Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

The digital age has not only transformed businesses globally, it has also created a growing number of challenges and opportunities for health businesses.

Challenges Medical And Health Services Practitioners Face Online

Today, more than ever, health services practitioners must work harder and find smarter ways to remain competitive and obtain new clientele. Not only do you have to maintain an active presence in the community your business serves, you must also maintain an active web presence. This includes having an effective web presence and learning how to better promote your medical or health services services online.

As well as spending dollars in offline marketing, businesses in the health or medical-related industry are now finding that they need to delegate a greater share of their budget to develop and manage a website that can attract prospects, engage visitors, outrank the competition in search engines and social media, and help to create wider exposure online.

This means that your site not only has to look professional, your pages have to load fast, and be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website will change over time and some areas may need to be frequently updated. This requires having a well-developed website and content management strategy.

Another problem that medical-related organizations face (as most other professions do for that matter), is that your site has an average of 30 seconds or less to give visitors the information they are searching for or they will go elsewhere to find what they need.

“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 Health And Medical Profession In The Web Economy

As well as facing a number of significant challenges, there are also loads of online opportunities available to medical-related businesses that are willing to adapt to meet online economy demands and think outside the box when it comes to improving their online marketing skills.

This comprehensive article will help you uncover new ways and opportunities to generate more web traffic and see significant improvements in your business presence online.

As well as providing general website improvement tips, we also place special emphasis on the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system to power your medical business website or blog.

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

• Discover Why A Poorly Built Web Site Can Cost You Prospective Customers And What To Do About It
• The Business Owner’s Guide To Using WordPress

Useful Tips For Improving 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 health or medical website and get better results online. We will look at what pages your site needs, what content works best, navigation structure, etc.

If you need website planning assistance, visit this page: A Comprehensive Guide To Web Site Planning For Business Owners

How To Improve Your Web Pages

Professional websites need some essential web pages. Let’s take a look at these.

Products And Services Description Page

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

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. pain management, pulmonology endocrinology, reconstructive surgery, neurology, respiratory, bariatric surgery, eye diseases operating theaters, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. general dentistry, children’s dentistry, oral health, restorations, orthodontics, emergency dentistry services, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac patient rehabilitation, coronary care
• Prenatal and Neonatal – e.g. birth suites, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic – mammography, lung screening, x-ray, pap smears, MRI scanning, food allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology services – laboratory testing and analysis, routine pathology testing, insurance and corporate testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling services – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug counselling, couples, wellness, social development services
• Alternative treatments – acupuncture, reflexology, reiki, massage therapy, chiropractic, hypnosis, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – weight management, podiatry, reproductive services, occupational therapy, inherited diseases, artificial limbs, hearing aids, home and community care, clinical information, 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 what these services do and why they should choose you.

About Us

This page needs to describe your business and explain to visitors what it stands for, its unique approach, philanthropy, etc.

Remember to mention any awards, certifications, accreditations, recognitions, publications, associations, etc., that you can use to promote your business and to set yourself above similar service providers.

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

Staff Page

Are you searching for quicker, easier and cheaper ideas to grow your business online or increase user interaction with your site? Then something you can do, is help visitors get to know, like and trust your organization better.

You want potential clients to relate to your business. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your staff. This page should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors will not tend to be familiar with medical or health-related terms your bio descriptions should tell who they are and what their specialties are. You may also want to explain what those specialized areas do. This page should include social buttons that will allow your visitors to follow selected team members on their social networks.

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

(Add an employee description page. Screenshot image sourced from: southperthchiro.com.au)

To learn more about how to easily add an updatable simple staff directory in a WordPress site with no coding skills required, go here: How To Create A Simple Employee List For Your WordPress Site

We’re Hiring

List any job or career opportunities available within the clinic. It would include training provided, benefits, opportunities for advancement, etc. It should include stories of recruits who have worked their way up in your company and information such as the job outlook and upcoming career opportunities in the medical or health industry.

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

Case Studies & Testimonials

Testimonials from past clients and case studies are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase what type of services you offer. Adding a page with testimonials and case studies also helps to establish social proof online.

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

If you want to learn more using client testimonials and reviews to improve your business results online, go here: Learn How To Improve Your Visitor-To-Sales Conversions Using Highly Effective Testimonials

Contact Page

A functional contact page is vitally important.

Your contact page should include the following information:

• Name Of Your Business
• Your address
• Telephone
• Fax
• Contact email address
• Google Map and directions
• Website URL
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media URLs
• Online chat (optional)

If you operate out of several areas you want to make that clear when showing your address and contact information.

