for your company.

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

Very few businesses know that WordPress can turn your web presence into an automated traffic-generation machine that can help begin to attract targeted visitors to your site, simply by adding regular content to your site.

(WordPress can automate your traffic generation)

Go here to learn more about this:

• Website Traffic Blueprint – Discover How To Turn Your WordPress Blog Into A Web Traffic Machine

Legal Information

As a professional health provider, ensuring that you have a compliant website is very important. This is not only important for establishing trust and credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no laws and regulations are being breached wherever you do business.

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

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

We have written a detailed article about adding legal pages to your website. To learn more, go here: The Importance Of Adding Legal Pages To Your Site

How To Improve Your Web Content

In today’s globally competitive economy, the sooner you begin to publish good content on your site, the quicker you will begin to see results and differentiate yourself from other competing businesses.

Provide useful content with information and tips that will get your readers sharing your web pages online with others and coming back for more content. This is the most effective way to inform and teach site visitors and prospective clients about using your services.

For example, if you provide solutions that help people manage their weight, then some of the areas you can cover in your content include:

• What is BMI (what it stands for, what it does, how to calculate yours)
• Weight loss surgery – benefits vs risks (who should get it, risks, rates of success)
• How you eat your food - just as important as what you eat (eat at table, chew slowly)
• What salad dressings can ruin your diet (and healthier choices)
• Etc.

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

Use keywords in your content that readers will search for online.

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

Ways To Improve Visitor Experience

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

Syndicating Content Using RSS Feeds

RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds provide lots of benefits for your site.

If you provide content that adds value to others, other businesses may 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 kept in one place
• Content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Your feed can be shared
• Allows users to subscribe
• A feed provides a way for links to point back to your site
• Your feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• There are multiple ways readers can receive your content (e.g. users can view the content on their mobile device using feed readers)
• It’s built into WordPress

There are also benefits to adding syndicated content to your website from other websites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.

To find useful RSS feeds for your website, visit sites of medical or health-related government departments and industry bodies.

Here are some feeds containing useful information that you could add to your site:

• US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Blog RSS feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SelectedHhsBlogPosts, etc. You can also choose individual RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Breastfeeding, Fitness and nutrition, Heart health and stroke, Mental health, Smoking and how to quit, 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. Nucleic Acids Research, The Journal of General Physiology (JGP), RadioGraphics, BMJ Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Molecular Biology and Evolution, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health - Find many feeds on health-related topics here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• FDA – Find FDA-related feeds (e.g. FDA drug safety, health fraud, tainted products marked as dietary supplements, radiological health, 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. Western Australia – http://www.public.health.wa.gov.au/feed/?types=news
• Centers For Disease Control And Prevention - Get many RSS feeds on health-related topics 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. Fitness and nutrition: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Nutrition.xml)
• MedicineNet.com – Daily Health and Medical News: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyhealth.xml. You can also choose individual RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Medications, Menopause, Cold & Flu, Diet & Weight Management, Eyesight, Infectious Disease, etc.)
• MedicalNewsToday.com – Medical News 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. Stem Cell Research, Dentistry, Infectious Diseases/Bacteria/Viruses, Veterinary, Food Intolerance, Medical Innovation, Obesity/Weight Loss/Fitness, 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. “pharmacy rss feeds”, “dyslexia rss feeds”, “weight loss rss feeds”, etc.

(Add RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds to improve your health-related site’s user experience.)

Add Downloadable Forms

Checklists and educational charts are a great way to increase visitor engagement and add value to your audience. They can provide users with useful step-by-step instructions and resources to complete a task. They can also be great client instructional tools.

Checklists, charts and medical forms could include subjects such as:

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

Provide Unique Tools

Providing useful tools, gadgets and applications on your website can help increase visitor engagement and add value to your potential clients. Calculators are useful tools to add to your website. Others could include things like diagnostic tools, or even recipes.

In the next section of this detailed guide, we take a look at a number of online tools you can use in your site using WordPress plugins and themes that can improve your search engine optimization, improve user engagement and drive more visitors to your business.

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This is the end of part 1 of this guide on ways to improve your medical or health business web presence.

Click here to continue reading:

• Your Health Clinic Services Website – Improve SEO, Improve User Engagement And Increase Web Traffic Generation With Plugins And Themes

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