Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress
Medical practitioners today face significant challenges.
Online Challenges For The Medical Profession
Now, more than ever, businesses in the medical sector must work harder than ever to remain competitive. Not only do you have to become actively involved in the community your business serves, you must also develop and maintain a strong presence online. This includes having an effective web presence and learning smarter ways to market your services online.
In addition to spending money in offline marketing activities, you will probably find that in order to compete, increasingly larger amounts of their budget will need to be allocated towards developing and managing a website that will attract leads, engage visitors, outperform the competition in search engines and help to increase your marketing reach online.
This means that your site not only has to look professional, your web pages have to be fast-loading, and be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website may change over time and many aspects may need to be updated often. This requires the implementation of a sound web and content management strategy.
One other problem that medical or health-related organizations (and other businesses) face online, is that your site has only around thirty seconds or less to provide users what they are looking for or they will 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 The Health Profession In The Online Economy
As well as facing significant challenges, there are also many online opportunities available to businesses in the health or medical sector that are willing to evolve to meet the demands of the online economy and who can think outside the box in terms of marketing their business services better online.
The guide below will help you uncover new opportunities to attract new visitors and create noticeable improvements in your online results.
As well as providing tips and information on ways to improve your business online, we also recommend that you consider using the WordPress content management system (CMS) to power your medical or health business website or blog.
To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system, see these articles:
- How A Poorly Built Web Site Can Cost You Prospective Customers And What To Do About It
- WordPress And Small Business – An Online Guide To Building Your Successful Small Business Using A WordPress Site
Practical Tips For Improving Your Website
This section will show you how to improve your health-related website and get better results. We show you what pages a medical-related site needs, what content works best, your layout and navigation, etc.
If you need help with website planning, read this article: The Website Planning Process - A Cost-Saving Blueprint For Non-Technical Business Owners
Basic Web Pages
Professional business websites require several essential pages. Let’s go over the pages your need to have and how to structure your website for best results.
Services Description Page
You need a page that explains your products and services. Depending on which area of health or medical services you specialize in, this page could include services such as:
- Medicine & Surgery – e.g. acute pain management, nephrology diabetes, cancer, hyperbaric medicine, respiratory, urology, ophtalmology surgical outpatients, etc.
- Dentistry – e.g. general dentistry, children’s dentistry, oral health, veneers, crowns and bridges, dentofacial orthopedics, emergency dental, etc.
- Cardiology – e.g. cardiac surgery, coronary care
- Prenatal & Postnatal – e.g. birth suites, midwifery, etc.
- Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
- Diagnostic services – mammography, skin cancer, audiology, gynaecology, psychosis, food allergy testing, etc.
- Pathology – laboratory testing and analysis, routine pathology testing, fine-needle aspiration, speech pathology, etc
- Counselling services – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, trauma counselling, wellness, social development services
- Alternative treatments – Chinese medicine, reflexology, hydrotherapy, tai chi, chiropractic, hypnosis, etc.
- Other medical services – weight management, sports medicine, lymphedema therapy, stomal therapy, neurosciences, artificial limbs, sleep therapy, home and community care, clinical information, medical transport, etc.
Make sure to 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 these services and why they should choose you.
Who We Are
The ‘About Us’ page needs to describe your business and explain to visitors what your business stands for, its unique approach, community events, etc.
This page should also mention any awards, certifications, recognitions, accreditations, associations, publications, etc., that could be used to promote your services and to set yourself above your competitors.
(List all of your professional awards certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc. in the About page. Image sourced from: squaremedical.com.au)
Staff Page
Are you looking for quicker and simpler ideas to sell more products online and get people to stay longer on your site? Then one of the things you can do, is make it easier for prospective clients to get to know you, your team and your organization better.
You want your business to be relatable. One great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your staff members. It should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors will not tend to be well-versed in health-related terms it should tell who they are and what they specialize in. You may also want to explain what those specialties mean. It can also include social buttons so your site visitors can follow selected team members on their social networks.
On this page, don’t be afraid to humanize your team members with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to highlight your person’s experience, why they are an asset to your team, and more importantly, how they can help add value to your clients’ business.
(Make sure to add an employee description page. Image sourced from: southperthchiro.com.au)
If you need help how to easily add an easy-to-maintain directory of employees to your site using free WordPress plugins, go here: Adding A Staff List Directory: Step-By-Step Tutorial
Recruitment Page
List any job opportunities within the practice. This page can include type of training provided, benefits, advancement opportunities, etc. You should also include case studies of graduates who have risen within your business and information about additional career opportunities in the health or medical-related industry.
Include also 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 newsletter, follow you on social media, etc.
Case Studies And Testimonials
Testimonials and case studies are a great way to attract potential clients and showcase your services. Adding a page with case studies and reviews from clients also provides visitors social proof.
(Add a web page with case studies and client reviews. Image source: arrowsmiledental.com)
We have written extensively on using testimonials and user reviews to grow your business online. For more details, go here: How To Turn More Visitors Into Prospects Using Standout Testimonials
Contact Page
A contact page is vitally important.
It should include the following information:
- Company Name
- Your physical address
- Telephone number
- Fax
- Email address
- Map
- Website address
- Contact form
- Contact name
- Social media URLs
- Live Chat/Skype
If your business operates from multiple locations you want to make that clear when showing the address and contact info.
You could also include links to an FAQ section, useful pages, online booking form, support area, newsletter, blog, etc.
