How Online Reviews Can Improve Your SEO

Search engine optimization, SEO, used to be as simple as stuffing a landing page full of redundant keywords in order to rank higher for relevant searches. However, search engines have since gotten wiser and now rank websites by the quality of their content– user generated content being among the most valuable. Therefore, genuine customer reviews can significantly improve a business’s SEO, placing them higher on the search results page. 

Let’s take a look at the specific benefits online reviews have in regards to SEO:

1. More keywords

Reviews are known as user-generated content because customers are content creators too! In fact, they are often considered the most valuable creators as prospective customers often look for reviews when making a purchase decision. And Google recognizes this, which is why the search engine will scrape new reviews, good or bad, for relevant keywords. Customer reviews are saturated with relevant keywords, be it your company name, products, services, or other related search terms.

So, whether the review itself is positive or negative, your SEO only improves! However, you should always strive for positive reviews, obviously.

2. Enhanced competitor edge

Many companies think content curation is the only way to improve SEO. Therefore, while your competitors are focused elsewhere, you can boost your online ranking by generating customer reviews. You should start by collecting reviews on your Google My Business listing so you can improve your overall SEO, as well as your local SEO (we’ll discuss this later). 

Then you should do some research to determine what other review sites are most important to your business. Once you’ve done this, consider implementing a widget on your site that displays all of your best customer reviews. This expands the opportunity of prospective customers reading your reviews, driving your traffic and clickthrough rate.

3. Google favors user generated content

Google looks at the quality of a customer review the same as it looks at the quality of a backlink. If a backlink isn’t relevant to its content or doesn’t provide any additional value, then Google doesn’t see it as an advantage. In terms of reviews, a negative review doesn’t benefit the user, therefore Google favors positive reviews. Google also looks for relevancy and frequency of reviews. Which is why local listings always start with businesses that have the highest number and most recent reviews, disregarding advertisements.

4. Review responses increase interaction

Google My Business advises companies to interact with their customers on their GMB listing by responding to reviews. Why? Well, while they do not explicitly explain this piece of advice, it is obvious that it gives the platform more information to scrape. Therefore, by responding to customer feedback, you not only engage your clientele but you could potentially boost your online ranking. Responding to negative reviews could even persuade the customer to change their feedback.

5. Reviews decrease bounce rates

Bounce rates can kill a company’s online ranking. Studies have found that showcasing online reviews can actually improve a business’s bounce and conversion rates. This is because reviews enable customers to gain knowledge and trust for a business before making a purchase. Therefore, businesses should display their best reviews on popular directories and their own website.

6. Local SEO

Local SEO refers to how local businesses are ranked in their area. For example, if someone from Dallas Google searches “dentists near me” only dentists in and around Dallas will populate. The dentists will be ranked based on their Google My Business review quality and quantity. Therefore, businesses with positive, frequent, and large quantities of reviews will appear at the top of the list. 

SEO practices are ever-evolving, but one thing that will never lose its effectiveness is customer reviews. Businesses should prioritize review generation in order to maintain their online presence and customer reach.

The History of Online Reviews

Prior to online reviews, people relied on recommendations from loved ones and thorough research before making a purchase or choosing a healthcare provider. The research phase back then could take weeks or even months, and therefore the sales funnel was much longer. Thankfully, the internet has since been invented and allows people to view reviews and data from hundreds of credible sources in a matter of seconds.

However, this didn’t just happen overnight. So let’s look at the history of online reviews and how they came to look the way they currently do.

The First Online Reviews

The first reviews to appear on the world wide web were published in 1999 on sites like eBay, Epinions, RateItAll, and Deja. These websites generated over 1 million reviews but was later outshined by Yellow Pages in 2001. Yellow Pages and City Search acted as directories where businesses could list their company and collect customer reviews. 

Because of the success of these online directories, more review sites started forming and catering to different types of businesses. Now there are countless online review platforms, the most popular include:

Google

Google is the largest, most robust search engine on the internet, which is why it was only fitting that they also collect business reviews. Businesses can claim a free Google listing by creating a Google My Business account and start collecting customer reviews the same day. Google then uses these reviews to improve your local SEO, or search engine optimization. So the more reviews you have, the higher up on the results page you appear for relevant searches.

Yelp

Yelp was created in 2004 with the intention of establishing a platform where healthcare providers can collect patient reviews. The inspiration struck when one of the founders fell ill and couldn’t find any reviews for local doctors or physicians. The concept of leaving anonymous reviews made Yelp extremely popular and by 2009 they had collected over 4.5 million reviews!

