Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress
Health professionals face many challenges in the digital economy, especially in terms of growing a successful business presence online.
Online Challenges For Health Practitioners
Now, more than ever, medical providers must work harder and find smarter ways to stand apart from the crowd and generate new clients. Not only do you have to be fully involved in the community you serve, you must also develop and maintain an active digital presence. This includes having an effective website and learning how to better market your services online.
In addition to investing money in offline marketing activities, you will probably find that in order to remain competitive, you will need to invest a greater portion of your marketing budget towards developing and managing a website that can drive clients, engage users, outrank the competition in search engines and help you gain a wider degree of reach online.
This means that your website not only has to look professional, your pages have to be fast-loading, and be easy to navigate, but even more importantly, the needs of your website will change over time and sections may need to be frequently updated. This requires the implementation of a well-planned website and content management strategy.
Another challenge that medical-related organizations (and all other professions) face with their websites, is that your site has only about thirty seconds to provide users with 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 The Health Profession In The Online Economy
As well as facing many business and technology changes, there are also plenty of online opportunities available for businesses in the health or medical-related profession that are willing to adapt to meet online demands and can think progressively when it comes to marketing their business better online.
In this guide, you will learn about a number of ways to attract more visitors and establish stronger online credibility for your medical-related business.
As well as providing practical tips and information on ways to improve your web presence, we also place special emphasis on the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress platform to power your health business website or blog.
To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system, go here:
- Learn How A Poorly Constructed Web Site Can Cost You Prospective Customers And What To Do About It
- Learn How To Grow Your Business With A WordPress Blog
Useful Tips To Improve Your Medical Center Services Site
This section will show you ways to improve your website and get better results online. We will look at what pages a medical-related site needs, what type of content works best for health-related websites, layout and navigation structure, etc.
If you need additional information about website planning, read this guide: A Money-Saving Guide To Web Site Planning For Business Owners
Ways To Improve Your Web Pages
All business websites require a number of basic pages. Let’s take a look at these.
Services
It’s essential to have a page that explains your services and products. Depending on which area you specialize in, this page can list services like:
- Medical And Surgical – e.g. pain management, pulmonology diabetes, cosmetic surgery, geriatric medicine, renal, weight loss surgery, ophtalmology operating theaters, etc.
- Dental Services – e.g. general dentistry, holistic dentistry, cleaning services, restorations, dental braces, emergency dental, etc.
- Cardiology – e.g. cardiac surgery, coronary care
- Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. birthing, maternity services, etc.
- Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
- Diagnostic services – mammography, skin cancer, oral health, 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 – mental health, alcohol, tobacco & other drug services, trauma counselling, diet and nutrition counselling, social development services
- Alternative treatments – Chinese medicine, reflexology, functional medicine, tai chi, osteopathy, hypnosis, etc.
- Other medical services – weight management, chiropody, reproductive services, speech therapy, inherited diseases, prosthetics, mobility, home and community care, sexual health, medical equipment, 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 what your services do and why they should book an appointment with you.
Who We Are
The ‘About Us’ page should give a description of your business and explain to visitors what it stands for, its unique approach, community events, etc.
Remember to include any business awards, certifications, recognitions, accreditations, associations, publications, etc., that you can use to promote your services and to position yourself above other competitors.
(List all of your awards certifications, accreditations, recognitions, publications, associations, etc. in your About Us page. Screenshot image source: squaremedical.com.au)
Team Profile
Are you searching for cost-effective ideas to sell more products or services online or increase user interaction with your site? Then something you can do, is help your visitors get to know, like and trust you, your team and your organization better.
Your business needs 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 bio. Since most visitors are probably not well-versed in health or medical terms your descriptions 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 your staff members on their social pages.
In this page, don’t be afraid to humanize your team members with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to outline your team member’s qualifications, why they are an invaluable asset to your team, and more importantly, how they will help add value to your clients’ business.
(Make sure to add a page that introduces your employees or team members to prospective new clients. Screenshot source: southperthchiro.com.au)
If you need help how to create and add an easy-to-maintain simple staff directory to a WordPress site, see this step-by-step tutorial: How To Create A Simple Employee List In Your WordPress Site With No Coding Skills
We’re Hiring
This is a listing of career opportunities within the company. This page would include type of training provided, employee benefits, advancement opportunities, etc. You can include case studies of graduates who have established a solid career path thanks to your company and information about upcoming career opportunities in the health and medical industry.
Maintain 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 newsletter, follow you on social media, etc.
Case Studies And Testimonials
Case studies and testimonials from previous clients are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase your services. By adding a page with case studies and reviews from clients, you are also helping to are also providing visitors social proof for your business.
(Add a page to your site with case studies and client reviews. Image source: arrowsmiledental.com)
We have written extensively on using client testimonials and client reviews improve your business online. Go here to learn more about this: All You Need To Know To Achieve Better Results Online Using More Effective Client Testimonials
Contact Us
Having a contact page is absolutely vital.
It should provide some or all of the following information:
- Business Name
- Physical location
- Telephone
- Facsimile
- Contact email
- Google Map
- Web address
- Contact form
- Name of person to contact
- Social media links
- Live chat
If your business services different areas you will want to make this clear when displaying the address and contact info.
