Grow Your Medical Or Healthcare Business Online With WordPress

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

Challenges Professional Health Services Providers Face Online

Today, more than ever, medical providers must work harder to remain competitive and generate new clientele. Not only do you have to become actively involved in the community you serve, you must also develop and maintain an active web presence. This includes having an effective web presence and figuring out smarter ways to market your medical services online.

As well as spending money in offline marketing, you will probably find that in order to compete with other medical or health businesses, increasingly larger amounts of their budget will need to be allocated towards the development and maintenance of a website that brings new prospective clients, engages visitors, outranks the competition in search engines and social media, and helps you gain wider reach online.

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

One other problem that medical professionals face with their websites, and most other professions for that matter, is that you have an average of thirty seconds or less to provide visitors what they are searching 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

Online Opportunities For Health Professionals

As well as facing many business and technology changes, there are also plenty of online opportunities available for medical-related practices that can evolve to meet online economy challenges and can think strategically when it comes to marketing their services better online.

In this comprehensive guide, you will discover ways to find new bookings and establish online credibility for your health or medical-related business.

As well as providing tips and information on ways to improve your health-related business online, we also place special emphasis on the benefits and advantages of using WordPress to power your medical or health-related website.

To learn more about the benefits and advantages of using WordPress, see these articles:

• Why A Poorly Constructed Web Site Can Lose You Customers And What To Do About It
• The Beginner’s Guide To Growing Your Successful Business Using A WordPress Site

Practical Tips For Improving Your Medical Services And Health-Related Site

Let’s start by covering the basics. In this section, we’ll look at how to improve your website and get better results online. We show you what pages your site needs, what type of content works best for health-related websites, navigation structure, etc.

If you need website planning assistance, visit this page: The Web Site Planning Process Explained: A Basic Primer For Business Owners

Essential Website Pages

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

Products And Services

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

• Medical And Surgical – e.g. anaesthetics, orthopedics endocrinology, reconstructive surgery, rehabilitation medicine, rheumatology, endoscopy, optometry palliative care, etc.
• Dental Services – e.g. cosmetic dentistry, holistic dentistry, oral health, restorations, dentofacial orthopedics, emergency dental services, etc.
• Cardiology – e.g. cardiac patient rehabilitation, coronary care
• Prenatal/Neonatal – e.g. obstetrics, maternity services, etc.
• Child Health – paediatrics, child development, children services, etc.
• Diagnostic – breast screening, skin cancer, medical imaging, pap smears, psychosis, food allergy testing, etc.
• Pathology – lab testing and analysis, routine pathology testing, clinical trials, speech pathology, etc
• Counselling services – mental health services, alcohol, tobacco & other drug counselling, couples, diet and nutrition counselling, social work services
• Alternative therapies – acupuncture, homeopathy, holistic medicine, massage therapy, chiropractic, hypnotherapy, etc.
• Other medical services/therapies – weight management, othopedics, reproductive services, rehabilitation, neurosciences, artificial limbs, sleep therapy, home care, sexual health, medical transport, etc.

List all of the services you provide. Provide your visitors with information that will educate them about the benefits of using these services and direct them to your contact or appointment booking page.

Who We Are

The ‘About Us’ page needs to describe your business and explain to visitors what your business stands for, its unique approach, sponsored community activities, etc.

It’s important to list any awards, certifications, accreditations, recognitions, associations, publications, etc., that can be used to promote your medical services and position yourself above your competitors.

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

Team Profile Page

If you are looking for inexpensive ways to sell more products online, then something you can do, is help your visitors get to know, like and trust you, your team 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 bio. Since most visitors won’t be that well-versed in health terms your bio descriptions should tell who they are and what they specialize in. You may also want to explain what those specialties mean. This page should include social buttons so your site visitors can follow individual staff members on their social pages.

On this page, don’t be afraid to humanize your people with personal stories, hobbies, etc., but make sure to highlight your person’s expertise and qualifications, why they are an invaluable asset to your team, and more importantly, how they will help add value to your clients’ business.

(Add a staff description page. Image source: southperthchiro.com.au)

If you need help how to create and add an easy-to-maintain simple team members directory to your website using a free plugin, go here: How To Add An Employee Directory: Plugin Tutorial

Job Opportunities Page

This is a listing of career opportunities within the business. This page should include type of training provided, benefits, opportunities for advancement, etc. You should also include information about career opportunities in the health 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.

Case Studies And Testimonials

Testimonials from past clients and case studies are a great way to attract prospective clients and showcase the services you offer. By adding a page with testimonials from previous clients and case studies, you will also help to provide visitors social proof online.

(Add a page with case studies and testimonials from past clients. Screenshot source: arrowsmiledental.com)

If you want to learn more about using testimonials, case studies and client reviews, see this article: How To Get Better Results Online With Awesome Testimonials

Contact Us Page

Having a contact page is crucial.

Your contact page should include:

• Name
• Your physical location
• Telephone
• Facsimile number
• Email address
• Map
• Web URL
• Contact form
• Name of person to contact
• Social media web addresses
• Interactive chat feature (optional)

If your business operates from multiple locations you will want to make that clear when displaying the address and contact info.

Consider also including a few links point to the most commonly asked questions page, frequently-visited pages, booking request, helpdesk, newsletter opt-in form, blog, etc.

Add A Medical-Related Blog Section

A blog can be a very powerful marketing tool. Most blogging platforms typically include a content management system that is simple to use and allows you to promote your business by publishing timely content such as the latest announcements, updates, training articles, discussions on current topics, how-to videos, media presentations, etc.

