Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Health professionals today face difficult challenges thanks to the web economy.

Online Challenges For Medical Services Providers

Now, more than ever, businesses in the health industry must work harder than ever to remain competitive. Not only do you have to actively participate in the community you serve, you must also develop and maintain a strong web presence. This includes having a website and figuring out better ways to grow your practice online.

As well as investing money marketing offline, businesses in the health or medical-related industry are also finding that increasingly larger amounts of their budget will need to be allocated to develop and manage a website that can attract new prospective clients, engage users, outrank the competition in search engines and social media, and help give them wider exposure online.

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

Another problem that medical providers (and all other businesses) face online, is that your site has an average of thirty seconds or less to give users what they are looking for or they will go elsewhere to get their needs met.

“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 And Medical Services Practitioners

As well as facing many challenges, there are also many online opportunities available to medical practices that can adapt to meet the demands of the online economy and can think outside the box when it comes to marketing their services better online.

This detailed guide will help you uncover opportunities to source more business and establish stronger online credibility for your business.

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

To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress CMS platform, see the articles below:

• Learn How A Poorly Designed Website Can Lose You Potential Clients And What To Do About It
• How To Grow Your Business With A WordPress Site

How To Improve Your Health Center Website

Let’s start by going over the basics. In this section, we’ll look at how to improve your medical-related website and get better results online. We show you what pages you need, what type of content works best, your layout and navigation structure, etc.

If you need help with website planning, visit this page: A Comprehensive Guide To Web Site Planning For Non-Technical Business Owners

Your Website Pages

All websites need several essential pages. Let’s discuss these.

Services Description Page

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

• Medical And Surgical – e.g. ear, nose and throat, nephrology endocrinology, reconstructive surgery, incontinence, respiratory, colon/rectal surgery, ophtalmology operating theaters, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. preventive dentistry, holistic dentistry, oral hygiene, veneers, crowns and bridges, orthodontics, emergency dentistry services, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac surgery, chronic heart conditions
• Prenatal and Postnatal – e.g. obstetrics, maternity services, etc.
• Child Health – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic services – breast screens, lung screening, hearing, gynaecology, psychosis, food allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology services – lab testing and analysis, routine pathology testing, insurance and corporate testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling services – mental health services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug counselling, trauma counselling, wellbeing, social work services
• Alternative therapies – Chinese medicine, reflexology, hydrotherapy, tai chi, osteopathy, hypnosis, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – weight management, othopedics, lymphedema therapy, stomal therapy, inherited diseases, artificial limbs, assisted living, home care, clinical information, medical supplies, 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 what these services do and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us Page

This page should give a description of your business and what it stands for, its unique approach, sponsored community services, etc.

It’s important to also include any awards, certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that can be used to promote your services and position yourself above your competitors.

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

Team Profile Page

Are you looking for quicker and simpler ideas to grow your business online and get visitors to stay longer on your site? Then help your prospective clients get to know, like and trust you and your organization better.

Your business needs to be relatable. One great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your employees. It should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors won’t be familiar with medical or health terms it should tell who they are and what they specialize in. It should also explain what those specialized areas do. It can include social buttons so your prospective clients can follow some of your team members on their social pages.

On this page, don’t be afraid to humanize your team members with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to highlight each person’s expertise, why they are an invaluable 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 staff members to prospective new clients. Image sourced from: southperthchiro.com.au)

To learn more about how to add an easy-to-manage list of staff or team members in your WordPress site using a free plugin, go here: How To Easily Add A Staff List Directory: Tutorial

Recruitment

List any job opportunities within the clinic. It can include training offered, employee benefits, professional development, social aspects of working for your business, etc. You should also include case studies of trainees who have established a solid career path thanks to your organization and information such as the job outlook and career opportunities in the medical industry.

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

Testimonials

Case studies and client reviews are a great way to attract potential clients and showcase your services. Adding a page with case studies and testimonials also provides visitors social proof.

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

We have created a detailed article about using testimonials, case studies and user reviews get better results online. Go here to learn more: How To Turn More Visitors Into Prospects Using Awesome Client Testimonials

Contact Us Page

A clean contact page is absolutely necessary.

It should include some or all of the following information:

• Company Name
• Address of clinic
• Telephone
• Fax number
• Contact email
• Google Map
• Web URL
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media URLs
• Live chat feature

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

Consider also including links to an FAQ page, useful pages, booking form, support area, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add A Medical Or Health Blog

A blog can be a powerful marketing tool for your business. Most blogging platforms are built around a content management system that allows you to easily promote your business by publishing timely content such as announcements, product releases, training articles and tutorials, informative posts, videos, webinars, etc.

