12 Tips to Optimise Your Medical Website
In today’s world, web presence is of utmost importance. Be it a small business or a professional – a website is necessary to communicate with your audience, generate interest and provide general information.
Having a website is not enough to generate traffic to your site or convert potential patients into real patients. You need to optimise your site. But do you need a website to promote your practice? Definitely yes. Read our blog on why it is essential for medical professionals to have websites. In this article, we share 12 tips to optimise your medical website from our web designers in Perth. It is not a one-time effort either; optimisation strategies keep changing continuously as search engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing etc.) use smarter and smarter analytics to evaluate internet user behaviour. You will always need to monitor and modify continuously to keep your website optimised.
Here are 12 tips you must follow if you want to optimise your medical website –
1. Website Speed
Slow websites lead to increased abandon rates and low indexation by search engines. This affects your search engine results negatively. So, page loading speed is a crucial factor for optimisation and will remain so. A fast website leads to user satisfaction, higher search engine ranking and better conversions. This is our number one recommendation to optimise your medical website. You should look for a good hosting provider with 24/7 support services. A premium hosting service provider like The Computing Australia Group can ensure good speed for your website and 24/7 technical support.
2. Smartphone Friendly Website
With more and more people turning to their smartphones to use the net, it is vital that your website must be easy to navigate on a smartphone. Mobile phone users generally do not click on links as much as a PC user, so important information and images should be available upfront.
3. Real Business Information
Ensuring your business information (name, address, phone number) is updated and the same across all pages gives credibility to your site. Also, your patients would mostly be from the local area where your practice is located and would do a search for medical professionals in the area. Using a tool like Google My Business allows you to appear in maps and local area listings and lets visitors leave reviews. Reviews help in improving SEO and increase in visitors. GMB also provides insights about visitor traffic, like where your visitors are coming from and their demographics. For more information, check our blog on Google My Business.
4. Site Formatting
Your site must have a good structure to be easily accessible and indexable by a search engine. Easy indexing ensures higher search rankings. You should have headings and subheadings and use relevant keywords in these. Users must also be able to navigate through your site easily. One of the best ways is to use navigation bars at the top of the page and to have clear and eye-catching Calls to Action. If your site is not user-friendly, it will have high ‘bounce’ rates, which will affect your search engine rankings very negatively.
5. Quality Content
Your website should have good quality and authentic information. Post useful articles, blogs on medical developments regularly to keep your site up to date and relevant. Use keyword rich content but do not stuff your site with them as it is considered low-quality content and search engines will penalise you. Use images and videos on your site and ensure that the description is rich in relevant keywords. Ensure that visual representations are in accordance with the National guidelines.
6. Build Links
Build links from your site to authoritative and reputable sites, which have a higher ranking than yours. A good example would be government agencies and authoritative health sites. If you can get a link back from authoritative sites, it can give a huge boost to your site rankings. Use blogs for consistent link building, but do not overdo it. A few links to trusted and authoritative sites are much better than a lot of links to low-ranking pages. Ensure that you remove dead links on your site regularly.
7. Adhere to Guidelines
Ensure that your website design and content is in accordance with the Medical Board of Australia’s Guidelines for Advertising of Regulated Health Services. You would not want to be penalised or your website taken down for any violation. For, e.g., certain advertisements for therapeutic medicines need approval before publication. Restrictions on the use of testimonials, discounts and low prices, use of warning statements for surgical and invasive procedures, etc, are some of the common areas where guidelines are usually overlooked.
8. Use Right Images
Using images will break the wall of content on your site, especially for articles or posts. As much as possible, use real photos rather than stock images. Of course, we don’t mean the actual medical procedures. But while using a ‘team at work’ image, use photos of your staff. Also, try to avoid too clinical images, as some patients may get squeamish with graphic images.
9. Optimise for Voice Search
Optimising your content for voice search has become essential with the increasing popularity of voice-activated devices like smart speakers and virtual assistants. This involves using natural, conversational language that mirrors how people speak rather than how they type. Focus on answering common patient questions directly and clearly, as voice search queries often take the form of questions. By doing so, you can improve your chances of appearing in voice search results and better meet the needs of your audience.
10. Use Clear and Compelling CTAs
Ensure your call-to-action (CTA) buttons are designed to stand out visually, using contrasting colours and bold text to grab attention. Make the language on your CTAs clear and action-oriented, such as “Book an Appointment” or “Contact Us Today.” Strategically place these buttons in prominent locations on your website, like the homepage, service pages, and at the end of blog posts. This helps guide visitors seamlessly towards taking the desired actions, such as booking appointments or contacting your practice for more information.
11. Improve Website Accessibility
Ensure your website is accessible to everyone, including individuals with disabilities, by adhering to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). These guidelines provide comprehensive recommendations for making web content more accessible, such as using alt text for images, ensuring sufficient colour contrast, and enabling keyboard navigation. By following WCAG, you can create an inclusive online experience that meets the needs of all users and complies with legal accessibility standards.
12. Monitor and Analyse Website Performance
Utilise tools like Google Analytics to track various metrics on your website, such as visitor behaviour, traffic sources, and conversion rates. By analysing this data, you can identify areas for improvement, such as pages with high bounce rates or low engagement. This information lets you make informed, data-driven decisions to enhance your website’s performance and user experience.
So, that was our recommended 12 tips to optimise your medical website. Once your site is optimised, check out our blog on how to use your online presence to get more patients. Website optimisation is a highly dynamic, technical and continuous job. Keeping up with it will take your time and attention away from your practice. Let The Computing Australia Group’s SEO team in Perth do the job for you. We design and maintain websites, do SEO audits for your site, develop optimisation strategies and keep your site optimised at all times. Talk to our experts today or email us at sales@computingaustralia.group. Contact us today.
Jargon Buster
Hosting Service Provider : A provider where your actual website files and images are stored. This is different from a domain provider. A good provider ensures your website is fast, optimised and available 24/7.
Stock Images : Images that can be bought online for a license fee. These are generic images that you would search to match your requirement.
SEO audit : It is an analysis to see how well your website is optimised for visibility in search engines.
Reviewed on – August 23,2020
Reviewed by – Monisha M M
Changed title from 7 Tips to Optimise Your Medical Website to 8 Tips to Optimise Your Medical Website
Included point on using Right Images
by The Computing Australia Group