DIGITAL MARKETING FOR DOCTORS
By: Panigrahi Arpita
Tags: Digital Doctor, Doctor Digital Marketing, Digital Transformation, Doctors

No matter what business you are in, digital marketing has become indispensable for standing out from the competitors in your field. In this era of Smartphones, digital channels are now predominant for communication and marketing as opposed to just being an alternative option.

The role of Digital marketing plays for Doctors is to help your practice get found, get noticed, get leads and then turn those leads into new patients.

A recent study reveals that almost half of the internet users search online for symptoms of their ailments and medical conditions even before visiting the doctors or hospitals. They browse for internet and hospital websites to find the suitable healthcare facilities before booking an appointment.

Reach of Digital marketing for Doctors and Medical Professionals

These trends reflect the fact that the digital marketing channels are now overtaking the traditional marketing channels. This change in consumer behavior and proliferation of multiple digital channels present an unprecedented opportunity for doctors and medical professionals to reach and to retain a much wider section of patients.

Internet presence of healthcare facilities

The key challenge that doctors and clinical practices today face is gaining visibility under tough competition.

The healthcare industry is continually pursuing the next technological advancement. Whether it’s a new, improved treatment, a groundbreaking facility or the expansion of physician specialties, healthcare organizations are always working to provide a higher level of care for patients. Now a days almost everyone prefers to research before visiting a doctor. Unlike any other industry, healthcare serves a broad audience. And today’s consumers are becoming more dependent on apps and websites. In fact, patients are relying on websites at an increasing rate to make healthcare decisions.

Benefits of Digital Marketing in Medical profession

Digital marketing brings several benefits to doctors and medical professionals. It advertises their services to a wider range of public and helps in better managing their brand image, attracting new customers to their business. Digital marketing also enables the doctor’s clinics to access a host of new tools and techniques to serve the patients and healthcare seekers in a professional and more efficient manner.

Similar to word of mouth marketing, people tend to share recommendations for good hospitals and doctors.

Traditional marketing techniques do not tend to be as effective as digital marketing today. That is why digital marketing is being used by areas like the food sector, travel industry, IT industry as well as the healthcare industry. The main reason for this progress is digitization.

Let’s have a look at the relationship between the healthcare industry and what digital marketing has to offer.

Digital Marketing can bring value to a clinical practice by increasing Patient base, reputation and brand building, streamline the appointments and reducing the patient waiting time. Overall relationship building.

Businesses that use social media marketing along with social media marketing get significant over others in the competition.

Business to rank better in Google and other search engine results which leads to better visits. Better ranking means better visibility to anyone searching direct or indirect similar search results leading to more visits to your page.

So, a digital marketing effort to take care of the online presence and other options is a great way to satisfy that requirement.

In the last few years, digital marketing has taken a huge leap forward over the traditional marketing approaches. Healthcare sectors like biotech, medical, diagnostics, and pharmaceutical devices, etc. are benefiting because of mobile apps, social media, and digital sales.

To target the consumer, digital ads are being used more than traditional marketing methods. Digital marketing sectors like social media presence, mobile apps are contributing actively to shifting the focus of digital marketing professionals and channels.

Around 19% of people surveyed had health and fitness apps on their smartphones.

Awareness of Digital marketing

People don’t just blindly follow doctors and are becoming more and more aware. There is a rise in the awareness levels in people who are becoming increasingly health-conscious. Digital marketing is helping by pushing and advertising products and services across several platforms. Apps, website, blogs and even social media are equally using digital marketing. There is a wave of digital marketing covering every sector with the increasing developments in the IT sector.

They need to optimize their websites keeping in view both the aesthetics and the ease of use, while making it SEO friendly. The doctors can now get tremendous exposure and reach millions of people through social media and strategic SEO techniques in comparison to the traditional; advertising methods.

Conclusion

However, digital marketing need not necessarily be complicated. You can even outsource the entre process to professional marketers, if you do not want to be bothered by any of its hassles. Your prime goal is to build a strong online presence so that the website of your hospital or clinical practice pops up whenever prospective patients search online concerning their medical problems.

In case, I missed out any then please feel free to add in and post your comments which will definitely motivate me to write more.

Thanks

Arpita