Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Medical and health services professionals face many new challenges in the web economy, especially in terms of growing a successful business online.

Challenges Professional Health Services Providers Face Online

Today, more than ever, medical services professionals must find smarter ways to remain competitive and find new clientele. Not only do you have to be fully involved in the community you serve, you must also develop a strong web presence. This includes having a website and learning how to better market your practice online.

In addition to spending money in offline marketing, businesses in the health or medical industry are now finding that increasingly larger amounts of their marketing budget will need to be delegated towards the development and management of a website that will drive clients, engage users, outperform the competition in search engines and increase their presence online.

This means that your website not only has to look great, load fast, and your site layout has to be easy to navigate, but it’s also important to keep in mind that the needs of the website will change in time and sections will need to be updated often. This requires a well-planned website and content management strategy.

Another challenge that medical or health-related organizations face (as most other businesses do for that matter), is that they have only about 30 seconds or less to help visitors find what they are looking 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 Health Practitioners

As well as facing many business and technology changes, there are also plenty of online opportunities available to medical businesses that are willing to adapt to meet the demands of the digital economy and can think progressively in terms of marketing their services better online.

The guide below will help you uncover a number of ways to attract and engage new visitors and notice significant improvements in your online results.

As well as providing practical tips and information on ways to improve your health website, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress platform to power your health or medical business website.

For more information about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system (CMS), see these articles:

• Why A Poorly Built Website Can Lose You Potential Buyers And What To Do About It
• The Complete Guide To Building A Successful Small Business Using WordPress

Practical Tips For Improving Your Website

We’ll start first by covering some basic information you need. In this section, we’ll look at ways to improve your website and get better results online. We show you what pages a medical or health-related site needs, what type of content works best for medical-related websites, ways to improve navigation structure, etc.

If you need assistance or help planning your website, check out the detailed guide we have written here: The Website Planning Process Explained: A Practical Primer For Business Owners

Basic Website Pages

All business websites need a number of essential web pages. Let’s discuss the pages your  should have and how to set up your website for best results.

Products And Services Description Page

It’s essential to include a page that describes your products and services. Depending on which area of health or medical services you specialize in, this page can list services like:

• Medicine & Surgery – e.g. ear, nose and throat, pulmonology haematology, cancer, neurology, respiratory, infection control, eye diseases palliative care, etc.
• Dentistry – e.g. cosmetic dentistry, holistic dentistry, cleaning services, teeth whitening, dental braces, emergency dental, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac patient rehabilitation, coronary care
• Prenatal and Postnatal – e.g. birthing, maternity services, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic services – breast screening, lung screening, medical imaging, women’s health, psychosis, food allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology services – laboratory testing and analysis, routine pathology testing, occupational and environmental testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, trauma counselling, diet and nutrition counselling, social development services
• Alternative treatments – acupuncture, homeopathy, holistic medicine, massage therapy, chiropractic services, hypnosis, etc.
• Other medical services – weight management, othopedics, fertility services, rehabilitation, inherited diseases, artificial limbs, hearing aids, home and community care, clinical information, medical equipment, etc.

Make sure to list all of the services you provide, not just the ones you specialize in. Educate your visitors about what your services do and direct them to your appointment booking page.

About Us

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

It’s important to list any industry awards, certifications, accreditations, recognitions, publications, associations, etc., that you can use to promote your services and position yourself above similar service providers.

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

Meet Your Staff

If you are searching for quicker and simpler ideas to sell more products online, then one of the things you can do, is help visitors get to know you and your business better.

You want prospects to relate to your business. A great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your staff. It should include a photo and a mini biography. Since most visitors will not tend to be well-versed in medical terms your descriptions should tell who they are and what they specialize in. It should also explain what those specialties mean. It should also include social buttons that will allow your prospective clients to follow some of your staff members on their social pages.

In this page, make sure to highlight each team member’s 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 page that introduces your employees to prospective new clients. Image sourced from: southperthchiro.com.au)

To learn more about how to easily add a list of employees in your web site without coding skills, see this step-by-step tutorial: How To Add A Simple Staff List To Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills Required

Career Opportunities

List any career opportunities within your organization. This page would include training provided, benefits, professional development, etc. It should include case studies of recruits who have risen within your company and information about career opportunities in the medical-related industry.

Also include a positions available section in this page. If there are no positions currently available, consider inviting people to return periodically to the page, join your newsletter, follow your social pages, etc.

Testimonials And Case Studies

Case studies and client reviews are a great way to attract potential clients and showcase the services you offer. Adding a page with case studies and testimonials from previous clients also helps your health-related website to provide prospective clients with social proof online.

(Add a page with case studies and client reviews. Screenshot image sourced from: arrowsmiledental.com)

To learn more about using client testimonials and reviews, refer to this article: Learn How To Improve Your Sales Using Effective Testimonials

Contact Us

Having a contact page is crucial.