Facebook

By 2007 Facebook was booming and many businesses were creating platforms to become a part of its rise. This led the website to create a new feature that allowed companies to create their own “Page”. On these pages, businesses could collect reviews from their customers, outline their information, and create informative posts.

Medical Review Sites

Medical review sites, such as Healthgrades and Vitals, are tailored to businesses that fall within the healthcare industry. Although Yelp was originally created for this purpose, dozens of review sites have since been established so patients can leave reviews for:

• Hospitals
• Doctors
• Nurses
• Clinics
• Caretakers

Why Online Reviews are Important for Businesses

Nowadays, consumers don’t make a purchase decision or choose a healthcare provider without performing thorough research, and reviews are a major part in this phase. Without regular, positive reviews, prospective customers are likely to overlook your business for another that makes their online reputation a priority. 

Here are some online review statistics that you need to know:

• 72% of people say online reviews help them establish trust in a business
• 92% of people say they will patron a business if they have at least a four star rating
• 73% of customers place more value on the written review, rather than the star rating
• To out-do your competitors, you need to respond to at least 30% of your reviews
• 54% of consumers visit a local business’ website after reading a positive review
• A 2020 survey showed 77% of people use online reviews as the first step in finding a new physician 
• 84% of patients regularly consult review sites to view or post comments and ratings of healthcare staff 
• 86% of people would pay more for services from a company with higher ratings and reviews
• A one-star rating hike on Yelp can mean a 5% to 9% rise in restaurant revenue

How to Get More Online Reviews

Now that you understand the importance of online reviews, let’s discuss the different ways you can collect them:

Register your business on online directories

First and foremost, you need to list your business on all major directories, including Google and Facebook. Then you should look into review sites that are tailored to your specific industry. For example, if you own a healthcare clinic, you would want to be listed on Healthgrades, Vitals, and ZocDoc. Once you are listed, you can begin directing your clients to your listing to leave a review.

Ask for reviews

Don’t be afraid to ask your clients to leave you a review on the review sites that matter most to you. Some businesses even offer incentives or gift cards to clients that prove that they left a review. Consider launching an email campaign, putting up signage, or even reaching out to customers directly to generate more online reviews.

Reply to reviews

Getting reviews is only the beginning to establishing an online reputation, you must also reply to reviews. Start by responding to negative reviews, as they can significantly harm your reputation and cost you potential customers. However, you should also respond to positive reviews to show customers that you appreciate their loyalty.

Feature reviews

Consider featuring your best reviews on your social media, website, and in marketing campaigns! Studies have shown time and time again that consumers prefer user-generated content over traditional promotions, so give the people what they want!

Stay active online

Make sure you stay active online, whether that is through posting on social media or continuously updating your website. It is not enough to convert a customer, you have to make sure to consistently engage your clientele to maintain their loyalty. Otherwise, you may risk losing them to a competitor that nurtures their relationships.

Online reviews are here to stay, which means all modern businesses need to prioritize generating customer reviews in order to establish credibility. Consider purchasing review generation software to capture reviews on the sites that matter most to your business! Interested in ReviewIQ? Learn more about our review generation and monitoring here

Why You Need a Microsite

Microsites are often overlooked as marketing tools, when in fact, they hold a lot of value for companies looking to improve their online presence and client engagement. For those that don’t know, a microsite is essentially a smaller website or landing page that is dedicated to specific content. Many companies use microsites to separate their different locations or showcase a specific product. This can be great for product launches, marketing campaigns, or maintaining information in a confined location.

So why use a microsite and not just add a page to your existing website? Well, microsites have many benefits, including:

Improved Local SEO

Since a microsite is separate from your main website, it gets its own unique URL. With a concise, searchable URL, it becomes that much easier for prospective customers to find your specific product or company. This is a huge advantage when it comes to SEO, especially when you fill your microsite with keyword-rich content. 

Expert Reputation offers ReviewIQ users with a complimentary microsite that features all of their 5 star patient reviews from their monitored sites. With just a few clicks they can customize their microsite with their company:

• Banner photo
• Hours of operation
• Contact information
• Social media links

This aids the prospective patient’s purchasing decision and boosts the user’s local SEO. What is local SEO? Local SEO is how a business ranks on search engines for local searches. For example, if someone located in San Diego searches “dentist near me” Google would only populate dentists in their local area. Therefore, by adding content that mentions the business location, the microsite will improve your local SEO!