Consider also including links to an FAQ section, frequently-visited pages, booking request, helpdesk, newsletter, blog, etc.

Blog

A blog can be a powerful marketing tool for your business. Blogs are built around a content management system that is easy to use and allows you to promote your business by publishing content like news and announcements, updates, useful articles and tutorials, informative posts, how-to videos, webinars, etc.

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

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

Something not many businesses know about, is that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn into an automated traffic-generation machine that can instantly begin to deliver targeted visitors to your website, simply by adding new content to your website on a regular basis.

(WordPress can generate new traffic automatically to your website)

For more info, see this article:

• WordPress Web Site Traffic Blueprint – A Complete Guide To Generating More Web Traffic Automatically

Legal Information

It’s vital to have a website that complies will all legal requirements online. This is not only important for building trust and credibility with visitors, but also to ensure that no laws and regulations are being breached in whichever region you do business.

Depending on the services you provide, adding some or all of the following legal pages to your health or medical website will help keep you out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers (e.g. Google), and other potential legal threats or inconveniences:

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

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

Improve The Content On Your Site

In today’s globally competitive economy, being generous with content that educates and informs readers has become one of the key differentiators for businesses that sell similar products or provide similar services.

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

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

• Nutrients your body needs on a daily basis (carbs, proteins, minerals, vitamins, fats)
• How to get support when embarking on a weight loss program (friends, family, weight loss seekers)
• How to develop an exercise regimen you can enjoy and will stick with
• How to incorporate an occasional fast food into a healthy diet plan
• Etc.

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

Remember to use the same keywords 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 actionable information that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your website or blog, save money creating useful 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 Of Improving Visitor Engagement And User Experience

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

Adding RSS Feeds

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

If you provide useful 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 in one place
• Doesn’t rely on email
• Feeds can be shared and picked up by other sites online
• Users can subscribe to your RSS feed
• It provides links back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• RSS provides several ways for your readers to receive your content (e.g. users can read the content on their mobile device using feed readers)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also a number of benefits to providing great information on 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, search online for health-related government departments and respected industry bodies.

Below we have listed some feeds you could consider adding to your website:

• US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Blog posts feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SelectedHhsBlogPosts, etc. You can also select individual RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Breast cancer, Environmental health, Illnesses and disabilities, Menopause, Screening tests and vaccines, etc.) here: http://womenshealth.gov/news/rss/rss-feeds.html
• US National Libraries Of Medicine – For a directory of RSS feeds from various medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. Dermatology Times, Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC), BMJ Medical Humanities, Radiology, 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 many health-related feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• US Food And Drug Administration (FDA) – Find feeds on fda-related news and topics like criminal investigations, food allergies, recalls, foods, 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 - Find many health-related RSS 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. Medical research: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Research.xml)
• MedicineNet – MedTerms Medical Word of the Day: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyword.xml. You can also choose specific RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Lung Conditions, Cancer, Cholesterol, Pregnancy, Prevention & Wellness, Women’s Health, etc.)
• Medical News Today – MNT Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• MedicalNewsToday.com – You can also choose specific RSS feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Ovarian Cancer, Fertility, Palliative Care/Hospice Care, Lymphoma/Leukemia/Myeloma, Back Pain, Cosmetic Medicine/Plastic Surgery, Clinical Trials/Drug Trials, etc.)

You can also just search online for general RSS feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific topics, e.g. “nuclear medicine rss feeds”, “women’s health rss feeds”, “premature ejaculation rss feeds”, etc.

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

Adding Downloadable Forms And Checklists

Adding checklists and educational charts to your site is a fantastic way to increase visitor engagement, add value to your visitors and set yourself apart from the competition. Forms and checklists can give them useful information and resources to get necessary steps done. Forms and checklists can also be great instructional tools.

Checklists, charts and medical forms can cover topics such as:

• Checklists and forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for post-surgery recovery
• Health checklists and charts for specific conditions
• 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. acidity level of different foods, the importance of sleep at different stages of development, etc.)

Online Tools

Providing unique tools, gadgets and applications on your site can help increase visitor engagement and add value to users. Calculators are useful tools for your website. Other tools can include things like diagnostic tools, and even recipes.

In part 2 of this guide, we will look at a number of online tools you can add to your website using WordPress plugins that can also help improve your search engine optimization, improve user engagement and drive more visitors to your business.

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This is the end of section 1.

Click here to continue:

• The Complete Step-By-Step Guide To Successfully Growing A Medical Practice Services Business Online – Part 2

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