Your website is a renewable asset. That simply means that unlike printed marketing collateral you can make changes at will.
You might be thinking, “I thought a website was a set-it-and-forget-it marketing investment.” At one time, perhaps, but no more.
A website audit is good for a number of reasons. It helps you assess its ever-evolving purpose and functionality, and can help you rank higher, bringing in more patients. If you haven’t updated your website in years, here’s what you should know.
How Websites Have Changed
Websites, and the way they’re built and designed, have changed in two fundamental ways:
1. How search engines rank sites
Google now places a high value on consistently updated, fresh, useful content.
That means that your services & procedures pages might have long ago lost their SEO value. It doesn’t mean that current or new patients searching online for you won’t be informed when they ultimately land on your site and browse. But you need more.
2. The rise of content marketing
This is simply the consistent publishing of content (e.g. blog posts, articles, video, podcasts, etc.) via your website platform.
Again, search engines look for “authority” and useful “expertise” when they “crawl” throughout the internet in your industry niche (and your website). If search results turn up useful, relevant, well-written, thoughtful content on a particular dental service you increase your odds of achieving better ranking.
But you must be consistent, and your content must be deemed original, fresh, and useful.
Content keeps website visitors engaged and helps them connect with your practice. You’ll get more new patient leads if your content is interesting! Too many dentists simply produce content without thinking about how interesting and compelling it will be. Before you invest your time in producing content, ask yourself: why will this matter to my audience? If you don’t have a good answer, it’s probably not worth the time it will take to produce. [1]
How to Assure that Your Dental Practice Website is Found and Frequently Useful to Those Searching for Your Services
1. Simplify
Your current patients and potential new patients visit your website for a simple reason. They want information about your services to improve their oral health and appearance and/or to eliminate pain.
You have virtually seconds once they land on your site. Distracting webpage banners, an overwhelming logo, ill-timed pop-ups, an “explosion” of words (as in too “wordy”), overly technical language, and navigational challenges are among the common reasons site visitors click away.
Establish your credibility with simple, easy to understand explanations, and easy to navigate web copy and pages. Search online for practices whose site, content, language/tone, and navigation you like. Then duplicate it using your own practice DNA.
Keep your blog/article page front and center. Internal links that inform them of your most recent blog post with a compelling headline and lead will keep them on your site.
And once they scan (what everyone does online) your content make sure they find simple answers to questions about treatment, procedures, etc.
2. Clean up
Dentistry is technical. Its technical nature is what gives you credible expertise.
But when you’re creating your website copy and digital content, you should make sure it’s clean of jargon. “Industry-speak” that’s overly technical fails to connect with your patients.
Avoid high-brow explanations of dental services. Word count matters for SEO, but keep it short, easy to understand, and benefit-focused.
Dental web designer Nina Litovsky asks, “Is your content high quality, written in simple language for the average American reader? Your content should be easy to read and understand and be comprehensive enough to convey everything the patient needs to know about each procedure.” [2]
And remember to include a clear call-to-action at the end of each page: “Contact us about…,” “click here to…,” etc. Give your site visitors a clear path to follow.
3. Solve
Clarity is essential. Remember, your site visitors – current patients and potential new ones – have questions, and your website must be designed to answer them.
Heavily worded, graphically cluttered, and hyper creative websites can affect their search. Offer solutions to problems and answers to the questions they have about dental care and you’ll keep them engaged.
You surpass your competition with clear, compelling answers to questions and solutions to problems.
Evaluate your current webpage copy with the ask-and-answer-problem-solution filter. Does this page/copy/content clearly answer-and-solve the site visitor’s question and problem?
Give them more reason to trust you as a dental “authority.” Share your content via social media (Facebook, Instagram, etc.) with links back to your blog/article page or relevant site page.
And remember always give them access to how they can immediately solve their problem. Use call-to-action links on your pages.
A website is more than a website. It’s a platform that showcases your dental expertise.
For more ways to grow your dental practice, you can offer LendingUSA’s financing for dental patients.
[1] http://www.dentaltown.com/blog/post/7744/7-mistakes-to-avoid-in-your-dental-practices-website
[2] http://ninainteractive.com/articles/makes-good-dental-website/