More Focused Content

Microsites feature specific content so users focus only on what the business wants them to. Whereas websites are more complicated and can bombard users with too much information, making it difficult for business owners and marketers to direct users’ attention to something specific. With Expert Reputation’s microsite, you can highlight your best reviews to capture the interest of prospective patients.

Cost Efficient

Microsites are cost efficient and do not take much to maintain, especially when compared to traditional websites. Microsites are typically only one page and contain concise content that doesn’t require much updating. They also are more often than not only run by one program.

Quick Development

Microsites are extremely easy to develop and sometimes can even be launched within a day! Unlike traditional websites, microsites are typically one-pagers and feature specific content. Expert Reputation allows you to customize and launch your website in just a few clicks!

To summarize, microsites are great tools for companies and practices looking to direct prospective customers to specific content. This can improve their SEO, engagement, and marketing effectiveness.

SEO Web Design Tricks to Help You Rank on Google

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a continual process that modern businesses need to prioritize in order to remain relevant on popular search engines. Why is this important? Well, because prospective clients start their research on search engines, like Google. It is there that they are exposed to businesses, but only if they appear on the first page. That is why you need to optimize your site to ensure you appear high on the results page.

Here are five web design tricks to help your site rank high on Google:

Create Relevant Content

The number one organic traffic driver is quality content. What is quality content? Well it can be an article or video saturated with relevant keywords that is crafted carefully for your target user. Content that matches your target audience’s intent, is written well, and is optimized, gives your site authority and relevance for online searches. This means that your content appears high on the results page for specific keywords and phrases.

To start creating quality content, curate a list of keywords and phrases relevant to your business, products, and services. For example, if you are a dentist you can make a list of different dental procedures, illnesses, and common questions your patients have. However, it is important to keep in mind that one piece of content will only likely rank for one keyword or phrase, unless the phrases are extremely similar. Therefore, you should center each piece of content around a specific keyword.

Once you have curated a list of keywords, try to place them in as many places as possible, including:

• URL
• Article title
• Article subtitle
• Image titles
• Headings/subheadings

Try to repeat the keyword or phrase as many times as you can throughout the article until it becomes too redundant. The more your keyword is mentioned throughout the article, the more authority it gains on search engines.

Update Content Regularly

Once you create a piece of quality content, it can sit on your site for a little while until it gains traction. However, you don’t want the information to become outdated or else your site loses relevance. Therefore, you should create a strict schedule where you review your content and make necessary updates. Updates can either entail ensuring the data is still accurate or even adding another section detailing newer information. 

You should also consider using the pillar/supporting article scheme when filling out your blog. This strategy entails writing a long-form article as the pillar and shorter articles that cover surrounding topics. For example, a doctor can write a pillar article covering why patients should visit their primary care physician and how often. Then they could write multiple supporting articles, each covering common procedures. This pyramid-like scheme increases the authority of the original pillar article.

Prioritize Metadata

Metadata is often overlooked simply because it is short-form information. Metadata is concise data inserted on the backend of a website that describes a piece of content, such as the title, headings, image description, etc. Let’s go over the three main types of metadata:

Title Metadata

Title metadata determines page titles at the top of the browser and the headline that appears in search engines. Because of this reason alone, title metadata is the most important metadata on a website.

Description Metadata

Description metadata is exactly what it sounds like, it is the text that describes what is on a webpage. This description often appears under the title data on the search engine results page, but not always. It needs to accurately describe the page while also enticing users to click the webpage in just two sentences.

Keyword Metadata

Keyword metadata falls at the end of the list when prioritizing SEO, only because it is rarely used for determining your search engine rankings. However, at this point you should have already curated a list of keywords, so it doesn’t hurt to add them to your site. Make sure to add a variety of keywords, keeping around 3-7 phrases each containing 1-4 keywords.

Back-link

In order to have a link-worthy site, you need other authoritative sites linking to your content. This will come naturally as you continue to create quality content and create a user-friendly site. As your search engine ranking improves, other sites will want to reference you, which in return will skyrocket your SEO!

So where do you start? Well, start by adding relevant links throughout your content. Make sure not to hyperlink the text “click here” as this is overused and not valued anymore by search engines. Instead, hyperlink keywords that add value to your article and accurately describe the destination URL.

