I have talked with dozens of plastic surgeons who have spent thousands (some $10,000 or more) on their website, but are not getting new patients from it. To invest that kind of money and see no return on that investment is a sour topic for many plastic surgery doctors.
Unfortunately, many did not know what they should have on their website to attract new patients, and the firms they hired didn’t either. I’ve heard this many times. There are several critical elements your website should have to not only get more patients from it, but for it to be optimized for higher search rankings (especially in google).
With over 85% of people searching on the net having a local intent, it’s a must you have a good looking, functional plastic surgery website, that is optimized both for google, and the user who lands on your website.
I want to discuss several elements that you must have on your website to attract the highest amount of cosmetic patients.
Where’s Your Number?
The number one goal of your website is to get people to contact your office. The warmest “lead” you can get is a phone call Unfortunately on many cosmetic surgery websites I can’t find it!
It is imperative you have a big phone number that is in text format for google to find. Preferably in the upper right corner of your website on EVERY page, so people get familiar with where it’s at.
Also, have an action word in front of the number like, “Call Our Office Today“. You need to tell people the “next step”. If you don’t, they won’t do anything, which makes your current website a poor marketing vehicle for your practice.
Where Are You Located?
The second most important element on your website is your office location. People instantly want to know if you are relatively close to where they live, and that your office is in a nice location. I can tell you over 50% of cosmetic websites I evaluate do not make it easy for the visitor to find the doctors office.
When you make it hard for a web visitor to find something on your website, “they are GONE!”
People are lazy by nature. Make them work on your website and forget about it!
Instead, make sure you have a clickable map on your website, along with text directions from major landpoints, so they can quickly and easily visualize where you are. That will make their decision a bit easier, if-and-only-if you have provided the information on your website that builds trust and credibility to the point they take action.
Who’s Your Ideal Patient
You can’t be all things to everyone. You need to narrow down to your ideal patient. This patient typically has an age, sex and specific desire. When you come up with your ideal patient, all of your marketing messages both on your website and offline should connect with that demographic.
What I see all the time on cosmetic surgeons websites are stock images of beautiful women. These images are used on many of the same websites, so pretty soon all the cosmetic websites start looking the same. Not good!
In my professional opinion, this is not the way to attract new patients. People connect with people that are more like them, and these beautiful “stock images” of models is not real, and your web visitors will have a major disconnect with your practice and leave your website.
So how do you fix this dilemma?
EVERY image on your website should be of YOUR PATIENTS (with their permission of course). When your web visitors see your work done on “real people” they will have an INSTANT connection with your practice. You’re now more than half way to getting them in your office and hiring you..
Educate Your Web Visitors
The last thing I want to talk about is the words on your website. Again, I see most of the plastic surgery websites have content that talks mostly about the doctor. I call this “me marketing”. I can tell you people only care about what you can do for THEM!
The more educational content you have on your website in the form of articles, and more importantly video will catapult you above your local competitors. Answer all your potential patients questions on your website, and they will see you as THE AUTHORITY, and call you first.
Your About page is the ONLY page to toot your own horn about your education, awards and accomplishments. That page can be “all about you”, and don’t get me wrong…it’s a very important page to build credibility. Every other page on your website should be about THEM!
I hope you found this article helpful in your pursuit of new patients from the Internet.
If you are struggling to attract new patients I would love to discuss it with you.
