The Client:
A Bay Area
neurosurgical group with multiple offices.
The Situation:
This
established practice needed a web presence
that would encourage new patients to visit.
Silicon Strategies Role: Marketing
message and original web content creation.
The Research: The doctor/patient
relationship is based on trust and faith in
the doctor. This is doubly so for
surgeons who work on the neck and spine.
When establishing a plan for their web
site, Silicon Strategies Marketing drafted a
"creative direction" document that guided
all content development, key messages,
and imagery. The emotional feeling
people had when they visited the web site
was one of absolute trust, and being better
informed than before.
During our research, recurring themes
emerged concerning what people wanted to
believe about a neurosurgeon. These traits
included professionalism, optimism, and
stability. Customer response would be
greater for a site that omitted freighting
images associated with neurosurgery such as
CAT and MRI scans, surgical room scenes, and
any expression of pain.
The Strategy: Matching the web
site to existing marketing materials was
dictated as imperative. Aside from that,
answering the top-10 typical questions a
patient might have was important.
Over-promoting the fact that this practice
had several offices also sold the concept of
success, which helped to reduce patient
anxiety. The web site also allowed for
patients to request appointments online.
From the beginning, search engine
optimizations (SEO) were used to correlate
several items that made the practice
relevant to patients: location,
symptoms, and procedures. Research
indicated that these elements were most
likely to be used in web search (for
example, "back pain doctor Fremont
California" was a very likely search
phrase).
The Results: The site offered a
large collection of articles concerning
neurosurgery, written in
simple-to-understand language. This allowed
patients using search
engines to:
-
Find this web site while researching
their conditions (using medical keywords
to drive traffic)
-
Learn about the condition
-
Learn about treatment options
-
Gain confidence in this practice based on
the surgeons'
demonstrated knowledge and empathy for patients
The strategy produced consistent "above
the fold" search results on tested keywords
and phrases. Web analytics showed
searches were the primary source of new web
traffic. Internal measurements show
that on average 20 to 30 new patients are
gained every month from web site
visits, and that more than half of
their patients make the visitation decision
based on the site itself.
The Lesson: Knowing the negative
motivators is just as important as knowing
the positive motivators. Many medical web
sites use horrific images of X-rays,
surgery, and injuries to illustrate their
services. Patients want to be comforted and
assured, not frightened.
The other lesson is that search engine
optimization begins with the customer.
Research needs to be performed to understand
the way customers think about the services
they want, and how their limited vocabulary
might affect a search. A web site must
be designed with their perspective as the
driver.
Contact Silicon
Strategies Marketing for a telephone
consultation on finding growth market
opportunities. |