Use Alt-Tags

Lastly, if you are showcasing an image or video, be sure to include plenty of alt-tags, also known as alternative text descriptions. This enables search engines to accurately rank your page even on text-only browsers. 

SEO best practices are always changing, which is exactly why you must actively monitor your site and determine where you can improve it, both for the user-experience and ranking.

10 Reasons Your Business Needs an Optimized Website

Search engine optimization, or SEO, is often the number one way that businesses reach their key users. It is also the most cost-effective traffic generator. Why? Because it attracts organic traffic through users that are actively searching for your product or service. This means that they are already in the funnel and looking to convert. 

So how does one go about SEO? Well, arguably the most important thing is to have a custom website, design with the latest SEO practices so search engines recognize you as a credible source when generating the results page. Without this, you risk falling behind competitors that have taken the time to carefully craft their website and content. And let’s face it, no one looks past the first page of Google. 

Here are 10 reasons your practice needs an optimized website:

1. Organic Search is Your Primary Traffic Source

Organic search and traffic makes up a major part of businesses’ online engagement and conversions. These users have already reached a critical part of the sales funnel, the research phase. In this phase, you know that they are in the market for your particular product or service and are weighing their options. And where do most online users conduct their research? Search engines. 

Digital marketers understand that Google holds the vast majority of online users compared to its competitors, Bing, Yahoo, and others. Occupying over 92% of online searches, online businesses need to focus on their Google ranking in order to get in front of prospective clients.

2. SEO Builds Trust and Credibility

Your searchability on major search engines directly correlates to your trust and credibility. If users can’t find your practice in a quick Google search, you lose major points right away. The goal of SEO is not only to create an amazing website that represents your brand, but also to improve the user experience by making your site easy to reach and navigate.

Now let’s say users are able to find you online relatively easily but your website is outdated. Again, you can immediately lose their trust just by having a slow loading time, outdated graphics, and other antiquated site elements. By keeping your website current, you establish what is known as authority in search engines, ranking you higher and getting you noticed by more searchers. Over time, your brand awareness increases and you begin establishing trust with your audience.

3. SEO Gives You a Better Understanding of Your Audience

By understanding how people are searching for and reaching your website, you gain a better understanding of your audience’s mindset. Fine tuning your SEO practices enables you to sense macro shifts in your market so you can stay ahead of the competition.

4. SEO Relies on the User Experience

Every business wants the best organic ranking. What most businesses do not realize is that your rank is directly impacted by the users’ impression, which then affects their experience. When Google scrapes websites relevant to the user’s search, it is able to use complex algorithms to determine sites’ user-friendliness in a matter of seconds. User-friendliness depends on how easy your site is to navigate, your site’s load time, relevant content and other key factors.

Based on these factors, search engines will determine if your site is page-one worthy and rank you accordingly. So you want to show that your site is relevant and provides the best user experience.

5. Local SEO Increases Traffic, Engagement, and Conversions

Mobile traffic has been dominating online searches over the past couple of years, making local SEO crucial for all businesses. In fact, local SEO focuses on a certain vicinities, such as:

• Neighborhoods
• Towns
• Cities
• Regions
• States

Local SEO narrows down users’ search results to a specific area to quicken the sales funnel and aid their purchase decision. And you know what that means – higher engagement and conversion rates! So you want to make sure you’re on that results page. Local SEO is heavily based on your online listings, reviews, and local citations. Therefore, you should focus on building your online presence. (If you are looking to generate more reviews and improve your online reputation, check out our review generation service here!)

6. SEO Best Practices are Always Changing

SEO tactics are always evolving, meaning your website may have been optimized at the time it was launched but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t since gone out of date. Because search engines are continuously improving their algorithms, you must also regularly check your website efficiency and make improvements to secure your place on the results page. Those that are reactive rather than proactive are quick to get left behind.

7. SEO is Cost-Effective

Yes, optimizing your website costs money, but it has a longer shelf life than paid promotions. When you craft content saturated with relevant content, it can sit on your website for as long as you’d like, unlike advertisements that run for as long as your budget permits. Consider SEO a business investment rather than a marketing cost, as it impacts your reputation as well as revenue.

8. SEO and Reputation Management Go Hand-in-Hand

Speaking of reputation, SEO and reputation management actually go hand-in-hand. Not only do your online reviews significantly impact your search engine ranking, your website optimization is responsible for your long-term brand equity. A high Google ranking elevates your practice’s reputation among competitors and in the minds of prospective patients.

