For a practice to grow and thrive, it needs a steady stream of new patients. Before the days of the internet, most medical practices depended heavily on current patient referrals and word of mouth to spread the word about their practice and services. While this tactic is very effective, it is limited to the amount of people a patient knows, such as friends and family. However, with the help of search engines and digital marketing, healthcare practices have the ability to get the word out about their practice to a much larger audience of prospective patients.
If you are looking to boost your practice’s marketing efforts but aren’t sure where to start, here are a few basic digital marketing tactics to help extend your practice’s reach and make new connections with potential patients.
Harnessing SEO & Content Marketing
If your practice has a functioning website, great! You already have a foot in the door to new patient leads online. However, if that site is not user-friendly or hasn’t been updated in a decade, it probably could use some sprucing up. This is where implementing SEO tactics come into play. SEO (search engine optimization) is a marketing strategy that involves optimizing websites to rank higher on search engines. This can involve a wide range of tactics from integrating focus keywords into your website’s copy, to filling out your site’s metadata, to optimizing the site for mobile use. Working together, these tactics will help to boost your site’s ranking, or where your website shows up, in search engine result pages.
Most people will never stray much further than the first page of Google’s search results when looking for something online. Earning one of those top spots for a highly searched keyword or phrase like “pediatrician in Dallas” will undoubtedly garner more visits to your practice’s website.
Reputation Management
Another important factor to improving your practice’s online marketing efforts is managing your practice’s reputation online. Especially in metropolitan areas, patients have a lot of options on where to go to seek medical care. Before scheduling an appointment, many will do research on review sites, such as Yelp or Google, to get a better idea of what patients’ experiences were with your practice. These review sites are essentially the new word of mouth referral and reach a much larger audience than just friends and family.
Should a potential patient read a bank of recent, positive reviews about your practice, they will feel more confident scheduling an appointment and being under your care. The same can be said in the opposite situation. Should a potential patient be greeted by a string of dissatisfied reviews, this will easily dissuade someone from reaching out to your practice. Luckily, there are programs like
Review Builder that can help practices build their online reputation organically.
Medical Practice Marketing Guidance
RemedyConnect has been working with medical practices for years to help drive new growth and enhance patient experiences through proven digital marketing strategies and web services. We are a team of medical professionals and digital marketing experts with a desire to simplify the healthcare experience through technology. Our goal is to offer a comprehensive service to improve your practice’s online presence and ultimately, grow your business. Learn more about our fully integrated service offerings including:
web services,
after-hours answering services, top notch medical content, and
telehealth for your practice.