Add A Health Or Medical-Related-Related Blog
A blog is a powerful marketing tool. Blogs typically comprise of a content management system that allows you to promote your business using content like news and announcements, updates, educational information, discussions on current topics, promotional videos, infographics, etc.
If you already have an established site, then consider adding a WordPress-powered blog to promote your clinic.
If you don’t have a website yet, or if your existing website is very hard to manage or not delivering you the results you want, then WordPress can be used as both your website and business blog.
You may not have been told about this, but WordPress can become an automated traffic system that can instantly attract targeted traffic to your business, simply by adding regular content to your website.
(WordPress can generate new traffic automatically to your site)
Go here to learn more about this:
Legal Information
Having a website that complies will all legal requirements online is extremely important. This is not only important for building credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that no laws or regulations are being broken wherever you practice.
Depending on what products and services you provide, adding the legal pages below to your medical or health-related website will help you stay out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential sources of legal threats and 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 Disclaimers
- Refund Policy
- Video/Audio Terms
- etc.
We have written a comprehensive article on adding legal pages to your site. Go here to learn more: Adding Legal Pages To Your Website
Ways To Improve The Content On Your Website
In today’s highly competitive online business economy, committing to the practice of content marketing has become one of the key success factors for businesses.
Providing great content with useful tips, advice and information will get your visitors sharing your web pages online and coming back for more content. Publishing content is the most effective way to inform and teach site visitors and prospective clients about your business and services.
For example, if your business provides products that help people lose weight, then some of the areas you can cover in your content include:
- Overweight vs. Obese – what are the differences?
- How to identify the bad habits that need to be corrected to ensure permanent weight loss
- How you eat your food - just as important as what you eat (eat at table, chew slowly)
- Smartphone apps for tracking calories and exercise
- And endless other content topics
You can also create a series of informative articles that will help your your prospective clients understand your services, by explaining benefits, procedures, costs (including payment plans, insurance coverage, etc).
Include keywords in your articles that your prospective clients will be searching to find you online.
We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with easy-to-digest information that will show exactly how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating useful content that will add value to your 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!
Tips For Improving Visitor Engagement And User Experience
Improving website user experience (known as UX) will help to keep visitors coming back and engaging with your site. This section will show you different ways to improve visitor engagement and user experience.
Content Syndication – RSS Feeds
Adding RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve visitor engagement and user experience in many ways.
If you provide information that adds value to others, other businesses will want to syndicate your content to their visitors.
Some of the benefits of syndicating your content to other businesses using RSS feeds, include:
- All of your content updates are in one place
- Content distribution doesn’t rely on email
- Can be shared
- RSS feeds allow for subscribing
- A feed provides a way for links to point back to your content
- RSS feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregator services
- There are several ways your readers can receive your content (e.g. subscribers can 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 adding syndicated content to your website 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 loads of useful content by searching online for health and medical-related government departments or respected industry bodies.
For example, here are a few feeds containing useful information that you could add to a health-related site:
- US Department Of Health And Human Services – e.g. Latest news feed: http://www.hhs.gov/rss/news/hhsnews.xml, etc. You can also choose specific RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Body image, Healthy aging, HIV/AIDS, Minority women’s health, Violence against women, etc.) here: http://womenshealth.gov/news/rss/rss-feeds.html
- US National Libraries Of Medicine – For a directory of feeds from leading medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. BMJ Journal of Medical Ethics, BMJ Journal of Medical Genetics, European Heart Journal, BMJ Tobacco Control, Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
- National Institutes Of Health - Get various health-related feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
- FDA – Find FDA-related news feeds (e.g. consumer health information updates, food allergies, pet health, tobacco news, etc.) and podcasts here: http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/ContactFDA/StayInformed/RSSFeeds
- Department of Health UK (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. Victoria – http://www.health.vic.gov.au/rss/newsfeed.xml
- Centers For Disease Control And Prevention - Get many health-related RSS 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 – Daily Health and Medical News: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyhealth.xml. You can also select specific RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Alzheimer’s Disease, Arthritis, Chronic Pain, Diabetes, Eyesight, Infectious Disease, etc.)
- MedicalNewsToday.com – MNT Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
- MedicalNewsToday.com – You can also choose individual feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Public Health, Immune System/Vaccines, Depression, Pancreatic Cancer, Food Intolerance, Respiratory/Asthma, 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. “vascular rss feeds”, “mental health rss feeds”, “wearable technology rss feeds”, etc.
(Use RSS feeds to improve your medical or health site’s UX.)
Checklists And Forms
Adding checklists and educational charts to your site is a fantastic way to help increase user engagement and add value to your visitors. Charts and checklists can give them useful information and resources to perform steps. They are great educational tools.
You can provide online or downloadable checklists and forms (or links to these) covering a range of topics such as:
- Checklists and forms for booking appointments
- Checklists for pre or post treatment
- Health checklists for specific conditions
- Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral hygiene program, cosmetic dentistry, etc.
- Fitness and nutrition program checklists
- General charts & infographics (e.g. caloric level of different foods, the importance of sleep at different stages of development, etc.)
Provide Other Tools
Providing useful online tools and applications on your site can help increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to your visitors. Calculators are useful tools for your website. Other tools would include things like nutritional tools, and even recipes.
In the next section of this detailed article, we take a look at a several online tools you can use in your health-related site using WordPress plugins that improve your search engine optimization, improve user engagement and drive more traffic to your business.
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"This is AMAZING! I had learnt about how to use WordPress previously, but this covers absolutely everything and more!! Incredible value! Thank you!" - Monique, Warrior Forum