9. SEO is Quantifiable

Although SEO doesn’t provide immediate ROI like paid media, its results are quantifiable. With proper tracking mechanisms and analytics you can see who clicked your site and how they navigated through it. You can then use this information to make necessary adjustments to your website to improve the overall user experience.

10. If Your Not on Page One, You’re Not Being Noticed 

Especially with Google’s new zero-click answer feature that displays text from the top result, if you aren’t ranking on the first page – you aren’t getting noticed. In fact, if you aren’t displayed at the top half of the first page you may not be getting noticed. This new Google feature often eliminates the need to even scroll past the first half of the page to pinpoint the match to the user’s search. This makes it very difficult for practices that fall past the top three ranks.

While there are many more benefits to optimizing your website, these 10 reasons showcase exactly why your practice needs to prioritize building an SEO-friendly website. By focusing on SEO, you stay relevant in your specific industry and specialty, increase your client reach, and generate long-term brand equity.

Tips to Jumpstart Your Reputation Management

As your business grows in size, the more people will talk about your brand and everything that comes with it. And while publicity is great, it is important to manage and regulate the conversation regarding your company to ensure your reputation stays intact.

Let’s first go over the basics:

What is reputation management?

Reputation management involves monitoring sites to maintain your brand’s image and how clients, or prospective clients, perceive you. This can include the conversation revolving around your business, products, or services, reviews, articles written about your company, and any other attention your brand may get.

Why is reputation management important?

What is the first thing you do before purchasing a product or even going out to eat? Probably look at their online reviews, right? This is exactly why reputation management is so important, especially for healthcare providers. People are putting their lives in your hands, so they want to vet you and make sure they are getting the best possible care. 

A study found that 85% of customers conduct online research before making a purchase decision. Another study found that a brand risks losing 22% of their clientele if just one negative article populates when they search your brand. With successful reputation management you can optimize your online presence and expand your reach. 

How do you manage your reputation?

Given that the majority, if not all, customer research happens online, you need a way to effectively monitor relevant sites to manage your online presence. You can do this by using a software that monitors review sites and alerts you when your brand is mentioned, this way you can join the conversation immediately.

Expert Reputation’s Listings Manager monitors the primary healthcare review sites, making it simple to ensure all of your online listings have the most accurate information. Paired with our ReviewIQ software, that automates review link invites, you can improve your SEO in no time!

How to Kick Off Your Reputation Management

Now that we’ve covered the basics, let’s go over 7 ways you can jumpstart your reputation management strategy:

1. Monitor your most important online platforms

First and foremost, you must identify which online platforms matter the most to you. Are they forums or review sites? Whichever it may be, you need to establish a monitoring system so you remain in the know of how your brand is being talked about.

2. Respond to negative reviews

Unfortunately, people are more likely to leave a review when they have a bad experience. Rather than ignore these negative reviews, it is essential that you respond immediately to mitigate any further repercussions. By ignoring the reviews you risk losing a customer and prospective customers that are in the research phase. 

3. Ask for reviews

Prospective customers want to see that you have a healthy amount of recent reviews before they move to the next step. So make sure you are constantly asking your customers to leave you a review on the sites that matter most to your business. 

How do you do that? Well you can manually ask them at checkout or you can automate review link invites with software, like ReviewIQ! This eliminates the unnecessary busy work and ensures you are capturing the patient experience at the optimal time, as soon as they leave their appointment!

4. Create a blog

A major element of reputation management is search engine optimization, or SEO. SEO determines where you show up on the results page when users search key terms related to your business. This affects not only your reputation, but also your customer reach and searchability. By creating a blog saturated in relevant keywords and phrases, you can drastically improve your online ranking.

5. Cross promote content on another blog

The more content you have related to your specific set of keywords, the higher search engines, like Google, rank you. And this only increases as your site gains authority. Therefore, if you have a site with high-authority publish your blog you are likely to see a drastic boost in your site’s SEO. So consider creating a partnership with another professional site that already has a successful SEO strategy.

6. Optimize your social media accounts

We know you’ve hear it a million times, but you need to establish a presence on social media. Now this doesn’t mean you need to have an immediate following, but clients and prospective clients should be able to easily find you on all major platforms. Based on your business model, create an account on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and/or YouTube to reach your target audience.