If you already have an established health-related website, then consider adding a WordPress-powered blog to market your services.

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

Very few people know that an expertly configured WordPress site can turn your web presence into an automated traffic system that will help begin to attract targeted visitors to your site, simply by publishing regular content to your website.

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

Go here to learn more about this:

• Website Traffic Blueprint – Learn How To Grow Your Website Visitors For Your Business

Legal Pages

As a professional health or medical services practitioner, ensuring that you have a website that complies will all legal requirements online is crucially important. This is not only important for establishing trust and credibility with visitors, but also to ensure that you are not breaching any local, regional or federal laws and regulations wherever you provide services.

Adding some or all of the legal pages below to your medical site will help you stay out of trouble with most regulatory authorities, third-party service providers (e.g. Facebook), and other potential sources of legal threats and 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/Financial Disclaimers
• Refund Policy
• Video/Audio Terms
• etc.

We have written a detailed article about adding legal pages to your site. Go here to learn more about this: The Importance Of Adding Legal Pages To Your Website

Tips On How To Improve Your Content

In today’s highly competitive global economy, the ability to deliver valuable content to visitors free of charge has become one of the key business differentiators.

By committing to providing great content with tips and information, you will get your visitors sharing it with others and coming back for more content. This is a great way to inform and educate site visitors and prospective clients about using your products and services.

For example, if you provide services that help people manage their weight, then some of the areas you could cover as content on your site:

• What’s the difference between being overweight and obese?
• How to figure out how many calories you burn each day
• Recovering after weight loss surgery – useful tips and suggestions
• How to curb the late night urges for a snack (e.g. drink water with lemon)
• And endless other content topics

You can also create a series of educational articles that will help your your readers understand your services, by explaining benefits, procedures, terminology, etc.

Remember to use relevant keywords and terminology in your articles that your readers 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 teach exactly how to drive more traffic to your site, save money creating useful content that will add value to your visitors and grow your website using content marketing. It’s not only a great course with loads of useful information, it’s also completely FREE!

Improving Visitor Engagement And User Experience

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

Content Syndication – RSS Feeds

Adding RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve your visitor engagement and UX in several ways.

If you provide valuable content, other sites may want to syndicate your content.

Some of the benefits of having other businesses syndicate your content, include:

• All of your updates are in one place
• your content distribution doesn’t rely on email
• Can be shared
• Users can subscribe to your RSS feed
• An RSS feed provides links to your site
• RSS feeds can be submitted to RSS directories and aggregators
• There are multiple ways your readers can 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 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.

To find useful RSS feeds just search online for relevant government departments or industry bodies.

For example, here are some useful RSS feeds you could add to your 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 select individual RSS feeds, like feeds on women’s health issues (e.g. Body image, Fitness and nutrition, Illnesses and disabilities, 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 RSS feeds from well-known medical journals, publications and websites (e.g. BioMed Central, CDC Emerging Infectious Diseases Journal, Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, BMJ Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Cambridge Journals Online, etc.) go here: http://www.healthplusplus.com/wiki/List_of_RSS_feeds_on_health
• National Institutes Of Health (www.nih.gov) - Get many health-related RSS feeds here: http://www.nih.gov/Subscriptions.htm
• US Food And Drug Administration (FDA) – Get FDA-related feeds (e.g. enforcement reports, FDA drug shortages, tainted products, vaccines, blood and biologics, etc.) and podcasts here: http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/ContactFDA/StayInformed/RSSFeeds
• Department of Health UK (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. Victoria – http://www.health.vic.gov.au/rss/newsfeed.xml
• Centers For Disease Control And Prevention - Find various health-related feeds 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. Medical 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. Medications, Cancer, Neurology, Diet & Weight Management, Exercise & Fitness, Hearing, etc.)
• Medical News Today – MNT Featured Headlines: http://rss.medicalnewstoday.com/featurednews.xml
• Medical News Today – You can also select specific RSS feeds here: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/newsfeeds-rss (e.g. Gout, Seniors/Aging, Cervical Cancer/HPV Vaccine, Regulatory Affairs/Drug Approvals, Food Intolerance, Cleft Palate, Medical Practice Management, etc.)

You can also search online for general feeds, e.g. “medical rss feeds” or search for feeds on specific topics, e.g. “homecare rss feeds”, “medical malpractice rss feeds”, “psychiatry rss feeds”, etc.

(RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds can help to improve your health or medical site’s UX.)

Checklists & Forms

Adding checklists and educational charts to your site is a great way to help increase visitor engagement, add value to your audience and set yourself apart from the competition. Forms and checklists can provide users with useful step-by-step instructions and resources to complete necessary steps. They can also be great educational tools.

Forms, charts and checklists could cover topics such as:

• Checklists and forms for booking appointments
• Checklists for post-surgery recovery
• Health checklists and charts for specific conditions
• Dental checklists – e.g. first visit, oral hygiene program, cosmetic dentistry, etc.
• Weight loss and nutrition program checklists
• General charts & infographics (e.g. acidity level of different foods, sleep requirements at different ages, etc.)

Adding Online Tools

Providing useful tools and applications on your website is a great way to increase visitor engagement and add significant value to your visitors. Calculators are useful tools to add to your website. Others can include things like diagnostic tools, or even recipes.

In the next section, we will look at a number of online tools you can use in your health-related website using WordPress plugins and themes that can help improve seo, increase user engagement and drive more visitors to your business.

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This is the end of part one.

Click on this link to continue:

• Online Business Tips For Health And Medical Services Providers – WordPress Plugins That Improve Search Engine Optimization, Increase User Engagement And Generate More Traffic

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