Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Health and medical services practitioners today face increasing challenges.

Challenges Medical Firms Face Online

Now, more than ever, medical practitioners must work hard to remain competitive and obtain new clientele. Not only do you have to be fully involved in the community your business serves, you must also develop and maintain a strong digital presence. This includes having a website and learning smarter ways to grow your business online.

In addition to investing dollars in offline marketing activities, businesses in the health or medical industry are now also finding that increasingly larger amounts of their marketing budget will need to be directed towards the development and management of a website that will drive new clients, engage users, outrank the competition in search engines and help them gain a wider amount of exposure online.

This means that your site not only has to look great, your pages have to load fast, and be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website may change in time and sections will need to be updated often. This requires implementing sound website and content management strategy.

One other difficult challenge that medical or health organizations face online, as most professions do for that matter, is that your site has around thirty seconds or less to help visitors find what they need or they will leave your site and 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 Medical Services Providers

As well as facing a number of significant business and technology changes, there are also many online opportunities available for businesses in the health-related sector that are willing to evolve to meet the challenges of the digital economy and who can think strategically when it comes to marketing their services better online.

In this article, you will learn about new ways to generate web traffic and improve your business results online.

As well as providing practical tips and information on ways to improve your web presence, we also focus on the benefits and advantages of using WordPress to power your health website or blog.

To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system, see these articles:

• Learn How A Poorly Constructed Website Can Cost You Prospective Buyers And What To Do About It
• The Business Owner’s Guide To Using WordPress

Useful Tips For Improving Your Medical & Health Practice Services Site

This section looks at ways to improve your medical or health-related website and get better results. We show you what pages you need, what type of content works best, layout and navigation, etc.

If you need website planning assistance, go here: Planning Your Small Business Website - A Money-Saving Blueprint For Business Owners

Essential Pages

Professional websites require a number of basic pages. Let’s review these.

Services And Products Description Page

You need to include a page that lists your services and any products that you offer. Depending on which area of health or medical services you specialize in, this page could include services like:

• Medical And Surgical – e.g. acute pain management, pulmonology diabetes, oral surgery, stroke, rheumatology, bariatric surgery, ophtalmology day surgery, etc.
• Dentistry – e.g. preventive dentistry, holistic dentistry, gum disease, teeth whitening, implants, emergency dental services, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. heart surgery, coronary care
• Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. birth suites, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic – breast screens, skin cancer, radiology, pap smears, psychosis, allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology – laboratory testing and analysis, emergency pathology testing, occupational and environmental testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling services – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, domestic abuse, diet and nutrition counselling, social development services
• Alternative therapies – acupuncture, aromatherapy, reiki, tai chi, chiropractic, hypnosis, etc.
• Other medical services – weight management, podiatry, fertility services, rehabilitation, medical genetics, artificial limbs, sleep therapy, home care, clinical information, medical transport, etc.

Make sure to list all of the services you provide, not just the ones you specialize in. Educate your visitors about the benefits of using your services and why they should choose you.

Who We Are

This page needs to describe your business and what it stands for, its unique approach, causes that you support, etc.

Remember to also mention any awards, accreditations, recognitions, certifications, publications, associations, etc., that could be used to promote your medical services and position yourself above the competition.

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

Staff Page

Are you looking for quicker and simpler ways to grow your business online or get prospective clients to stay longer on your site? Then help your prospects get to know you, your team and your business better.

Your business needs to be relatable. One 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 are probably not well-versed in health terms it should tell who they are and what they specialize in. It should also explain what those specialties mean. It should include social buttons so your prospective clients can follow your team members on their social networks.

On this page, make sure to highlight your staff member’s experience, how their skills and knowledge 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 page that introduces your staff to prospective new clients. Screenshot image sourced from: southperthchiro.com.au)

We have created a detailed tutorial on how to easily add an easy-to-manage simple team directory in your website using free plugins here: How To Add A Simple Staff List To Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills Required

Work With Us

List any job opportunities within your business. It could include type of training provided, benefits, professional development, social activities promoted by your business, etc. You can also include case studies of recruits who have risen within your company and information about additional career opportunities in the health or medical industry.

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

Case Studies And Testimonials

Testimonials from past clients and case studies are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase the services you offer. By adding a page with reviews from clients and case studies, you will also help to will also be establishing social proof online for your business.

(Add a page to your site with testimonials from previous clients and case studies. Image sourced from: arrowsmiledental.com)

We have created a comprehensive article on using testimonials, case studies and client reviews to improve your business results online. For more details, go here: Achieve Better Results Online With Effective User Testimonials

Contact Page

A functional contact page is crucial.