7. Consistently engage with your audience

Once you’ve established your online presence and have reached your target audience, make sure you are actively engaging them. After all, it is much more cost effective to maintain your current clientele than it is to acquire new ones. Respond to their reviews on review sites, their comments on social media, and any other inquiries to show that you are active online. 

Reputation management and developing an SEO strategy can be tricky, and sometimes businesses require assistance. Be sure you check out our reputation management services to see how we can help!

How to View Your Facebook Profile as a Public User

If you need help seeing your Facebook profile from the public’s perspective, you’re in luck! This article will show you how to see your page as a public user in 4 simple steps.

Facebook has a nifty accessibility feature that allows you to see what your profile looks like publicly, with specific friends, and from the admin’s perspective. This is helpful when crafting your page for specific audiences. 

Here is how you can view your profile from the public’s view:

1. Visit Facebook.com or open the Facebook app and login to your account. Select your profile icon in the top right corner of your browser
2. Select the three dots under your cover photo
3. From the dropdown menu, select View As
4. Your profile is now shown to you from the public’s eye, or non-friends perspective

Why You Should View Your Profile as a Public User

Viewing your profile from the public’s perspective gives you the ability to determine what information you want to private versus what you’d allow everyone to see. It is important to remember that anyone that comes across your page can view the information that you made public. When you determine what information you want to keep private, you can change your privacy settings accordingly to keep it secure.

How to Respond to Positive Reviews

When responding to online reviews, most people think it is only necessary to address those that are negative. While they should definitely take priority, also responding to positive reviews can significantly improve how prospective patients view your business. 

In this article, we will cover the benefits of responding to positive reviews, response tips, and examples.

Why Should You Respond to Positive Reviews?

So why dedicate time to responding to positive reviews in the first place? Aren’t the positive reviews good publicity enough? Yes they are great for attracting potential customers, but by responding to them you:

• Increase your patient reach- When you respond to a review, you gain even more advertisement promotion.
• Improve the customer experience- Making your customers feel like they are heard and appreciated improves their experience and attracts more customers.
• Search engine optimization (SEO)- The more content your business has, the higher you rank on search engines, such as Google.

Tips on How to Respond to Positive Reviews

So how exactly do you respond to positive reviews? Here are five quick tips to ensure you responding appropriately:

Respond Quickly

First and foremost, make sure you are responding promptly. Customers shouldn’t have to wait weeks in order to hear back from you. Try to respond within three days in order to engage the customer in a conversation.

Make it Personal

If you are using a pre-designed template to respond to reviews, make sure you are personalizing it. Otherwise, your clients are bound to notice that it is a cut-and-paste response.

Be Polite

Always be polite. Be sure to thank the customer for leaving the review first and foremost. While this may seem like a small gesture to you, it shows them that you truly value their feedback and satisfaction.

Reference Specific Points from the Review

This goes hand-in-hand with personalizing the review, but it’s worth focusing on. When responding to reviews, be sure to reference specific points from their initial review. This not only calls to their attention that you are personally responding, but it also gives you the opportunity to showcase specific products and services. This not only promotes what you offer but also boosts your SEO.

Promote Positive Reviews

When responding to reviews, ask customers if they are comfortable with you sharing their feedback on your social media and website. While this is not necessary, it is considerate to do so before publicizing their review and account.

Response Examples

Determining how to respond to positive reviews can be challenging. So here are three response examples:

1. Respond with an Offer

What makes a happy customer even happier? A special offer! Offer the client a discount on your services or even an award, such as a gift card. This shows them that you appreciate their feedback and patronage. 

2. Respond with Further Support

If the review touches on a specific product or service, be sure to reference it and offer further support. This not only gives them more information but highlights your services for prospective customers that are reading your reviews!

3. The Default Response

If time allows, try to respond to every review. This is doable by developing a default response that allows you to easily plug in the patient’s name and specific points. 

These methods are a great place to start when responding to positive reviews. If you need guidance on how to respond to negative reviews, be sure to check out our previous blog for more tips.

15 Healthcare Marketing Strategies to Gain More Patients

With so much information available online, prospective patients have the ability to choose their healthcare provider wisely. They no longer have to physically visit a facility to determine if it is the right fit for them. That is why healthcare practices and practitioners need to have a developed marketing strategy in order to capture the attention of prospective patients.

