Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Medical professionals today face a number of challenges.

Challenges Professional Health Services Practitioners Face Online

Now, more than ever, health and medical services providers must find smarter ways to stand apart from the crowd and generate new clientele. Not only do you have to participate in the community your business serves, you must also maintain an active digital presence. This includes having an effective website and learning better ways to promote your services online.

As well as investing money advertising offline on local newspapers, ads in industry publications and magazines, radio and tv, etc., you will probably find (if you haven’t already) that in order to compete with other web-marketing savvy health or medical-related businesses, you will need to invest a bigger share of your marketing budget to develop and maintain a website that will drive prospective clients, engage users, outrank the competition in search engines and social media, and help give you a wider degree of marketing exposure online.

This means that your website not only has to look great, your pages have to be fast-loading, and be easy to navigate, but it’s also important to keep in mind that the needs of the website will change in time and many aspects may need to be updated frequently. This requires a well-developed website and content management strategy in place.

One other problem that health or medical businesses face (as do other professions for that matter), is that they have only about 30 seconds to provide users what they are looking for or they will go away.

“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

As well as facing many business and technology changes, there are also loads of online opportunities available for health-related businesses that can adapt to meet online economy demands and can think strategically in terms of improving their online marketing skills.

In this guide, you will learn ways to generate more potential clients and notice significant improvements in your medical or health business presence online.

As well as providing general website improvement tips, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress CMS platform to power your medical or health-related website or blog.

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

• How A Poorly Designed Web Site Can Cost You Business
• How To Grow Your Business Using A WordPress Blog

Practical Tips To Improve Your Medical & Health Center Services Website

This section looks at ways to improve your health website and get better results online. We will look at what pages a health or medical website needs, what content works best, navigation structure, etc.

If you need website planning assistance, go here: The Web Site Planning Process Explained - A Comprehensive Guide For Business Owners

Your Web Pages

All websites require a number of essential pages. Let’s take a look at the pages your  need to have and how to set up your health or medical website for best results.

Your Services

You need to include a page that explains your products and services. Depending on which area of health you specialize in, your page could include services like:

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. ear, nose and throat, nephrology blood disorders, plastic surgery, gerontology, rheumatology, weight loss surgery, eye diseases operating theaters, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. preventive dentistry, holistic dentistry, bad breath treatment, teeth whitening, dentofacial orthopedics, emergency dentistry, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac surgery, coronary care
• Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. birthing, midwifery, etc.
• Child Health – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic – breast screening, lung screening, medical imaging, 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 services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug counselling, marriage counselling, diet and nutrition counselling, social work services
• Alternative treatments – acupuncture, homeopathy, holistic medicine, massage therapy, osteopathy, hypnotherapy, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – weight management, othopedics, lymphedema therapy, optical services, medical genetics, prosthetics, sleep therapy, home and community care, community health, medical supplies, etc.

List all of the services you provide. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about the benefits of using your services and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us Page

This page needs to describe your business and what it stands for, its unique approach, supported community projects, etc.

This page should list any professional awards, recognitions, accreditations, certifications, associations, publications, etc., that can be used to promote your medical, dental, chiropractic, surgery services, etc. and to position yourself above other competitors.

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

Your Staff Page

Are you searching for inexpensive ways to grow your business online? Then help your prospective clients get to know, like and trust you and your business better.

Prospects need to relate to your business. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your staff or team members. It should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors are probably not that well-versed in health or medical terms your bio descriptions should tell who they are and what their specialties are. You may also want to explain what those specialized areas mean. It should include social buttons that will allow your prospective clients to follow selected staff members on their social networks.

On this page, don’t be afraid to humanize your people with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to highlight each employee’s expertise and qualifications, why they are an asset to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add a ‘meet the team’ page. Screenshot source: southperthchiro.com.au)

To learn more about how to add an easy-to-update directory of staff or team members to WordPress with no coding skills required, refer to this tutorial: How To Add A Simple Staff List On Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills

Job Opportunities

This is a listing of job opportunities available within the organization. It could include type of training provided, benefits, opportunities for advancement, etc. You can include case studies of graduates who have worked their way up in your business and information about upcoming career opportunities in the medical industry.

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

Case Studies And Testimonials

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

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

We have written extensively on using testimonials and user reviews to improve your business results online. To learn more about this go here: How To Create Better Results Online Using Meaningful Customer Testimonials

Contact Page

Having a contact page is absolutely vital.

It should provide visitors with the following information:

• Name
• Physical location
• Telephone number
• Facsimile
• Contact email address
• Google Map and directions
• Website URL
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media URLs
• Live Chat/Skype

If you operate out of several locations you want to make this clear when displaying the address and contact information.

You should also include links pointing to commonly-asked questions page, main pages, online booking request, support page, newsletter opt-in form, blog, etc.

