Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Health and medical services providers today are facing many challenges thanks to the digital economy.

Challenges Professional Health Practitioners Face Online

Today, more than ever, businesses in the health sector must work harder than ever to remain competitive. Not only do you have to maintain a strong presence in the community you serve, you must also develop a strong digital presence. This includes having an effective website and learning how to better market your practice online.

As well as investing dollars in offline marketing, businesses in the health or medical industry are also finding that increasingly larger amounts of their budget need to be allocated towards developing and maintaining a website that will bring new prospective clients, engage visitors, outperform the competition in search engines and social media, and give their business wider marketing reach online.

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

Another challenge that medical businesses face, and most other businesses for that matter, is that your site has only about thirty seconds to provide users with what they need or they will find what they are looking for 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 Medical Providers

As well as facing a number of significant business and technology changes, there are also loads of online opportunities available for businesses in the health-related sector that can evolve to meet digital demands and think strategically about improving their online marketing skills.

This detailed guide will help you uncover ways to find new client bookings and improve your online results.

As well as providing general website improvement tips, we also emphasize the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress Content Management System (CMS) to power your health or medical-related website or blog.

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

• Why A Poorly Constructed Web Site Can Cost You Customers And What To Do About It
• WordPress For Small Business – The Beginner’s Guide To Growing A Successful Business With A WordPress Blog

Practical Tips To Improve Your Website

This section will show you how to improve your medical or health-related website and get better results online. We show you what pages you need, what type of content you need, layout and navigation structure, etc.

If you need website planning assistance, read this detailed guide: The Website Planning Process: A Basic Primer For Non-Technical Business Owners

Basic Website Pages

Professional websites require several essential pages. Let’s discuss these.

Your Services And Products

It’s essential to include 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. anaesthetics, nephrology diabetes, reconstructive surgery, rehabilitation medicine, rheumatology, gastroenterology, ophtalmology day surgery, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. preventive dentistry, children’s dentistry, bad breath treatment, teeth whitening, implants, emergency dental, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac patient rehabilitation, coronary care
• Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. birthing, maternity services, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic – breast screening, skin cancer, hearing, women’s health, psychosis, allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology – lab testing and analysis, emergency pathology testing, food and water testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, couples, diet and nutrition counselling, social development services
• Alternative treatments – Chinese medicine, homeopathy, natural therapy, meditation, chiropractic, hypnotherapy, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – weight management, sports medicine, fertility services, speech language therapy, medical genetics, artificial limbs, mobility, home and community care, clinical information, medical transport, etc.

Make sure to list all of the services you provide. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about what your services do and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us Page

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

It should include any awards, certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that you can use to promote your medical services and to position yourself above similar service providers.

(List all of your awards certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc. in the About Us page. Image sourced from: squaremedical.com.au)

Team Profile Page

Are you looking for ideas to sell more products or services online? Then make it easier for prospective clients to get to know, like and trust you, your team and your organization better.

You want prospects to relate to your business. One great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your team members. This page should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors will not tend to be familiar with medical-related terms it should tell who they are and what they specialize in. It should also explain what those specialties mean. It can include social buttons so your site visitors can follow 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 staff member’s expertise and qualifications, why they are an invaluable asset to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add a staff page. Screenshot image source: southperthchiro.com.au)

If you need help how to easily create and add an easy-to-manage directory of employees or team members to your web site using free plugins, refer to this step-by-step tutorial: How To Add A Simple Employee List On Your WordPress Site Without Editing Code

Recruitment Page

This is a listing of career opportunities within your company. This page should include training provided, benefits, professional development, etc. You can also include case studies of trainees who have worked their way up in your organization and information such as the job outlook and additional career opportunities in the health and medical industry.

Include also a positions available section in your page. If there are no positions currently available, consider inviting people to return periodically to the page, subscribe to your updates list, follow your social pages, etc.

Testimonials And Case Studies

Reviews from clients and case studies are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase your services. Adding a page with case studies and reviews from clients also provides social proof.

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

We have written extensively on using testimonials and reviews to improve your business results online. Go here to learn more about this: Learn How To Improve Your Conversions Using Powerful Customer Testimonials

Contact Page

A contact page is crucial.

It should provide some or all of the following information about your company:

• Business Name
• Physical address
• Phone
• Facsimile
• Contact email
• Map
• Website address
• Contact form
• Request for information – who to contact
• Social media web addresses
• Interactive chat feature (optional feature)

If your business services multiple areas you will want to make that clear when showing the address and contact information.

You can also include a few links point to the most commonly asked questions page, useful pages, online booking form, helpdesk, newsletter, blog, etc.

