Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress
Health professionals today are facing significant challenges created by the digital economy.
Online Challenges For Health Services Providers
Today, more than ever, medical services providers must work harder to stand apart from the crowd and generate new clientele. Not only do you have to become more involved in the community you serve, you must also develop and maintain a strong presence online. This includes having a website and figuring out better ways to grow your business online.
In addition to investing money in offline marketing activities, businesses in the health-related industry are now also finding that increasingly larger amounts of their marketing budget will need to be allocated to developing and maintaining a website that will attract new clients, engage users, outrank the competition in search engines and help to increase their presence online.
This means that your site not only has to look great, your pages have to load fast, 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 some aspects may need to be updated frequently. This requires the implementation of a well-planned website and content management strategy.
One other problem that medical-related businesses face online (as do other professions for that matter), is that your site has an average of thirty seconds to give visitors what they are searching for or they will look 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
Online Opportunities For Medical And Health Businesses
As well as facing many new business and technology changes, there are also many online opportunities available to health or medical-related practices that can evolve to meet digital economy challenges and can think outside the box when it comes to improving their online business marketing skills.
This comprehensive guide will help you uncover new ways and opportunities to find more potential clients and establish online credibility for your health or medical business.
As well as providing general website improvement tips, we also focus on the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system (CMS) to power your health website or blog.
For more information about the benefits and advantages of using the WordPress content management system, see these articles:
- How A Poorly Designed Website Can Lose You Customers And What To Do About It
- Everything You Need To Know About Growing A Successful Small Business With A WordPress Blog
Practical Tips To Improve Your Website
Let’s start by going over some basic information you need. In this section, we’ll look at how to improve your website and get better results online. We will look at what pages a medical site needs, what content works best, suggestions for improving your site’s layout and navigation structure, etc.
If you need additional information about website planning, see this detailed guide: A Basic Guide To Web Site Planning For Non-Technical Business Owners
Ways To Improve Your Web Pages
Professional business websites require some basic pages. Let’s discuss the pages your need and how to structure your medical or health website for best results.
Description Of Products And Services
You need a page that explains your products and services. Depending on which area you specialize in, your page could include services like:
- Medicine & Surgery – e.g. acute pain management, pulmonology blood disorders, oncology, stroke, rheumatology, weight loss surgery, ophtalmology palliative care, etc.
- Dental Services – e.g. preventive dentistry, children’s dentistry, gum disease, veneers, crowns and bridges, dental implants, emergency dental, etc.
- Cardiology – e.g. cardiac patient education, chronic heart conditions
- Prenatal & Postnatal – e.g. birthing, maternity services, etc.
- Child Health services – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
- Diagnostic services – mammography, lung screening, hearing, gynaecology, magnetic resonance imaging, allergy testing, etc.
- Pathology – lab testing and analysis, emergency pathology testing, clinical trials, speech pathology, etc
- Counselling – mental health services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug counselling, trauma counselling, wellness, social work services
- Alternative treatments – Chinese medicine, aromatherapy, hydrotherapy, yoga, chiropractic, hypnosis, etc.
- Other medical services/therapies – diet and nutrition, othopedics, fertility services, optical services, medical genetics, artificial limbs, assisted living, home and community care, community health, medical supplies, etc.
Make sure to list all of the services you provide, not just the ones you specialize in. Educate your visitors about the benefits of using these services and why they should book an appointment.
Who We Are
This page should give a description of your business and what your business stands for, its unique approach, causes supported, etc.
This page should include any business awards, recognitions, certifications, accreditations, associations, publications, etc., that can be used to promote your medical, dental, chiropractic, surgery services, etc. and to position yourself above similar service providers.
(List all of your awards recognitions, certifications, accreditations, publications, associations, etc. in your About Us page. Screenshot image sourced from: squaremedical.com.au)
Meet Our Team
If you are searching for ideas to sell more products online, then one of the things you can do, is make it easier for your visitors to get to know, like and trust you and your business better.
Your business needs to be relatable. One great way to do that is to have a page that introduces your people. This page should include a photo and a brief biography. Since most visitors won’t be 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 do. This page can include social buttons so your prospective clients can follow some of your staff members on their social pages.
In this page, make sure to outline your person’s expertise, why they are an asset to your team, and more importantly, how they will help add value to your clients’ business.
(Make sure to add an employee description page. Screenshot image sourced from: southperthchiro.com.au)
To learn more about how to add an easy-to-manage directory of employees in your web site using a free WordPress plugin, go here: How To Easily Create A Simple Employee Directory For Your WordPress Site Without Editing Code
Recruitment Page
This is a listing of career opportunities available within your business. This page could include training provided, benefits, opportunities for advancement, etc. You can include information such as the job outlook and additional career opportunities in the health or medical-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, subscribe to your newsletter, follow your social pages, etc.
Testimonials
Testimonials from past clients and case studies are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase your services. Adding a page with client reviews and case studies also establishes social proof.
(Add a web page with case studies and reviews from clients. Image source: arrowsmiledental.com)
We have written a comprehensive article on using testimonials, case studies and reviews improve your business online. Go here to learn more: Improve Your Sales Conversions Using Knockout User Testimonials
Contact Us
A functional contact page is crucial.
It should include some or all of the following information:
- Name Of Your Business
- Your physical address
- Phone
- Fax
- Contact email address
- Map and directions
- Website URL
- Contact form
- Contact name
- Links to social media networks
- Chat/Skype
If your business operates in different areas you want to make that clear when displaying your address and contact information.
Consider also including links to an FAQ page, frequently-visited pages, online booking form, support page, newsletter opt-in form, blog, etc.
