The website for your dermatology practice will serve as its “digital doorstep.” It’s your business’s primary online representative and will be the central platform where people research your practice. Because of its importance, your website must be at its best.
It’s not enough to have an attractive website design—your website must also be fully functional. If you’re wondering how to optimize your website’s functionality, there are ways to do so while maintaining stunning design.
Here are some key ways you can improve your dermatology website. These steps will help you create the ideal website for your practice and stand apart from competitors.
1. Focus on User Experience Design
One of the main components of a functional website is good user experience (UX) design. There are different elements to consider when optimizing your site for UX.
For example, you’ll need to ensure your website has a mobile-responsive design. If your website is responsive, it will have the same appearance and functionality across devices. People viewing your website on their computers will see and experience the same thing as mobile users. This is crucial if you want to provide users on all devices with a good UX.
Your website should also be accessible and appeal to those with specific disabilities. You can increase accessibility by adding alt text to images on your website, transcribing videos, and taking other steps to make content more accessible for everyone to digest.
Other aspects to consider in creating the ideal user experience include:
- Easy navigation
- Helpful contact pages that enable users to reach you online or over the phone
- Clear and appealing calls to action (CTAs)
- Faster page loading speeds
- Informative videos and images that only provide people with the information they need
2. Use a Patient Acquisition Platform
In addition to good UX design, your website will benefit from a patient acquisition platform. The right platform will function as a reliable healthcare marketing tool that helps convert more visitors to patients.
Patient acquisition platforms are specifically designed for dermatologists and other medical professionals. This means they’re HIPAA-compliant and provide you with the best tools for lead-to-patient conversion.
Some of the solutions you can use with a good patient acquisition platform include:
- Digital intake forms
- Online payments
- Real-time scheduling capabilities
- 24/7 managed chat
- Text reminders of appointments
An efficient platform also helps reduce various costs by automating and simplifying many tasks. It can ultimately help fuel your practice’s growth while improving your website’s functionality.
3. Optimize Before-and-After Photo Pages
Before-and-after photos are invaluable assets to include on a dermatology website. They’ll show patients what results they can get from specific skin treatments. They can also improve search engine optimization (SEO) with sufficient optimization.
The importance of before-and-after shots makes it necessary to develop and curate a full photo gallery on your website. You can do so by starting with high-quality photos. Your images should look great and reflect the quality of your services. Additionally, they must be HIPAA-compliant and maintain confidentiality. You should also host your photos on a secure website that protects them consistently.
Regarding SEO, you’ll need to optimize your photo gallery to target relevant keywords. As you brainstorm keywords for photos, try to aim for more long-tail terms such as “patient treated with topical chemotherapy” or “patient before undergoing photodynamic therapy.” Certain tools can help you identify the best keywords with a high search volume.
A great photo gallery of before-and-after shots will build more trust around your practice and help you maximize visibility in search engines.
4. Avoid WordPress
While WordPress is a popular option for hosting websites of all types, it comes with certain disadvantages that make it worth avoiding in many instances.
One of the biggest disadvantages of WordPress is its dependence on plugins. If you want to add more features to your website to improve functionality, you’ll need to continue adding plugins. Many plugins are free to use, but others will cost you. Over time, once-functioning plugins may also become obsolete and remove features from your website.
Another problem with WordPress is slow page loading speeds. As you continue to add plugins, they may weigh down your website. Extensive databases and codebases could further impact loading speeds. If your website takes too long to load, visitors are far more likely to leave it out of impatience.
Other issues you’re more likely to encounter with WordPress include:
- Increased vulnerability to spamming and hacking attempts
- Not HIPAA-compliant
- Frequent site crashes
- Lower rankings in search engines
- Frequent updates to plugins and themes
Instead of WordPress, opt for robust, HIPAA-compliant patient acquisition platform.
5. Offer Real-Time Appointment Scheduling
Many practices still require new and existing patients to call in and request appointments. However, this is an outdated method of scheduling that can benefit from automation.
Your website should provide real-time appointment scheduling that allows patients to easily and quickly schedule appointments. You can offer this through a patient acquisition platform that can also remind patients of appointments with automated text reminders. This offers more convenience and can substantially improve website functionality.
What Is the Return on Investment for Improving Your Website?
The ROI seen with an improved dermatology website will depend on the demand for treatments in your area and the competition level.
You can determine the level of competition in your area by conducting a Google search for “dermatologists near me.” You’ll see a list of local dermatology practices that can help you gauge competitiveness.
On the other hand, figuring out the demand for dermatology treatments is more complicated. One way to do this is to pull zip code information from census.gov and cross-reference it with Google keyword data. Another method is to use DoctorLogic’s free, instant local market analysis. With the help of this analysis, you’ll be able to determine how much revenue you should be making based on the local demand for procedures.