Consider also including links to an FAQ section, useful pages, booking form, support page, newsletter, blog, etc.
Add A Medical Blog
A blog can be a very powerful marketing tool for your business. Most blogging platforms are built around a content management system that is easy to use and allows you to promote your business using content like announcements, updates, training articles, informative posts, educational videos, infographics, etc.
If you already have an existing website, then consider adding a WordPress-driven blog to create more exposure for your organization.
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 website and your blog.
Very few businesses know that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic machine that can help drive an ongoing stream of web traffic to your web site, simply by adding regular content to your website.
(WordPress can automate your traffic generation)
Go here to learn more about this:
Legal Information Pages
It’s extremely important for professional businesses 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 no local, regional and federal laws and regulations are being broken in whatever region you service.
Depending on what services you provide, adding the following legal pages to your site will help you stay out of legal hot water with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers (e.g. Google), and other potential legal threats or inconveniences:
- Contact Page
- Privacy Statement
- 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 detailed article about adding legal pages to your site. For more info, see this article: The Importance Of Adding Legal Pages To Your Site
How To Improve Your Web Content
In today’s fiercely competitive online business economy, the sooner you begin to publish good content on your site, the faster you will begin to see results and differentiate yourself from other competing businesses.
You will want to provide useful content with great tips, information or advice that will get your visitors sharing it with others and coming back for more content. This is the most effective way to educate your visitors and prospective clients about using your services and products.
For example, if you provide weight loss services, then some of the topics you can write content about include:
- What is BMI (what it stands for, what it does, how to calculate yours)
- How to set realistic, but challenging weight loss goals
- Tips for developing an exercise plan you can enjoy and will stick with
- How to avoid late night snacking (e.g. sleep earlier)
- Etc.
You can also create a series of informative articles that will help your readers understand your medical or health services, by explaining benefits, procedures, terminology, etc.
Remember to include keywords and terms in your articles that your prospective clients will search for.
We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive a comprehensive series of training emails with actionable information and practical tips that will teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your website, save money creating useful content for your visitors and grow your presence online using content marketing strategies. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!
Ways Of Improving User Experience
Improving user experience (known as UX) will help you keep visitors coming back and engaging with your site. This section will show you different ways to improve visitor engagement and user experience.
RSS Feeds
An RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed provides lots of benefits for your site.
If you provide content 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 sites using RSS feeds, include:
- All of your content updates are in one place
- your content distribution doesn’t rely on email
- Your feeds can be shared and picked up by other sites online
- Users can subscribe to your RSS feed
- An RSS feed provides links to your content
- RSS feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
- There are various ways readers can receive your content (e.g. users can view your content on their mobile device using a feed reader)
- RSS is built into WordPress
There are also benefits when it comes to providing great content on your website from other sites, such as the fact that you don’t have to write, manage or update the content.
You can find RSS feeds with useful content for your website by searching online for medical-related government departments or key industry bodies.
Here are some useful RSS feeds you could consider adding to your 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 select specific feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Emergency preparedness, Health care for women, HIV/AIDS, 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 directory of RSS feeds from well-known medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. Nucleic Acids Research, ADA ClinicalDiabetes, Stem Cells, BMJ Journal of Clinical Pathology, Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
- National Institutes Of Health (www.nih.gov) - Find many health-related news feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
- US Food And Drug Administration (FDA) – Get FDA-related news feeds (e.g. enforcement reports, health fraud, tainted products, foods, 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 (www.cdc.gov) - Get many health-related RSS feeds and podcasts here: http://www2c.cdc.gov/podcasts/rss.asp
- Medical News Feeds: You can search medical news RSS feeds in places like the NYTimes RSS feeds section (e.g. Research: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Research.xml)
- MedicineNet – MedTerms Medical Word of the Day: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/dailyword.xml. You can also choose specific feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Alzheimer’s Disease, Asthma, Nutrition, Food, & Recipes, Depression, Digestion, High Blood Pressure, etc.)
- MedicalNewsToday.com – Medical News 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. Hypertension, Fertility, ADHD/ADD, Autism, Men’s Health, Allergy, Statins, etc.)
You can also just search online for general feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific subjects, e.g. “nuclear medicine rss feeds”, “pediatrics rss feeds”, “obesity rss feeds”, etc.
(RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve your website’s UX.)
Adding Online Charts And Checklists
Checklists and educational charts are a fantastic way to increase visitor engagement, add value to your audience and provide something unique. They can provide visitors with useful step-by-step instructions and resources to perform tasks. Checklists and forms are also great educational tools.
You can provide checklists and forms covering a range of 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, maintenance program, cosmetic dentistry, etc.
- Weight loss and nutrition program checklists and charts
- General charts & infographics (e.g. acidity level of different foods, the importance of sleep at different ages, etc.)
Adding Other Tools
Providing useful tools, gadgets and applications on your website can help increase visitor engagement and significantly add value to users. Calculators, for example are useful tools to add to your website. Others could include things like nutritional tools, and even recipes.
In the next section of this guide, we discuss a several online tools you can add to your site using WordPress plugins and themes that can improve your search engine optimization, increase user engagement and drive more web traffic to your business.
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