Add A Medical Or Health-Related Blog
A blog is a powerful marketing tool for your business. Blogs are built around a content management system that is simple to use and allows you to promote your business using content like news and announcements, updates, educational articles, opinions on current topics, promotional videos, media presentations, etc.
If you already have an existing health website, then consider adding a WordPress blog to create more exposure for your medical business.
If you don’t have a website yet, or if your existing website is very hard to manage or not giving you the results you want, then WordPress can act both as your business website and blog.
Something few people know about, is that WordPress can turn your web presence into an automated traffic-generation system that can help begin to attract new targeted traffic to your site, simply by publishing regular content to your website.
(An expertly configured WordPress site can generate traffic automatically to your site)
For more details:
Legal Information
It’s essential for professional businesses to make sure they have a compliant website. This is not only important for establishing trust and credibility with prospective clients, but also to ensure that you are not breaching local, regional and federal laws or regulations wherever your business is located.
Depending on what products and services you provide, adding some or all of the following legal pages to your health website will help keep you out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers, and other potential legal threats and inconveniences:
- Contact Page
- Privacy Policy
- 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
- etc.
To learn more about adding legal pages to your website, refer to this article: What You Need To Know About Adding Legal Pages To Your Site
Improve Your Web Content
In today’s fiercely competitive online business economy, the sooner you start to publish great content on your site, the sooner you will begin to differentiate yourself from the competition.
Provide great content with useful information, advice or tips that will get your readers sharing it with others and coming back for more. Content marketing is a great way to educate your visitors and prospective clients about using your products and services.
For example, if your business provides products or services that help people manage their weight, then some of the areas you can write about include the following:
- What is BMI (what it stands for, what it does, how to calculate yours)
- How to set realistic, but challenging weight loss goals
- Why using a measuring tape is better than a scale when it comes to weight loss progress
- How to incorporate a little fast food into a healthy diet plan
- Etc.
You can also create a series of informative articles that will help your your prospective clients gain a better understanding of your health services, by explaining benefits, procedures, costs (including payment plans, insurance coverage, etc).
Include keywords in your content that readers will search for online.
We recommend subscribing to our Content Marketing Email Training Series. You will receive regular training emails with actionable information and practical tips that will show you how to drive more traffic to your website, save money creating high-quality content for your site visitors and grow your presence online using content marketing. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!
Ways Of Improving Visitor Experience
Improving website user experience (generally referred to as UX) helps you keep visitors coming back and using your site. This section will show you different ways to improve your visitor engagement and user experience.
Syndicating Content - RSS Feeds
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds provide lots of benefits for your site.
If you provide valuable information, other businesses may want to syndicate your content.
Some of the benefits of having other businesses syndicate your content, include:
- All of your updates are kept in one place
- Doesn’t rely on email
- Your feed can be shared and picked up by other sites online
- Users can subscribe to your RSS feed
- It provides links to your content
- RSS feeds can be submitted to RSS directories
- RSS provides multiple ways for your readers to receive your content (e.g. subscribers can view your content on their mobile device using feed readers)
- It’s built into WordPress
There are also a number of benefits to providing information on 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 relevant government departments or well-known industry bodies.
Below we have listed some 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 search by departments and select individual RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Breast cancer, Fitness and nutrition, Heart health and stroke, Menopause, Screening tests and vaccines, 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. Rheumatology, ADA DiabetesCare , BMJ Injury Prevention, Current Psychiatry, Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
- National Institutes Of Health - Get many health-related feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
- FDA – Get FDA-related feeds (e.g. enforcement reports, FDA drug shortages, pet health, cosmetics, 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. NSW – http://www.health.nsw.gov.au/pages/rss.aspx
- Centers For Disease Control And Prevention - Get many RSS feeds on health-related 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. Fitness & nutrition: http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Nutrition.xml)
- MedicineNet.com – Weekly Health and Medical News Digest: http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/weeklyhealth.xml. You can also select specific RSS feeds here (http://www.medicinenet.com/rss/article.htm) (e.g. Allergies, Menopause, Cholesterol, Diet & Weight Management, Eyesight, Women’s Health, etc.)
- Medical News Today – MNT 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. Medical Students/Training, Pulmonary System, Sexual Health/STDs, Menopause, Water – Air Quality/Agriculture, Cleft Palate, Tuberculosis, etc.)
You can also search online for general RSS feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific subjects, e.g. “avian flu rss feeds”, “prostate rss feeds”, “cancer rss feeds”, etc.
(RSS feeds can help to improve your site’s user experience.)
Checklists & Charts
Checklists and charts are a great way to help increase user engagement and add value to your audience. Charts and checklists can provide users with step-by-step information and resources to complete a task. They are great client instructional tools.
You can provide online or downloadable forms and checklists covering a range of areas such as:
- Booking appointments
- Checklists for post-surgery recovery
- Health checklists and charts for specific systems
- Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, caries prevention program, general dentistry, etc.
- Weight loss and exercise program checklists
- General charts & infographics (e.g. acidity level of different foods, the importance of sleep at different stages of development, etc.)
Add Unique Tools
Providing useful online tools and applications on your site is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add significant value to your visitors. Calculators are useful tools you can add to your website. Others would include things like nutritional tools, and even recipes.
In the next section of this guide, we take a look at a several online tools you can use in your medical or health-related site using WordPress plugins and themes that can help to improve your search engine optimization, improve user engagement and generate more web traffic to your business.
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This is the end of section one of this comprehensive guide on ways to improve your health-related business online.
To view Part 2, click here:
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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