A professional website and online presence are essential for any dental practice, small or large. A good website does the following things:
- makes you look more like a credible business
- helps develop your brand
- answers questions and solve problems your customers have
- enables potential customers to learn about you
- gives you control over your online persona, enabling you to put your best foot forward.
However, creating a new website is not an easy task. With so much pressure from other local practices, it is important to give careful consideration. For those who design their website, the following are the key elements that should be on any dental website.
Good design
Great design is the first thing to consider. The ease by which your website visitors can move through your website is of particular importance. Designers (and some businesses) often get bogged down in colors, fonts and flashy graphics that might disrupt the flow of your website.
What is more critical is the layout, which must be both user-friendly and intuitive. A good browsing experience helps your users find what they’re searching for, so when designing your website, you should make it easy for them to navigate their way around.
A definitive call to action
Call to Action (CTA) is a picture or text that invites website visitors to take specific actions. CTAs take your visitors on a journey towards improving their dental health. Your call to action may be to request a call-back, schedule a consultation, or download a free PDF. People like to be led to helpful ideas and tools that will get them closer to solving their problems.
The basics of SEO in place
Optimizing your website pages so that they more easily appear in search engines is a must. For millions of websites now vying for a spot on the 1st page of search results, you will need to follow a few best practices for search engine optimization (SEO) to be found.
The first step is to find out which keywords visitors are using to find your site–the more specific and regional the better for locally based dentists such as yours. Use these keywords naturally all over your website for maximum effect. Learn even more about SEO as it relates to dental website design with our SEO guidebook.
Great content
For many companies, your website is the first impression you give to potential dental clients. You want to offer them what they’re searching for, and if you continuously do so, they may keep coming back.
Search engines love unique, fresh, regularly updated content. By continuing to update your blog, you will ensure your website has the best chance of ranking highly on search engine results pages.
Social media links
One of the easiest ways to show the human side of your business is to incorporate social media into your website. You could add social media feeds to your homepage or simply provide logos linking visitors to your social media profiles. By including interesting, relatable copy and regular photos from social media, you can help reinforce your brand identity, as well as trust in your practice.
You can also show positive reviews from your consumers on your website or on your website. These show others that you have a long line of happy customers that are willing to vouch for you.
Mobile Responsiveness
Having a website that is mobile-responsive is very important for any successful small business today. Most website visits are now conducted on a mobile device, as opposed to a desktop computer. This means your website needs to look good and be easy to use on smartphone or tablet-size screens, as well as desktops.
Your website is meant to act as a discreet sales representative. Walk your website guests through marketing funnel and turn them into satisfied dental patients. Provide them with the knowledge, human interest stories and expert advice that they need to become your dental patient. Running a dental practice is hard, but if you stick to these tips for your website, you will have a great foundation for all your subsequent digital marketing efforts.
Dr. Websites
Do you need a website and don’t know where to start? Leave it to us here at Dr. Websites. We take care of all of your digital marketing needs so you can just focus on delivering the best dental care in your area. Contact us today for a consultation.