Your contact page should include:

• Company Name
• Physical location
• Phone
• Fax number
• Email
• Google Map
• Web address
• Contact form
• Contact name
• Social media web addresses
• Online chat

If your business operates in several areas you want to make that clear when displaying your address and contact info.

You could also include links to an FAQ page, frequently-visited pages, online booking form, support area, newsletter opt-in form, blog, etc.

Add A Health Or Medical-Related Blog

A blog can be a very powerful marketing tool. Many blogging platforms are built around a content management system that is simple to use and allows you to easily promote your business using content like news and events, updates, educational articles and tutorials, informative posts, videos, infographics, etc.

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

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

Very few businesses know that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic-generation system that can instantly deliver targeted traffic to your site, simply by publishing new content to your website on a regular basis.

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

For more details:

• Web Site Traffic Blueprint – How To Automatically Increase Your Web Traffic For Your Business With WordPress

Legal Information

It’s really important to have a compliant website. This is not only important for building trust with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no local, regional and federal laws or regulations are being broken wherever you provide services.

Depending on what services and products you provide, adding the legal pages below to your medical or health site will help keep you out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential 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 Links Policy
• Health/Financial Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• etc.

To learn more about adding legal pages to your site, see this article: The Importance Of Adding Legal Pages To Your Website

Improve The Content On Your Site

In today’s fiercely competitive online economy, the sooner you begin to engage in the practice of content marketing, the faster you will begin to see results and differentiate yourself from other competitors.

You will want to provide useful content with great tips, information or advice that will get your readers sharing it with others and coming back for more content. Using content is a great way to educate your visitors and prospective clients about using your services.

For example, if you provide services that help people lose weight, then some of the topics you can write about include the following:

• Potential health issues caused by being overweight
• How to ask for support when embarking on a weight loss program (friends, family, weight loss seekers)
• How to develop an exercise plan you can enjoy and will stick with
• How to avoid late night snacking (e.g. drink water with lemon)
• Etc.

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

Use the same keywords and terminology in your articles that readers will search for.

We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular 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 that will add value to your site visitors and grow your presence 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 ways you can improve visitor engagement and UX.

Adding RSS Feeds

Using RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve your visitor engagement and UX in several ways.

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

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
• Feeds can be shared
• Users can subscribe to your feed
• A feed provides links to your content
• Your feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• There are a number of ways your readers can receive your content (e.g. users can read the content on their mobile device using a feed reader)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also benefits when it comes to providing great information on your site 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 loads of useful content for your website by visiting sites of relevant government departments and key industry bodies.

Below we have listed a few feeds containing useful information that 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 search by departments and select individual RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Emergency preparedness, 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 list of feeds from leading medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. BioMed Central, BMJ, Neurology India, BMJ Archives of Disease, BMJ Postgraduate Medical Journal, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health - Get many health-related feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• FDA – Find FDA-related news feeds (e.g. enforcement reports, food allergies, pet health, tobacco news, 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. NSW – http://www.health.nsw.gov.au/pages/rss.aspx
• Centers For Disease Control And Prevention (www.cdc.gov) - Find many RSS feeds on health-related news and topics 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. Health news: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Health.xml)
• MedicineNet.com – Daily Health and Medical News: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyhealth.xml. You can also choose specific RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Alzheimer’s Disease, Mental Health, Cholesterol, Diabetes, Digestion, High Blood Pressure, etc.)
• MedicalNewsToday.com – 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. Gout, Headache/Migraine, Infectious Diseases/Bacteria/Viruses, Hearing/Deafness, Nursing/Midwifery, Biology/Biochemistry, Genetics, etc.)

You can also search online for general feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific topics, e.g. “headache rss feeds”, “parkinson’s disease rss feeds”, “drug trials rss feeds”, etc.

(Using RSS feeds can help to improve your health website’s user experience.)

Adding Online Checklists

Checklists and educational charts are a fantastic way to help increase visitor engagement and add value to your visitors. They can provide useful step-by-step instructions and resources to complete necessary tasks. Checklists and forms are great client educational tools.

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

• Booking appointments
• Checklists for pre or post treatment
• Health checklists for specific systems
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral maintenance program, cosmetic 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.)

Adding Online Tools

Providing useful tools and applications on your site can help increase visitor engagement and add significant value to your visitors. Calculators, for example are great tools you can add to your website. Other applications would include things like diagnostic tools, or even recipes.

In the next section of this guide, we will be discussing a number of WordPress-based tools you can add to your website that can also help to improve your seo, improve user engagement and drive more web traffic to your business.

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This is the end of section 1.

To keep reading, click here:

• How To Grow Your Medical & Health Center Web Presence Using WordPress – Part Two

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