In today’s modern world it feels like everything is moving faster than ever before. Women are especially busier than ever, having to juggle their families, career, and a thousand other responsibilities. These changes have created a boom in convenience and time saving services, and forever altered how modern OB/GYN providers connect with their patients. Don't let your practice stay stuck in the past. Ride the digital wave to success with these easy to follow tips and tricks to attract and retain patients in today’s digital world.
What Patients Expect
Everyone expects fast, easy, and flawless service. Patients have grown accustomed to appointment scheduling online, communication via email and text, and telehealth services provided on a digital platform. Just as their expectations for service have evolved, so have their expectations for marketing.
Print media ads and radio endorsements don't mean as much as they used to. Instead, the new normal has become comprehensive, multi-channel engagement strategies across several platforms. This means touching on each step of their consumer journey, and keeping in constant contact with helpful advice and content that provides value to them. By focusing your efforts on digital marketing, you can stand out from the competition and accelerate your growth much faster than ever before.
Your Website - The Storefront Of The Digital World
The average American spends 5-6 hours online each day, this number has only been trending upwards with each year. Nearly everyone has a mobile smart phone in their pocket and a computer at home. This means that creating and maintaining a strong and visually-appealing web presence is a necessity for OB/GYN practices who are looking to remain relevant in the modern era.
A beautifully designed website helps to attract prospective patients in a similar manner to how a well-kept storefront or office attracts foot traffic. If your business does not come across as professional, well maintained, and organized, then most patients will turn the other way and leave without ever setting foot in your building or clicking through your site.
However, just looking good isn’t enough to draw in customers, you need to rank well on Google and other search engines to draw that traffic into your website. This is where an expertly crafted SEO strategy comes into play. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization, it's how companies like Google rank your site and decide which sites to display on their pages. Getting on the top page has a tremendous impact on your search traffic, and without targeting the proper keywords and providing the right content, your site might be lagging behind the competition.
To rank #1, you will want to bolster your site with more content, such as blogs and service pages. Be sure to incorporate keywords your patients are looking for to drive traffic to the relevant page. Your relevance ranking plays a large part in how likely each page is to show up on a search engine like Google. Search engines only want to put the best and most relevant sites at the top of their search results, which is why there is so much competition for that top spot. These proven SEO tactics will help prospective patients who need an OB/GYN provider to quickly and easily discover your site.
The Importance Of Social Media
What people say about you matters, and in today’s digital landscape it's even easier for unhappy customers to get their voice heard. The explosion of social media has made reputation management even more vital to business success than ever before. Use social media as a tool to spread awareness about your services, highlight your best features, inform your viewers of any changes, and address complaints.
Your social media presence can even affect how you get new patients from direct referrals. Most women will do their own additional research online before choosing an OB/GYN, even if you are referred by someone they trust. Social media has made it incredibly easy and convenient for potential patients to quickly scroll through your brand, and see what other women are saying about your practice. Managing patient reviews,your star rating on Google, and local listings can have a significant impact on how people view your practice and whether or not they choose to trust you.
Local Search For Local Success
Even with an amazing website design and all the digital conveniences your patients expect, if your site isn't easy to find, then you might not see the increase in traffic you were hoping for. People’s attention spans are shrinking. No one wants to scroll through dozen of sites to find what they are looking for, and ranking #1 globally is a monumental task. Instead, it's best to focus your efforts on the surrounding areas and become a hometown hero.
With an effective SEO strategy focused on enhancing your visibility across local search, you’ll maintain a steady stream of new patients. While optimizing for local search is critical, it's not always the easiest task. Ranking at the top requires expertise and frequent updates in a digital landscape where the rules and best practices are always changing.
While the fine details might shift over time, some cornerstones of a good strategy always remain true. You want to create a comprehensive search engine optimization strategy that reaches across several touch points throughout the customer journey. You want to set clear boundaries about your location, service areas, and what you provide. Having a clear and concise message that hits your key points without going overboard can be a challenging balancing act, but will always pay off in the long run. Be sure to verify your business on Google Business, WebMD, and any other local listing sites that are reputable.
Tying It All Together
Growth always starts by expanding your presence and attracting more customers. For an OB/GYN practice, that means reaching out to new patients and providing excellent service that will keep existing patients from walking away. The best way to expand and grow online is through a comprehensive digital marketing strategy that involves your website, social media, local listing, and more. Your website is usually the first place potential customers will interact with your brand online. It allows you to connect and engage with prospective patients while they’re doing their research at the beginning of their customer journey. Social media allows you to connect directly with potential and existing patients to build trust and connections. Your local listing and Google Business Account helps you to target potential patients close to your practice.
When all these components are optimized and unified in their message, it means more visibility for your site, and more patients for you. Making the perfect digital marketing strategy can be difficult, especially when it's not your specialty. Which is why you need the right tools and the right support to succeed.