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

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

Something not many businesses know about, is that WordPress can turn into an automated traffic-generation system that will begin delivering an ongoing stream of new targeted traffic to your website, simply by adding regular content to your web site.

(WordPress can generate new traffic automatically to your website)

Go here to learn more about this:

• WordPress Web Traffic Blueprint – A Complete Guide To Growing Your Website Traffic Automatically Using WordPress

Legal Information Pages

As a professional business, having a website that complies will all legal requirements online is crucial. This is not only important for building trust and credibility with visitors, but also to ensure that no laws or regulations are being contravened wherever you practice.

Depending on what services and products you provide, adding some or all of the following legal pages to your medical or health website will help you stay out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential sources of legal threats and inconveniences:

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

We have written a detailed article on adding legal pages to your site. Go here to learn more: What You Need To Know About Adding Legal Pages To Your Site

Improving The Content On Your Website

In today’s globally competitive economy, the sooner you start publishing content on your site, the faster you will begin to see results and differentiate yourself from other competitors.

Providing useful content with tips, advice or information will get your readers sharing it with others and coming back for more content. Publishing content is a great way to educate site visitors and prospective clients about your services.

For example, if you provide weight loss services, then some of the topics you can cover as content on your site:

• How does fiber help you with weight loss?
• How to get support when embarking on a weight loss program (friends, family, weight loss seekers)
• How to develop a better eating and exercise regimen
• Smartphone 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 health or medical-related services, by explaining benefits, procedures, costs (including payment plans, insurance coverage, etc).

Include keywords and terms in your content that readers would search to find you online.

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

Ways Of Improving 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 visitor engagement and UX.

Adding RSS Feeds

RSS feeds provide many benefits for your website.

If you provide valuable information, 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 kept in one place
• Content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Feeds can be shared
• Users can subscribe to your feed
• A feed provides a way for links to point back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregator services
• There are several ways readers can receive your content (e.g. read the content on their mobile device using feed readers)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also a number of benefits to adding syndicated content to your site from other sites, 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 or industry bodies.

Below we have listed some examples of RSS feeds you could add to your site:

• US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Blog feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SelectedHhsBlogPosts, etc. You can search by departments and select individual feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Breastfeeding, Fitness and nutrition, Illnesses and disabilities, Minority women’s 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. Nephrology Dialysis Transplantation, CDC Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal, BMJ Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases, American Chemical Society, The New England Journal of Medicine, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health (www.nih.gov) - Get many RSS feeds on health-related news and topics here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• US Food And Drug Administration (FDA) – Find FDA-related news feeds (e.g. criminal investigations press releases, food allergy reports, pet health, cosmetics, 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. Victoria – http://www.health.vic.gov.au/rss/newsfeed.xml
• Centers For Disease Control And Prevention - Find various health-related feeds and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
• Medical News Feeds: You can search medical news feeds in major news publications like the NYTimes feeds section (e.g. Fitness & nutrition: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Nutrition.xml)
• MedicineNet.com – Weekly Health and Medical News Digest: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/weeklyhealth.xml. You can also choose specific RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Alzheimer’s Disease, Mental Health, Cold & Flu, Oral Health, Prevention & Wellness, Skin, etc.)
• Medical News Today – MNT Medical News Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• Medical News Today – You can also choose individual feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. MRSA/Drug Resistance, Acid Reflux/GERD, Muscular Dystrophy/ALS, Lymphoma/Leukemia/Myeloma, Bones/Orthopedics, Pediatrics/Children’s Health, MRI/PET/Ultrasound, 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. “stroke rss feeds”, “deafness rss feeds”, “hepatitis rss feeds”, etc.

(Adding RSS feeds can help to improve your health website’s UX.)

Checklists & Charts

Checklists and educational charts are a great way to increase user engagement and add value to your visitors. Forms and checklists can provide visitors with useful step-by-step instructions and resources to perform a necessary task. Charts and checklists are also great client educational tools.

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

• Checklists/forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for pre or post surgery
• Health checklists and charts for specific conditions
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral hygiene program, cosmetic 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.)

Unique Tools

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

In part 2 of this guide, we take a look at a several WordPress-based tools you can use in your website that can also help to improve your search engine optimization, increase user engagement and generate more web traffic to your business.

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

To view Part 2, click here:

• How To Successfully Grow Your Medical-Related Website – Part Two

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