Blog Section

A blog is a powerful marketing tool for your business. Many blogging platforms are built around a content management system that is easy to use and allows you to easily promote your business using timely content like events, product releases, useful articles, informative posts, promotional videos, media presentations, etc.

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

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

Something few businesses know about, is that WordPress can become an automated traffic-generation system that can instantly begin delivering web traffic to your website, simply by publishing new content to your website on a regular basis.

(WordPress can drive new traffic automatically to your website)

For more info, see this article:

• Website Traffic Blueprint – How To Create An Automated Web Traffic-Getting Machine

Legal Information Pages

It’s very important for medical and health services practitioners businesses to ensure they have a website that complies will all legal requirements online. This is not only important for building credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no local, regional and federal laws or regulations are being broken in whichever region you service.

Depending on the products and services you provide, adding some or all of the following legal pages to your 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 Statement
• 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
• etc.

We have written a detailed article on adding legal pages to your site here: Why You Need To Add Legal Pages To Your Website

Improving Your Web Content

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

You will want to provide useful content with great advice, information and tips that will get your visitors sharing your web pages online and coming back for more content. This is a great way to inform and educate site visitors and prospective clients about using your products and services.

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

• What is BMI (what it stands for, what it does, how to calculate yours)
• How to set realistic, but challenging weight loss goals
• Why using a measuring tape is better than a scale when it comes to weight loss progress
• What processed foods can ruin your weight loss program (and healthier choices)
• And many other content topics

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

Remember to use relevant keywords and terms in your content that your prospective clients will be searching for online.

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

Improving Visitor Engagement And User Experience

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

Add RSS Feeds

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

If you provide information that adds value to others, other sites may want to syndicate your content to their visitors.

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

• All of your content updates are kept in one place
• Content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Can be shared and picked up by other sites online
• Users can subscribe to your feed
• An RSS feed provides links to your content
• RSS feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• RSS provides a number of ways for your readers to receive your content (e.g. view the content on their mobile device using a feed reader)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also a number of benefits to providing valuable content on your website from other sites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.

You can find RSS feeds with useful content by searching online for medical-related government departments or key industry bodies.

Here are some examples of feeds containing useful information that you could add to a medical or health website:

• US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Blog feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SelectedHhsBlogPosts, etc. You can search by departments and choose specific RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Emergency preparedness, Environmental health, Heart health and stroke, Menopause, Pregnancy, 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. Haematologica, BMJ Disease in Childhood – Fetal and Neonatal Edition, American Cancer Society, BMJ Archives of Disease, BMJ Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health - Find many health-related RSS feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• FDA – Find FDA-related RSS feeds (e.g. criminal investigations press releases, FDA drug shortages, pet health, vaccines, blood and biologics, etc.) and podcasts here: http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/ContactFDA/StayInformed/RSSFeeds
• Department of Health UK (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 many RSS feeds on health-related news and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
• Medical News Feeds: You can search medical news RSS feeds in places like the NYTimes feeds section (e.g. Fitness & nutrition: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Nutrition.xml)
• MedicineNet.com – 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, Mental Health, Cholesterol, Pregnancy, Digestion, High Blood Pressure, etc.)
• Medical News Today – Medical News Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• Medical News Today – You can also select specific feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Ovarian Cancer, Immune System/Vaccines, Melanoma/Skin Cancer, Swine Flu, Medical Devices/Diagnostics, Cleft Palate, Genetics, 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. “rheumatology rss feeds”, “conferences rss feeds”, “erectile dysfunction rss feeds”, etc.

(Use RSS feeds to provide your visitors with a better UX.)

Add Forms & Checklists

Checklists and educational charts are a great way to help increase visitor engagement, add value to your visitors and provide something unique. Charts and checklists can provide users with step-by-step instructions and resources to perform tasks. Charts and checklists can also be great client instructional tools.

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

• Checklists/forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for post-surgery recovery
• Health checklists for specific systems
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral maintenance program, general dentistry, etc.
• Fitness and exercise program checklists and charts
• General charts & infographics (e.g. sugar content in different foods, sleep requirements at different stages of development, etc.)

Other Tools

Providing unique tools and applications on your site is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add value to users. Calculators, for example are useful tools you can add to your website. Others could include things like nutritional tools, or even recipes.

In the next section of this guide, we discuss a number of WordPress-based tools you can use in your site that can also help to improve search engine optimization, increase user engagement and drive more traffic to your business.

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This is the end of part one of this comprehensive guide on ways to grow your health-related business online.

Click on this link to view Part Two:

• Online Business Tips For Health And Medical Services Practitioners – How To Improve Search Engine Optimization, Improve User Engagement And Increase Traffic Generation With WordPress Plugins

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