Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

Health or medical professionals today are facing an ever growing number of challenges brought about by the web economy.

Challenges Health And Medical Firms Face Online

Today, more than ever, businesses in the medical sector must work harder than ever to remain competitive. Not only do you have to maintain an active presence in the community your business serves, you must also maintain a strong presence online. This includes having an effective website and figuring out smarter ways to market your medical services online.

In addition to investing dollars in offline marketing, you will probably find (if you haven’t already) that in order to compete, you will need to allocate a larger portion of your marketing budget towards developing and managing a website that will drive new prospective clients, engage visitors, outperform the competition in search engines and increase your reach online.

This means that your website not only has to look great, your web pages have to be fast-loading, and your website layout has to be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website will change in time and sections may need to be updated frequently. This requires having a sound website and content management strategy.

One other difficult challenge that medical and health services providers face online (as all other businesses do for that matter), is that you have only about 30 seconds or less to provide visitors with what they need 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 Health Providers

As well as facing a number of significant challenges, there are also plenty of online opportunities available to businesses in the health-related sector that are willing to evolve to meet online economy demands and can think progressively when it comes to marketing themselves better online.

This comprehensive article will help you uncover a number of ways to increase web traffic and establish online credibility for your business.

As well as providing tips and information on cost-effective ways to improve your medical website, we also place special emphasis on the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress Content Management System (CMS) to power your health or medical-related website or blog.

For more information about the benefits and advantages of using WordPress, see the articles below:

• Learn Why A Poorly Constructed Web Site Can Cost You Customers
• Everything You Need To Know To Grow Your Business With A WordPress Blog

Practical Tips For Improving Your Website

Let’s start by reviewing some basic stuff. In this section, we’ll look at how to improve your website and get better results online. We will look at what pages you need, what type of content works best for health or medical websites, your layout and navigation structure, etc.

If you need assistance or help planning your medical or health-related website, visit this page: A Cost-Saving Guide To Web Site Planning For Business Owners

How To Improve Your Website Pages

All websites need several basic web pages. Let’s go over the pages your  need to have and how to structure your health or medical website for best results.

Services Description Page

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

• Medical And Surgical – e.g. pain management, orthopedics blood disorders, oncology, stroke, respiratory, urology, eye diseases operating theaters, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. general dentistry, holistic dentistry, cleaning services, teeth whitening, braces, emergency dental services, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac patient rehabilitation, coronary care
• Prenatal and Postnatal – e.g. obstetrics, maternity services, etc.
• Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic – breast screens, lung screening, radiology, gynaecology, MRI scanning, allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology services – lab testing and analysis, routine pathology testing, insurance and corporate testing, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling – mental health services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug counselling, trauma counselling, wellness, social development services
• Alternative therapies – Chinese medicine, reflexology, reiki, tai chi, chiropractic, hypnosis, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – diet and nutrition, sports medicine, lymphedema therapy, speech therapy, medical genetics, artificial limbs, assisted living, home and community care, community health, medical supplies, 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

The ‘About Us’ page needs to describe your business and what it stands for, its unique approach, supported community projects, etc.

It’s important to mention any professional awards, certifications, recognitions, accreditations, publications, associations, etc., that can be used to promote your medical, dental, chiropractic, surgery services, etc. and to set yourself above your competitors.

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

Your Staff Page

Are you looking for quicker, simpler and cost-effective ways to grow your business online? Then make it easier for your visitors to get to know, like and trust you, your team and your business 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 are probably not very well-versed in medical or health-related terms your bio descriptions should tell who they are and what they specialize in. You may also want to explain what those specialized areas mean. This page can include social buttons that will allow your prospective clients to follow your staff members on their social pages.

On this page, make sure to highlight your team member’s qualifications, 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 page. Screenshot image source: southperthchiro.com.au)

If you need help how to easily add an easy-to-update simple employee directory in your website using a free plugin, go here: WordPress Plugin Tutorial: Adding A Staff Directory

Job Opportunities Page

List any job or career opportunities within your company. This page could include training provided, employee benefits, opportunities for advancement, social aspects of working with your organization, etc. You can also include information such as the job outlook and new career opportunities in the 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 the page, join your announcements list, follow your social pages, etc.

Testimonials

Case studies and reviews from clients are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase your services. Adding a page with case studies and testimonials from past clients also helps your medical-related site to provide visitors social proof.

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

We have written a detailed article on using testimonials and client reviews get better results online. Go here to learn more: Discover How To Convert More Visitors Into Prospects Using Knockout User Testimonials

Contact Us

A contact page is absolutely vital.

It should include some or all of the following:

• Name Of Your Business
• Physical address
• Phone
• Fax number
• Contact email
• Google Map
• Web address
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media URLs
• Chat/Skype (optional feature)

If your business operates from several areas you will want to make that clear when displaying the address and contact information.

You could also include links to an FAQ section, main pages, booking request, helpdesk, newsletter, blog, etc.

Add A Medical Blog Section

A blog is a very powerful marketing tool for your business. Blogs are built around a content management system that is simple to use and allows you to easily promote your business using timely content such as news and announcements, new releases, useful articles, opinions and discussions, how-to videos, media presentations, etc.