Your contact page should include:

• Company Name
• Address
• Telephone number
• Facsimile
• Email
• Map
• Website address
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Links to social media profiles
• Interactive chat

If your business operates in several locations you will want to make this clear when displaying your address and contact info.

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

Add A Blog Section

A blog is a very powerful marketing tool for your business. Many blogging platforms typically comprise of a content management system that allows you to easily promote your business by publishing content such as news and announcements, updates, useful articles and tutorials, discussions on current topics, videos, webinars, etc.

If you already have an established medical or health website, then consider adding a WordPress blog to market your practice.

If you don’t have a website yet, or if your existing health or medical-related website is hard to keep updated with new content or not giving you the results you want, then WordPress can serve both as your website and your blog.

Something few businesses know about, is that an expertly configured WordPress site can become an automated traffic system that will help begin attracting a stream of web traffic to your website, simply by adding new content on a regular basis to your website.

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

Go here to learn more about this:

• Website Traffic Blueprint – A Complete Guide To Getting More Website Traffic For Your Business Automatically

Legal Pages

It’s vital for professional companies to 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 you are not breaking any local, regional or federal laws or regulations wherever you do business.

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

We have written a detailed article about adding legal pages to your website. Go here to learn more about this: How To Add Legal Pages To Your Website

Tips For Improving The Content On Your Website

In today’s fiercely competitive online business economy, being generous with information has become one of the key differentiators for businesses.

Providing great content with useful information, advice and tips will get your readers to share your web pages online and come back for more content. Using content is a great way to inform and educate your visitors and prospects about your services.

For example, if you provide services that help people manage their weight, then some of the topics you can publish content about include the following:

• What is fiber and how can it help you with weight loss?
• Is weight loss surgery right for you? (who should get it, risks, success rates)
• Hypnosis and weight loss
• What salad dressings can sabotage 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 services, by explaining benefits, procedures, costs (including payment plans, insurance coverage, etc).

Include the keywords in your content that your prospective clients will be searching for.

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 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 website using content. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!

Ways To Improve Visitor Experience

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

RSS Feeds – Content Syndication

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

If you provide useful information, 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 in one place
• Content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Your feeds can be shared and picked up by other sites online
• Users can subscribe to your feed
• It provides a way for links to point back to your content
• RSS feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregator services
• There are multiple ways readers can receive your content (e.g. users can view the content on their mobile device using feed readers)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also a number of benefits to providing valuable 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 useful RSS feeds for your website, visit sites of health or medical-related government departments or respected industry bodies.

Here are some examples of useful RSS feeds you could consider adding to a health website:

• US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Blog posts feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/SelectedHhsBlogPosts, etc. You can search by departments and choose individual feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Breastfeeding, Healthy aging, HIV/AIDS, Mental health, Pregnancy, 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. Journal of Applied Physiology, CDC Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal, Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, American Chemical Society, 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 RSS feeds on health-related news here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• FDA – Find RSS feeds on fda-related topics like criminal investigations, FDA drug shortages, recalls, tobacco news, etc. and podcasts here: http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/ContactFDA/StayInformed/RSSFeeds
• UK Department Of Health (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 - Find various 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 feeds section (e.g. Research: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Research.xml)
• MedicineNet.com – Weekly Health and Medical News Digest: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/weeklyhealth.xml. You can also choose specific feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Allergies, Cancer, Cold & Flu, Diabetes, Eyesight, Women’s Health, etc.)
• MedicalNewsToday.com – Featured 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, Lupus, Fibromyalgia, Flu/Cold/SARS, Smoking/Quit Smoking, HIV/AIDS, Obesity/Weight Loss/Fitness, 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. “ADD rss feeds”, “cold rss feeds”, “alzheimer’s rss feeds”, etc.

(Add RSS feeds to provide your visitors with a better user experience.)

Provide Downloadable Forms

Adding checklists and explanatory charts to your site is a fantastic way to increase visitor engagement, add value to your readers and provide something unique. They can provide useful information and resources to get necessary steps completed. They are also great educational tools.

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

• Booking appointments
• Checklists for pre or post surgery
• Health checklists for specific medical conditions
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, active maintenance program, cosmetic dentistry, etc.
• Fitness and nutrition program checklists
• General charts & infographics (e.g. sugar content in different foods, the importance of sleep at different stages of development, etc.)

Unique Tools

Providing useful tools and applications on your site is a great way to increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to potential clients. Health-related calculators, for example, are useful tools for your website. Others could include things like nutritional tools, and even recipes.

In the next section of this guide, we discuss a number of WordPress plugins and themes you can use in your medical-related website that improve your search engine optimization, increase user engagement and generate more web traffic to your business.

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This is the end of part 1.

Click on this link to access Part 2:

• Online Business Tips For Medical Providers – WordPress Plugins And Themes For Improving SEO, Better User Engagement And Generating More Traffic

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