Driving traffic to your healthcare website will help you to gain influence in your field. And you can gain new clients for your medical services. Gone are the days when word-of-mouth advertising or a well-placed billboard were enough to sustain your business. The online era brings a lot of opportunity for sharing influence and reaching entirely new audiences. But the sheer amount of online activities in which you can partake is understandably overwhelming. Choosing a few places to improve, and working on them one at a time will let you achieve the growth you’re looking for. Find out some key ways to drive more traffic and get leads from your healthcare website design.
Positive reviews go even farther than you could imagine when they’re online for all to see. Google, Facebook, and medical rating websites provide forums for patients to upload reviews of your practice and services.
Prove patient satisfaction
Even if you haven’t directed patients to make reviews of your practice, it’s possible that there are reviews out in cyberspace. Finding a way to centralize your reviews will give new patients a reliable place to go to see a good sampling of your patient satisfaction.
Encourage reviews
And if you have a particularly satisfied or loyal patient, definitely encourage them to write a review to help your ratings go up. Of course, it’s unethical to offer an incentive or any other motivation to get good reviews. But happy patients should be more than willing to review you because they are pleased with the services.
Drive up local SEO
Good reviews help new patients learn about your services. Plus, positive reviews legitimize your practice in the eyes of the Internet. These reviews also help boost your local SEO rankings.
Get found on the search engines
This is of utmost importance since good local SEO rankings will drive your practice to the top of the page. When users enter related keywords to your practice and include the geographic area, they’ll find you.
Focus on keyword improvement
Speaking of keywords, running a pay-per-click ad and claiming keywords on Google will help you to increase site traffic. These methods do require a bit of investment. But when users type “heart doctor Cleveland” and your practice practically falls into their laps, the investment is worth it.
Getting active on social media platforms, particularly Facebook, which has a portfolio of business services, will help you to generate more website traffic. Set up a business page. Encourage reviews to come there, while you’re at it. This helps you to start claiming your stake in the Facebook medical community.
Find new followers
An active social media presence help you to stay more connected to your existing patients. And this presence will give you the chance to reach new clients, as well. Perhaps you’ve written an awesome essay about healthcare reform or organ transplants. The essay is even better when it is unique in your community. Sharing portions from this article on your social media platform will attract like-minded or curious social media users. Over time, some of these users will begin to look to you as an expert in your field.
Add fresh content regularly
While we’re on the topic of content, having a healthy social media presence requires adding new and relevant content constantly. Depending on the platform, you may want to post up to a few times a day to keep followers interested. Posts can include photos, interesting tidbits, and reminders of your services. Post whatever you think your audience might enjoy and benefit from seeing.
Build customized ads
Facebook ads give you an even greater opportunity to reach new followers. Simply work with the ad tool to select a demographic you want to target, create an ad that links back to your site, and set it free. Facebook users who see your ad will be led back to your website, where they can sign up for your email list or learn more about the services that you offer.
Grow your real-life network
While this activity doesn’t take place in the cloud, it’s important to mention the value of having an active offline network. Social networks online can take you only so far – but if you’re trying to reach a local community, being with the people you want to take part in your services is invaluable.
Engage in your community
Engage your community by participating in volunteer activities or getting involved with charities that complement the services that you offer. You never know who you’ll come across as these events, and face-to-face marketing is still valuable, even in today’s interconnected society. Additionally, community activities may lead to new connections that will want to follow you on social media or join your email list to stay up-to-date with your latest.
Keep regular patients coming back with follow-up appointments
While you’re building a new audience, you don’t want to forget about the people who already trust their health to your care. Include current patients in your online growth goals by adding some of your administrative services – like booking appointments and setting up follow-ups – on your website directly. Who knows? They may even stick around to check out your articles or surf over to your Facebook page. Create an email list for follow-ups, updates, and reminders. This is an excellent way to get online contact info for your patients and potential clients.
Obviously, having a well-made and active website is going to be a draw in and of itself. The importance of regularly adding content and culling your site of irrelevant or useless information will make you stand out.
Add a blog
Consider adding a blog to your website to help your patients and followers learn more about your area of specialty or important new treatment options that might save them time or money. A blog is a useful tool since links to articles can be shared in many places, including on your social media pages.
Use internal links
Internal links are as simple as leading users from one page of your site to another. When you post a blog post that references one of your services, you can include an internal link to your services page to get users acclimated with what you offer. Additionally, using internal links encourages users to stay on your site for longer and boosts your traffic stats.
Add video content
Video content can be incredibly valuable for your users. You can choose to host videos natively or get a free YouTube channel where your videos are primed for sharing. Whichever method you choose, always include a link back to your site and share away on your social media platforms to draw in new users.
Be mobile-friendly
It’s not enough to be online anymore, in today’s mobile optimized society. You also need to be mobile to maximize your online reach. If you haven’t already, make sure that your website is mobile optimized and check out what it looks like on an average smartphone. If your site isn’t mobile optimized, take steps to get it there. A growing number of people use mobile devices to access the Internet. It is important your business website is visible to these clients.
Consider developing an app
Additionally, if you offer services or expertise that might be useful in an app platform, look into having an app designed to help you connect with even more users. Whether it’s a fitness tracker or guide to bug bites in your geographic area, sharing your expertise in an app will grow your reach and influence across the Internet. People will rely on the app to get the info they need.
Get professional help
Sometimes, it’s best to leave things to the experts. And as an expert yourself, you’re probably all too familiar with the pitfalls that people fall into when they try to handle areas of particular expertise on their own. A website designer and marketing professional can help transform your online space to make it more useful and appealing. Keep in mind the WordPress platform is easy to use and simple to update so you can get some hands-on experience with simple tasks.
Let a developer take care of it
Getting professional development assistance with your website will help you to iron out bugs that make pages lag or photos appear odd and smushed down. There is quite a bit of backend work that your developer can do. You might not see the actual work, but these professional efforts will make your site run more smoothly. Patients are sure to appreciate a website that is attractive and navigable.
Additionally, if you need help with mobile optimization or social media management, finding experts in these fields will save you a lot of time and headache, so you can get back to doing what you do best. Adding a team of online experts to your staff, whether physically or virtually, will help you to grow your practice and your online presence.
Thank you for reading our blog! How can we help you? Contact us today.