Here are 15 tried and true healthcare marketing strategies to help you gain more patients:

1. Maintain your branding

First and foremost, you need to establish your brand. This includes your logos, color scheme, and overall aesthetic. Branding is essential to standing apart from the healthcare crowd, which tends to become repetitive with the white, sterile look. This makes it difficult for prospective patients to identify and recall a specific provider.

So, carefully craft your brand that is true to your identity but is also memorable. If you are having trouble developing your brand, start by identifying what makes you unique and go from there! You should also consider flaunting any awards you’ve won to develop a sense of trust right off the bat. 

Once you’ve found your voice and established your brand, make sure it remains consistent throughout all of your marketing efforts.

2. Evaluate the online user experience

The website is a business’s new storefront. It is often the first point of contact for most prospective customers, and if it isn’t attractive they won’t look any further. 

The initial landing page needs to draw the user in and present a story that is easy to follow. There should be clear call-to-actions, high-quality graphics, and of course, your signature branding.

When designing your website, you need to keep the user-experience in mind and map out how you would like them to navigate your site. Consider implementing the following into your site to keep users engaged:

• Appointment scheduler
• Videos
• Blogs
• Email sign-up forms
• About Us section
• Additional resources

3. Build a robust and responsive website

A responsive site automatically adjusts the format of content on your site so all users on their phone, tablets, and computers have the best experience. This ensures that users experience a seamless transition from different devices. In addition to the user-experience, a responsive website actually impacts your online ranking.

Search engines will scrape medical websites with every relevant user search and determine which sites are the most responsive. Therefore, even if your site contains good content, you will rank low if it isn’t optimized.

4. Test site loading speed

The user experience is something that every business with a website needs to prioritize as it is often the make or break of closing a sale. Studies have found that internet users are only willing to wait a maximum of five seconds for a page to load before bouncing. Not only do users seek services elsewhere, but search engines also rank the website lower.

Search engines, such as Google, can analyze thousands of websites in a matter of milliseconds based on their site content and speed. And any site that doesn’t hold relevant information or has slow loading times are automatically pushed down the ranking. If your loading times are lagging, speak to your developers about how they can increase page responsiveness.

5. Prioritize search engine optimization

SEO or search engine optimization is a term that gets thrown around quite frequently, but who understands exactly what it entails? SEO involves optimizing your content so when search engines scrape the web for relevant keywords, you are among the first to show on the results page.

Keywords can be just one word or even a phrase, such as “San Diego dentist.” However, you can’t simply repeat these words in your articles, captions, and meta descriptions. Thanks to machine learning and artificial intelligence, search engines are able to determine when these keywords occur naturally. 

In addition to creating quality content saturated with relevant keywords, websites should utilize backlinks that link to different pages within their website. Cross promoting blogs on other sites with backlinks that lead to your site creates site dominance. This means that your site looks like an expert in your field or speciality and search engines rank it accordingly!

6. Launch pay-per-click campaigns

You will notice that when you search a term or phrase in Google, for example, the first three to four spots on the results page are ads. This is because these companies are running a pay-per-click (PPC) campaign that targets those keywords.

In other words, rather than targeting a specific audience, these companies’ advertisements will appear whenever someone searches for a term that is relevant to their list of keywords. The phrase pay-per-click simply means that they are only charged when someone clicks on their ads, rather than the overall impressions the ad gets.

7. Leverage social media

Social media is a great way to establish a sense of community among your clientele. However, it should not be your only marketing tool, as it relies on organic engagement, which is only guaranteed after you’ve already established a following. 

Instead, you should use social media to post photos, give updates, and share entertaining content. You can also leverage paid social media, which allows you to run ads across platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter. This pushes your post so you can reach more prospective patients.

8. Encourage patients to leave reviews

According to the National Library of Medicine, over half of Americans reference reviews when choosing their physician. Prospective patients will scour online reviews to determine your quality of service and the worst case scenario. How is your staff? Do you have long wait times? Are your facilities clean? So on and so forth.

However, the majority of reviews lean to the opposite ends of the spectrum. This is because patients aren’t typically motivated to leave reviews unless they’ve had an extremely positive or negative experience. In other words, you miss all of the valuable reviews you could collect from everyday patients. 

You need to establish a process that invites patients to leave a review as they are leaving their appointment. This is the optimal time because there are no distractions and their experience is fresh in their minds. 

