Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

The information economy has not only transformed businesses globally, it has also created growing challenges and great opportunities for businesses in the medical-related industry.

Online Challenges For Medical Practitioners

Now, more than ever, medical professionals must find smarter ways to stand apart from their competition and generate new clients. Not only do you have to actively participate in the community your business serves, you must also maintain a strong web presence. This includes having a dynamic website and figuring out smarter ways to promote your practice online.

In addition to spending dollars advertising offline on local newspapers, ads in industry publications and magazines, radio and television spots, etc., you will probably find (if you haven’t already) that in order to compete with other web-marketing savvy medical or health-related businesses, increasingly larger amounts of their marketing budget need to be assigned towards developing and maintaining a website that can bring new prospective clients, engage users, outrank the competition in search engines and social media, and help give you wider exposure online.

This means that your website not only has to look great, load fast, and your site has to be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website may change in time and sections will need to be updated frequently. This requires a well-planned website and content management strategy in place.

One other problem that health or medical organizations (and most professions) face online, is that your site has around 30 seconds to help users find what they are searching for or they will leave 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

Online Opportunities For Medical Professionals

As well as facing significant business and technology changes, there are also many online opportunities available to health or medical practices that are willing to evolve to meet digital demands and can think strategically in terms of improving their online marketing skills.

The guide below will help you uncover new ways to drive more traffic and build more online credibility for your medical-related business.

As well as providing tips and information on cost-effective ways to improve your business online, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress Content Management System (CMS) to power your medical-related website or blog.

To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress CMS platform, go here:

• Discover How A Poorly Built Web Site Can Cost You Money
• How To Grow Your Business With WordPress

How To Improve Your Health Site

In this section we will start with the basics and show you how to improve your health or medical-related website and get better results. We show you what web pages you need, what content works best, navigation structure, etc.

If you need website planning assistance, check out the detailed step-by-step guide we have written here: A Cost-Saving Guide To Web Site Planning For Business Owners

Essential Web Pages

Professional websites require a number of basic web pages. Let’s discuss the pages your  should have and how to structure your website for best results.

Description Of Products And Services

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, this page can list services such as:

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. anaesthetics, pulmonology diabetes, cosmetic surgery, gerontology, respiratory, urology, eye diseases operating theaters, etc.
• Dentistry – e.g. general dentistry, holistic dentistry, oral health, restorations, dentofacial orthopedics, emergency dentistry, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac monitoring, chronic heart conditions
• Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. obstetrics, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic services – mammography, skin cancer, x-ray, women’s health, psychosis, food allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology – lab testing and analysis, routine pathology testing, fine-needle aspiration cytology, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, couples, diet and nutrition counselling, social development services
• Alternative treatments – Chinese medicine, aromatherapy, functional medicine, tai chi, osteopathy, hypnotherapy, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – weight management, sports medicine, fertility services, stomal therapy, neurosciences, prosthetics, sleep therapy, home and community care, clinical information, medical equipment, 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 the benefits of using your services and direct them to your contact or appointment booking page.

Who We Are

This page should give a description of your business and explain to visitors what your business stands for, its unique approach, community activities, etc.

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

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

Meet The Team

If you are searching for inexpensive ideas to sell more products or services online, then make it easier for visitors to get to know you and your organization better.

You want potential clients to relate to your business. One great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your people. This page should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors will not tend to be familiar with health terms your bio descriptions should tell who they are and what their specialties are. It should also explain what those specialized areas do. This page should also include social buttons so your prospective clients can follow individual 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 person’s expertise, why they are an invaluable asset to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

(Make sure to add a page that introduces your team to prospective new clients. Screenshot image sourced from: southperthchiro.com.au)

We have created a detailed tutorial about how to create and add an easy-to-update simple team members directory in your web site using a free WP plugin here: WordPress Plugin Tutorial: How To Easily Add A Staff Directory

Career Opportunities

List any career opportunities available within your clinic. This page would include training provided, benefits, advancement opportunities, etc. You can also include stories of trainees who have risen within your company and information about career opportunities in the medical or health-related 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

Testimonials and case studies are a great way to attract potential clients and showcase what kind of services you offer. Adding a page with case studies and reviews from clients also helps your medical-related site to provide social proof.

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

We have written extensively about using testimonials and user reviews get better results online. If you would like to learn more about this here: How To Improve Your Sales With Profit-Boosting Testimonials

Contact Page

A contact page is vitally important.

It should provide the following information about your center:

• Company Name
• Physical address
• Phone number
• Facsimile number
• Email
• Map and directions
• Web address
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media web addresses
• Chat (optional feature)

If your business services several locations you want to make this clear when displaying the address and contact info.

