Why is Your Website Turning Away New Patients?

When a potential patient visits your website for the first time, what will they see? How quickly will they see it? And, will it be the information they need, or will their valuable time be lost scrolling and searching? Your answers to these questions will likely determine whether you are about to gain a new patient, or if your website visitor will soon be contacting your competitor.

Don’t deter prospective patients with a bad website. Remember – bad websites are just bad customer service. Instead, have the right combination of factors in place to better serve possible new patients who visit you online. Your website, after all, is the face of your practice.

DOES YOUR PRACTICE HAVE A BAD WEBSITE?

IS IT MOBILE?

Your healthcare website should be smartphone compatible. Don’t require mobile site visitors to pinch their fingers together and zoom in to read your content. Actually, that won’t happen. They will hit the back button and then move on to the next physician from their Google search results.

Your mobile site is just as important as your desktop one, so have it ready for users to find what they need quickly, and with no hassle.

IS YOUR INFORMATION IS FRONT AND CENTER?

Visitors to your site are after one thing: information. If it’s not upfront and easy to find via their mobile or desktop, you aren’t helping them. Your main focus for your home page should be to give quick access to the following details:

• Contact information (especially a phone number)
• Appointment scheduling
• Location
• Hours
• Patient portal/bill payment

Secondary information like staff information, a list of services, records, blogs and articles, FAQs, and even parking information should also be fairly easy to attain as a complementary way to build trust early on.

Please note that while the latest in medical news can be helpful, someone new to your site is ultimately there for a specific purpose, and not to know the latest ways to help prevent the spread of COVID-19. Most people are being inundated with this information in the media already. It IS possible that a visitor is looking for information on symptoms, so in this case and in any other pertinent current news (like flu vaccine availability), try placing a banner for such at the top of your page that stands out aesthetically and garners attention. This can be a link to further details or just at-a-glance information.

IS IT UNAPPEALING TO THE EYE?

A jumble of content on your home page will make it appear too busy, resulting in overwhelming confusion for site visitors. Instead, strive for easy simplicity. A restrained layout is important for visitors to efficiently find information. First-time visitors to your website will statistically take around 15 seconds to look for what they need. A clean design and complementing color scheme with few extras will soothe your visitor and create a feeling of trust for your first impression.

IS IT BROKEN?

Finding the right information that’s needed to contact a business or schedule an appointment, only to discover the necessary link is broken or the page is missing, is truly frustrating to users. And sometimes what appears to be a link, is not even a link at all.

In keeping with the rule of simple aesthetics, refrain from overloading your site with the appearance of links and buttons. Be sure your links are clearly links, and that they’re all working properly and serve a purpose. Know that your pages current and updated. Regularly scheduled upkeep for your website will maintain its quality assurance, and you will be confident that everything works properly for users.

Today’s healthcare customer service looks truly begins online.

You have a unique opportunity as a healthcare provider to generate patient trust before contact by giving yourself credibility with the best user experience possible on your website. With ease of use and good maintenance, you can establish new patients even before their very first visits to your office.