With ReviewIQ, you can automate review link invites via text and email to get in front of your patients at the right time. With one click, their review is sent to the site that matters most to you, such as Google, Facebook, Healthgrades, Vitals, and more!

9. Follow-up on patient feedback

Reviews are open to the public and there isn’t much you can actively do except respond. Feedback, on the other hand, is internal and allows you to better your business while following up with the patient.

If a patient gives you negative feedback, be sure to respond promptly asking for more details. By doing this, you can pinpoint areas of improvement and inefficient processes.

10.  Consider traditional marketing methods

While digital marketing has taken over the healthcare space, you should still consider traditional marketing methods. While you should be careful about where you spend your money, it is worth looking into running campaigns via:

• Radio
• Magazine
• Newspaper
• Television
• Billboards

These spaces are not as saturated as digital platforms and may yield tangible results.

11. Implement referrals into your marketing

Referral marketing involves a physician liaison that networks with local hospitals and providers to develop referral partnerships. This way, you do not have to depend on your staff and receptionist to reach out to doctors in addition to their normal duties. This type of organic marketing is highly effective and allows you to form long-term business relationships.

12.  Utilize word-of-mouth advertising

Your current clientele holds a lot of value when it comes to marketing as well just through word-of-mouth advertising. Ask your patient base to refer friends and family for a special discount on their next appointment! If successful, this discount is significantly outweighed by the lifetime value of the new patients.

13. Establish your authority in your speciality

You need to establish yourself as an authority in your speciality or else you risk blending in with your competition. In order to stand out to prospective patients, you need a public relations strategy that highlights what makes you different. Perhaps you’ve won some awards, have a long history in your community, or other accolades that make you more qualified than competitors.

14. Analyze your marketing strategies

You need to have something in place that tracks key performance indicators (KPIs) such as return on investment (ROI), click-through rate (CTR), and cost-per-acquisition (CPA). These KPIs will help you determine which marketing efforts are the most effective and generate the most leads.

15. Audit your employees and marketing initiatives

Last but not least, you should audit your employees and marketing initiatives to determine where you capture and lose the most opportunities. A success audit will pinpoint:

• Patient pain points
• Inefficient processes
• Areas of miscommunication 

Marketing in the healthcare industry is ever-evolving, which is precisely why you need to keep up with the current trends to ensure you are capturing prospective patients. Carefully consider each of these strategies and determine which ones best fit your practice.

Should You Use TikTok?

We are in the age of social media–particularly Tiktok. Every person and business has an account, from teenagers to professional athletes. But what about healthcare professionals? Should they take part in this trendy app or is the market already oversaturated?

Well there are people that argue both sides. On one hand, there are a lot of healthcare professionals already on TikTok, making the competition rather steep. On the other hand, many professionals have found creative ways to stand out and gain attention from prospective clients.

So, is TikTok right for you? Well, let’s look at the pros and cons:

Pros

• You can educate your viewers on your specific expertise.
• You can clear up misconceptions and misinformation regarding your specialty. 
• You become more accessible to younger generations.

Cons

• You risk breaching doctor/patient confidentiality.
• Jokes and political stances may alienate patients and produce bad publicity.

Examples of Healthcare Professionals on TikTok

There are many healthcare professionals on TikTok that have taken an unconventional approach to spreading awareness and gaining a following. Here are just a few examples:

Dr. Anthony Machi, MD (@thetelepsychiatrist)

Dr. Machi is a psychiatrist that showcases his expertise and gives mental health tips in Spanish and English. But he is known for spreading awareness through dance trends while wearing his iconic bowties!

Dr. Adam Goodcoff, DO (@seethemedlife)  

Dr. Goodcoff is an emergency medicine resident that educates his followers through informational and motivational posts. 

Dr. Shonna Gaskin, MD (@shonnamissymehd) 

Dr. Gaskin is an anesthesiology resident physician that uses TikTok to spread awareness about the journey through medical school, as well as help current medical students through their studies. Dr. Gaskin goes through everything, from studying pre med to getting accepted into medical school.

Dr. Ryan Karmouta, MD (@skinmdryan) 

Dr. Karmouta is a student studying dermatology and is dedicated to helping his followers reach their skin care goals. He covers everything from common skin ailments to how to care for different skin types. 

As you can tell, there is room on Tiktok for everyone. If you have a passion for educating people or spreading awareness and have a creative way to do so, then you should consider creating an account. Encourage your current patients to follow you and hop on the latest trends to increase your viewership!