Consider also including a few links point to commonly-asked questions page, frequently-visited pages, online booking request, helpdesk, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add A 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 by publishing timely content like news and announcements, updates, useful articles and tutorials, opinions on current topics, how-to videos, infographics, etc.

If you already have an existing website, then consider adding a WordPress-powered blog to create more exposure for your medical organization.

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 as both your business website and your blog.

Very few businesses know that an expertly configured WordPress site can become an automated traffic-generation machine that can deliver web traffic to your web site, simply by adding regular content to your web site.

(WordPress can drive new visitors automatically to your site)

Go here to learn more about this:

• Website Traffic Blueprint – How To Attract More Traffic For Your Business Using WordPress

Legal Pages

As a professional health or medical services practitioner, having a compliant website is crucially important. This is not only important for building credibility with visitors, but also to ensure that you are not breaching laws and regulations wherever you practice.

Adding some or all of the following legal pages to your website will help you stay out of legal hot water with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential legal threats and inconveniences:

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

We have written a comprehensive article on adding legal pages to your website. For more details, go here: What You Need To Know About Adding Legal Pages To Your Website

Tips For Improving The Content On Your Website

In today’s highly competitive global economy, the sooner you start to engage in the practice of content marketing, the sooner you will begin to differentiate yourself from other competing businesses.

Providing great content with useful information or tips will get your readers sharing it with others and coming back for more content. Publishing content is a great way to inform and teach your visitors and prospective clients about using your services and products.

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 get support for your weight loss efforts (friends, family, weight loss seekers)
• Hypnosis and weight loss
• How a personal chef can help you lose weight (what they do, is it affordable)
• 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.

Include keywords and terminology in your articles that your readers would search to find you online.

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

Ways To Improve Visitor Experience

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

Content Syndication – RSS Feeds

RSS feeds can help to improve visitor engagement and user experience in several ways.

If you provide information that adds value to others, other sites will 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
• your content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Your feed can be shared online
• RSS feeds allow for subscribing
• It provides a way for links to point back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories
• There are multiple ways readers can receive your content (e.g. view your content on their mobile device using different applications)
• It’s built into WordPress

There are also a number of benefits when it comes to providing great content on your site from other websites, 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 visiting sites of relevant government departments or industry bodies.

For example, here are examples of RSS feeds you could consider adding to your website:

• 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 RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Breast cancer, Healthy aging, HIV/AIDS, Mental health, Violence against women, etc.) here: http://womenshealth.gov/news/rss/rss-feeds.html
• US National Libraries Of Medicine – For a directory of RSS feeds from well-known medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. BMJ Evidence-Based Nursing, ADA (American Diabetes Association), BMJ Emergency Medicine Journal, BMJ Archives of Disease, Pediatrics, 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 RSS feeds on fda-related news and topics like criminal investigations press releases, food allergy reports, tainted products marked as dietary supplements, foods, 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) - Get many health-related feeds and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
• Medical News: You can search medical news feeds by going to publications like the NYTimes feeds section (e.g. Medical research: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Research.xml)
• MedicineNet.com – MedTerms Medical Word of the Day: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyword.xml. You can also choose individual RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Lung Conditions, Menopause, Chronic Pain, Diabetes, Sexual Health, High Blood Pressure, etc.)
• MedicalNewsToday.com – Medical News Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• MedicalNewsToday.com – You can also select individual feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Pharma Industry/Biotech Industry, Vascular, Compliance, Dermatology, CJD/vCJD/Mad Cow Disease, Mental Health, Statins, 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. “viruses rss feeds”, “aid rss feeds”, “statins rss feeds”, etc.

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

Checklists & Forms

Adding checklists and educational charts to your site is a fantastic way to help increase user engagement and add value to your readers. Checklists and medical forms can provide visitors with useful information and resources to complete a necessary task. Charts and checklists can also be great client instructional tools.

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

• Checklists and forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for pre or post surgery
• Health checklists for specific medical conditions
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral hygiene program, general dentistry, etc.
• Fitness and exercise program checklists
• General charts & infographics (e.g. caloric level of different foods, the importance of sleep at different ages, etc.)

Adding Other Tools

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

In part 2 of this detailed article, we look at a several WordPress-based tools you can use in your website that can also help to improve search engine optimization, improve user engagement and drive more visitors to your business.

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This is the end of part 1.

Click here to access Part Two:

• The Complete Guide To Growing A Medical Clinic Web Presence With WordPress – Part Two

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