Blogging isn’t just for companies and corporations. Your medical practice can benefit from it as well, especially if you have an eye towards attracting and retaining patients. Here are just a few of the benefits that you’ll enjoy when you start blogging as an MD.
1. More Content Encourages More Web Traffic
According to studies from the Pew Research Center, 70 percent of web users have searched for health or wellness information at some time. The more content that you have for them to find, the more likely it is that they’ll stumble across your website. Don’t limit yourself to cut-and-dried information about your medical office and its services. Start a blog that covers healthy living topics such as food, fitness, medicine, nutrition and psychology.
2. SEO Helps All Websites
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a critical tool for site owners of all kinds, including medical practices. How many people will find your brand if it’s buried on page nine of Google’s results? You want your medical practice to be the first thing that people see when they search for “how to treat a burn” or “common symptoms of the flu.” Even if they don’t live in your area and can’t become your patient, their visitation helps you in terms of clicks.
3. You’ll Make More Money
Speaking of clicks, they’re one of the ways that you can start or increase the profits of your medical blog. Popular, successful sites have a certain number of unique visitors each month, and these statistics will matter in money-making ventures such as affiliate linking. They’ll also result in more people seeing your ads, getting information on your services and sharing it with friends. All things considered, a blog can be a great way to boost your revenue.
4. It Sets the Tone of Your Business
Your blog gives you the opportunity to make an impression on your patients before you even meet them. If you want them to have the utmost trust in your services, you can use professional, authoritative language that leaves no doubt concerning your expertise. If you want them to think of you as a friendly neighborhood doctor, you can adopt a casual, conversational tone that won’t intimidate them or scare them away. You control your first impression, and a blog can help you get off on the right foot.
5. More Opportunities for Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing is essential for the modern business. It doesn’t matter if you’re a neurologist or an acupuncturist; most of today’s online advertising is done through sites like Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest, so it’s important that you hop on the bandwagon. Blog content is much easier to promote on these platforms than an entire medical website. As a matter of fact, “Is Your Child At Risk For Asthma?” is the kind of thing that users expect to see on social media.
6. You Can Take Advantage of Supply and Demand
According to more digging done by the Pew Research Center, only two percent of people who seek out web-based medical advice are willing to pay for it. This means that all of those doctors putting out paid e-books are reaping only two percent of potential patients. You can scoop up the other 98 percent if you’re willing to provide free, easy-to-access content that gives web users what they want. Remember, you’ll be benefiting from it too.
7. A Healthier Lifestyle for Your Patients
How many times have you warned your patients about the dangers of smoking? How many lectures have you delivered about proper diet and exercise? You can only do so much with twice-a-year visits, but a blog that updates every day might have more success. If you post consistently useful information about healthy living, your patients are more likely to absorb the knowledge and maybe even act on it. This will increase their overall health and make your future job a lot easier.
8. More Promotional Opportunities for Your Services
With a blog, you can advertise every single service that you offer as a medical practice. Just create a blog post centered around it. For example, if it’s a little-known fact among your patients that you treat eczema, you can write a blog post about recognizing the symptoms of eczema and include your clinic’s phone number at the end. This kind of content will gain much more traction than a simple list of your services on your main website, so take advantage of the possibilities that they present.
These are just a few of the perks when you start blogging as part of your medical practice marketing. Whether you’re hoping to increase your patient number or just improve the loyalty of the ones that you already have, blogging can be a big help to your brand.
Starting a blog is a great way of acquiring and retaining patients but as with any other online channel it needs consistency and you should continuously assign the right amount of time and resources. If you are very busy or one of those MDs that are not very interested in getting involved with blogging, you can ask the help of professional companies such as Solution21 who offer various medical marketing services including blogging.