Add A Blog

A blog can be a powerful marketing tool for your business. Blogs typically comprise of a content management system that allows you to promote your business by publishing content such as news and events, product releases, educational articles and tutorials, informative posts, promotional videos, media presentations, etc.

If you already have an established health or medical-related website, then consider adding a WordPress blog to promote your medical clinic.

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

Something not many businesses know about, is that WordPress can become an automated traffic system that can deliver a stream of new targeted traffic to your website, simply by adding regular content to your website.

(WordPress can automate your traffic generation)

To learn more about this go here:

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

Legal Information Pages

Having a compliant website is essential. This is not only important for building credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that you are not breaking laws or regulations wherever your practice is located.

Depending on what products and services you provide, adding the following legal pages to your website will help keep you out of legal hot water with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers (e.g. Facebook), and other potential legal threats or inconveniences:

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

We have written a comprehensive article about adding legal pages to your site. Go here to learn more: Why You Need To Add Legal Pages To Your Website

Tips For Improving The Content On Your Website

In today’s highly competitive digital economy, the sooner you start engaging in the practice of content marketing, the sooner you will begin to differentiate yourself from your competitors.

By committing to providing useful content with information, advice or tips, you will get your readers to share your information and come back for more. This is the most effective way to inform and teach your visitors and prospective clients about using your services and products.

For example, if you provide services that help people lose weight, then some of the areas you could cover as content on your site:

• Common medical conditions that can cause weight gain
• How to calculate how many calories you consume each day
• Why using a measuring tape is better than a scale when it comes to weight loss progress
• How to modify recipes for achieving healthier results (e.g. substituting sugars, fats, etc.)
• Etc.

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

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

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

Ways Of Improving Visitor Experience

Improving user experience (generally referred to as UX) helps keep visitors coming back and engaging with your site. This section will show you ways you can 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 valuable content, other sites may want to syndicate your content.

Some of the benefits of syndicating your content to other sites using RSS feeds, include:

• All of your updates are kept in one place
• Doesn’t rely on email
• Your feeds can be shared
• RSS feeds allow for subscribing
• It provides links back to your content
• Your feeds can be submitted to RSS directories
• There are multiple ways your readers can receive your content (e.g. view your content on their mobile device using feed readers)
• It’s built into WordPress

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

To find RSS feeds with useful content for your website, search online for relevant government departments or industry bodies.

Here are some examples of useful RSS feeds you could consider adding 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 also select individual RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Emergency preparedness, 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 list of feeds from well-known medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. Journal of Neurophysiology, Bionet RSS, RadioGraphics, The AAPS Journal (American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists), Transplantation – Most Popular Articles, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health - Get many health-related news feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• US Food And Drug Administration (FDA) – Find feeds on fda-related news and topics like FDA drug safety, MedWatch safety alerts (human medical products), product recalls, tobacco news, 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. 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: You can search medical news feeds in major news publications like the NYTimes RSS feeds section (e.g. Research: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Research.xml)
• MedicineNet – Daily Health and Medical News: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyhealth.xml. You can also select individual feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Allergies, Arthritis, Cold & Flu, Oral Health, Prevention & Wellness, High Blood Pressure, etc.)
• Medical News Today – MNT Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• Medical News Today – You can also select individual RSS feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Bipolar, Bird Flu/Avian Flu, Asbestos/Mesothelioma, Menopause, COPD, Cosmetic Medicine/Plastic Surgery, Alzheimer’s/Dementia, etc.)

You can also search online for general feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific topics, e.g. “STD rss feeds”, “leukemia rss feeds”, “weight loss rss feeds”, etc.

(Use RSS feeds to improve your website’s user experience.)

Checklists And Forms

Adding checklists and charts to your site is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add value to your visitors. Checklists and charts can give them useful step-by-step instructions and resources to perform a task. They are great client instructional tools.

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

• Booking appointments
• Checklists for pre or post surgery
• Health checklists and charts for specific systems
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, maintenance program, cosmetic dentistry, etc.
• Weight loss and exercise program checklists
• General charts & infographics (e.g. caloric level of different foods, sleep requirements at different ages, etc.)

Other Tools

Providing unique tools and applications on your website is a great way to increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to your visitors. Health-related calculators are great tools you can add to your website. Other applications could include things like diagnostic tools, or even recipes.

In the next section of this detailed guide, we discuss a several online tools you can use in your website using WordPress plugins and themes that can also help to improve your search engine optimization, improve user engagement and generate more traffic to your business.

***

This is the end of section one.

Click on this link to continue:

• Online Business Tips For Medical Services Providers – WordPress Plugins That Can Help Improve Search Engine Optimization, Increase User Engagement And Drive More Visitors To Your Site

***

***