Why Content Marketing Matters for Healthcare Facilities
For most patients, choosing a healthcare facility isn’t just about finding a convenient location that’s in-network. It’s about finding a long-term provider that’s reputable, agreeable, and trustworthy. While there are specific marketing practices that can make a healthcare facility appear as any one of the three, there’s only one that will help you effectively and concurrently promote yours as all three: content marketing.
Establishing Trust
Content marketing can get patients to start putting trust in your facility before they even visit it. But just having content isn’t enough for your healthcare center to become a trusted authority figure. That’s why you need to leverage creativity and value in your content marketing approach. After all, if users aren’t impressed by the quality and presentation of information on your facility’s digital blog page, they won’t have reason to suspect anything impressive from an actual visit to your location.
By using your content to answer common, timely medical questions, you encourage patients to ask their uncommon ones as well. Publishing a series of infographics that neatly break down the top symptoms of the flu, for example, can restore peace of mind in healthy patients — making your healthcare center appear more reputable and authoritative. But this approach can also benefit your location by encouraging those with troubling symptoms to schedule an appointment and personally consult your clinical staff.
Other types of content your healthcare facility could share include:
- Blog posts
- Videos
- Podcasts
- eBooks
- Checklists
- User-generated content
Building Rankings
Every patient has a healthcare provider that they count on for virtually all of their medical needs, and there are a few things that influence their decision to continue coming back — proximity, previous experience, and third-party compatibility. Once they find a facility they like and trust, however, it’s harder to convince them to try a new one. So how can you get your facility in front of those that haven’t yet found the right provider?
By enriching your content with location-based keywords, you can boost your appearance in local search results. For example, your optimized blog titled “The Best Time to Get a Flu Shot in Central Florida” can help your facility’s website rank higher when local patients search for terms like “flu shot in Central Florida.” In general, optimizing your content for local searches can help your facility appear more frequently and in more prominent search engine positions.
Showing Personality
Patients are looking for a facility that’s trustworthy, but they’re also looking for a facility that’s personable. That’s why more and more healthcare centers are applying a friendlier approach to content marketing and digital marketing in general. Sharing a relevant quote from one of your physicians along with a picture of their smiling face inside a blog post, for example, will make your healthcare center appear agreeable and approachable — all while maintaining your reputability.
Furthermore, sharing user-generated content from patients that have a positive relationship with your facility makes your facility easier to connect with. So, when patients spread the word about your facility, show them that you see and value their content by repurposing it for your own. For example, if a patient leaves a positive review, share it in an optimized web page. Or, if a patient attends a community event and snaps a photo at your healthcare center’s table, share it in your next newsletter.
Your Healthcare Marketing Agency
From small clinics to commercial hospitals, every healthcare facility can benefit from content marketing. That’s why the team at Think Integrated combines years of medical marketing knowledge with ever-growing digital marketing expertise to create optimized, personalized, and relevant content for our partners in the healthcare industry. To get started on a content marketing strategy that best fits your facility, contact us today.