If you already have an health or medical website, then consider adding a WordPress-driven blog to create more exposure for your medical services.

If you don’t have a website yet, or if your existing medical or health website is hard to add new content to or not giving you the results you want, then WordPress can act both as your business website and your blog.

Not many businesses know this, but an expertly configured WordPress site can turn into an automated traffic system that will attract targeted visitors to your business, simply by publishing content on a regular basis to your website.

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

For more info, see this article:

• Web Traffic Blueprint – Discover How To Automatically Grow Your Web Visitors For Your Business With WordPress

Legal Information Pages

It’s extremely important to make sure they have a compliant website. This is not only important for building trust with prospective clients, but also to ensure that you are not contravening local, regional or federal laws and regulations wherever your practice is located.

Adding the legal pages below to your 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 Us
• Privacy Statement
• Terms And Conditions Of Use
• Website Disclaimer
• Affiliate Agreement
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• DMCA Notice
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Links Policy
• Health and Financial Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• and others

We have written a detailed article on adding legal pages to your site. For more info, see this article: Why You Need To Add Legal Pages To Your WordPress Site

Improving The Content On Your Website

In today’s globally competitive economy, the sooner you start engaging in the practice of content marketing, the quicker you will begin to see results and differentiate yourself from competing businesses.

Providing useful content with tips, information and advice will get your readers sharing your web pages and coming back for more content. This is a great way to inform and educate your visitors and prospective clients about your business and services.

For example, if you provide weight loss services, then some of the areas you can publish content about include the following:

• Potential health issues caused by being overweight
• Tips for developing portion control habits (smaller plate, don’t put food on the table, more vegetables)
• Recovering after weight loss surgery – useful tips and suggestions
• How to incorporate a little fast food into a healthy diet plan
• And endless 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, terminology, etc.

Include keywords and terminology in your content that your readers will search for 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 website, 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 100% FREE!

Improving Visitor Engagement And User Experience

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

RSS Feeds

An RSS feed provides plenty of benefits for your business.

If you provide valuable content, other sites will 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 in one place
• Content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Feeds can be shared and picked up by other sites online
• Allows users to subscribe
• An RSS feed provides a way for external links to point back to your content
• Feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• RSS provides multiple ways for your readers to receive your content (e.g. read the content on their mobile device using different applications)
• RSS is built into WordPress

There are also a number of benefits to adding syndicated content to your site from other websites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.

You can find many useful RSS feeds by searching online for medical-related government departments or respected industry bodies.

Below we have listed some examples of feeds you could consider adding to a medical-related 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 choose individual RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Emergency preparedness, Environmental health, Illnesses and disabilities, Mental health, Smoking and how to quit, etc.) here: http://womenshealth.gov/news/rss/rss-feeds.html
• US National Libraries Of Medicine – For a directory of RSS feeds from leading medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. The Oncologist, ADA ClinicalDiabetes, TheLancet.com, Medscape, Pediatrics, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health (www.nih.gov) - Get many feeds on health-related news and topics here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• FDA – Get FDA-related feeds (e.g. criminal investigations, MedWatch safety alerts (human medical products), tainted products, radiological health, 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 - Get many health-related RSS feeds and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
• Medical News: You can search medical news RSS feeds by going to publications like the NYTimes RSS feeds section (e.g. Health news: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Health.xml)
• MedicineNet – Weekly Health and Medical News Digest: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/weeklyhealth.xml. You can also select specific feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Medications, Cancer, Neurology, Oral Health, Sexual Health, Sleep, etc.)
• MedicalNewsToday.com – MNT Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• Medical News Today – You can also choose specific feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Cystic Fibrosis, Medicare/Medicaid/SCHIP, Cervical Cancer/HPV Vaccine, Hearing/Deafness, Transplants/Organ Donations, HIV/AIDS, Restless Legs Syndrome, etc.)

You can also just search online for general feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific areas, e.g. “hospice care rss feeds”, “prostate cancer rss feeds”, “statins rss feeds”, etc.

(RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve your site’s user experience.)

Checklists And Forms

Adding checklists and charts to your site is a great way to increase user engagement and add value to your visitors. Charts and checklists can provide users with useful step-by-step instructions and resources to get necessary tasks performed. Checklists and charts are also great client educational tools.

Checklists, charts and medical forms can address topics such as:

• Checklists and forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for pre or post treatment
• Health checklists and charts for specific conditions
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral maintenance program, general dentistry, etc.
• Fitness and exercise program checklists and charts
• General charts & infographics (e.g. caloric level of different foods, sleep requirements at different stages of development, etc.)

Provide Online Tools

Providing useful online tools and applications on your site can help increase visitor engagement and add significant value to your visitors. Health-related calculators are great tools you can add to your website. Other applications can include things like nutritional tools, or even recipes.

In the next section of this guide, we take a look at a several WordPress-based tools you can use in your health-related website that can help improve seo, improve user engagement and generate more visitors to your business.

***

This is the end of section 1.

To continue reading, click this link:

• How To Grow Your Health Practice Website – Part Two

***

***